3 ways AI accelerates advisor growth and scale

Key takeaways

• Artificial intelligence cannot replace advisors, but it can help them redefine their role and amplify their value.
• The use of AI tools improves efficiency, enhances high-net-worth client planning services and strengthens client acquisition.
• Advisors and clients alike can benefit from AI technology that is implemented thoughtfully, with strong oversight, data governance and a focus on client trust.

AI is a growth driver (not a replacement) for advisors

Client expectations are increasing. Wealth is transferring to the next generation. In this environment, advisors need to modernize their practice to drive higher productivity, deeper personalization and stronger client relationships. Generative artificial intelligence (AI) arrived right on time.

Advisors are adopting AI in various ways: 68% of wealth management firms are using it in some capacity today. Half of these firms are in the piloting stage, some have incorporated AI at scale for select use cases, and a small number have scaled their use of AI across multiple business functions.

Most advisors are using artificial intelligence in their practice
% of advisors

Given our work with advisors across the industry, the BlackRock Business Consulting team has a unique view into advisors’ experiences and beliefs about AI. Most advisors believe AI can help them work faster and smarter, yet some fear it will replace them or it will be too difficult to learn. But AI is not taking the role of advisors. Rather it is reshaping it in a way that positions advisors to accelerate business growth.

While investors often use AI to seek financial information, only 26% say they would allow AI to manage their investments.¹ Moreover, your value to clients is much bigger than the investments you manage for them. You help them define their financial goals, plan their future, stay on track through volatility and navigate complex decisions.

AI creates advantages for advisors by automating time-consuming tasks, identifying risks and opportunities early, and enhancing the quality and convenience of client services. It is a fascinatingly powerful technology that can support you and your clients in many ways, but it cannot replicate the human connection clients need to feel confident about their future.

Most advisors currently use AI for administrative tasks, but there is potential to benefit in bigger ways. Advisors who fall behind in adopting AI will be disadvantaged in terms of scale, personalization and client expectations.

Advisors favor AI tools that automate administrative tasks
% of AI-enabled advisors by use case

We see three paths to growth that advisors can accelerate by harnessing the power of AI: 1) improving operational efficiency to create capacity for serving more clients, 2) enhancing high-net-worth services such as estate planning, and 3) attracting ideal clients with a scaled, data-driven client acquisition strategy.

1. Improve efficiency with AI-powered workflow automation

Four out of ten advisors who have adopted AI technology say it makes their business more efficient and saves them a significant amount of time.² Common applications include virtual assistants like Copilot or ChatGPT that include agents designed for specific recurring tasks. Many advisors use client onboarding agents to automatically review new client documentation, upload important client data to their client relationship management (CRM) system, perform compliance checks and schedule meetings.

External-facing assistants, or client service chatbots, are increasingly ‘popping up’ on advisors’ websites, social media profiles and messaging apps, reducing the advisor’s involvement in simple, high-volume client interactions.

Increasingly, advisors are unlocking additional efficiency gains with AI solutions purpose-built for wealth management business functions, such as meeting automation platforms. Advisors have traditionally spent an average of 10% of their time on activities related to client meetings,³ making this a natural target for automation to lighten the load.

AI-powered meeting automation platforms (e.g., Jump, Zocks) include tools that draft agendas and pre-meeting briefs using client information from all available sources such as financial planning documents, notes of prior meetings and recent client communications. Note-taking tools allow advisors to be more present and attentive when they meet with clients. After meetings, AI tools update the CRM, compile ‘to-do’ lists, assign tasks, disseminate information to team members and draft follow-up client emails.

Having an AI-enabled process around meeting preparation, note-taking and post-meeting administrative work allows advisors to focus on the more important, human-to-human part of their client relationships.

2. Enhance your high-net-worth services with AI-enabled estate planning

Offering personalized advanced planning services can help you attract more high-net-worth clients, but it can also challenge your bandwidth. AI enablement can be a game changer for your high-net-worth capabilities, and estate planning is a great place to start. Most advisors provide estate planning services to their high-net-worth clients and 62% say it is one of the most time-intensive services they provide.

Estate planning is the most offered and most time-consuming service
% of advisors citing as among the most time-intensive services they provide

Advisors save a significant amount of time and deepen their value to clients by using AI-powered estate and tax planning platforms (e.g., FP Alpha, Vanilla) to automate and enhance their processes:

• Document analysis and insights. AI can read and analyze documents in all types of formats, including handwritten notes, and generate tailored recommendations for the client in significantly less time. It structures complex data and surfaces potential inconsistencies or vulnerabilities. As an example, advisors can use artificial intelligence to analyze trust agreements, operating agreements and tax returns, and identify any misalignment between current asset concentrations and original funding assumptions, outdated provisions, or entity structures that no longer reflect the client family’s governance priorities.
• Scenario modeling. When advisors anticipate a change in client circumstances (upcoming retirement, sale of a business, trust distribution), AI tools can model the tax implications across multiple entity layers and time horizons. This helps advisors effectively evaluate and discuss possible solutions and outcomes with their clients.
• Visual mapping of complex structures. AI tools can generate personalized visualizations of complex concepts in a variety of client-friendly formats. These ‘visual maps’ help advisors explain to clients how their assets, entities and trusts are connected as well as the tax implications of those arrangements across different scenarios.

