In today’s post we’ll have a look at an exciting new tool designed to help you create fully customised SoA templates directly within Microsoft Word. We call it the “SoA Helper” and it is helpful indeed, as it enables you to easily grab data from your Provisio strategies and display them within a Word template of your own creation. You can insert values from strategies, charts, tables and even conditionally display content based on client information.

The SoA Helper is a Microsoft Word plug-in tool. Installation is quick and easy… just have a peek at the instructions to see for yourself! After installation, the plug-in is accessible in MS Word via the Provisio tab.

Let’s start by having a look at the interface:

Interface

The SoA Helper is organised into five sections:

• Create
• Formatting
• Manage
• Details
• Information

Let’s have a closer look at each one:

Using the SoA Helper with Provisio

There are three steps to using the SoA Helper in coordination with Provisio. These include:

1. Create a template using the SoA Helper plug-in.
2. Upload your template to Provisio.
3. Export your strategy content to your new template.

There is a great deal of functionality available when creating a new customised template, so in today’s blog post we’ll focus on some of the core features: inserting variables and using conditional text.

Creating a Template: How to Insert a Variable

In the example below, we’ll create a simple entry in the template that displays your client’s date of birth. Start by entering, “Your date of birth is: ” in MS Word. As the SoA Helper is a point-and-click utility, you simply have to select the date of birth entry from the Provisio menu system to automatically insert the proper code. Here’s how to do it:

1. In Word, click the Provisio tab.
2. Click Insert Variable.
3. In the drop-down menu, select the Fact Find entry; alternatively, you can select a strategy. In the example below we’ll use the (Retirement) Adequacy entry.
4. In the sub-menu, select input.client.dateOfBirth

That’s it — the variable code is inserted and should read: {DOCVARIABLE ad.input.client.dateOfBirth}

The example graphic conveys some other popular client-based variables, such as retirement age, total income, the client’s superannuation balance and its tax-free component.

Later on we’ll upload the template to Provisio and then, when creating an SoA, we’ll select it for data export.

Creating a Template: How to Insert Conditional Text

One of the most powerful features of the SoA Helper tool is its ability to enter information that is conditional; that is, content is displayed to the viewer based on data from the client strategy.

1. In the example below, we are displaying a client’s relationship status. Start by entering two sentences: “You are single.” and “You and your partners are a couple.”
2. Highlight the “You are single.” sentence and, using the Provisio menu, select Remove Section → Adequacy → couple → Remove if couple. This removes the sentence if the client has a partner.
3. Then, as conveyed in the graphic, highlight “You and your partner are a couple.” and select Remove Section → Adequacy → couple → Show if couple. This displays the sentence if the client has a partner.
4. When you’re done, be sure to save the document in Word DOC format (not .DOCX). If you have a newer version of Word, this may require you to save the file as a Word 97 - 2003 document.

When you’re all done your template can be re-used over and over again, so there’s a good chance that you may need to do this only once. All subsequent strategies that use the template will automatically display one of the sentences based on the client’s relationship status as specified in Provisio. In the example below, the client has a partner.

Using the Information Section

Feel free to experiment with SoA Helper options when creating your own unique template. To view a definition of a variable, simply hover your mouse over a menu option. You can also insert a variable and then highlight it in Word… the Information section will display a description of the selected variable.

Uploading your Template to Provisio

When your template is ready to go, the next step is to upload it to Provisio. Here’s the walkthrough:

1. In Provisio’s Top Menu Toolbar, click your name and then, in the sub-menu, select Templates.
2. In this example we’re using the Retirement Adequacy strategy, so click New Adequacy Template in the Adequacy section.
3. Click Choose File, navigate to your newly-created DOC and then select it for upload.
4. After it has uploaded, enter a name for your new template in the Name field.
5. Click Save.
6. Your template is now available for export. If you make changes to the template in the future there’s no need to go through the whole upload process again… simply click the Update button.

In the example below we uploaded a template DOC and named it “Provisio Adequacy Template”.

Select the Template for Strategy Export

Well, the template has been created and uploaded to Provisio… the only thing left to do is to use it!

