The major banks may possess the biggest brands and the most extensive distribution networks, but their financial planners are far less likely to benefit from word of mouth recommendations than non-bank financial planning firms.
That is the bottom line of new research released this month by Brandmanagement as part of its Australian Financial Planning tracker series.
The data also found that people with relatively low levels of investible assets were more likely to be critical of the service they received from the major banks.
The Brandmanagement data reveals that 72.2 per cent of major bank clients with less than $100,000 in net assets could be classified as ‘detractors’ (deemed to be unhappy customers trapped in a bad relationship) compared to just 42.8 per cent of non-major bank planning clients.
The good news for non-major bank planning firms is that they appear to be relatively well regarded across the income and asset spectrum, with both wealthy and not-so-wealthy clients prepared to recommend their planner to family and friends.
The Brandmanagement data found that 42.9 per cent of clients with less than $100,000 and 57 per cent of clients with more than $900,000 would recommend their planner to family and friends.
It said this compared to 11.1 per cent and 26.9 per cent of banks’ planning clients.
The data also revealed that two out of five non-bank planning clients would recommend their planner, while one in two male and one in three female clients of the major banks could be classified as detractors.
Hardly surprisingly, the data revealed that men tended to have stronger opinions of their planner relationships than women.
It stated that “females are generally less opinionated and passive in their attitudes to both the major bank and non-bank planning groups”.
