Financial services industry losing out on the potential of women investors

It appears financial services firms are missing the mark when it comes to their relationship with women. This comes out of a report from marketing data and consulting firm Kantar entitled Winning Over Women released this week. The report highlights an estimated $782 billion in investable assets lost by firms via their poor relationships with women.

When compared to men, women are less confident about their financial future, less risk tolerant, and have lower engagement in investing than their male counterparts. The report points to several ways to increase customer experience, such as improved retail environments and enhanced communication, as methods of more effectively engaging women.

According to Anita Watkins, global head of qualitative, Kantar, “Financial institutions need to build trust and invite women to engage. They need to involve women as customers and not confuse confidence with competence. And most importantly they need to empower women, not diminish them. Banks and advisers need to get to know their female customer as a person.”

In order to better engage women, the report makes several suggestions for financial institutions, including:

• Conduct better research to understand female customers and their financial life cycle
• Build authentic communication via understanding of a diverse customer base
• Learn from other brands which connect with women beyond marketing
• Always deliver to the female customer as promised

These findings come on the heels of a report earlier in the year which estimated retail banks are losing out on $15 billion in revenue as a result in flawed marketing toward women.

Tearsheet’s Take: The growing wealth of women in the global economy continues to increase significantly. As such, financial firms are now forced to rethink how their businesses are not satisfying the needs of a growing client base with increasing financial power. Additionally, the Kantar report notes the propensity for women to be more loyal customers, making it more important than ever for financial firms to build services for women and retain their growing business.