1. Go ahead and create a new strategy projection. Since we’ve uploaded an Adequacy template, we’ll use the Retirement Adequacy tool to create and optimise a new projection.
2. When done, click the small arrow to the right of Export Document and select your new template. If there is no drop-down arrow, then click Export Document and select your template via the Select the template… field (in this case, “Provisio Adequacy Template”).
3. Select the Adequacy strategy projection you just created/optimised.
4. Complete other fields as needed.
5. Click Export.
6. Provisio will now export your strategy details to the new template.
7. When done, click Download Statement of Advice to save the SoA to your system.
8. That’s it — check out your document in MS Word, print it out and share it with your impressed client.

Last Words

Of course we’ve only just touched the tip of the iceberg in terms of the SoA Helper’s functionality. Your imagination is truly the limit. Your templates can be as simple or as complex as you like — tables of upcoming yearly financial data, financial projection charts and highly-configurable conditional text are all at your disposal. So create away!

Come check us out! No obligation.

Want to learn more about how Provisio can help you to engage with your clients in a more meaningful way?

• To learn more about how to create amazing Statements of Advice in minutes, please visit: http://www.provisio.com.au/statements-of-advice-in-minutes/
• Register now for a personal webinar with our CEO: https://www.provisio.com.au/webinars/
• Ready to try out a 30-day Free Trial of Provisio?: http://www.provisio.com.au/signup/

In this post we’ll continue our discussion of Provisio’s web education & engagement tools. In fact, the tools do a bit more than simply telling clients basic information about their super! On the contrary, each web engagement tool enables your clients to explore possible superannuation scenarios and lets them experiment with modifiable, and extremely relevant, factors.

First, let’s continue where we last left off: Retirement Adequacy. Today we’ll tell the story of Mark, a middle-aged office worker who, until now, hadn’t thought too much about his retirement. This prompted him to search online for a financial adviser; after some hits & misses, he found a certified adviser that featured Provisio’s Retirement Adequacy web engagement tool on their website.

Here is some key information about Mark’s current financial scenario:

• Mark is a single man who was born in 1970.
• His current annual income from employment is $50,000 – he also receives $2,000 per year in “Other” income.
• His superannuation balance is $16,500 and he is making extra super contributions ($4,800/year before tax and $2,400/year after tax).
• Mark would like to retire when he reaches 66 years of age and is targeting a retirement income of at least $50,000 per year.

Are Client Expectations Feasible?

After entering all of this data into the Retirement Adequacy web engagement tool, Mark realises he has some thinking to do… according to the results, his expected retirement income will fall a bit short of expectations:

Mark was hoping to receive a retirement income of at least $50,000 per year. Mark also lives a fairly healthy lifestyle and his ancestors are long-lived… so, fate-willing, he is hoping to exceed his life expectancy by more than just 5 years!

The web engagement Results page summarises Mark’s income and super situation as follows:

If the Client Makes No Changes…

At this stage, clients may ask themselves, “If I made no changes to my financial scenario, what would my retirement income have to be in order to avoid shortfalls and enjoy a consistent income for the long-term?”

To discover this, Mark clicks on the green Tell us your retirement objectives link shown above:

After clicking OK, Mark discovers that his current financial scenario would comfortably support a retirement income of $37,500 per year. He could expect this level of income to last well beyond his statistical life expectancy (up to 100 years of age!).

Clients can then ask themselves whether changes to their scenario are required or not. Fortunately, Provisio’s web engagement tools make it easy for your clients to discover the possibilities.

Making Changes: The Graphical Interface

Whether it’s retirement, a transition to retirement, contributions optimisation or insurance needs analysis, Provisio’s web engagement tools enable your potential clients to experiment with their financial plan in order to envision different scenarios. In Retirement Adequacy, for example, clients can modify the following graphical sliders on the Results screen:

• Contributions
• Retirement Age
• Retirement Income Goal

Let’s re-visit Mark as he experiments with the projection functionality of the Retirement web engagement tool in his attempt to reach a retirement income level of $50,000.

Modifying Contributions

Currently Mark makes a total super contribution of $7,200 ($4,800 before tax + $2,400 after tax). From the Results screen, Mark can easily change his total contributions in order to see what effect they would have on his particular end-case scenario.

