Advisers who do not have a mobile communication strategy are ignoring a change in consumer behaviour that will have substantial long-term repercussions, Association of Financial Advisers CEO, Brad Fox, has warned.
Mr Fox was speaking at the launch of the latest AFA white paper, entitled Connected Convenience, which offers an insight into advice clients’ usage of mobile devices and their consumption of digital information and applications. He said the findings provided a compelling business case for greater investment in mobile technology to enhance the financial advice experience.
According to the study, conducted by Beddoes Institute in partnership with Zurich Australia, advice clients are using mobile devices – smart phones and tablets – at a higher rate than the rest of the population. 77% of advice clients have a smart phone and 56% have a tablet, compared to 65% smartphone ownership and 37% tablet ownership among the general population.
The other key finding was that consumers are using smart phones and tablets for different purposes. The research showed that smartphones are used more for high frequency, transactional activities, such as phone calls, text messages emails, browsing the internet and accessing information, while tablets are used for more immersive activities such as buying, reading and videos.
…a ‘one size fits all’ mobile strategy will not succeed
“Mobile lumps two very different devices and sets of users together and it’s clear from the behaviour of financial advice clients that a ‘one size fits all’ mobile strategy will not succeed. Segmenting these users is an important part of increasing engagement of each of the two ‘mobile’ user groups – the smartphone users and the tablets users,” Mr Fox said.
Co-author of Connected Convenience and Head of Marketing at Zurich, Richard Dunkerley, added that the white paper gives a very clear indication to financial advisers, licensees and other participants in the financial advice space, of where to target spending of their marketing dollars.
“Clearly the days of building a website and thinking you have engaged with your clients are long past. The opportunity is to target marketing spend so as to integrate your services into the lifestyle of your client and how best to do that depends on their demographic,” Mr Dunkerley said.
Click here to read the white paper.
