Avaloq, a leader in digital banking solutions, has launched the Engage app, a solution that allows wealth managers and advisers to engage with clients through social messaging channels such as WhatsApp and WeChat in a secure and compliant manner.

Avaloq Engage has been developed to help financial institutions capitalize on the growth of new sales and service channels and comes at a time when “conversational banking” has become a major trend in wealth advisory and the wider financial services sector. The rollout of Avaloq Engage follows the recent launch of Avaloq Wealth and forms part of a new stand-alone, core-agnostic suite of digital wealth management platforms.

The Engage app allows relationship managers to service clients who use social messaging services in a responsive and timely manner and engage in meaningful conversations in real time through chat, notification and video calls. It also offers news and content provision, semantic language processing and smart “client intent” detection to deliver a higher level of service. For clients, it allows them to interact with their relationship manager using their preferred channels and perform banking transactions in a secure and compliant manner.

Use of digital channels and the demand for new ways of client interaction have accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic, with engagement levels likely to escalate further as social messaging services become mainstream platforms. WhatsApp usage increased by 51% during COVID-19 lockdown, for instance, and many banks and wealth managers have found it difficult to maintain the high levels of availability and responsiveness required to deliver tailored advice at the time when clients need it most.

In a recent white paper, Rise of Conversational Banking – Transforming Mobile Client Advice, Avaloq outlined the significant opportunities open to financial institutions that cater to the increase in new channels and digital engagement. While servicing clients on their preferred channels, conversational banking still fulfils the expectation of strict compliance and security and allows relationship managers to move from a sporadic exchange with their clients to ongoing interaction. A set of artificial intelligence-based analytic tools and semantic language processing capabilities helps the relationship manager to detect client intentions and answer client questions.

Fabian Grande, Avaloq Group Product Manager, Engage Platform, said: “Avaloq Engage has been launched to allow wealth managers to benefit from socio-behavioural changes as digital channels have become an integral part of the customer journey. Face-to-face advice will remain a central part of wealth advisory but social channels have risen in importance in much the same way as telephone banking did decades ago. Keeping ahead of this fragmented environment, and turning it into a competitive advantage, is at the heart of Avaloq Engage.”

Martin Greweldinger, Avaloq Group Chief Product Officer, said: “The wealth management sector is evolving, and it is evolving fast. Aspects of the market will remain the same, such as offering high levels of client service and competitive products. But digitalization is creating new challenges and opportunities. There are new market entrants, a focus on the new generation of wealth owners, including digital natives, and competition is fierce. Companies need to adapt to remain relevant, outcompete and succeed.”

Launched in July this year, Avaloq Wealth enables banks and wealth managers to provide highly personalized investment advice and bespoke services to their clients while reducing the time spent on preparing and analysing investment proposals. Besides Wealth and Engage, Avaloq is also planning to launch another stand-alone platform, Insight, in the coming months. The new, highly innovative platforms are designed to provide cost-efficient end-to-end digital solutions at a level of simplicity that will pave the way for the democratization of wealth management.