Current situation: Total contributions of $7,200/year

Increasing total contributions to $10,900 per year, for example, would enable him to reach his target retirement income of $50,000 per year. This can be done by dragging and dropping the blue contributions slider to a higher amount; the web engagement tool modifies its projection after the mouse button is released.

After increasing total contributions to $10,900/year

Modifying Retirement Age

A second option for your client’s consideration is the modification of their retirement age. Below we have Mark’s scenario… he wants to retire at 66 but, if he does so, he can expect a retirement income of $45,000 – $5,000 short of his original $50,000 per year goal.

Current situation: Retiring at 66 with a projected retirement income of $45,000/year

Your client can use the age slider to determine its effect on projected retirement income. In Mark’s example, he increased his retirement age from 66 to 68 with the following result:

Retiring at 68 with a projected income of $51,000/year

By making this change, Mark can see that an increase of 2 additional working years results in $6,000 worth of additional retirement income each year (from $45,000 to $51,000).

Cool Feature: You’ll notice that clicking the table icon (upper-right of the graph) enables your client to switch to the Super Account Balance view – this gives them an opportunity to see how their super balance diminishes as they draw from it over time. Re-clicking the icon toggles back to the After Tax Income view.

If such changes are not to Mark’s liking, he can always experiment with a different retirement income goal and then modify other factors, if needed, so that new goals can be achieved.

Modifying Retirement Income Goal

As with the other modifiable fields, changing the retirement income goal is done directly on the After Tax Income graph by sliding the income bar upwards or downwards, as desired.

In Mark’s case, he’s curious about the shortfall involved if he increases his retirement income goal from $50,000 to $60,000:

Increase of retirement income goal from $50k to $60k/year

By increasing his retirement goal, Mark can see that his income will be short $15,000 per year and that there will be a 7-year shortfall in terms of how long his superannuation fund will last.

Armed with this information, Mark can now further modify his financial scenario so that he can make the lifestyle choices needed to reach his goals. For example, he may want to increase contributions as well as increase his retirement age so that he can enjoy a higher retirement income far beyond his statistical life expectancy.

The Next Steps

Provisio’s web engagement tools are designed to whet the appetite of your prospective clients. They paint a picture of possibilities by engaging with your clients and giving them the opportunity to craft their own financial solution.

The information presented, however, does not answer the looming question on the mind of most clients: “How can I turn this scenario into a reality?”. A simple click on the Contact button is all it takes to start the process.

What happens when a client clicks Send?

• You receive an e-mail containing their contact information.
• The e-mail includes a link that launches the web-based Provisio Adviser Software.
• When launched in your browser, Provisio automatically includes all of the information entered by the client in the web engagement tool.
• You can then proceed to discuss the strategy with the client, modify data (if needed) and print out an SoA.

Come check us out! No obligation.

Want to learn more about how Provisio can help you to engage with your clients in a more meaningful way?

- Register now for a personal webinar with our CEO: https://www.provisio.com.au/webinars/

- Ready to try out a 30-day Free Trial of Provisio? http://www.provisio.com.au/signup/

Next Time

In our next blog post we’ll have a look at how you can create highly customised Statements of Account with Provisio, so don’t miss it!

Until the next time.

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When not writing content for Provisio, Brian is either cooking, gardening or playing tablet games with his young daughter. He works remotely from the Philippines.

In our last post we discussed the importance of real online engagement; that is, being able to genuinely engage and interact with your clients in an online environment. And we don’t mean offering simple, non-interactive financial calculators! In fact quite the opposite: Provisio’s web education & engagement tools are designed to take your advice service to the next level in terms of connecting with your website visitors.

Without further ado, let’s go ahead and take a walkthrough of one of those engagement solutions: the Retirement Adequacy tool. As a quick reminder, the Retirement Adequacy platform is used to assist people in determining how long their superannuation will last and what steps they need to take in order to align financial decisions with lifestyle objectives.

Step One: Personal Details

After launching the Retirement Adequacy web engagement tool, your site visitor will be presented with an interface consisting of a series of simple questions. The tool starts with some basic client questions as shown below:

When done, click Next.

