The current growth in the UK advice market is being largely attributed to businesses quickly adopting and investing more on their technological capabilities.
The 2022 Financial Adviser Survey by FE Fundinfo found that nearly 70% of advisers increased their technology budgets over the past year, with 81% recognising opportunities from greater adoption of digital services.
Of those that increased spend on tech, over 70% said they did so to help with business efficiency, while 41% introduced digital tools to support remote working.
At the same time, more than a third (35%) enhanced their digital offering following client demand, which FE Fundinfo found to be at an all-time high.
Among the more popular digital services, that advisers have invested in, are client portals (30%), risk profiling tools (24%) and investment research (23%).
Hurdles
But financial advisers are still encountering barriers. For instance, 58% cited the lack of integration between existing products and services, followed by the cost of implementation (50%), and then finding the right software to complement their existing suite of technology (49%).
Even though advisers overall recognised the benefits of being a more digital business, they are still worried of the threats that may come hand in hand with it.
Two of the main fears, FE Fundinfo discovered, were data theft and online security, alongside the general concern of losing a ‘personal touch’ with clients.
Oli Greenspan, adviser sales director at FE fundinfo, said: “The last couple of years presented a unique opportunity for advisers to take an active view of their tech stack. For many, it would have become fairly obvious throughout the period of remote and home working where gaps in their technology stack existed, and these would have most likely been addressed throughout the course of the pandemic.
“What we can see clearly though, through the financial adviser survey is that an industry which was perhaps unfairly seen as late adopters to digitisation, is not only recognising, but seizing the opportunities presented by a growing range of hardware and software which are bringing greater efficiencies across the board.
“While the research shows there is still much to be done in bridging existing gaps by service providers and technology enablers, advisers are all too ready and able to invest in technology which will aid their business when it becomes available.”
The survey polled over 200 UK-based advisers between November and December 202.
