16th December 2014

Aviva: Shape and investment process to suit your clients

With so many investment options available to you, it can be difficult to know where to begin. The regulator has made it clear you must choose your investment processes to fit your clients, not the other way round.

But when you’re deciding on the right solution for your clients, you also need to give some serious thought to the type of adviser you want to be.

Where do your strengths lie?

The answer to that will depend on where you feel you can offer the most value to your clients. 

You have a number of investment processes open to you, including:

• individual fund selection
• model portfolios
• managed portfolios
• single fund investments
• investment committees
• guided fund ranges
• discretionary fund managers.

Taking into account the needs of your client base, you’ll want to assess where you fit on the scale, from picking the funds yourself right through to outsourcing to specialists.

Choosing funds for your clients yourself takes a lot of time and effort, and can carry greater business risk. As you’ll be doing the work yourself, you won’t have to pay any of the costs involved with outsourcing investment decisions. However, if you choose to outsource investment decisions, you could increase the support you receive, help reduce the risk to your business and give yourself more time to spend with your clients.

Each option has its own merits, so it does depend on what is right for your clients and where you want to position yourself as an adviser. But to do this, you need to thoroughly understand all the options and decide on the best fit for your clients and your business. 

Find out more 

Our new paper on delivering investment processes gives you a rounded view of the options available and tips on what to consider when you’re making your decisions.

Written by industry experts such as Graham Bentley of gbi2, Dan Kemp of Morningstar, Keith Richards of Personal Finance Society and others, the paper covers topics like: 

• keeping investments suitable for your clients risk management
• fund analysis
• different types of investment processes.

It also offers insights into how two advisers have approached their investment processes.

If you’re assessing your investment processes or simply want to know more, read our paper now to see what our panel of 10 experts has to say.

Get your copy of this essential reading.

Partner Guides & Whitepapers, Investments