Step Two: Salary & Super Account Balances

In this step website visitors are asked about their employment income and super account balance. Optionally, users can also provide information about non-employment income and other super account balances.

See the little blue gear icons

When done, click Next.

Step Three: Super Contributions

This step asks if the user is currently making extra super contributions; if yes, they are prompted to specify the before and after tax contribution amount.

Note: Click the blue gear icon to indicate how often you contribute.

When done, click Next.

Step Four: Retirement Objectives

In this step your client is asked about their retirement goals in terms of a retirement age and a desired income. The web engagement tool, powered by the Provisio optimisation engine, uses this data to determine how the client’s goals can be reached.

When done, click Next.

Step Five: Government Age Pension

The final step, shown below, is shown if the tool determines that your client may be eligible for Centrelink payments. If so, they are prompted to provide further details regarding their assets and income. These are used to calculate their specific Centrelink entitlement.

When done, click OK. If a client wishes to skip this step, they can simply click Cancel.

Viewing the Results

After clicking OK, the Provisio engine processes all information in order to present an optimised snapshot of the client’s retirement years and expected income.

Key information includes:

• Summary Finding: This is the grey box at the top of the Results screen. In the example below, “Assuming you retire at 65 we estimate that you may be able to live off $40,000 per year until 5 years after your statistical life expectancy.”
• Income in Retirement: This is the amount of income that the client can expect to receive in retirement. The calculated amount provides the maximum drawdown of the pension balance to support your client until their statistical life expectancy.
• Age Super is Depleted: The expected age is the age at which your client’s super will run out if they draw the recommended retirement income Provisio has calculated. If the client specifies an alternative retirement income, the target age indicates when the super will run out if that level of income is provided.

Call to Action

The Contact button on the bottom-right corner of the Results screen acts as a bridge between the web engagement tool and the Provisio adviser software. As soon as the Contact button is clicked, an e-mail notification is automatically sent to you with a link. Clicking this link opens the Provisio adviser software with all of the strategy information collected from your online website visitor!

You can then proceed to modify the strategy, as needed, and produce an SoA for your client.

Exploring Functionality

There is a good deal of functionality here that enables your website users to explore their unique financial scenario on their own time, whether it’s retirement adequacy as above or via one of our other engagement tools (Transition to Retirement, Contributions Optimiser, and Insurance Analysis).

In our next blog post we’ll have a deeper look at this functionality, so please stay tuned.

Until the next time!

When not writing content for Provisio, Brian likes cooking, gardening and playing games with his young daughter. He works remotely from the Philippines.

So far on the blog we’ve only discussed the capabilities of Provisio as a web-based financial advice solution. While that’s awesome in and of itself, there’s actually another side to Provisio designed to take your advice services to an entirely new level. So… let’s have a chat about client engagement.

As any experienced Internet-oriented adviser knows, being able to deliver a richly interactive and engaging client experience is a crucial ingredient in your recipe for success. But what does that really mean? Not that long ago the term “online engagement” for financial websites meant online calculators: simple, single-purpose tools that provided raw information. While they served a purpose, that’s not our idea of client engagement.

Web Education and Engagement Tools

The Provisio approach is to ultimately drive clients to your advice service. The catalyst for this is our series of Web Education & Engagement Tools, all of which are designed to genuinely engage and interact with your clientele. Each tool can be fully customised in terms of your own branding and then embedded on your website within minutes. They enable your clients to explore financial pathways that are relevant to their unique situation.

These tools convey financial possibilities by asking simple scenario-oriented questions and then presenting optimised results via attractive & interactive graphs. Your website visitors can explore the functionality at their own pace, perhaps completing multiple outlooks based on what-if scenarios. Don’t worry, these education and engagement tools don’t necessarily show the client how to achieve specific goals; afterall, that’s the job of yourself and the Provisio Scaled Advice Optimisation solution.

For example, the Retirement Adequacy tool gives your website visitors the opportunity to explore possible retirement incomes by adjusting a horizontal age slider within an income graph:

Clients can also explore their income needs as they Transition to Retirement, determine whether they need to adjust their super Contributions, and perform an Insurance needs analysis to identify gaps in their existing cover.

