As financial advisors we have a lot of expectations from our clients. Some of these expectations are those expected as a professional and also those basic expectations as a person. Meeting this expectations is a crucial ingredient for success as an advisor. The advisor has to align his entire business practice to match the client expectations. While there may be countless expectations from clients, there are those which hold the basic fabric of the the relationship. In this piece, we will talk about some of these expectations ...

The basic expectations

• Respecting time: No longer can we continue with a 'chalta hai' attitude to our clients. This is one big thing which differentiates us As the markets become more competitive and professional and times more hectic & busy, respecting time of the clients is now a basic expectation. Advisors should make it a habit of arriving, meeting, calling, etc. on time with clients.
• Keeping records: Imagine already taking a decision with client and then forgetting it! It is something to be seen as a professional sin! Better we keep a proper record of all our meetings, tasks and all the conversations we have with the clients.
• Response time: In the age of instant foods and T20, the response time expectation has been severely curtailed. There is no excuse frankly for not responding on time. If there is some problem, you are expected to handle that but respond in time. You can take a cue from our Railway Minister who responded to a tweet from a lonely lady passenger at night. Let us set our own personal standards.
• Clear communications: Communications have to be precise, understandable, clear and concise. In today's digital age, the medium of communication also become crucial given the various mediums available. The advisor has to be follow the medium of his client to reach him else all other important ingredients of communication will be of no use.
• Regular updates: Needless to say, clients expect to be kept informed and updated, even if they are not very vocal about it. Basic expectation is of regular update on investments and financial plans, if any.
• Keeping in touch: Clients like to be remembered. The gesture of greeting on festivals, events, etc. is too basic to be stated. Some form of regular communication like news, articles, new products, etc. may be communicated as per client interests.
• Respectable & presentable: Being a complete man – with good etiquettes, dressing and language is always welcome. Successful professionals try to maintain a respectable, pleasant and attractive image and personality. It definitely you greatly in getting more business, references and obviously new clients.

The professional expectations:

• Understanding client: Understanding the client goes beyond his stated needs. It covers a whole gamut of client profile – right from risk appetite, financial situation, family background, family goals, etc. to provide truly customised and comprehensive range of services – as per your engagement. Understanding client is an ongoing process and it is not something to be asked or a matter of data collection.
• Fulfilling advisory role expectations: An important element of client engagement is knowing your role and the expectations. As financial advisors, there may be a lot of things which you can do, but perhaps which the client does not want. It is better to stick to your role and not push the boundaries of relationship unless the client wants it. Fulfilling your role to the full satisfaction to the clients is first step towards growing relationships.
• Keeping client interests supreme: Needless to say, no advisor can become big and famed unless he keeps client's interests supreme and at the heart of the relationships. Compromising this may fetch short-run benefits but they are also short-lived. There is every chance that another advisor comes along the way and highlights your misadventures to the clients. The best way to do this is to listen to your conscience after asking the question – am I truly helping the client without bias?
• Disclosing material facts: Trust develops when we do not hide things. However, it is also not necessary that we disclose everything which the clients does not need to know or is unable to understand. The true test of being material is when an information is relevant for making a decision or an element of the engagement or something which the client needs to know in his best interests. The choice of disclosure is of the advisor but so is the onus and the moral responsibility.
• Keeping updated & skilled: A financial advisor is expected to be knowledgeable, certified, licensed, informed and skilled in his area of expertise. High standards of knowledge & expertise should be maintained on an ongoing basis if we desire to grow in the business and stay relevant in coming times. This broadly covers the areas of regulations, markets, products & solutions and technology.
• Giving justice to relationship: There is only so much an advisor can do. Being human and being in the profession where your time is a precious commodity, there has to be a fine balance struck with the available time and the number of clients. There are ways to play this balance – through automation, infrastructure, people or team and by differentiated service offerings. The idea is to do 'reasonable and fair' justice to the client as per his expectations. There is no point in adding clients if you cannot do justice to the relationship. Over time, it only adds to the stress, low service quality and ultimately a dissatisfied client.

The Bottom Line
The reality today is that clients are increasingly aware and choosing their advisors carefully. In a world where many things are increasingly becoming automated and robotic, the importance of personal approach to a comprehensive advisory can never become out of fashion. Having a human face, today's financial advisors have challenges which can be met by putting proper practice related principles, policies and processes in place. The above behavioural and practice tips for meeting expectations, is but only a small part of the things that we need to do. Let us take the right step in this direction by first having strong expectations from our own selves....

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You all must have faced a plethora of questions from your clients or prospective clients about various investment products, their suitability, risk, returns, etc., and a very common question that comes up often, especially in the case of a new client is “What if the AMC goes bankrupt or if it decides to close down? People doubt the continuity of the AMC, and they wonder what will happen to their money if the fund closes down one day. This is indeed a difficult question and many times we do not have a satisfactory reply for the client. We may resort to generalized statements like “I am here, you don't have to worry” or “Nothing will happen to the AMC, it's in business since more than a decade”. The client has a very valid question and he is looking forward to getting a logic behind the sustainability of the fund from his advisor and not a vague assurance.

