Survey explores consumer attitudes towards financial advice, reveals generational trends

intelliflo, the leading cloud-based technology platform for financial advisors, today shared results from its recent survey conducted online by The Harris Poll. More than 2,000 U.S. adults were surveyed around their attitudes and behaviors related to financial advice.

Key findings from the survey include:

• 71% of Gen Z (ages 18-25) and 72% of Millennials (ages 26-41) strongly or somewhat agree that there are financial topics they want advice on but aren’t sure how to get it.
• Only about 1 in 3 Americans (32%) turn to registered financial advisors for financial advice, while more than half (52%) turn to family and more than 2 in 5 (41%) turn to digital sources.
  • 44% of Gen Z, 49% of Millennials and 47% of Gen Xers (ages 42-57) turn to digital sources for financial advice, including social media platforms (like Instagram or TikTok – 15%), blogs/vlogs (7%), podcasts (10%), and other online sources (27%).
• The top barrier preventing Americans from seeking financial advice from a registered financial advisor when they want/need it is the belief that they don’t think they have enough money to hire one (35%).
• Roughly two thirds of Americans (68%) say a personalized financial plan based on their goals would be an extremely or very important factor if they were considering a financial advisor.   

“As evidenced by our recent survey, there is a significant need and desire for financial advice across the board, but many simply don’t know how to access it,” said Jennifer Valdez, president of Americas, intelliflo. “Technology can play a critical role in helping financial advisors to efficiently serve these consumers. This need for more modern, digital software is why intelliflo was formed one year ago, with the mission of widening access to financial advice.”

On March 1, 2021, intelliflo combined five leading software businesses under one brand to offer its customers around the world a broader range of end-to-end solutions that span the financial advisory lifecycle. The platform’s scalable, API-driven architecture drives new levels of flexibility, efficiency, and personalization within financial advice, including financial planning, practice management, digital account opening, reporting, indexing, trading and rebalancing portfolios. intelliflo supports over 30,000 financial advisors worldwide across 2,500 companies, representing more than three million end-investors and over $1 trillion in assets serviced.

Valdez continued, “We introduced intelliflo to give advisors the robust software and digital tools they need to efficiently serve investors and provide the communication, collaboration and self-service tools modern consumers expect. intelliflo remains committed to enabling advisors to more effectively support investors across all demographics and sophistication levels, ultimately improving their financial health.”