Artificial Intelligence or “AI” may be a current buzzword, but as anyone in the tech industry knows, its been around in various forms for years. At NexJ, for years we’ve used various forms of AI to help industry-leading financial firms enhance the relationships their advisors have with customers.

But there is a transformation underway that makes it possible for AI in its many flavors to supercharge and transform client engagement in the financial industry. And it’s why NexJ today can offer some of our AI-powered capabilities as products that firms can essentially “wire” into their current platforms. We call these capabilities the Nudge-AI Suite.

But first, let’s back up a bit and define what we mean by AI.

To better equip financial advisors to interact real-time with their wealth management clients, Microsoft AppSource is now offering NexJ’s Inform solution. Inform, a product in NexJ's Nudge-AI Suite, enables financial advisors to engage with their clients using news and content highly personalized to the client’s specific interests. NexJ uses a sophisticated AI engine to match client interests to news from wealth management-specific premium news feeds, including 15,000 publicly available news streams such as the Harvard Business Review and Barron’s, as well as a firm’s own research.

There are thousands of companies and products that market themselves as Customer Relationship Management solutions, ranging from industry behemoths to tiny niche products. Given the importance of relationships to financial advisors, it’s no surprise advisory and wealth management firms think they need a CRM system. But is that really what they need?

We were lucky enough to sit down with April Rudin, Founder and President of The Rudin Group, Aawad Aamir, Analyst with Celent, and Andrew Cant, VP of Financial Services Solutions at NexJ Systems, about what truly improves the advisor experience. Throughout our conversation, we discussed the future of advisor efficiency, the current state of next best action, and how firms can implement tools to help advisors be at the top of their game.

Needless to say, the pandemic has upended the advisor / client relationship like no other event in our lifetimes. How, where and why financial advisors engage with their clients looks very, very different than it did pre-COVID. From Zoom meetings to virtual events to AI-driven online dashboards, clients have become accustomed to a very different way of working with their advisors … and frankly expecting much more.

The wealth management industry has always been competitive. With the advent of robo-advisors, retail investor apps and financial firms of all stripes entering the fray, each promising potential clients more of what they want, how can an advisor stand above the crowd and attract the right kind of clients?

Think about the volume of data you have at your fingertips. Investment research. Macroeconomic reports. “Social signals” from your clients. Now, how well do you feel you are able to bring all that data together, real time, to the benefit of your clients? Daunting, isn’t it?

“Money in motion.” It’s a phrase many advisors are familiar with. However, to capture that money is easier said than done.

Not only must advisors be clued into money in motion events, such as a client getting married (or divorced), having a child, inheriting money, selling a business, or changing careers or getting promoted, but they must be able to access that intelligence in real time with actionable ways to capitalize on the opportunities presented.

Wealth managers have talked about “personalization” and “client-centricity” for years. But is that actually how clients feel about the service they receive, or does it sound to them like more marketing speak?

Artificial intelligence (AI) in wealth management is no longer a cutting-edge technology. Many firms now claim to leverage AI within their CRM systems. However, despite its broad adoption, the targeted application of AI toward very specific advisor needs remains a lofty, unrealized goal for too many wealth managers. In other words, AI needs to be practical and solve specific problems for it to drive efficiency and enhance the client experience.

The wealth management industry has undergone a tremendous level of change in the past two years, driven by COVID-related forces, changing consumer expectations, and technological advances. The customer relationship management (CRM) market for wealth management is fighting to stay abreast of these trends and deliver the kinds of useful insights and time-saving efficiency advisors need to succeed.