While you’d be hard-pressed to find an Australian advice practice that doesn’t have women on its client books, fewer advisories tailor their services primarily to women. A recent report suggests this could be a missed opportunity.
Netwealth’s most recent Advisable Australian Report points out that there’s a growing cohort of young, affluent, educated and single women who are looking for more targeted advice services. At the same time, the report points out, women in families are taking on greater responsibility for household wealth decisions – sometimes after outliving their partners.
The research also showed, however, that wealth services – including advice – haven’t kept up with these societal shifts.
“While some wealth managers currently do specialise in servicing the needs of women, these are niche and do not reflect the larger opportunity on offer to the whole wealth-management industry,” the report stated.
“Developing a value proposition for women as a key market goes beyond recruiting female advisers [and] educating women on financial matters and product development…Wealth managers will need to transform their businesses and client service models so they can attract, acquire, retain and service women as long-term clients.”
What women want
A quarter of the women surveyed for the report see a financial adviser, while another 26 per cent are considering seeing one. But the research found women were looking for different attributes than men when it came to their advice experience.
For more than 80 per cent of the women surveyed, the client experience was as important as value for money.
Roughly half of the women surveyed were looking for a coaching-style relationship, while the other half wanted to outsource their wealth affairs, which Netwealth said emphasised the importance of adopting a tailored approach. Firms could also better satisfy their female clients by improving and increasing their social and sustainability activities.
“The two areas where advice firms have more work to do is in their community and their environmental impact, with only six in ten of those who are looking for this satisfied on this aspect,” the report stated.
Women in financial advice
Among advisers, women have been under-represented in the wealth space, with our data showing they make up less than a quarter of the profession. The number of women in advice has been steadily declining since 2018 – the year the industry’s numbers peaked for all genders.
The disparity between in representation between men and women is not in line with women’s performance as advisers. Analysis we conducted last year showed female advisers had slightly higher quality scores than their male counterparts, but a lower number of clients and funds under management.
In other parts of financial services, the statistics are more promising. Women account for more than half of the finance and insurance workforce, Australian Bureau of Statistics data shows.
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