We get asked many times what are some of the main trends in the wealth management market, in particular those that disrupt the advisor business. While we can come up with a number of them, here are some of the major ones to consider:

1. Digitization: Firms need to manage physical and digital channels and integration of disparate channels
2. Increased investment in advisor tools to increase operational efficiency: Improvement of wealth management platforms and advisor dashboards, collaboration tools, as well as self-directed tools for investors
3. Simplicity is key to maintaining customer relationships: user experience, content in everyday tools used by advisors, etc.
4. Integration – What does it mean for advisors to have an integrated experience? What are firms doing today to address this?
5. Customer segmentation – different strategies employed to retain/cross-sell/up-sell the various customer segments.
6. Challenges encompassing technology adoption These trends are seen across the board in the wealth management industry, although each firm has a different perspective and is engaging them at a different level, in particular because the pain points will be distinct depending on the type of firm and the customer segments targeted. Celent is currently doing a study to identify the differences in these main themes across multiple wealth management firms. If you are a firm with an advisor business and is interested in participating, here is the link: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/SFS8W8J Data will be used on an aggregate basis. Participating firms will receive a copy of the study when completed.