Source/Contribution by : NJ Publications
Wish You A Very Happy New Year !!
The year 2017 was an action packed year for our industry with regular headlines made throughout the year. The year started with the push of the digital payments in the post demo period and ended with big debate on bitcoins. Intermittently we passed through news on GST, tech-startups, rising markets, SEBI consultation papers and Aadhar notifications. Looking at 2017, it shouldn't surprise us if year 2018 turns out to be a year of rapid transformation and evolution in the industry.
So what is the transformation and evolution we are talking about? What are the key trends that are shapeing up the industry? These are the obvious questions that need to be answered and as financial advisors, needed to be understood.
Key trends:
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Democratisation and adoption of Internet: Thanks to competition in the telecom industry, data is becoming very affordable in India. Combined with falling prices of smart mobile phones, India has emerged among the top contries for very high internet penetration and the highest with data consumption. What internet access to the last person in remote village, devoid of roads and electricity, can do is amazing. Today he feels empowered and equal to virtually anyone, powered again with the JAM trinity. This has opened doors for digital banking, access to financial products, ecommerce, social media, news and so much more. It comes as a surprise to many that Indians have found themselves to be so comfortable using apps like Facebook, Whatsapp, Paytm, BHIM. This is also a reason why we say that India is a very data rich country. It is perhaps safe to say today that no one is shy of technology or using it as long as it is easy and it fulfills a person's needs.
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Technology is becoming mainstream: There was a time when products, features, price differentials was enough to influence decision making in financial products. Today however, convenience, features, customer servicing, digital availability, etc. are also becoming mainstream. Technology is no longer limited to backoffice processes. With technology taking center stage and attacting attention, the fin-tech startup community are now coming out with simple, neatly packaged and easy solutions across board in financial services industry. This has forced incumbent heavyweights in the industry to sit up and take notice, especially players in the banking and equity broking business. Their is a growing realisation that a digitally integrated, technology centric but client focused solutions is a must for success.
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Data is the new oil: When Mukesh Ambani uttered these lines, what must have been in mind? Let me try. We are well into the information age and data is what differentiates winners and loosers. As a country, we may have been unfortunate to have huge oil reserves and were also late to technology adoption. However, the later has actually been a boon in disguise as India can directly adopt new technologies with much enthusiasm and emerge a global leader, which it is doing remarkedly well, especially powered by the JAM trinity. India today also has the largest consumption of internet data in the world. Within financial services industry, data is weighted in gold and everything from client acquisition, servicing, business decisions, sales, etc. is powered by intelligence gathered from data. Just to cite an example, every major company today is focussing on Business & Sales Analytics to find cross-sell and up-sell opportunities in new and existing clientele. Client communications are made keeping these outcomes in mind instead of the earlier practice of bombarding everyone with everything you have to sell.
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Emergence of new technologies: 2017 was also a year when new technologies gained critical mass, enough to intrigue even the non-technical, business guys. Terms like Artifical Intelligence, Machine Learning, Chatbots, Robotic Process Automation (RPA), Blockchain, Internet of Things (iOT), etc. now sound familiar to us. Financial services industry is now exploring and adopting some of these technologies in their business operations. For example, AI and social media analytics today play a very important part in marketing. Chatbots (a chat software which talks like a human being to a customer) have literrally become a backbone for customer servicing in many companies. Even companies like SBI are today studying blockchain technology to find appropriate usages.
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