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What good asset management CX looks like

What good CX looks like
Welcome to the last blog in our series on the fundamentals of client experience (CX) for asset managers. This one is on what good asset management CX looks like.
So far, we have learned:
- What is CX? đ¤ˇđťââď¸ CX is a clientâs overall impression of you as a supplier. It is personal, subjective, open to influence, sometimes irrational, and subject to change as a result of any and every interaction they have with your firm.
- Why asset management CX? And why now? đ¤ˇđťââď¸ The old ways asset managers used to differentiate themselves still exist but have become unreliable. How your firm conducts itself, how it serves its clients, and how it leaves them feeling remains THE differentiator. Thatâs CX, and it is controllable, commercial, and incremental.
- How does CX work? đ¤ˇđźââď¸ Differentiation is about being remembered, for which you need to do something extraordinary. If you do, your clients will remember, share, and discuss their experience â thatâs how we create advocacy. Emotions create these memories so, to stand out, your firm must operate at the emotional level.
- Is B2B CX really so complicated? đ¤ˇđźââď¸ B2B CX has some additional features to it over and above B2C CX. These make B2B CX more complicated, protracted, but still entirely achievable if you use an appropriate model.
In this blog, we explain what good asset management CX looks like, we introduce the building blocks of CX, and we re-cap the importance of being memorable. We finish by pulling together from across the blog series the competitive, financial, and logical reasons for maintaining a deliberate CX capability.
The characteristics of good asset management CX

Be client-led
At its heart, good CX is about being client-led. Quite simply: we all get what WE want, by helping our clients get what THEY want. So, first and foremost, the experience we give our clients must be aligned with what they want and need.
Achieve this in two steps.
Firstly, assess your clientsâ needs using an appropriate model, such as the Accomplish Model of B2B CX Â that we explain in our blog on B2B CX. This assessment is essential because your alignment with what your clients want will drive their impression of your value.[1]Â
Secondly, segment your clients based on what THEY want. Unless you have a homogenous book of business, you may have different types of clients who want different things. Because the closeness of your alignment with their needs will affect your value, a âone size fits allâ approach may fit none of them perfectly.
To solve this problem, base your primary client segmentation on what THEY want, before then identifying the most commercially attractive segments to your firm.
It is a common mistake to segment clients purely by revenue or AUM: these are things your firm wants, but they will tell you little about what your clients want and, therefore, they do little to align you with your clients. Check out our blog on effective client segmentation for other common segmentation mistakes.Â
Be deliberate
Next, you need the assurance that you have a deliberate CX capability. As they say in the UK, âone swallow [a type of bird] doesnât make a summerâ, so make sure your CX doesnât rely on chance or a small number of employees. That would not be sustainable.
The building blocks of CX
When we benchmark the strength of asset managersâ CX capability, we measure it against the five building blocks of CX. Each building block is designed to perform a specific function and, combined, they give your firm a holistic and deliberate CX capability. In our experience, there is no primary building block and you need them all.

- CX strategy â if CX is an effect we create, then the first question must be, âwhat effect do we want to have, and on which client types?â Your answer will give you your objective. Every firm at the leading edge has defined its strategy for meeting its objective in relation to CX. A good strategy will start with the objective and why it matters, explain how the objective is going to be achieved, and assess the resources and capabilities needed. Check out our research into effective CX strategies and contact us if you would like more help as we have a CX strategy definition service for our clients.
- Client journey â âat what point do you want to have a certain effect?â Good CX has a client journey that connects your end-to-end client touchpoints into a coherent experience and is relevant, explainable, and memorable. A superior client journey will ensure that, where appropriate, different touchpoints meet the different needs of your client segments.
- CX governance â âhow will you measure your effect on your clients?â This brings in governance and oversight, for which you will need a framework of accountabilities and processes that monitors the effect your firm has had on its clients and why. Effective CX governance will make sense of the experience you have given your clients by measuring actual observable effects (key experience indicators) and comparing them the causes (key performance indicators). This is a new way doing things we developed after we discovered that how and why 75% of asset managers gain no benefit from their current measurement activities.Â
- CX culture â âhow will your colleagues and you create your desired effect?â This refers to the cultural recognition your organisation places on the primacy of listening to clients and serving their changing needs. A client-centric culture has clear responsibility for CX, solves client queries collaboratively, empowers employees to involve and interact with clients, and includes CX in annual objectives and incentive programmes.
- CX data and analytics â lastly, âwhat data and insights will you need?â Data is the essential raw material for maintaining up-to-date 360° view of clientsâ needs as they change over time. A âgoodâ data capability will exploit consolidated data to identify meaningful differences in clientsâ needs, analyse them on an ongoing basis, and predict changing needs across segments of clients.
Another great thing about these building blocks is that they are incremental and, with the help of the CX Maturity Benchmark, you can sequence improvements across each one on a deliberate path to client centricity.
If you want to know where to start, after you have benchmarked your CX maturity, unless your report recommends a specific sequencing, the order we have listed the building blocks may be helpful to get you started: having a clear strategy is always a good first move.
In our CX training courses , we help asset management staff understand the details of these building blocks, learn how to apply them, and give guidance on connecting and embedding them into BAU.
Be memorable
Take an âengineeringâ approach to designing your client journey(s), but not all touchpoints are equal, and clients are not machines. Unless we engage them on an emotional level at specific points, our efforts will likely be forgotten.

There is no point being good unless your clients remember. Because of this, just being good, isnât good enough. We know from an earlier blog that extraordinary events disproportionately skew our memories, which means we should be extraordinary to be remembered, shared, and discussed. Everything else gets forgotten, so if you want to stand out you have no choice but to do something extraordinary. Anything.
Guard against being forgotten by identifying the aspects of the client journey where they tend to be more emotionally invested â the moments that matter: these are the moments that they are already pre-disposed to remember, discuss, and share. So, help them remember these moments positively by, as we say in Accomplish, âsprinkling unexpected delightsâ that say something about your culture.
Follow Accomplish on LinkedInÂ
The discipline of B2B CX is still in its infancy in the asset management industry.
Accomplish is changing this by helping firms stand-out from their competitors  through the experience they deliver to their clients.
This completes our blog series on the fundamentals of CX and here are the links:
- What is CX? đ¤ˇđťââď¸
- How does CX work? đ¤ˇđźââď¸
- Is B2B CX really so complicated? đ¤ˇđžââď¸
- Why asset management CX? And why now? đ¤ˇđźââď¸
- What does good CX look like? đ¤ˇđťââď¸
If you found this article useful, follow Accomplish on LinkedIn where we contribute frequently to extending the leading edge of CX across the asset management industry.