Adding High Touch to High Tech

[One of the biggest challenges for technologists is in creating solutions that not only solve a major problem, but that can also be readily used and embraced by the people whose problem is being solved. In other words, there is the need for building tech solutions specifically around the inherent inertia and habits of human beings. Countless stories exist of a great new tech solution being bought with high hopes and expectations to just sit there - rarely being used by anyone.

 It takes a purposeful and focused effort by technologists in designing their Hi-Tech with a Hi-Touch; of knowing the limits of the technology and understanding the human beings they are innovating for. To better understand how to address these inherent problems, the Institute for Innovation Development talked with Corey Westphal, CEO of Mobile Assistant who is actively infusing High-Touch to transform traditional dictation service technology into a tool that truly engages and boosts advisor effectiveness.] 

Hortz: What did your original research tell you about the needs for and the problems with dictation services in the financial services industry?

Westphal: Before Mobile Assistant, I owned and operated a medical transcription service company for 16 years. When I initially researched potential industries that could benefit from high quality dictation other than the healthcare industry, the financial services industry immediately came to the top of the list. I was however, surprised to discover a high quality dictation solution did not exist for financial professionals. 

Advisors who were interested in using dictation as a client meeting note documentation tool were forced to settle for inaccurate software solutions or dictation services that were not much better. The time spent editing notes produced by these dictation options was, in my opinion, a big reason for the lack of adoption by advisors. Why use dictation to document meeting notes if clean up and editing is required for it to be an accurate solution. It was both an eye opening and exciting revelation because I knew this industry could benefit so much from a solution like Mobile Assistant.

Hortz: How does a dictation service “bullet-proof” an advisor’s practice and what kind of adoption impact have you found that it can have on an advisor’s overall business?

Westphal: From a compliance standpoint, the right dictation solution can help provide a layer of protection for advisors in three very important ways: 1. Capturing meeting notes efficiently and accurately saving hours of typing time each week, 2. Increasing meeting documentation detail greatly supports compliance and fiduciary responsibility protection, and 3. Having real-time access to previous meeting notes better prepares advisors for upcoming meetings and protects against recollection mistakes.

As for the impact on an overall business, the adoption impact was clearly illustrated by a 2017 case study by one of our largest financial services customers. The study of over 1100 advisors compared asset-growth of Mobile Assistant adopters versus non- or infrequent adopters. Mobile Assistant adopters for client meeting notes averaged over $400,000 in increased asset-growth, and, for new advisors, there was over $2 million asset growth increase compared to their counterparts who started their careers without the service. One of the largest impacts was the increased revenue to the overall organization of over $260 million directly attributable to the use of dictation. A powerful story of what dictation adoption can do for individuals and organizations.

Hortz: The underlying voice-to-text dictation technology hasn’t changed much but what refinements have you made with Mobile Assistant to more humanize the technology?

Westphal: Software solutions like Dragon and Siri have and will continue to improve, but there will always be a need for a human component in the voice to text translation process to ensure accuracy. Although Mobile Assistant is categorized as financial technology, one aspect of our cutting edge technology that we have in place is the means by which we are connecting our customers to the best transcriptionists in the dictation service industry. At Mobile Assistant we are committed to utilizing US based, professional transcriptionists exclusively.

What does professional mean to us and why does it matter? Our transcriptionists are training on current financial and insurance terminology, and are only hired after extensive testing, background checks and interviews. As an added layer of quality assurance, Mobile Assistant also employs full time Quality Assurance Editors who support our growing transcription staff. If there is a question about a term or difficulty deciphering a dictation, our transcriptionists have the ability to flag the note for quality review so our Quality Assurance Editors can listen to the dictation and complete it. The human touch is the key ingredient in our process to produce highly accurate notes for our customers, and is all done behind the scenes.

Hortz: How are you addressing the chronic problem of relatively low user adoption for advisor tech tools? How are you designing your service to better enable advisors to put this tool into their day-to-day routine and use it effectively?

Westphal: The biggest challenge for any advisor to incorporate new technology in their practice is the change in routine. I think this is especially true for dictation, since the client meeting note process has to be changed to include the immediate use of dictation after the meeting to ensure increased detail and accuracy of the information. To have the biggest impact on an advisors’ practice, I believe a dictation solution needs to be more than just voice to text. 

Our integrations with CRM companies is a good example of the importance of technology solutions working together to help increase adoption. By delivering Mobile Assistant meeting notes directly to the CRM, advisors have a streamlined process by which notes are captured after a meeting, and those notes delivered where they are needed. Other important features incorporated in the Mobile Assistant service to help increase adoption include Templates, Search and View Notes Section in our mobile app that includes a Tag feature (add keyword search criteria), and a soon to be released Dictation Wizard. Technology solutions that integrate with existing technology, and provide value added features is essential for widespread advisor adoption.

