By Fiona Moore
COMMUNICATION in the financial planning industry should be as free and open as possible as a means of building trust between advisers and clients, according to Accumulus certified financial planners, directors and authorised representatives, John Wotherspoon and Rosemary Osman.
“Mostly what we sell [in the financial planning industry] is trust because qualifications are a given in this industry,” Wotherspoon says.
Another important impact of communication is timeliness. Wotherspoon and Osman recount their own experience with a fund manager’s communication strategy after the September 11 terrorist attacks in New York.
“Only one fund manager that we use sent us a briefing within seven days after the event. There is nothing as deadly as silence. It’s the worst thing you can do,” Osman says.
Accumulus has recently undergone an overhaul of its entire communication strategy after identifying a series of events that necessitated a change in its approach to communication.
“In April last year, there was the tech wreck and by September this was affecting the blue chip end of the market. Then from September to September this year, the US stockmarket dropped by 20 per cent.”
While it is hard to know the general standard of communication in the industry, there is a risk of financial planners believing that all clients make decisions in the same way.
Osman says understanding the behavioural psychology of clients helps to indicate whether a client is loss averse or risk averse.
Accumulus uses a proprietary software system called MoneyMax to help determine the different client personalities and who is most anxious in the current economic environment.
“A lot of it is fear because a lot of it is out of their control. Other people see it as a good buying opportunity. So it’s about understanding emotions,” Osman says.
Accumulus’John Wotherspoon and Rosemary Osman, together with founding shareholder of Matrix Planning Solutions, Graham Poole, will speak on communication strategies on Friday at 10.30am.
