Asset management firms should approach automation and analytics to maximize roi

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How marketers at asset management firms should approach automation and analytics to maximize ROI www.lcb-global.com
How marketers at Asset management firms
should approach automation and analytics
to maximize ROI
Strategies to optimize content generation, content distribution
and analytics

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Contents
Transformational times for asset managers 03
New demands on marketing
Shifting regulations
Skills and outsourcing
An important role for marketing
The unfulfilled promise of marketing automation 07
About this white paper 08
Marketing process 1: Content generation 09
Key challenges
How tailored automation can help
Marketing process 2: Content distribution 12
Key challenges
Marketing process 3: Analytics – successfully closing the loop 13
Key challenges
Looking forward 14
References 15

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Transformational times for asset managers
Asset management is going through a period of transformation. The
volume of investable assets is set to increase from around $64 trillion
today to $102 trillion by 2020. However, this is likely to be accompanied
by rising costs, greater transparency and increased oversight from
regulators.1
A recent Citibank report identifies the key challenges facing the industry
as regulatory complexity, growth, risk management and market
volatility, with operational efficiency as the key factor linking them all.
In Citibank’s view, the keys to securing to organic growth include
building a strong brand position, better analytics and an improved, more
transparent customer experience.2
However, with the general move towards passive investing and ETFs3
,
plus general market volatility post-2008, both fees and profits have
fallen dramatically from the heights of a few years ago4
. That has put the
spotlight on improving operational efficiency as a way to improve
profitability.
According to the recent reports by Credit Suisse released, over the 119
years from 1900 to 2018, the left-hand chart shows that the real return
on the world index was 5.0% per year for equities and 1.9% per year for
bonds. The right-hand chart shows that the world equity index had an
annualized equity risk premium, relative to Treasury bills, of 4.2% over
the last 119 years, and a similar premium of 4.0% per year over the most
recent 50 years5
.

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New demands on marketing
Despite the squeeze on resources, the expectations placed on
marketing teams within asset management firms have never been
higher. Traditionally, marketing was viewed as a support function, not
a revenue generator; as profits fall, so CMOs are put under pressure to
cut costs.
Marketers’ task remains the same as ever: to distribute compelling
products across all channels to help investors who are trying to
maximize returns in an age of increasing interest rates and inflation. But
the means of achieving that goal have changed almost beyond
recognition.
A decade or so ago, it might have been enough to maintain a set of
product sheets, create a static website and fire off the occasional email
newsletter. But over the last few years, digital marketing has
undergone some radical changes.
First and foremost, there’s simply more marketing information and
collateral to manage. Marketing teams need to stay on top of product
sheets (potentially in their hundreds), email campaigns, articles,
websites and printed collateral such as brochures and flyers. They also
support sales teams by working on pitch books and RFPs, and work on
internal documents such as strategy presentations and performance
reports.
Everything must be kept up to date, with key information such as
disclosures and asset under management (AUM) accurately
represented. Many content assets are inherently repetitive – yet, at the
same time, marketers are also aiming to reduce unnecessary content
duplication across the marketing, distribution and client servicing
groups.
However, achieving quality is just as important as coping with quantity.
Financial advisors and investors, like the rest of us, are deluged with
marketing messages every day. To cut through the noise and reach
prospects with messages they care about, asset managers must convey
their marketing messages through video, audio, infographics and social
updates – not just text.5

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Almost half of asset managers
believe that regulation will be
the biggest disruptor of the
industry over the coming
years.
Shifting regulations
Regulations and compliance are always crucial for asset management
marketers. In the US, the demands of SEC regulation 204 and the FINRA
guidelines9 place strict controls on marketing content. For businesses in
the EU, the GDPR has imposed new rules on collecting, retaining and
using customer data, with implications for many aspects of digital
marketing as well as asset managers’ operations.10
Overall, the requirements to demonstrate compliance are growing all the
time, and the penalties for non-compliance are severe. On top of that, the
regulatory landscape is constantly changing.11, 12, 13
Some observers feel
that the post-crisis consensus on systemic risk and the overall regulatory
agenda is breaking down, with important implications for asset
managers.14
Unsurprisingly, almost half of asset managers believe that
regulation will be the biggest disruptor of the industry over the coming
years.15
Skills and outsourcing
To deal with compliance risks effectively, asset management firms need
transparency and accountability across all their marketing content. But
that demands skills in project management and content strategy that they
may simply not have in-house – and reduced margins make recruitment
difficult. An increasingly crowded marketplace presents numerous
options/solutions that need strategic evaluation to identify the ideal fit for
a given team and organization, demanding a certain depth and breadth of
technology and process optimization that is not an asset manager’s forte.
Also, the more internal teams are involved in any process, the longer
and more complex that process becomes. That’s why marketing and
client management teams are looking for new ways to work with
external partners and increase their use of automation, with a view to
streamlining their processes, improving operational efficiency and
reducing the risk of costly mistakes.
Time horizons are getting shorter across the board. With investors
looking for short-term returns, asset managers must respond with new
investment ideas and shorter times to market. For marketing teams,
that means an overriding need to generate and distribute useful,
accurate marketing content more quickly than ever before.