The advisor needs to tell them the rationale behind the safety of their investment. So we have penned down the points that will help you in supporting your contention and to provide comfort to your investors, which are as follows:

• The key logic is, the Mutual Fund AMC or the broker don't own your investment, they are the facilitators between you and the companies where your fund has invested in. Your investment lies with the companies and not with the AMC. For Eg. You have invested Rs 1 Lac in a Diversified Equity Fund of HDFC Mutual Fund, and the fund has a portfolio of let's say 50 different stocks. So, HDFC does not have your money, it is only managing the portfolio. So, in the worst case scenario if one day HDFC decides to close down, the money is yours and is lying with those 50 different companies in different proportions as decided by the AMC. In case a part or all of the investor's money is in the form of assets like Gold, or real estate or cash, then all these assets lie with a Custodian, an independent entity, and not with the AMC.
• Secondly, SEBI has put strict checks on the structure and activities of a mutual fund with a view to protect investors' interests. The structure of a Mutual Fund is such that there is minimal scope of manipulations. The day to day operations of a mutual fund are carried out by the AMC. A mutual fund is constituted as a trust, and this trust acts through independent trustees, who have no relation with the sponsor. The primary role of these trustees is protecting the investors' interests at all times. Moreover, there is high level of transparency mandated by SEBI in Mutual fund's routine operations. The NAV is published on a daily basis, the portfolio, commissions and charges, and other relevant details about the fund have to be aptly disclosed. Because of such strict checks, rules and regulations, the investors are protected at all times.
• Thirdly, the Mutual Fund may decide to shut down operations, sells its business or merge with another mutual fund. In India, such mergers have taken place in the past, without bringing in any trouble for the investors. So, if your mutual fund is about to get shut, you will be allocated units of the merged mutual fund or the new mutual fund for an amount equal to the investment you held in your last mutual fund. If in case you aren't happy with the decision, don't worry, you will be given enough time to redeem your units at the latest NAV without having to pay any exit load.

So, whenever you visit a new client, be prepared for this question, the above points will help you in gaining his satisfaction. It's best that you familiarize yourself with the Mutual Fund Structure, rules and regulations protecting the safety of the investor and past examples of Mutual Fund mergers, to support your claim better.

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A website is the face of any business, it is a warehouse of all the information that a business wants to impart to the people at large. Technology has changed the way businesses are done and a website is the heart and soul of a company. Having a website is inevitable for a business, no matter how small or large the scale of the business is. It establishes a connect between a business and it's customers.

Many businesses do not have a website because they doubt the importance of having one. They believe a facebook page is enough for providing the requisite online presence, or customers will not visit their website ever, or having and maintaining a website is a costly affair, and numerous other alibis that keep them from owning a website. And such firms are substantially loosing out on some serious business.

Like every other business, a financial advisor too needs a website.

Let's have a look at why having a website is a necessity for a financial advisor:

• Credibility: A website advocates legitimacy and builds credibility of your business. You want to choose between two restaurants, you google for it's reviews, you don't the know way to your friends house, you google, you want to choose a school for your kids, you google. Similarly, when you go to a customer and talk about your offerings, he would want to crosscheck to believe you in the first go at least, So what will he do? Probably Google. So, your website will be there as an answer to his uncertainty and to enhance your credibility.
• Available 24*7: A website is the core marketing strategy of a business and what's best is it works 365*24*7. Even when you are in a deep sweet slumber, your website has it's eyes and ears open, on duty propagating for you.
• New Customer Base: A website knows no boundaries. Not only a prospective client is going to look for you on the internet, but anybody who is looking to invest and is exploring options online, may come across your website. Optimum use of SEO can help you in getting an increasing number of leads.
• Elaborate Content: We all communicate with and update our clients through WhatsApp, sms', emails, etc., and these modes undoubtedly are fabulous ways to spread important know-how. But when it comes to communicating extensive literature like articles, product information, elaborate content like your business history, accomplishments, important information about the industry, etc., then you need a website as a platform to communicate.
• Features: A website sports some unique features which can aid in getting more customer leads like it shows the number of visitors, it can have an enquiry form, a chat section, so you can have an executive who can do online chats with leads, solve their queries, and increase the chances of having them onboard. Online chats can help you cater to your existing customers, solve their doubts and improve your customer service.
• Spread Updates and News: A website is one of the most effective ways to spread news and updates. You just have to upload the content on the website and it'll reach to a mass at the click of a few buttons. You can even have financial calculators like SIP Planners, return calculators, market indicator tables, etc. on your website, with a view to update your customers.
• Interactive: You can play around with your website and can make it interactive by having attractive professional templates, appealing colour combinations, pictures, videos, client testimonials, etc. An interactive website can captivate people's interests and further bolster the appearance and growth of your business.
• Save Time & Money: Lastly, a website is a cost effective and quick method of marketing.

These are among the many benefits which a website offers to a financial advisor. So, there is no reason to not have one. However, when you buy a website, you need to exercise thorough due diligence and select the right domain, look at it's update and maintenance costs, etc. To uncomplicate stuff for you, NJ introduces the NJ webNEST, which will give your business an own domain and e-mail and will give wings to your business.