All of Provisio’s Web Tools include a call-to-action asking your website visitor to contact you directly so that they can learn how to make their plans become a reality. This call-to-action, coupled with lead generation methods, combine to create an effective online pathway to your advice service.

Providing an Online Pathway to your Service

With Provisio you can essentially create an online pathway designed to convert your website visitors to long-term paying clients. This process starts with web “Teaser” tools and marketing campaigns, both of which are designed to drive traffic to the embedded Web Education & Engagement Tools described above.

From there, website visitors can contact you directly in order to understand their projections and how to make them a reality. Clients can also send you a contact referral from within each tool, enabling you to access the full details of the strategy they created.

This model, comprised of multiple components that work together seamlessly, is aimed at giving you the tools that you need to effectively engage with your clients online and in face-to-face meetings. By taking a multi-faceted approach that blends the traditional with the new, you can increase your client base while championing an engagement-first methodology that gives true value to your clients.

Until the next time!

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Some final thoughts…

Very exciting stuff! I am looking forward to delving into more detail about our web-based engagement tools. Perhaps a walkthrough of one of them is in order. Feel free to share your thoughts via a comment below, I look forward to hearing from you!

When not writing content for Provisio, Brian likes cooking, gardening and playing games with his young daughter. He works remotely from the Philippines.

Connecting with your Clients… the Easy Way

Here at Provisio, we like to challenge the status quo. In fact, we’re actually financial advice rebels.

If you work in this industry then you are probably aware of some long-standing assumptions. The most stubborn of which is the correlation between tediousness and excellence. Yes, you read that right! The thinking is that if something takes a long time to complete, then it must be worth the effort.

Brick and mortar financial institutions have relied on the implied importance of long strategy meetings for hundreds of years, effectively linking extraneous analysis with quality.

Your friendly financial software company (us!) beg to differ. In fact, we would argue that the faster you can formulate a strategy, the more time you can spend talking with your client and making a personal connection. Afterall, isn’t that what it’s all about?

The Provisio Web-based solution fosters client connections by crunching all of the numbers for you and achieving optimised results without hands-on modeling. It literally takes just minutes to incorporate complex client requirements for multiple strategies and produce a customised Statement of Advice for your clientele.

In the video demonstration above, the client wants to start a TTR strategy after her 55th birthday. She is making salary sacrifice contributions and wants to make a lump sum contribution in the future. She’d also like to reduce the number of working days as she approaches retirement.

Within 6 short minutes Provisio created a comprehensive TTR strategy based on all of these requirements and then incorporated that data into a retirement adequacy strategy. Provisio then created a customised SoA that includes a step-by-step guide to implementing the TTR, along with detailed tax tables, extra super & pension benefits (without sacrificing income) and year-by-year reviews of how the strategy affects her retirement.

But enough of my chatting… check out the video and let us know what you think via a comment!

Until the next time,

Brian

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Some final thoughts…

One of the things I really like about Provisio is that it empowers advisers to give clients the answers they want quickly. And “answers” are not simply the first available path; on the contrary, Provisio essentially models every possible way to implement a given strategy with all circumstances considered. After some intensive back-end modeling, Provisio identifies and conveys the singular strategy with the highest benefit for the client.

This entire process of optimisation is all done online, in a Web-based interface, within seconds. The amount of time saved is amazing. In short: less time number-crunching and more time getting to know your client and making that all-important personal connection. It helps advisers to connect with their clients… the easy way.

When not writing content for Provisio, Brian likes cooking, gardening and playing games with his young daughter. He works remotely from the Philippines.

In our previous post we discussed the “Who?” and “What?” aspects of Provisio: who we are as a company and team, and what we offer in terms of a financial advice solution. Today we will go into a bit more detail by looking at the “How?”; specifically, how is Provisio different from other solutions?

The Provisio platform implements a unique twist on providing financial advice: Instead of beginning from the traditional starting point (e.g., client background, expenses, assets) we jump straight to what your clients want to know (e.g., how much will my income be when I retire?). We do this by providing optimised scaled advice.