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An important role for marketing
Taking a broader view, the challenges for marketers are actually
challenges for the entire asset management firm. Marketing isn’t an
island. It has vital links with compliance, sales/distribution and client
servicing. All these functions must be aligned and harmonized to produce
a coherent, positive experience for the customer.
Marketing, as the first step in the journey, sets the tone for everything
that follows. And since most clients’ first contact with the asset
management firm will be through a digital touchpoint, the chief digital
officer (CDO) has a key role to play. No wonder that one-fifth of large
corporates already have a CDO.16
Five challenges for asset management marketing teams
Sales support Digital trends Regulation
Accountability Resources

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51%
Of asset management firms
had yet to start using any
marketing automation at
all in 2017.
Only
25%
Of asset management
marketers feel that their
organization is doing fairly
well at creating a holistic
advisor experience – and
none of them feel their
efforts in this area are
excellent.
The unfulfilled promise of
marketing automation
Financial services was one of the first industries to embrace digital
technology, investing heavily in connectivity that would improve execution
speed. But the enthusiasm for technology hasn’t yet reached the marketing
function – or, perhaps, senior managers are less willing to green-light big
investments in this area. Overall, asset managers have been slow to wake up
to the opportunities of the digital age.17,18,19
What implementation we have seen so far has been mixed. While some
larger players have developed sophisticated integrated systems, others
are making do with a patchwork of different tools and/or manual
processes to handle areas such as compliance, version control, email
marketing and so on.
In 2017, 51% of asset management firms had yet to start using any
marketing automation at all – although the proportion was falling.15
Manual processes are slow, cumbersome and error-prone, and unlikely
to deliver excellent results. No wonder, then, that only 25% of asset
management marketers feel that their organization is doing fairly well at
creating a holistic advisor experience – and none of them feel their
efforts in this area are excellent.7

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About this white paper
This white paper looks at three key areas where asset managers can
transform their marketing processes through automation: content
generation, content distribution and analytics.
Three marketing processes that can be transformed through
automation
Content generation:
How can we produce content more quickly and
Accurately?
Content distribution:
How can we share our content with stakeholders?
More efficiently?
Analytics:
How can we measure the performance of our
content?
Though primarily aimed at CMOs and marketing teams within asset
management firms, this document will also be of interest to
distribution/ sales and client management/reporting functions, and
anyone else who is involved in the process of creating and approving
marketing content, such as internal compliance teams.

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Five main challenges of
Content generation
Multiple data sources
Content volume
Compliance
Updating
Reporting
Marketing process 1:
Content generation
Creating content that will inform and attract new prospects has become a
central element of the marketing mix for asset managers.20 Of the 200 largest
asset managers in the world, 88% are using content marketing,21 and almost
two-thirds of asset managers expected content to be their most effective
marketing tool for 2018.22
Because many asset managers have only rudimentary processes in
place for creating, distributing and managing the success of their
content, it’s difficult for them to tame the large volumes of content
they are now required to create.23
Key challenges
Today’s marketing teams must create multiple types of content, in
multiple formats, across multiple channels. To do so, they must gather
and coordinate source material from many different sources both within
and outside the organization, such as product teams, portfolio managers
and compliance teams, authors, designers and media producers.
Sometimes, more than 10 people will work on a single piece of content
before it is published.
Since it originates from such diverse sources, raw material arrives in a range
of different file formats and is usually unstructured, with crucial data
missing. So someone must manually reformat it and fill in the gaps by liaising
with the original provider. Many firms use templates in the attempt to
impose some control over the structure, layout and branding of their
materials. But if the templates themselves aren’t standardized, neither are
the resulting documents – which simply creates more work for designers
downstream.
Once their content is created, marketing teams need to obtain
approval from compliance teams and/or external bodies, often passing
through several stages. All these iterations should be documented –
indeed, this is increasingly required by regulators.
However, all that work only produces one single, isolated item of marketing
content. In fact, there may be hundreds of such items that need to be archived,
updated and reused, perhaps several times over. Others may need to be
coordinated across multi-stage marketing campaigns, or sales funnels that take
prospects all the way from building initial awareness through making sales and on
to maintaining brand loyalty.

