Developing financial plans allows financial advisors to have a comprehensive understanding of their clients. This understanding is not limited to just their financial needs but also their family and social beliefs and what money really means to them. This understanding empowers to effectively manage the money for their clients and to guide them with the financial discipline. However, creating a comprehensive and meaningful financial plan requires a good financial planning software.
Some common challenges that advisors typically face with different financial planning software include:
- Lack of intuitive user interface for data entry
- Time consuming data entry
- Cumbersome reports and unclear recommendations
- Lack of flexibility in the software
Obviously, in choosing a financial planning software you need to look for a software that addresses these challenges. Let’s understand what these challenges mean.
Intuitive User Interface
For the user interface of a software to be intuitive, it has to pass the test in multiple facets. If I’m creating just a retirement plan, why not have all the data entry on one screen so I don’t have to go back and forth to check what was entered. As a financial advisor when I’m evaluating a financial planning software, the software design should allow me to pre-populate meaningful default values to quickly evaluate the software. While there can be a long list of requirements for an intuitive user interface, I will expect the software designer to have the thought leadership for an intuitive user interface.
Data Entry
The data entry should not be spread across more than a few screens. The labels for different data entries need to be obvious and have helpful information displayed right there, no clicking away to a different screen. In fact, there shouldn’t be any click at all.
Reports and Recommendations
Some financial planning software companies measure the sophistication of their software based on the number and length of the reports. Some reports can run hundreds of pages. Unless an advisor is getting compensated based on the weight of the report, they aren’t really worth the effort. If an advisor is having a tough time to understand these reports, how do you expect a client to understand? Simplicity and straightforward recommendation is really important to make the report actionable.
Flexibility of the Software
An advisor deals with clients belonging to different age groups, income and wealth levels, their knowledge of financial services, and their current and future needs. So, if the software requires the same monolith time consuming path regardless of a client profile, it’s not an efficient use of a financial advisor’s time. Some clients have complex financial needs and a cash flow based financial plan may be appropriate for them. Conversely, some clients may have simple financial needs and simplified financial plans. For them a goals based financial plan may be more appropriate. In some cases, a client ‘s needs may evolve from a goals based plan to a cash flow based plan. That doesn’t mean an advisor should change the software or re-enter the data all over again. So, a flexible financial planning software needs to adapt to an advisor’s needs, not the other way around.
The GoWealthPro software was designed to address these challenges. With one simple selection, it automatically adapts to a client’s situation and advisor needs. If you need to address some specific areas of planning e.g. when and how to take Social Security benefits, you can generate a plan that maximizes the Social Security benefits within 10 minutes. The software offers both goals and cash flow based financial planning. It covers most commonly used financial planning modules: Retirement, Social Security, College Education, Insurance, Investment Risk Profiling and Asset Allocation, and Estate & Taxes. Furthermore, the software free, secured, and privacy protected. The software works on computers and hand-held devices.
