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Understanding the Institutional Investor Journey When Selecting an Asset Manager
Institutional investors yield considerable decision-making power and often involve an extensive list of resources in their process of vetting and hiring a new asset manager. The firms vying for attention need to effectively differentiate yet not over-complicate their unique value propositions. Given the intensity of competition in the institutional market, asset managers need to make the most of every potential mandate to position themselves to win new assets. While many struggle with the challenges of building brand awareness to even get a chance to be considered, the most successful firms arm their sales, relationship management and product teams with insight on the decision-making process in order to maximize their opportunities of being selected.
Common triggers prompting asset manager searches include multiple periods of underperformance, investment team turnover, style drift, and corporate merger/acquisition activity. That said, new-manager hires are not always the result of the need to replace an incumbent, as institutional investors and consultants are open to opportunistic searches for new strategies that could enhance the overall portfolio. While performance and price along with familiarity and strength of the brand are integral in the evaluation of asset managers, a variety of more subjective factors weigh heavily in the final selection decision.
In the process of hiring an asset manager, all institutional investors follow a similar journey, with each type bringing its own nuances to the overall process. Along the journey, asset managers can leverage a number of points of influence to maximize their potential for selection. The people and additional sources of information also involved in the journey vary by type of institution, offering opportunities for asset managers to target their ongoing outreach to specific audiences. For example, consultant recommendations are by far the most influential factor for defined benefit (DB) pensions, yet peer recommendations, either formal or word-of-mouth, can be a gateway for endowments.
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Consumer & Retail RSS FeedGet via email
How Your Brick-and-Mortar Retail Store Can Survive the Online Retail Wave
There’s no doubt that online sales are growing. In fact, at 16%, online retail sales growth is swiftly outpacing in-store sales growth, which stands at 3.4%. But before you close up shop, consider the other side of this story: Most … Continue reading
How to Optimize Go-to-market Strategies Quickly and Efficiently
Lessons from the Consumer Packaged Goods Industry The telecom industry has always been innovative, but the innovation has been mostly incremental. Over the past century, we had telegraphs, then wired telephones, then wireless phones, then cell phones, and now we … Continue reading
Making VR a Market Research Reality
Virtual Reality Is More Than Fun and Games Over the past four years, a flurry of product introductions has created significant buzz around the area of virtual reality (VR), and much of the hype is well deserved. Users confirm that … Continue reading
Energy RSS FeedGet via email
Dear Energy Santa: Three Wishes for Energy Utilities
With digital transformation occurring at breakneck pace, it is time to shift gears. Our wish list revolves around reinvigorating your brand and your approach to customer experience so that more people can “believe” in you again.You may be asking; why … Continue reading
How Energy Utility Brands Should Develop KPIs
As utilities face increasing deregulation and competition from distributed generation, they need to refocus their key performance indicators (KPIs) on metrics that describe customer actions and sentiment rather than on the somewhat passive metric of operational satisfaction.Recently, utility executives have … Continue reading
Three Things Utilities Can Do to Delight Their Customers
Insights Powered by Cogent Reports™ This article is not about building the fundamentals for strong customer engagement: operational excellence, a strong brand and value-added product offerings. Instead, it’s about the moments that catch customers off guard—in a good way—and how … Continue reading
Financial Services RSS FeedGet via email
Going Beyond Consideration
Insights Powered by Cogent Reports™ Understanding the Institutional Investor Journey When Selecting an Asset ManagerInstitutional investors yield considerable decision-making power and often involve an extensive list of resources in their process of vetting and hiring a new asset … Continue reading
Advisors’ Top Reason for Selling Annuities
Insights Powered by Cogent Reports™ Amid Rising Sales, Advisors Cite Guaranteed Retirement Income as Top Reason for Selling Annuity ProductsAnnuity sales are rebounding and advisors expect to maintain, or even increase, their use of annuity products in the … Continue reading
Is There a Future for Financial Wellness Programs?
Insights Powered by Cogent Reports™ Financial wellness programs were greeted with great hopes when they first debuted. But is the prognosis for their long-term success starting to flag? Amid signs that such programs have not been as impactful as … Continue reading
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The Financial and Emotional Upside of Marketing to Caregivers
Healthcare marketers may be talking to the people who use their products—but are they talking to the people who buy their products? It’s an important distinction, and in many cases, these two stakeholders may not be the same.In a recent … Continue reading
My Mom, a Caregiver: Portrait of an Overlooked Hero
How the Healthcare Industry Is Failing 29% of the US Population If you’re like me, you have firsthand experience watching someone you love care for the health of another person. I watched my mother care for her husband of 50 … Continue reading
Will Uber Health and Lyft Concierge Change Healthcare?
This year Uber and Lyft formally entered the healthcare market to offer rideshare services to nonemergency patients for transportation to scheduled doctor appointments. Patient no-shows are a prevalent problem in the US, with an estimated 3.6 million Americans reportedly missing … Continue reading
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New Research: Pharmaceutical Companies are Overlooking a Key Audience
I never used to pay attention to anything in the healthcare industry. As someone young and healthy with no medical conditions, I rarely went to the doctor and ignored drug commercials. That all changed when I met my husband. After … Continue reading
Measuring Physician Relationships in a Changing Pharma Environment
The world is always changing, and the pharmaceutical industry is no exception. The Way Things WereCustomer experience research in pharma used to be heavily centered on sales representative performance because they were the “face” of the pharma company and the primary … Continue reading
Doctor’s Orders: Why Patient Engagement Matters
Ensuring that patients understand, accept and follow recommended treatment plans is the first step towards the best possible outcome—medically for the patient and financially for the healthcare delivery system. Similarly, physicians are in the best position to individualize this treatment … Continue reading
Technology RSS FeedGet via email
Making VR a Market Research Reality
Virtual Reality Is More Than Fun and Games Over the past four years, a flurry of product introductions has created significant buzz around the area of virtual reality (VR), and much of the hype is well deserved. Users confirm that … Continue reading
Will Uber Health and Lyft Concierge Change Healthcare?
This year Uber and Lyft formally entered the healthcare market to offer rideshare services to nonemergency patients for transportation to scheduled doctor appointments. Patient no-shows are a prevalent problem in the US, with an estimated 3.6 million Americans reportedly missing … Continue reading
Amazon Is At It Again: Disrupting Healthcare and Pharma
Amazon already has a deep hook in the book, retail, delivery service, music, video, restaurant and even grocery space. It looks like healthcare is its next big target. Healthcare is a broad arena tangled in complexities. Most consumers struggle with … Continue reading
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How to Optimize Go-to-market Strategies Quickly and Efficiently
Lessons from the Consumer Packaged Goods Industry The telecom industry has always been innovative, but the innovation has been mostly incremental. Over the past century, we had telegraphs, then wired telephones, then wireless phones, then cell phones, and now we … Continue reading
Measuring Sponsorship Value in a Changing Digital Landscape
It’s been three-plus years since I wrote an article on measuring the value of sponsorships, and to this day I still get regular emails and calls about it. Years ago I worked for a large, global CPG company that plowed … Continue reading
Death of Net Neutrality Is Not Necessarily a Good Thing for ISPs
New Market Strategies study reveals consumer attitudes on “fast” and “slow” lanes Many industries are closely watching the future of net neutrality. Just last month, the Senate voted to preserve net neutrality, blocking a Federal Communications Commission plan to undo rules … Continue reading