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Marketing process 1: Content generation
Despite the current challenges,
many asset management
marketing teams are still using
manual tools and processes in
their content workflows.
And some marketing materials will include content modules such as disclosures,
which need to be kept up to date and featured consistently across many different
items, even though they vary by geography, client type, risk profile and so on.
Reporting adds additional demands and layers of complexity. Since information
systems are only updated manually and in retrospect, CMOs and marketing
managers don’t have an overview of current workflow or future demand, which
makes it difficult to tell what stage individuals items are at – let alone plan for
future demand.
With so many stakeholders across the business involved (who will, of course, have
other priorities), manually chasing up outstanding action items
can be enormously time-consuming. And without a clear picture of what
information is being used where, there’s a risk of needless duplication as the
same content is developed twice over by people who don’t know what their
colleagues are working on. There may also be no information on how content is
being utilized, or how satisfied clients have been with it.
Despite these challenges, many asset management marketing teams are still using
manual tools and processes in their content workflows.24 The software they use
tends to be confined to particular functions, such as email marketing or content
management, and Excel spreadsheets do their best to serve project-management
and management information needs.
Where integrated tools are used, they are generic, rather than being
tailored to the specific needs of finance firms generally or asset
managers specifically. Overall, the risk of delays, late publication, errors,
duplication and other problems is high.
Automation can help to address these problems in a number of ways.
Every business is different, and therefore each automation solution needs
to be customized.
Very often, however, the best first step is to create a comprehensive,
shared repository that brings together all marketing materials, data
sources and templates in one place.
This unified content management system provides the foundation
for managing content generation workflows in a far more orderly and
coordinated way.

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Marketing process 1: Content generation
Automated alerts and
follow-ups
With stakeholders,
eliminate the need for
manual ‘chasing’ and
help prevention of
missed deadlines and
long turnaround times.
A single repository for marketing content offers a range of benefits:
• A ‘one stop shop’ for marketing teams, authors, writers and designers, as well as
sales and compliance teams, to access marketing content
• The potential to use rule-based data validation to check raw data
automatically
• An easy way to track content items as they move throughout the
workflow
• A way to map data requirements across all content types
• A streamlined process for gathering source data, allowing the same
source to feed through to multiple documents
• An overview of where and when each item of content has
been published or used
• Automated alerts and follow-ups with stakeholders, eliminating the
need for manual ‘chasing’ and helping to prevent missed deadlines
and long turnaround times
• Automatic version control, with a full audit trail of content creation,
development, checking and approval
Once the headline content management issues have been addressed, there
are several additional ‘micro-automations’ that can be put in place for
relatively low cost but medium to high impact. They include:
• Automated updating of structured documents – for example,
where only charts or tables have changed, but the rest of the
content remains the same
• Automated content generation in specific formats such as
PDF, PowerPoint and HTML
• Single-point access to templates – for example, through
PowerPoint toolbars
• Automated checking of grammar, editorial style and compliance
with brand guidelines, with auto-correction.
Taken together, automations like these can deliver significant improvements
in terms of shorter turnarounds, improved accuracy, reduced workload and
enhanced management information. This, in turn, frees up the marketing
team’s time to concentrate on more value-adding activities such as
developing thought-leadership content, which could secure a branding
advantage over competitors.25

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Simply generating content is
challenging enough for asset
management firms.
Content distribution
Key Challenges
As the previous section illustrates, simply generating content is challenging enough
for asset management firms. But the story doesn’t end there.
Organizations also need a solid, reliable process for distributing their
content across multiple channels such as websites, email campaigns,
third-party/in-house websites and so on.
Often, this work is done manually, with marketing staff manually uploading
documents to different platforms. If someone makes an error or misses
a deadline, the entire process is delayed, meaning turnaround times
are higher than they should be.
Planning and scheduling is done manually too, and there may be no
centrally shared calendar to show when different content items will be
published. This risks duplication, conflict or poor co-ordination between
different channels, campaigns and publications, and means that
managers have no easy way to get an overview of what content is in the
pipeline, or identify important gaps in coverage.
Sales and client-coverage teams rely heavily on marketing teams for routine
content requests and minor updates. But if there is no standardized process for
content requests to be submitted, recorded and managed, there’s a real risk of
delays, or even that requests are missed altogether.
As with content creation, every business has different needs in terms of
automation. However, building a central repository of marketing content
addresses many of the challenges posed by content distribution.
With all content stored in one place, client-facing teams can easily
access the content they need through a self-service portal, without
submitting manual requests to the marketing team.
Automation tools such as auto-uploading systems, automated content
tagging and content scheduling can help to streamline the process of
publication, save time and reduce the reliance on human effort.
For their part, managers can access instantly generated reports on what
content is being produced and by whom, as well as when it will be
published. They can also review and prioritize content requests, rejecting
or amending those that aren’t required.

