Page 14 - Investment Advisor July/August 2022

INDUSTRY INSIGHTS

By Timothy D. Welsh

An Inside Look at the Technology Advisors Like

Each year, Joel Bruckenstein and Bob Veres ask advisors about their tech
preferences and usage, and what works and doesn’t for them.

very year, the industry gets an
in-depth look at all of the soft-
Eware tools, platforms, appli-
cations and innovation that is driving
the growth in the independent wealth
space. Its form? The annual T3/Inside
Information Advisor Technology survey.
The survey polls the advisory com-
munity to see what tools and appli-
cations they are using, how satisfied
they are with them, and what they are
looking to invest in as their business-
es continue to expand and grow. The
survey, done by Joel Bruckenstein and
Bob Veres, this year had 4,500 respon-
dents who answered nearly 100 ques-
tions, making it one of the most robust
in the industry. Over 800 applications,
services, platforms and software tools stand vs. their competitors and how as consolidation is happening and the
were listed showing just how big and their users feel about their products. backers of these platforms continue
diverse the advisor technology industry And for newer advisor tech companies, to expand capabilities with new fea-
has grown. the pressure to lobby Bruckenstein tures, functionality and, of course,
The survey basically has become and Veres to be listed on the survey is by acquisition.
the “buyers guide” for advisors to see immense so that they can gain visibility For example, in the financial planning
how the tools they are using are being in the industry, even if they have tiny category, eMoney and Money Guide Pro
adopted as well as how satisfied other market shares. each have roughly 33% market share
advisors are with them. The survey also This year, the survey covered 36 dif- (when you add up their various ver-
tracks what tools, applications and plat- ferent categories showing the tremen- sions), with Right Capital around 12%.
forms are emerging based on the general dous growth in the technology space, as The remaining 22% of the market is
sentiment of advisors looking to switch newer technologies are being adopted made up of 17 other products, with
to or adopt various platforms. This is a to support myriad business models that most of those having less than 1% mar-
leading indicator of what new technolo- advisors are deploying to best serve ket share. The leaders beyond the big
gies are gaining traction in an extremely their target clients. three here are Orion (which acquired
fragmented industry. Advizr three years ago) and Asset Map.
“The goal of this annual survey is, KEY TAKEAWAYS Interestingly, the survey found that
and has always been, to help advisors 1. Rise of Oligopoly nearly 70% of Asset Map users also
and members of the fintech community One of the key takeaways from the use another planning application as
answer the most basic questions about survey is that in the most popularly well, again showing how the financial
technology in the financial advisory used applications (CRM, financial plan- planning software industry is trending
space,” Bruckenstein and Veres say in ning), a rising oligopoly is forming toward an oligopolistic structure.
the introduction. in each of these categories. In other In addition, when looking at the CRM
For the software vendor community, words, the top three vendors in each category, we see a similar top-heavy Adobe Stock
the survey is critical to see where they make up the majority of market share concentration with Redtail by far the

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