Self-directed investors are increasingly looking to platforms to deliver a more direct experience, however platforms are not taking advantage of opportunities to provide scaled or limited advice.
“There are disparate tools available that need to bring self-directed investors into one community or one experience,” OneVue Limited chief executive Connie McKeage told InvestorDaily.
“Increasingly, people are saying, ‘can platforms provide a direct experience?'”
McKeage said platforms have the potential to efficiently service the market but it cannot be a subset platform structures currently available in the industry.
“They have to be completely different. It’s the difference between a full service broker and an online broker; they’re two very different experiences with both leading back to advice.”
The need for advice has gradually evolved from procedural and holistic, to scaled and event-driven.
The opportunity therefore lies in advisers accepting the new event-driven model, as it is still a very valid way of gaining client confidence, McKeage said.
“The way or the operating model under which advice used to [work], where people would get these mega plans, is diminishing and the industry need to look at different ways of engaging upfront with the client.”
In response to industry players who believe intermediary consumer platforms for self-directed investors are taking away opportunities from advisers, McKeage said a lot of the fear has stemmed from the fact that certain platform providers don’t have a solution.
“Once they have one, their position will change because they’ve recognised it’s the fastest growing part in the United States and it’s something they need to do.
“If they continue to hold that belief, it will be a self-fulfilling prophecy. The reality is, you can’t fight what’s inevitable; you have to embrace it and find the opportunities within it.”
OneVue plans to make a number of announcements in relation to its offerings in the coming weeks.
