Enhancing customer experience in wealth management

John: Hello, welcome to PwCs Transformation Talks series. Today we're here to talk about the intersection of technology and focused customer experience in the context of Canadian banking's wealth management businesses. It's an exciting time, an interesting time as technology continues to evolve, and greater focus on advisor's ability to have more personalized, more contextual, more relevant conversations with their customers.

So today, joining me for this discussion is Owen O'Neill. Owen, thank you for joining.

Owen: Happy to be here, John.

John: So before we dive deeper into this conversation, wanted to do a little bit of context of what's changing. Why is this an important topic now for Canadian wealth management businesses, especially for banks? As we know, banks are the majority share of the wealth management in Canada. However, there's increased competition. We are seeing increased pressure on many families from rising interest rates, and we're seeing many banks finding that just returns aren’t enough. They need to be more holistic in their thinking and their offerings to customers. So maybe, from your perspective, what are you seeing within the market right now?

Owen: 100%. That's absolutely a trend that we're seeing in the market. I think for a lot of investors, the investment conversation has changed from, how do I beat the market? How do I generate alpha? To more of a, what are my personal outcomes going to be? Am I going to be okay? What's going to happen to me? And what's going to happen to my family? The best advisors get this, and so they're already thinking about, how do I connect more with my clients on a personal level? And then work together with their clients to make a plan and an approach that works for them.

John: So Canadian banks are facing a lot of competition. We talked about this earlier about getting more competition from upstarts, fintechs, different offerings, and we're seeing competition increase on some very different segments. How is this playing out? So one of the segments that we often talk about is the baby boomer segment. So maybe you could share your thoughts on how do banks win with baby boomers?

Owen: Yeah, the baby boomers are critically important. They hold the majority of wealth in Canada today, and they have very distinct needs, and you could easily argue that those needs aren't being fully met today. I think as we age, we naturally tend to think about new challenges, adjusting to life and retirement, thinking about our health, longevity, our legacy. The best advisors can add a tremendous amount of value by engaging with their clients on these sorts of topics. Again, it's a focus on holistic wellness and not so much just investment expertise.

John: Well, what another key battleground that many of the banks are tackling is amongst the mass affluent, which is a really complicated segment to serve, both from the scale and the size. And more importantly, how do we identify them early in their life cycle, potentially before they have the assets, before calling them mass affluent? So maybe how are you seeing other clients tackling how to win in this area as well?

Owen: Yeah, in the mass affluent segment, we see our clients trying to combine the best of digital and personal engagement in order to try and connect with their clients. The idea here is to provide the comfort that wealthier investors are seeking, but to do so in a more affordable and scalable way. So we see banks investing in technology and digital tools to be able to provide those great client experiences, while also freeing up capacity for advisors to spend more time with their clients.

John: On building on the intersection of digital and technology and advisory, we're seeing on the client experience side where many of our clients and many advisors have really found the secret sauce of doing personalized advice and service more holistically. But I think the opportunity for the banks is to really identify, who are the best of the best? Codify their practices. And technology plays a really interesting role of identification and codification, and then dissemination of these practices. So I think it's a really exciting time to think about client experience, the role of technology, and the role of skill building across these networks. What's your thoughts?

Owen: I think the key message for me is that wealth is intensely personal, and so to succeed with their clients, you need to get to know them on a personal level and understand their needs. At PwC, we often talk about being human led and tech enabled. That absolutely applies in the wealth management industry. The best wealth managers out there have figured out a way to leverage technology, to connect with their clients, and also enable their teams to do so in a deeper way.

John: I completely agree that this is a space that has more competition, more intensity, but has really exciting opportunities by being human led, tech enabled. And at PwC, we're really focused on helping our clients structure their transformation programs that drive great results, not only for the business, but also for the customers. So want to thank the audience for joining us today. If there's any questions, please feel free to reach out to us. We'd love to hear from you.