The benefit to advisors is greater efficiency and the ability to provide estate and tax planning services to more clients. The benefit to clients is a deeper level of service: Advisors who provide AI-enabled tax and estate planning services spend less time managing documents and more time evaluating strategic questions, like ‘Should we consider restructuring this trust before the next liquidity event?’ or ‘What governance conversations need to happen before decision-making shifts to the next generation?’

Additionally, AI tools continually monitor estate plans and alert advisors when a change in tax laws or client circumstances may have an impact. Early awareness can help advisors coordinate the necessary expertise and lead families through complex decisions more effectively.

3. Acquire ideal clients with a scaled, data-driven marketing strategy

Purchasing leads and cultivating prospects through referrals and networking can take a lot of your time and money, and serving non-ideal clients can hinder profitability and growth. In an increasingly competitive landscape, advisors have begun leveraging artificial intelligence to grow their business more intentionally and with less drain on their resources.

AI-powered marketing tools and platforms designed specifically for the wealth management industry can help advisors target the right prospects, identify high quality leads, expedite conversion and drive ongoing client engagement at scale. AI automates the core functions of an end-to-end marketing strategy:

• Lead generation. AI can parse data from website forms, inbound emails, social media conversations and business cards, and use predictive scoring to identify high-quality leads. Some AI-powered lead generation systems (e.g., FINNY) go beyond data scraping to track major events in prospects’ lives and then surface individual leads at the time the prospect is most likely to convert.

• Content creation. Crafting marketing content is time-consuming work. Instead, advisors can feed talking points into an AI tool that creates branded content tailored to specific audiences in various formats such as email, web pages, social media posts, newsletters, brochures and event invitations.
• Targeted campaigns. AI-powered marketing platforms can be integrated with an advisor’s CRM to generate profiles resembling the most valuable clients and then analyze data from external advertising platforms like Google or Meta to determine the type of content that is most effective for driving conversion with each profile. The output is a marketing campaign with scaled, personalized content. Some platforms (e.g., Snappy Kraken) include a library of pre-built, comprehensive marketing campaigns that can be automatically customized for the targeted profile.

• Niche-specific messaging. Re-writing content for different audiences is inefficient, causing many advisors to settle for generic content that is less effective. AI tools can convert one core message into multiple credible, niche-specific versions that consider the pain points and benefits that most resonate with specific client segments (e.g., physicians, business owners, growing families).
• Compliance reviews. AI marketing platforms often include built-in compliance agents that review both AI-and human-generated copy, flag potential violations and recommend edits. While the capabilities of these tools may be robust, it is imperative to maintain human oversight of all marketing output to mitigate compliance risks.
• Performance metrics. Advisors can maximize the impact of their marketing campaigns by using AI to surface real-time insights across channels, niches and creative variations, and recommend next steps. Some marketing platforms provide enterprise-level insights (e.g., VastAssembly) including consolidated growth metrics across teams and campaigns, giving firm leadership visibility into AUM performance and marketing efficiency compared with their peers.

Advisors are increasingly embedding artificial intelligence into their client acquisition processes. End-to-end marketing automation platforms can help advisors build a bigger pipeline of clients without a bigger workload, which can be a competitive advantage for a growing practice.

Manage AI risk with strong governance and data security

If you use AI-driven technology, or you plan to, be mindful of the potential vulnerabilities and maintain close oversight to protect your clients and your business.

• Data privacy and security are paramount. AI tools may touch sensitive information. Consult a technology specialist to ensure your data policies and procedures are adequately protecting your business and clients.
• Output is as good as the input. Establish procedures for ensuring the data feeding your AI-driven technology is consistently current, accurate and properly stewarded to avoid erroneous or misleading outputs.
• Human oversight is critical. Thoroughly review AI-generated outputs, especially where the workflow involves regulated tasks, such as account openings, or the output is client-facing, such as marketing content or email correspondence. Detailed audit trails and human signoffs help mitigate potential regulatory and reputational risks.
• Preserve your personal touch. Clients want to know that you care enough to communicate with them personally. If they sense your communications are machine-generated, it can harm your relationship. If you use AI to draft client communications, edit the drafts to ensure it sounds like you.

Only 48% of financial services firms have formal AI governance committees for setting policies and assessing risks relating to the use of AI tools, and only 28% have a process for testing or validating AI outputs.⁵ Client financial outcomes and trust are on the line, regulatory scrutiny is increasing, and the combination of AI’s speed and scale means that errors can be catastrophic. Establish rigorous procedures and train your staff to best manage risks and keep data secure.

Lead AI adoption with a clear growth strategy

Artificial intelligence can empower you to be more tactical in streamlining processes, allocating resources and focusing on the best growth opportunities. Yet even with powerful new technology at your disposal, the growth of your business still hinges on the strategic decisions you make about your business, clients and value proposition.

The BlackRock Business Consulting team can help you evolve your practice and reallocate your time where it matters most: serving your clients and growing your firm with intention, while staying human at the center and future‑ready at the edges. Contact your BlackRock representative for more information.