Service v experience: Delivering ‘above the line’ advice

As the advice industry continues to evolve with technology, two specialist business consultants have said advisers need to focus on delivering an experience for clients, not just a service.

The rapid expansion of technology, particularly AI, has not only changed the way advisers operate, but also granted everyone access to endless information at the touch of a button. 

This means advisers need to deliver offerings beyond technical financial advice as consumers have – for better or worse – access to a wealth of information available online for free.

With this in mind, Vital Business Partners (VBP) director David Carney explained that because every financial adviser generally has access to the same tools and is largely equipped with the same knowledge, the point of differentiation must be the client experience.

According to Carney, people generally seek advice after a major life event, whether it is receiving an inheritance, going through divorce or looking to purchase a house, and they look to their adviser to help them with it. Beyond this, however, they are also seeking a trusted relationship with their adviser. 

“Good advice is an intimate relationship. Client time should be very intimate, very personable, even though it might be very similar. You know, circumstances vary from one client to another for the adviser, but for the particular person they should feel that this is very customised. It’s not a cookie cutter approach to the advice,” Carney told Money Management.

“There’s been a lot of businesses that have failed to adopt and make the change because they were stuck in this idea that they were selling a service, whereas the companies that have really understood that and create an experience, connect a lot more with their end users and have done quite well.”

Looking at the advice offering itself, Carney said understanding the difference between providing a service, or a “below the line” offering, and an experience is crucial for advice businesses.

“‘Below the line’ is what we do for people. We set up your self-managed super fund, we manage for tax purposes, we’ll do some tax planning, we’ll get you debt recycling, all the products, and this is where we’ll put your short-term cash. All of that stuff is what you call below the line, transactional type activity.”

However, Carney suggested advisers need to additionally deliver those “above the line” offerings to clients and dig into the “why” behind their financial decisions.

Notably, Vanguard’s Emotional and Time Value of Advice report released in July found that 71 per cent of human-advised clients and some 47 per cent of those receiving digital advice saw an increase in positive emotions, such as confidence and security, compared to when they were managing their own finances.

Carney added:“What’s important to you? What are you trying to achieve? Where do you want to be? People don’t walk into an adviser’s office saying, ‘I’ve really been thinking about my long-term where I want to be in 10–15 years. What really drives me, what motivates me, what keeps me happy.’ They don’t think like that.

“Having those above the line conversations is what creates the experience for people.”

In a similar vein, Audere Coaching & Consulting founder, Stewart Bell, said every adviser wants to believe they are different, but when products and prices are the same across an industry and they are all following the same basic requirements, what they can deliver on top of that becomes crucial.

“Experience is the only way that advice businesses can go and represent what they do and make an impression, make somebody say, ‘Actually, I’m going to go to these guys and stick around year after year’,” Bell told Money Management.

“The stuff that makes someone go from, ‘Yeah, this is OK’, to ‘I’m not going anywhere else’. It’s the experience.”
Bell added: “The service offer is sitting down and defining what you’re going to deliver. The client experience is how it’s meant to make them feel.”

Implementing this in the practice

Creating an experience then requires intentional effort on the part of the adviser and the wider practice, with Carney suggesting advisers should be thinking about how they can introduce clients to their firm’s team and the business itself as part of the onboarding process. 

This, he explained, lets them know that it is more than just their adviser supporting them and fosters greater confidence.

“That experience means that they go, ‘I can trust them, I have someone in my corner and they're keeping me accountable to my goals and objectives, and that gives me peace of mind’,” he said.

In order to deliver this experience, Bell said advice firms need to look at the client touchpoints across the year and find ways to introduce consistent, meaningful engagement, even when it is simply getting them to input information required for the advice process.

For Bell, this means introducing “excite and delight” contact with clients, which may include calling them unexpectedly to simply check in on them and reminding them of the goals they are working towards with their adviser, keeping them informed and engaged.

“Put those things together and you end up with a client who is excited, they’re focused, they’re motivated. They know what they need to know, and more importantly, they’re working with you,” he said.