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Analytics
Closes the loop by showing
marketers how clients and
prospects are responding to
what they produce.
Analytics – successfully
closing the loop
Key challenges
Many asset managers are still using a traditional, one-way model of
marketing. ‘One size fits all’ messages are blasted at as many prospects
as possible, in the hope that some will stick. This gives very little sense of
the results that are being achieved, beyond basic metrics such as open
and response rates for emails.
Other asset managers are tracking metrics, but not in a consistent or
centralized way. At times, content performance is measured, but without
being linked to overall marketing performance.
As profits fall and resources become scarcer, marketers need to be much
smarter in the way they generate and use data. They need to know
exactly what works, and what doesn’t, so they can focus on what will be
most effective in future. And they need to link up their efforts with sales
teams, so both functions can leverage each other’s strengths instead of
working in isolation.
As the previous sections have shown, automation holds the potential to
transform the way asset management marketers generate and distribute their
content. Analytics closes the loop by showing marketers how clients and
prospects are responding to what they produce.
Within the marketing team, it can show which campaigns and messages
are resonating most with readers, guiding future marketing strategy and
aligning marketing activities with the priorities of the rest of the business.
Analytics can also provide quantitative evidence of the impact of marketing on
sales, at both departmental and campaign level. These KPIs can help marketing
managers make the case for resources and funding, positioning marketing as a
value-adding activity rather than just an overhead.
On a broader scale, those insights can also be shared with sales teams to
increase sales through better lead generation.29 If marketers know who
has engaged with content on specific themes, they can identify warm
leads who are likely to respond positively to an approach. They can
identify customer segments more precisely and understand customers’
most important behavioral traits.30

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Looking forward
This white paper has shown how innovations in automation can
deliver real benefits in the way asset managers generate
marketing content, distribute it to stakeholders and analyze the
results of their efforts.
On the whole, asset managers have been relatively slow to bring
digital technology into their marketing operations. But that
opens up the opportunity to move in before industry rivals and
secure a competitive advantage.
In the future, the use of automation in marketing is only going to
increase. There’s a real risk of getting left behind, and the time to
start making changes is now.
If you are looking for ways to integrate digital technology into your
marketing operations, and seeking smart solutions to increase your
team’s efficiency and effectiveness, get in touch with us.
Schedule a FREE consultation today!
SCHEDULE CONSULTATION

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References
1. Olwyn Alexander, Andrew O’Callaghan, Justin Ong and Thomas Holly,
“Asset Management 2020: A Brave New World”, 2014, PWC Global,
https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/industries/financial-services/asset-
management/publications/asset-management-2020-a-brave-new-
world.html
2. Citibank, “Issues Facing the Asset Management Industry: Navigating a
Challenging Environment”, 2013, http://www.citibank.com/
transactionservices/home/sa/cab/investors/meetings/ny0129/day1/
asset_management_industry.pdf
3. Institute for Innovation Development, “The Coming Challenges
For Asset Managers And Financial Advisors”, June 9, 2017,
https:// seekingalpha.com/article/4080465-coming-challenges-
asset-managers-financial-advisors
4. Michael Ferguson, “The Challenge of the Asset Management
Industry”, May 10, 2018, Paperjam Business Zu Letzebuerg,
http://paperjam.lu/ news/challenge-asset-management-industry
5. Adrian Odds, the Financial Content Marketer, “Content: A route through
disruption”, Editions Financial, https://www.editionsfinancial. com/wp-
content/uploads/2017/06/EF_EBrief3.pdf
6. Sarah Rector, “5 Top Challenges Facing Investment Management
Marketers (and How to Overcome Them)”, January 4, 2018, Quark,
https://blog.quark.com/2018/01/5-top-challenges-facing-
investment-management-marketers/
7. Aaron Tellier, “Realizing the True Power of Marketing in Asset
Management”, 2016, Merkle Inc., https://www.merkleinc.com/thought-
leadership/white-papers/marketing-strategies/insurance/realizing-true-
power-marketing-asset-management/thankyou
8. Jeffrey R. Margolis, “Aligning Investments, Sales, And Marketing In A
Challenging Environment”, October 20, 2015, The ExecRanks, https://
www.execrank.com/board-of-directors-articles/aligning-investments-
sales-and-marketing-in-a-challenging-environment
9. Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, “Rules and Guidance”, 2018,
http://www.finra.org/industry/rules-and-guidance (9)
10. Michelle Bedwin, “GDPR – the challenges for an asset manager”,
April 23, 2018, Alternative Investment Management Association
(AIMA), https://www.aima.org/article/gdpr-the-challenges-for-an-
asset-manager.html
11. Marsden International, “How are regulations affecting asset
managers?”, http://www.marsdeninternational.com/uk/module.
php?name=custompages&pid=169
12. Deloitte, “Navigating the year ahead: Investment management 2018”,
December 2017, https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/
us/Documents/regulatory/us-regulatory-investment-management-outlook-
2018.pdf
13. Brown Brothers Harriman, “Challenges & Opportunities: A Look at
Asset Management in 2017”, July 25, 2017,
https://www.bbh.com/en-us/ insights/challenges---opportunities--a-
look-at-asset-management-in-2017-23198

