The Socially Savvy Advisor + Website: Compliant Social Media for the Financial Industry

Chapter 28How Can Social Media Be Used to Save Time and Money in Servicing Clients?

It's risky not to do client servicing on social media. For most companies, it's going to happen regardless.

—Lindsay Tiles, managing director, corporate public relations, Charles Schwab

Despite the obvious business necessity of satisfying customers, we in the financial industry are still struggling to do so in the social media world.

A broad range of industries are satisfying wealthy consumers and setting their expectations for service—expectations where, in comparison, the financial sector frequently falls short, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) reports in its white paper The Connected Advisor: The Rise of Digital and Social Advice in Wealth Management.¹

“Indeed, attitudes, behaviors, and preferences of the affluent are increasingly being shaped by experiences in other sectors where content, interactions, and features are richer and deliver a more engaging and rewarding experience,” the report says. See Figure 28.1.

Figure 28.1 Identifying the Delivery Gap

Source: James Allen, Frederick F. Reichheld, Barney Hamilton and Rob Markey, “Closing the Delivery Gap,” Bain & Company, 2005, http://bain.com/bainweb/pdfs/cms/hotTopics/closingdeliverygap.pdf.

Why the discrepancy? “Firms have been slow to bring new technologies to meet the challenge for regulatory, privacy and, more importantly, cultural reasons,” ...