The amount of sensitive information and private documents that advisors and financial firms deal with on a daily basis can feel like a torrential downpour.
Weathering the storm as you always have with clunky local servers or complicated, non-industry-specific systems like Dropbox or OneDrive may seem like the only option. But there’s a better long-term forecast with Skience Safe: Cloud-y with absolutely no chance of frustration.
Skience Safe is the modern, integrated, and secure document management solution that solves the top six cloud storage challenges advisors face.
Here’s how.
Challenge #1: Seamless Integration with Salesforce + Skience
Advisory firms want and need a solution for documents that integrates with their existing wealthtech stack, especially the customer relationship management (CRM) system.
Most well-known cloud-based repositories, such as Dropbox, OneDrive, Google Drive, and Box, were not built with advisory firms in mind. They are siloed programs that require either hours of setup from a firm’s IT department or endless repeated, manual work to share data with the other tech solutions in your stack.
The Solution
Skience Safe integrates directly into the Salesforce + Skience platform, which allows for easy facilitation of financial account and client documentation.
With Skience Safe, advisors get logical, easy-to-use navigation between financial accounts, Salesforce accounts and contacts, and Salesforce households. And it will automatically upload and index Salesforce notes and attachments to help with compliance.
Challenge #2: Comprehensive and Compliant Repository
Firms need a document repository that allows them to store any document related to their business that is also compliant with SEC 17a-4 storage requirements. Meeting all the regulations when it comes to data storage and management can be overwhelming, and the cost in terms of SEC penalties and your firm’s reputation is high should an error or breach occur.
Storing your documents in the cloud allows for customized sharing options that include setting permissions and time windows to ensure private information stays safe. Files also can be organized and secured in a uniform manner so that advisors aren’t trying to chase down a directory or doing so without following the same standards and procedures set by the firm.
The Solution
Skience Safe offers best-in-class SEC 17a-4 compliant cloud storage that makes sure your clients’ information and your firm’s reputation are kept safe and secure.
With Skience Safe, any document can be stored in an SEC-compliant fashion with built-in record retention requirements. Those retention requirements also are customizable and include guidelines to maximize ease-of-use for advisors and assist with intuitive compliance. In addition, time-based permissions for shared files, as well as private folders, allow advisors to share a file without opening the permanent portals to clients’ information.
Challenge #3: A Fully Digital Experience
Firms want to provide the best digital experience for their employees, advisors, and clients. After all, in today’s digital world, clients are demanding a modern wealth management experience that doesn’t include hours of filling out paper forms or having to email back-and-forth or download/upload ad nauseam to get digital forms and signatures to their advisor. Otherwise, they will take their investments elsewhere.
In turn, your advisors desperately need and/or want—in order to compete with other advisors in a crowded wealth management industry—a modern and secure cloud-based solution for client document storage where they can see financial account data along with any paperwork submitted by clients or third parties in order to establish and maintain the financial account.
The Solution
It can sometimes be hard for firms to provide the best digital experience for their employees, advisors, and clients at the same time. Skience Safe provides the ability to all user groups to create a personalized digital workspace experience that is tailored to their unique positions.
Skience Safe also offers workflows to standardize and speed up everyday processes that everyone will benefit from. With event-based and automated storage rules, financial documents from digital signature programs, such as DocuSign, can be automatically indexed. And household documents from managed account programs, like Envestnet, can be automatically stored using event-triggered or time-triggered workflows. Advisors won’t ever have to mess with links or copying from one system to another.
Challenge #4: Streamlined New Account Opening
Firms need to provide advisors a solution that will deliver the fastest and most efficient new account opening experience within one solution.
Filling out paperwork and submitting forms manually leaves open too many chances for mistakes and, even worse, too much frustration for a client. Even just a small hassle of re-doing forms can be enough for a client to decide not to finish the new account opening process or even stop working with your firm.
And for advisors, if they’re bogged down by paperwork and manual processes, they may get frustrated and make up their own process. This kind of process is almost never shared with anyone else and would likely make your compliance officer cringe, cry, or quit.
The Solution
Skience Safe delivers a streamlined new account opening experience for both advisors and clients by removing tedious work and creating a space for easy collaboration and communication between all parties.
This streamlined experience boosts productivity by making it easier for advisors to open accounts faster and more efficiently. And the digitization keeps client data secure and safe while helping build and/or keep trust between advisor and investor.
Challenge #5: Efficiency Excellence
Firm Operations needs to leverage technology to drive scale and reduce total cost of ownership.
Most Ops Teams likely will have put together a wealthtech stack of solutions for employees and advisors to leverage, including a CRM, trading and rebalancing, financial planning, and electronic document signing. But all of that can sometimes complicate document management and storage instead of helping it.
The Solution
The Skience Safe can deliver significant operational efficiencies and cost savings, including improved efficiency for new account opening and maintenance.
Right out of the gate, Skience Safe can shave hours off your entire team’s workload by automating the process of uploading and directing mountains of documents to the proper storage place. This automation ensures files are exactly where they need to be without Ops needing to remind everyone where everything goes.
Challenge #6: Track Record of Cloud-Enabled Innovation
Executives want cloud enablement solution providers that will grow and innovate as their business evolves.
There are lots of solutions out there that either aren’t geared toward the unique needs of advisory firms or are too complicated to the point that the ROI just isn’t there because no one wants to use it. Ultimately, firms that embrace technology and effectively implement and utilize it will grow faster than those that struggle with adoption.
The Solution
Skience has a proven track record of innovation, continuous improvement, and stability, and Skience Safe is built to support your firm as you grow and scale. As a modern, integrated document storage and management solution, Skience Safe can provide the peace of mind that all of your bases are covered, and everything is organized how it should be, including in regards to compliance.
Make Document Storage a Breeze
Looking for a sunny outlook for your firm’s document storage and management? It’s time to put Skience Safe on your radar.
Discover more by scheduling a demo today!