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References
14. KPMG, “Evolving Asset Management Regulation 2018 - a parting of
the ways?”, June 2018, https://home.kpmg.com/xx/en/home/
insights/2018/06/evolving-asset-management-regulation-2018-fs.
html
15. Kurtosys, “The Asset Management Digital Marketing Survey 2017”,
Autumn 2017, https://thefsforum.co.uk/app/uploads/2017/10/
kurtosys_dig_mkting_survey_2017.pdf
16. Consultancy.uk, “One fifth of large corporates now have Chief Digital Officer”,
August 10, 2017, https://www.consultancy.uk/news/13818/ one-fifth-of-
large-corporates-now-have-chief-digital-officer
17. Ed Tracy and Kimberly Yurisch, “It got so late so soon: Wealth and
asset managers awake to the new digital age”, 2015, EY, https://
www.ey.com/Publication/vwLUAssets/ey-wealth-and-asset-
managers-awake-to-new-digital-age/$File/ey-wealth-and-asset-
managers-awake-to-new-digital-age.pdf
18. Peter Hans, “Growth Through Digital Marketing; Many Asset Managers Are
Still Taking Batting Practice”, December 6, 2017, Forbes, https://
www.forbes.com/sites/peterhans/2017/12/06/growth-through-digital-
marketing-many-asset-managers-are-still-taking-batting-
practice/#496f6ca8608d
19. Jason Fidler, “Three Asset Management Marketing Trends to Watch in
2018”, January 31, 2018, https://seismic.com/company/blog/three-asset-
management-marketing-trends-watch-2018/
20. Emilie Totten, “Content Marketing: 8 Essential Tips for Fund Marketers”,
https://ss-usa.s3.amazonaws.com/c/531457/media/57166f21eaeb0/
content_marketing-ebook-8-essential-tips-fund-marketers.pdf
21. BackBay Communications, “Feeding The Beast: Content marketing
nearly ubiquitous among world’s largest asset managers”, 2017,
http://backbaycommunications.com/wp-content/uploads/Content_
Marketing_in_Asset_Management_2017.pdf
22. Mark Kitchen, “Almost two-thirds of asset managers see content
marketing as most effective tool in coming year”, October 11, 2017,
https://www.hedgeweek.com/2017/10/11/257042/almost-two-thirds-
asset-managers-see-content-marketing-most-effective-tool-coming
23. Incisive Media, “Content Marketing in the Asset Management
Industry: A snapshot of the current trends in 2016 and how the
landscape is evolving”, 2016, https://incisivemedia.turtl.co/
story/581b1acfd906bb4450efe3bb.pdf
24. Nick Fitzpatrick, “Asset Managers ‘Struggling’ with content creation”,
March 15, 2017, Funds Europe, http://www.funds-europe.com/news/
asset-managers-struggling-with-content-creation

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25. Richard Mellis, “Where Asset Managers Fail at Thought Leadership: Six
tips to make your campaign deliver results”, June 2017, Editions
Financial, https://www.editionsfinancial.com/wp-content/
uploads/2017/06/thoughtleadership.pdf

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Asset management firms should approach automation and analytics to maximize roi