News
Announcing the Benchmark of Intermediary Client Behavior
In-brief
The benchmark of asset management client behavior goes to the heart of whether institutional clients are buying, staying, or buying more. But intermediary clients have different buyers, influencers, and goals, so Accomplish is working with a quorum of firms on the launch of a twin benchmark of intermediary client behavior focussed on wholesale and advisory relationships.
Client behavior is the reliable indicator of demand
Asset managers selling funds to intermediaries like platforms, wealth managers, and advisors can observe and measure their company’s effect on them by what they say (feedback) and what they do (behavior). Humans are tricky creatures, though, and actions speak louder than words, so you will find the data about their behavior to be the reliable indicator of demand.
Separating winners from losers
Accomplish’s institutional Behavioral Benchmark will soon be 2 years old. 100% quant and covering the Americas, EMEA, and Apac, it helps asset managers who sell to end clients like corporates, pension funds, and governmental bodies.
Because it goes to the heart of the behaviors that matter, it yields vital business intelligence that separates winners from losers, for example:
- Buying – variations in pitch win rates.
- Staying – early warning of client retention issues.
- Buying more – potential blind spots to cross-selling opportunities.
At Accomplish, we see more and more firms embedding client behaviors into their targets and strategies. In the words of one Head of Analytics and Insights, “this is exactly the type of data we’ve been looking for – clients, markets, and competitors.” If you would like to see what they mean, download a brochure that will show you the metrics, use cases, and project plan.
The Benchmark of Intermediary Client Behavior
However, the intermediary market has different buyers, influencers, and goals than the institutional space. This means that even though asset managers will still want clients to buy, stay, and buy more, the behaviors they need to stimulate in them are different.
This is because, compared to the on / off nature of institutional investments, the intermediary market is more nuanced:
- Buying – distributors select funds and make them available to advisors, who make discretionary investment decisions on behalf of their end clients.
- Buying more – over time, flows of assets increase and decrease.
- Staying – if appetite tails-off, ‘run-off’ replaces the abruptness of ‘termination’.
As a result, the measurable behaviors that distributors and advisors display relate more to buying and buying more. In addition, the flow nature of a funds-only market and the influence of ratings agencies makes their behaviors different to those in the institutional space, so we need to measure them differently.
In response, Accomplish worked with heads of advisory and wholesale businesses from around the global industry to design the benchmark of intermediary client behavior to enable asset managers to measure, compare, and predict the client behaviors that matter most in this market.
A two-phase approach
In Phase 1, we will lay the foundation for the new benchmark with an exclusive focus on buying behaviors: 10 high-ROI metrics will enable participating firms to measure and compare their effect on whether intermediary clients are buying and buying more. Specifically, we will develop insights into the behavioral effects buy ratings have on flows and relationship depth.
In Phase 2, we will implement the leading behavioral indicators you will need in order to evaluate the effect of the experience you give clients on the strategic and dollarizable behaviors from Phase 1.
The result will give Heads of Intermediary a new tool that will go to the heart of wholesale and advisory relationships.
Looking at this from the perspective of a P&L statement, Accomplish’s Behavioral Analytics Platform will enable you to drill down into the behaviors that drive revenue generation (buying), and the cost of sale (buying more). You will then be able to embed client behaviors into your targets and develop strategies to stimulate the actions you want.
Act now to avoid missing out
If you are interested in participating, book a 20-minute demo now. In the session, we will show you how behavioral benchmarking works and let you explore the metrics that will comprise the new benchmark of intermediary client behavior.
After the demo, the next steps would be for Accomplish to train your data owners to calculate their measurements in the same way as the other firms, after which you will submit your Phase 1 results by Friday 10 February.
Lastly, to reflect the current economic environment, we are giving the intermediary benchmark free for the whole of 2023 to every firm that participates in Phase 1.
Can you afford to get left behind?