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We often get to read and hear insights about the Do's and the Dont's for running a successful business. And we try to blend those ideas into our business as a part of our efforts towards continuous improvement and enhancement of our business. It's good that we try to expand and be better, but we often miss the preliminary step – analyzing ourselves.

When you send your kid for tuition or for activity classes like dance or painting, you analyze your kid's skills and then take the decision to send him for a class. If you see he is weak in a Maths, you send him for Math tuitions, if you see he has a flair for dancing, you send him for dance classes to polish his skills. The idea always is to identify the skills or strengths and then build on it.

Similarly, there is a technique which can help you analyze your business' skills and then decide where exactly you need to work. It is called SWOT Analysis. SWOT analysis is about understanding the four important elements of your business, namely, your internal Strengths and Weaknesses and external Opportunities and Threats. A SWOT analysis is nothing but a study undertaken to identify these aspects of your business which can then help you build the right strategic plans to address each of these aspects. You may see it as a structured planning method for your business which can help you know where exactly you stand and that plans you need to take to reach your goals. This technique is a very commonly practiced by corporates and this article concentrates on how can the concept be extended to a financial advisor.

We will now explore each of these four aspects of our business and will throw light on the questions we shall ask ourselves while exploring each of them...

STRENGTHS:

This section will focus on your strong points.

• What do you think you are good at?
• Find out what others think you are good at?
• How are you positioned better than your peers? Any particular advantage you enjoy over others?
• What is your USP?

List down all your strengths here. I have a large product basket, so I am like a one stop solution provider or I have got good interpersonal skills or I have a rich experience of 10 years, so I have all the knowledge of the industry, and the like. Think and pen down all your strengths here, this section will be a confidence booster.

WEAKNESSES:

Next comes identification of your weaknesses.

• What are your weak characteristics as an individual? You may be weak in communication or you may not be comfortable with technology, etc.
• Do you have the required business vision and strategy?
• Do you have important skills needed for advisory like excel, presentation, marketing, sales, etc.?
• Do you have the required infrastructure and right people with you?
• Also step into the client's shoes to identify your weaknesses. If you were your client, then what are the things that may put you off from you.

List down all your weaknesses here.

OPPORTUNITIES:

Divide the opportunities between the present opportunities, i.e. the ones which are there, which can stimulate your business but you haven't used them yet and the future opportunities, i.e. the factors which will contribute to your business in the future.

• What are the up-selling & cross-selling opportunities in my existing customers?
• Are we asking and getting referrals from existing clients?
• Will getting Certification Courses help in building the business?
• Can I activate clients who are not very active in business?
• What new products and services can I add to my basket to increase wallet share of the customer?

There will be many more, which you need to spot. Identify the opportunities which are there but you haven't explored properly. The idea is to list out opportunities available to you.

THREATS:

Lastly, you have to collect all the warning placards and put them here.

• The existing and probable competitors in your area / city which may pose a threat to your clientèle.
• New business models and technology which offers competition to your business.
• Possible change in regulations that can have an adverse impact on your business.
• Over concentration of business on select few large clients.
• Having limited products / services in your basket.

The idea here too is list out all the threats.

Strategy:

So, take out some time on a weekend, sit in your garden or your balcony, think with an open mind, and put down everything on a piece of paper. This exercise will need a few hours of commitment and brainstorming because you have to look at things which are not explicit. But once you are through with this exercise, you'll a get a lot of clarity about your business and about yourself.

After doing the SWOT analysis exercise, the next step it to devise a strategy to manage your business accordingly. The strategy can be implemented through action plans which can be further broken up into

• short term or immediate plans

• medium term plans of say over 6 months to 1 / 2 years

• long term plans of over 1 / 2 years

The contents of your strategic plan to address each of the four components of a SWOT analysis can be as follows:

Strengths: How to build on your strengths such that you are known for it and it helps you distinguish yourself / your business from the competition. The idea is to capitalise on your strengths to gain the maximum advantage.

Weaknesses: How to either build on your weaknesses or nullify it's negative impact on your business? The idea is to prioritise things which are important for your success and then work on it. If there are things which cannot be worked upon and are not critical to success, you may think of alternative ways to address those weaknesses smartly without allowing them impact your success.

Opportunities: The idea is to explore all possible opportunities and have plans to exploit them using your strengths. Chose the opportunities that have the maximum potential and/or are the easiest to crack to get going in your business. Your medium to long term plans should include action plans for future business opportunities.

Threats: The idea is to have an action plan to counter the existing and potential threats to your business. This may be required to diversify your business, get more services on board, diversify your clientèle, move clients to online platform and so on. Like for opportunities, all your plans should include action plans for future business threats.

Conclusion:

All of us may have done some thinking on our business and its' future direction. SWOT analysis is nothing but just a framework for you to think appropriately. The principles of SWOT analysis can be applied to smaller areas or different product categories, etc., so as to be more detailed. With growing dynamism in the industry, it is high time we also regularly introspect our business and its' environment. Our success in future, regardless of our success in past, will depend on how effective we can manage our internal strengths and weaknesses, exploit the external opportunities and address the threats to our business.

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