Hortz: What I find interesting is that you not only created a series of standard templates but you actively work with your advisor customers in co-creating specific templates that most help and motivate advisors to use the service. Can you discuss this aspect of your service and what have you learned through the co-creation process?

Westphal: When Mobile Assistant entered the financial industry technology scene eight years ago, one characteristic that I perceived as a negative has worked in our favor - no financial industry experience. That forced us to listen! By deeply listening to what our customers, including both individual advisors and financial corporations, needed from their dictation service, we have been able to build a solution designed to fulfill needs specific to this industry. 

Templates, for example, are offered to Mobile Assistant users to help the advisor structure their notes in a personalized way. Not every advisor or company has the same documentation needs, so we help them create templates that structure meeting notes in a way that is most beneficial to them. What questions need to be answered at the end of every client meeting can be very different from one office to the next. What I learned over these eight years in this industry is that advisors are ultimately the best resource for us to improve our service. By listening carefully to what advisors really need from their dictation service, the features and functionality of Mobile Assistant are constantly evolving.

Hortz: Where is your R&D taking you? What other enhancements and tools are you planning for Mobile Assistant?

Westphal: This is a great question that follows the same advice that I just mentioned. Listening to our customers over the years led me to the realization that it is not enough for us to provide accurate notes and an easy app to speak those notes. For many of our customers to be truly successful incorporating dictation, more guidance and structure was needed.

New for 2018, Mobile Assistant will be launching the Dictation Wizard. The idea behind this new feature is that changing a routine is hard. For advisors to successfully implement dictation into their client meeting routine, help in the form of prompts can break down the barrier to help get the process started. Our customers now have the ability to create Wizards within our iPhone app. These are customizable questions that are read back during a dictation and are displayed on the record screen.

 Now an advisor can create a dictation guide without needing to write down or print off a template. Have a top ten questionnaire you want to be prompted for after every new client meeting? Simply create a new Wizard called “New Client Onboarding” and type the ten questions you want read back to you. At the record screen you can select the Wizard you want to use and the questions are read back as you dictate. My hope is that this new feature helps advisors adopt dictation more easily, builds more confidence in using this tool, and helps structure the dictation process for more concise and detailed meeting notes for current adopters of our service.

Hortz: Do you work with other firms in the development of your enhancements and what is the nature of those relationships?

Westphal: Integration enhancements with other technology firms is essential to our success. A great example of successful integration development is with our CRM partner, Redtail. For six years our integration with Redtail delivered the Mobile Assistant notes to a general landing area on the dashboard. Advisors were then required to select the Mobile Assistant note and assign it to a contact or create a new activity. When we received feedback from Redtail/Mobile Assistant integration users that it would be a great enhancement to have the Mobile Assistant notes delivered directly to the contact notes section and have the option to create activities using our service, we knew an enhancement was needed.

The development teams at Mobile Assistant and Redtail worked together to enhance our integration, which now allows advisors to speak three different types of notes: 1. Note delivered directly to the contact Notes section, 2. Activity delivered to the Things To Do Today section of the Redtail Dashboard, and 3. Generic Note delivered to the Mobile Assistant Messages section of the Redtail Dashboard that can be edited and assigned later. This is a great example of two companies working together to deliver an enhancement that benefits advisors, driven by their needs.

Hortz: Have you seen advisors using your solution in ways beyond what the tool was originally intended, beyond client notes and tasks?

Westphal: One aspect of a financial advisor’s responsibilities that I admittedly did not have on my radar was content creation for newsletters, blogs and other communication to clients. People today expect ideas and thoughts from their advisors more than ever before. When I heard that advisors were using Mobile Assistant to create first draft articles that were then used for blogs or newsletters, it was an unexpected use of our service. Instead of sitting down at a computer for hours trying to create a new article, the free flowing idea generation from dictating gives advisors an easy way to create useful content in just minutes.

Hortz: Can you recommend how advisors can apply your learning to their efforts in trying to better engage and add value in their relationships with their clients?

Westphal: I have learned over the years not to underestimate the importance of deeply listening to your customers to fully understand the features and functionality they need. Proactive listening is where the ideas come from to design your service in ways that help break down barriers to change.

Too many business people create from their heads, from their “expertise” and embedded assumptions, to truly see what will actually motivate potential customers. I think that listening to your customers is how you transform a useful invention into a widely used innovation.

Written by Bill Hortz, Founder & Dean, Institute for Innovation Development

The Institute for Innovation Development is an educational and business development catalyst for growth-oriented financial advisors and financial services firms determined to lead their businesses in an operating environment of accelerating business and cultural change. We position our members with the necessary ongoing innovation resources and best practices to drive and facilitate their next-generation growth, differentiation and unique community engagement strategies. The institute was launched with the support and foresight of our founding sponsors - Pershing, Voya Financial, Ultimus Fund Solutions, Fidelity, and Charter Financial Publishing (publisher of Financial Advisor and Private Wealth magazines). For more information click here.