True Potential's chief executive Daniel Harrison has said the advice business is looking into whether it can "gamify" its annual suitability reviews to encourage clients to provide its advisers with as much information as possible themselves.
He said this could result in a clients being rewarded if they keep their advisers updated with information by moving up levels, and potentially being offered rewards.
Harrison said the aim of this would be to make sure annual reviews were focused around more meaningful conversations rather than "box ticking" exercises by encouraging clients to carry out some of these processes themselves online.
He said: "The reason for bringing the annual suitability review online was to help the client look after themselves more. It frees up all advisers to have proper conversations with clients rather than box-ticking conversations.
"We are in the process of looking into how we can make sure clients [provide us with updated information] - but also all of those things which means they are more inclined to log in on a more frequent basis.
"That’s where some of the gamification kicks in and it almost starts to unlock levels."
Asked if True Potential was considering whether to offer rewards, similar to life insurer Vitality which provides its clients with things like cinema tickets and discounts at certain retailers, Harrison said this was something the advice business was exploring.
But he said: "One of our values is to treat a client with £1 the same as a client with £1mn. We don’t want to say ‘you are a better client’ if you have more money.
"It is about using technology with a purpose. One of the things I hate about technology is when it doesn't have a purpose. It becomes a gimmick."
About a year ago private equity firm Cinven bought a majority stake in True Potential for an undisclosed sum.
'If there was a deal of interest, we would have to shape it our way'
Earlier this year the Newcastle-based company saw recorded results, with profits up 80 per cent to £132mn and assets on its in-house platform passing £22bn.
Harrison said True Potential would probably recruit 300 advisers by the end of 2022.
He said: "We very deliberately on-board clients and advisers one-by-one. That can seem slower but for us it means we have a client for many years."
Harrison said this on-boarding policy was the reason True Potential was particularly interested in buying advice firms.
He said: "We have been offered some in the past but it doesn't fit with the way we think is the right way of on-boarding clients. But never say never. If there was a deal of interest we would have to shape it our way. It wouldn't be a case of bringing 100 per cent of the advisers and clients across."
Harrison said the same was true for platforms, where there has been a large amount of M&A activity in recent years.