By scaled advice, we mean financial advice that is targeted in scope to the unique needs of your clientele. This approach enables you to remove barriers to affordability while presenting highly relevant advice to your clients.

The optimisation process gives you the capability to provide accurate answers to client questions within a few short minutes — not hours. Instead of starting from an unquantified beginning position, optimised advice starts from a quantifiable end-scenario and then displays the correct strategy required to reach your client’s goal.

Whether your client is preparing to transition towards retirement or compare insurance cover between funds, Provisio’s optimised scaled advice methodology gives you a powerful opportunity to reach untapped client markets. The combination of efficient, accurate and affordable financial advice — available in an easy-to-use Web-based environment — truly lets your business stand out from the crowd.

In our next post we’ll talk about how Provisio can open up new doors for your financial advice business, from customised marketing opportunities to direct online client engagement. Don’t miss it!

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Some final thoughts…

I am looking forward to posting the next blog article, as we’ll be talking about some key marketing aspects of Provisio. In other words, how you can really improve your business via online solutions. The cool thing is that Provisio is entirely Web-based, so it fits in perfectly with those advisers who are Internet-oriented. By the way, feel free to post comments or share your own Provisio experiences below! I look forward to hearing from you.

When not writing content for Provisio, Brian likes cooking, gardening and watching movies with his young daughter.

The Provisio story began eight years ago…

Way back in 2005 we revolutionised the financial advice industry with a simple approach: to enable financial advisers to provide accurate information quickly.

Why “revolutionary”? Traditionally, financial advice has fit neatly into a rather predictable mould: a client requests an analysis and a lengthy strategy session ensues… after which a hefty fee is paid and the client receives a Statement of Advice. Rigid, predictable and time-consuming. Few people questioned the logic of this approach. It was, after all, the “way it has always been done.”

This process, though, isn’t very client or adviser-friendly. What happens when the client’s life situation changes? Shouldn’t the client be able to receive insightful answers to specific questions within minutes instead of hours? From the adviser’s perspective, the long drawn-out process restricts accessibility to a variety of clientele — afterall, there are only so many working hours in the day. Also, in today’s Internet-driven environment, advisers should be able to easily integrate Web-friendly tools into their financial services menu. The old face-to-face meetings and lengthy client questionnaires aren’t exactly consistent with offering a “cutting edge" service.

In short, the approach of old school financial advice has become out-of-synch with the reality of those seeking guidance. More people want to receive financial advice; so, as an industry, how do we meet that need?

Provisio was born from an understanding of the needs of both clients and advisers. We departed from traditional advice modellers by developing financial advice optimisation: an online process that is designed to produce tangible results for clients within minutes. We started with Transition to Retirement and, after perfecting our calculations, reduced the average wait time to receive advice from hours to mere minutes.

Provisio was then expanded to include other strategies: Retirement Adequacy, Contributions, Super Comparison, Insurance Analysis and Investment Choice. Highly-relevant, yet minimal, client data coupled with robust super-fast technology enables our Web-based solution to produce automated, personalised SoAs that answer the questions that clients want answered - "What income can I have when I retire?”, “How does my current investment scheme compare with others?”, “How much money in fees can I save by comparing superannuation funds?”, and so on.

This new approach changed the way the game is played. As a result, Provisio has risen to prominence and is now used in many institutions, financial advice practices and super funds.

Ultimately, with Provisio, you can save time and money no matter what the size of your business. This blog will be dedicated to sharing valuable information about the Provisio solution, such as its functionality, capabilities and how it can be used to help you revolutionise your own financial advice business.

Until the next time!

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Brian, your intrepid Provisio content writer, works remotely from the Philippines. When not dodging earthquakes and spending time on Provisio, he enjoys reading fantasy novels and playing games with his young daughter.

In 2013, Provisio Technologies announced it had entered into a conditional, binding agreement to sell the business to Rubik Financial. The acquisition of Provisio will place Rubik as a market leader in the provision of scaled wealth advice software in the superannuation fund market. This will complement its existing leadership position in the institutional market for comprehensive wealth advice software.