CRM and the Battle for RIA Market Share

CRM is the backbone of the advisor tech stack. It is the intelligent conduit for client acquisition, onboarding, and the growth of existing client relationships. However, a poorly integrated CRM costs advisors time, money, and end-client satisfaction – and often, their sanity. That is why turnkey CRM applications like Wealthbox and Redtail are held in high esteem in the RIA community: they work well in the tech stack and are deployed with relative ease at low cost.

A recent Javelin survey shows the enterprise-centric Salesforce CRM platform outpacing smaller competitors such as Redtail and Wealthbox in the battle for registered investment advisor (RIA) market share. These traditionally RIA-centric vendors are seeking to fend off Salesforce and other enterprise competitors by making their turnkey platforms pliable enough to appeal to the customization needs of fast-growing RIAs. Enterprise CRM platforms, for their part, should aim to deliver a less complex and functionally relevant out-of-the-box solution to advisors. Such a solution could help capture the hearts and minds of RIAs who are approaching $1 billion in assets, a level at which typically a higher degree of workflow customization is required. 

Key questions discussed in this report:

• How should CRM platforms compete for RIA market share?
• What are the critical RIA CRM pain points?
• Is there a custodial partnership opportunity for CRMs to create incremental value?

Companies Mentioned: 

Accenture, Advisor Engine, Advyzon, Affirma, Asset+map, Bank of America, CapGemini,  Charles Schwab, Codezero, Cognizant, Comnexa, Deloitte, DocuSign, Ebix, eMoney, Envestnet, Fidelity, Globant, Hubspot,
IBM, Infosys, Microsoft, Pershing, ProTracker, PwC, Redtail, Salesforce, Sikich, Silverline, Simon, SmartRIA, SS&C Salentica, Tata Consultancy Services, TD Ameritrade, Wealthbox, YieldX, Zoho