Fintech Corner

Until recently, financial advisors were severely limited in the value they could extract from their software, but new, more flexible technology has the potential to simultaneously catalyze growth.

Technology that can both scale up a practice and zoom-in to offer client experience enhancements is at a premium, said, Tom Westhoff, vice president of Global Sales at Practifi, a business management platform for financial services firms, because clients are demanding better experiences with their advisors.

Over the next 25 years, 45 million U.S. households will transfer nearly $70 trillion worth of wealth, but many financial advisors lack the tools and soft skills to manage the rising generations of clients.

The wealth transfer is an existential issue for wealth managers. According to Cerulli, 45 million households will transfer more than $70 trillion over the next two decades.

Earlier this month, the financial advisory & fintech industries gathered in NYC for the annual Wealthies awards highlighting the most innovative companies serving financial advisors & among the winners was Practifi.

“Today’s wealth management industry is awash with data but starved of insight,” according to Adrian Johnstone of Practifi. “We have so much information but lack clarity on how to manage it and what to do with it.”

Practifi's Adrian Johnstone recently joined the DWealth Muse podcast to discuss the role of CRMs in RIAs, cybersecurity for advisors and how COVID has impacted the relationship between advisors and tech.

Practifi, a business management platform for the financial services industry, was planning to change how it interacted with email and calendar scheduling programs but wasn’t sure how to proceed. A client advisor board offered just the insights the firm needed.

Implementing personalization as a wealthtech firm requires not only knowing the wealth management firms being served but also their clients, said Lindsey Hanson, head of client success at Practifi.

What was once considered a good wealth management technology stack was entirely purpose-driven—as long as the software and equipment did their work reasonably well for the practice.