For financial advisors to serve their target-market clients and grow, they need to run efficient practices and bring in new assets. That is increasingly challenging in today’s wealth management environment, as the largest wealth firms and the most sophisticated RIAs face the headwinds of rising client expectations, fee pressure, increased competition, and scarcity of staff.
As a result, the leaders are rethinking how they differentiate and deliver value. And at the center of this transformation are three interconnected strategies:
Streamlining internal processes
Deepening client relationships
Engaging high-potential prospects
Together, these pillars form a practical framework for advisors seeking to optimize their growth potential. Here’s how the leaders are making it happen.
Operational discipline is essential for any advisor looking to scale their practice. Many still rely on manual workflows or legacy systems that could hinder visibility across the book of business, slow decision-making, and delay client communications. Today’s top advisors are adopting a combination of standardized processes, integrated platforms, and automation to streamline their internal operations. Here are examples:
Automating routine tasks such as client meeting preparation, client onboarding, document management, and compliance tracking. Automation minimizes manual effort and increases consistency. This is one of the first workflows where AI agents will become commonplace.
Standardizing procedures, especially for large practices. Advisors are documenting workflows for recurring client service activities, investment operations, and review cycles. This enables teams to work more efficiently and maintain a consistent, referable experience for clients across the book. It also speeds up new-hire training. Again, the most forward-thinking wealth managers are testing AI capabilities before hiring new staff to generate operational efficiencies that will pay them back with scale as they grow.
Centralizing data and systems, in which advisors are replacing fragmented tools with unified platforms that integrate CRM, financial planning, portfolio management, and reporting. This creates a single source of truth, reducing errors and enabling more efficient workflows.
One example of an integrated wealth management platform is FactSet’s Advisor Dashboard. It provides summary statistics for an entire book of business and at the portfolio level such as household, individual, investment strategy, level of discretion, and tax status. Because the system integrates research, traditional and proprietary signals, and market-moving news, you can quickly evaluate impacted accounts before contacting clients and have the answers at the ready when your clients contact you.
Enabled by advances in technology across so many facets of everyday life, consumers are accustomed to experiences that reflect their individual goals, preferences, and circumstances. In the advisor-client relationship, this translates to a desire to feel top of mind, with the confidence that their unique financial priorities are understood and proactively supported.
Whether it’s recognizing a major life event, responding to portfolio changes, or anticipating future needs, it is table stakes for advisors to stay in contact with clients. Advisors today are maintaining regular, personalized client contact by:
Sending timely updates that reflect market or economic shifts or changes in a client’s investment strategy. This is especially important during periods of market uncertainty or volatility.
Hosting virtual or in-person review meetings that reinforce the client’s importance. It’s key to regularly discuss how the client is feeling about their goals and changes they anticipate, summarize progress, and offer recommendations if financial planning or investment adjustments are needed.
Scheduling automated communications based on client anniversaries, birthdays, or other important milestone moments. Advisors also automate email campaigns providing ongoing financial education or market insights.
An example of high-value communications are personalized client proposals that address their needs and goals and showcase your expertise. The Proposal Generation tool from FactSet and CapIntel generates in minutes a personalized and compliant proposal with polished charts and graphics that you can present digitally or in PDF format.
Finding new clients who align with an advisor’s ideal client profile remains one of the most persistent challenges in wealth management. It can be a laborious and manual effort to discern high-value prospects through traditional activities such as client events, webinars, or generic referral requests.
As the industry grows more competitive, advisors are refining and strengthening their new-business strategies to accelerate prospect identification and conversion. For example:
Timing referral requests around high-value moments such as after a successful planning review, support through a major client life event, or achievement of a major financial goal where the advisor added tangible value.
Making the ask specific by describing the type of person they serve best—e.g., “If you know any business owners preparing to sell or transition, I’d be happy to speak with them.”
Executing targeted digital marketing campaigns that speak directly to the needs and concerns of their ideal client segments. Some advisors also position themselves as thought leaders through local speaking events, business groups, and as guest authors of online content.
Advancements in digital tools and the acceleration of AI capabilities offer advisors a material way to identify target-market warm leads that result in more closed deals. For example, FactSet’s Intelligent Prospecting & Monitoring (IPM) tool enables advisors to find more leads through their existing relationships. The system includes a wide selection of filtering options across FactSet and third-party data totaling 100 million professionals, 300 million households, and 800 billion mapped connections across employment histories.
To deepen client relationships and grow net inflows in this competitive and evolving wealth environment, the firms and advisors setting the pace are strategically delivering efficiency, personalization, and systematization. As a result, they are positioning themselves for long-term, scalable growth.
Firms can integrate FactSet’s wealth management tools into their own workflows, enabling seamless client engagement, centralized data access, and increased advisor productivity. FactSet’s open platform ensures that wealth management capabilities meet advisors wherever they work. Whether through the traditional FactSet Workstation, web browser, mobile device, or embedded directly within CRM systems like Salesforce or Microsoft Dynamics, all data, insights, and functionality are available where and when advisors need them.