ING focuses on new service strategy

It has been almost a year since Mercantile Mutual changed its name to ING and acquired a new managing director, John Wylie. During that time, the company has made a splash in the minds of consumers with its quirky advertising campaign featuring Scottish comedian Billy Connolly.

With the external image now in place, senior executives have turned their minds to the company’s internal workings, and fundamental changes have started to take place within ING’s distribution network, with the purpose of improving services to its adviser network.

One of the most important changes has been the recently unveiled new distribution structure aimed at improving the services delivered to advisers. The new structure has integrated all functions at the enterprise level, and distribution has now been split into seven groups — distribution management, marketing, customer service, corporate and financial, investment management, business technology, and people and development.

According to ING’s head of distribution, Les Clayton, the reason for such a wide reaching change was to cover all the bases in terms of the support planners needed to function efficiently.

“We worked out there are in excess of 20 functions needed to run a broker dealer group, such as marketing, business planning and sales support. If advisers are concentrating on these things, they’re not concentrating on their businesses, so we’ve turned these functions into turnkey solutions that advisers can buy from ING,” Clayton says.

“Some are delivered through technology and some aren’t, like our selling seminars. And because of our scale, we can offer these services at a reasonable cost.”

Wylie believes this approach is being well received by financial planners.

“We’ve gradually built up these services over the years by trying to understand the needs of advisers. Now we are having a lot of success because we understand their businesses, which has also helped us to understand the various parts of our own business much more clearly,” Wylie says.

“The ultimate aim is to produce more business and have clients who stick with us and place more business with us.”

With the restructure in its final stages, ING is now looking to further develop its distribution network and according to Clayton, there are opportunities in the development of ING’s existing distribution structure. These will be found through the relationships ING has with national advisory firms and independent advisers, and he says there is potential for strategic alliances, with the aim of offering products and services to another party’s client base.

Another change at ING has been an increasing focus on being part of a global organisation, and the company has been sharing ideas with other members of the global ING network. Some functions, like international equities, are already managed on a global basis. In fact, the company fosters a culture of co-operation.

Wylie says the group is very close connected and around 20 Australian ING employees are currently working in overseas offices. His prior posting was head of ING’s life insurance operations in Poland, while the previous head of funds management, Paul Bedbrook, has headed off to Canada and ING research and technical manager Roslyn Shirlaw has recently jetted off to work in Japan.

“We have a global exchange of people and we make sure we’re aware of the products and services that are offered globally.”

As part of the culture of knowledge sharing, ING has played host to various overseas delegations this year, particularly from Asian members of the group.

“There are only two countries in the Asia Pacific region with open distribution, Australia and New Zealand, and Australia is considered a pool of experts on this issue for the area”, says Clayton.

“This year we’ve had people here from Japan, Malaysia and Taiwan, and we’ve been showing them what we’re doing,” he says.

Wylie believes one of the biggest challenges facing the financial planning industry in the future will be ensuring there are enough advisers to service an ageing population whose wealth is increasing.

“The population is growing and nest eggs are becoming bigger. A lot of people dabble now online, but once you get a serious sum of money, you tend to be more careful and rely on advisers more,” Wylie says.

“And because of the complex regulations which affect super in Australia, it’s important to get good advice,” says Wylie, adding that he thinks it unlikely that either the Liberal or Labor parties will attempt to address the issue of tax on super in the near future.

Finally, the question on everybody’s lips, the cricket. ING’s predecessor, Mercantile Mutual, was famous for its cricket stump logo and cricket sponsorship, in fact, the idea for the company was conceived at a cricket match in 1878. Now the company has changed its name to ING, will the cricket sponsorship continue?

“Definitely. We see it as part of building the ING brand name” says Wylie, adding that the company has pledged to continue its sponsorship for another five years.