How Asset Planning Corporation transformed financial services scheduling for clients with Cronofy

Founded in 1975, Asset Planning Corporation are experts at managing their clients’money and investments. As with all service-based business, great relationships are at the core of their work. When it comes to money there’s also an additional need for trust. Many clients work with Asset Planning Corporation for decades, throughout their career and retirement and to make arrangements for when they pass away. It’s a lifelong partnership and delivering a first-class service is a high priority for the firm. The nature of their work demands attention to detail when it comes to issues surrounding compliance, security and privacy.

Asset Planning Corporation are also pioneering in their commitment to using digital technology to enable more inclusive financial planning and to enhance their service. Recently they’ve had success launching a subscription based financial planning service, seeing it as a new avenue for which to reach young investors looking for financial planning.

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The challenge

Asset Planning Corporation set out on a search for a new scheduling partner to help organize their meetings when they realised that Calendly – their provider at the time – couldn’t meet all of their requirements. It was especially true of Calendly’s permanent booking links that didn’t match with their consultative rather than sales focused philosophy.

Another drawback of permanent booking links is that they allow prospects and clients access to the advisors’ calendars at any time and reducing the level on control advisors have over their schedule.

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“In financial services, an ample amount of time is spent scheduling appointments with current or prospective clients.  We wanted to stand out from our competitors and offer scheduling that enables the client to have some control and choose a time that works best for them.”

Jonathan McAlister | Client Service Associate, Asset Planning Corp.

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Delivering a bespoke scheduling experience to prospects and customers help them understand that the relationship is valued and personalized. It makes sense that this is a high priority. The emphasis on building trust and maintaining a close and long-term relationship demanded a first-class experience when organizing regular meetings between clients and asset managers. The solution needed to be as simple as possible with no extra work for the client.

Permanent booking links, which open up the calendar of the event host also offered their team less control and they had concerns about security which was a top priority. Cronofy was recommended to Asset Planning Corporation by their IT consultant as a possible alternative.

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The solution

What attracted Asset Planning Corporation to Cronofy’s Scheduler was the ability to generate a new scheduling link for each meeting. These links are personalized with the contact details, name of the event and video conferencing info. The clients only has to choose a time to book a meeting in two clicks.

This perfectly answered their requirement to provide a personalized scheduling experience.

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Cronofy allows for more customization when booking a single meeting than a permanent booking link. The Scheduler also offers an extra degree of control and clients can only use it once, to book a single meeting which better meets Asset Planning Corporation’s needs.

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“We chose to use Cronofy because of the unique calendar link invites you can send to a client. Being able to send specific times to a client to choose from for their meeting with you is great. Other calendar services don’t give the level of specialization Cronofy gives.”

Jonathan McAlister | Client Service Associate, Asset Planning Corp.

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Another great part of the solution was the fact that prospects and clients don’t have to fill out their details. The scheduling link is generated by the financial advisor in a few clicks and pre-filled with the details of the invitee. This shows clients that their advisors care about their time while also feeling more professional.

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“ The fact that you can offer clients very specific times to schedule with us is great. All they have to do is click the time and everything else has been done for them. We don't mind the fact that we enter in their email and their name. It doesn’t take long and the experience is so much better for clients, and of course when we’ve entered their details once, it saves them as a contact in the Scheduler.”

Jonathan McAlister | Client Service Associate, Asset Planning Corp.

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The Cronofy scheduling experience also makes booking meetings more efficient, freeing up time to focus on building the relationship and eliminating email back-and-forth. Asset Planning Corporation are not just using the Scheduler for their portfolio review meetings with clients. Prospects who make enquiries on their website are sent scheduler request links to book initial consultations with advisors. This is another occasion to make a great first impression while eliminating the need to chase prospects with phone calls which might not be picked up.

Enhancing the online booking process by offering times based on the real-time availability of advisors is a seamless experience and allows the firm to meet with potential clients much faster. Adopting digital tools for scheduling creates a simple and hassle-free booking process. It also suits the firm’s goals of diversifying their client base to include younger age groups. Offering a choice of face to face or online conferencing tools gives flexibility and is more appropriate for some investors, particularly considering the shift towards online since 2020.

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Enterprise onboarding

A key requirement for Asset Planning Corporation was for their entire team to be securely centrally onboarded in order to immediately get the full benefit of the Cronofy Scheduler. Other providers were unable to connect to their on-premises Exchange server whereas it is one of Cronofy’s strengths.

Data privacy and security was a big consideration in this project due to the sensitivity of the information contained on calendars and the fact that the industry is heavily regulated.

Connecting to secure calendaring servers, as is often the case in regulated industries, rather than just to calendar services hosted in the cloud is something that Cronofy’s products are designed to do. Using our Enterprise Connect service, the entire team at Asset Planing Corporation could be onboarded and setup at once so they could use the tool straightaway. We worked with their IT team and the onboarding was completed within a day.

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“Cronofy’s products are seamless. The tool and their service has exceeded our expectations and requirements. Cronofy was helpful in getting our calendar synced with Cronofy’s software.  They helped us step by step to get our company all setup. The care Cronofy showed us really felt impactful.”

Jonathan McAlister | Client Service Associate, Asset Planning Corp.

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Do you face a similar scheduling challenge? Get in touch to see how using the Scheduler can transform your client experience.