The way advisors communicate with their clients has changed dramatically in recent years. Digital channels enable advisors to send quick messages to communicate things that might previously have required a phone call or a face-to-face meeting.
Email, in particular, has become one of the most prominent ways for advisors to communicate. Although it may seem like a quick and convenient way to correspond with clients, however, email is not as secure as many advisors think.
“Email communication is very simple and easy, but let’s face it: it is absolutely unsecure,” says Rick Hyde, CEO of Ticoon Technology Inc. “Probably the worst thing you can do is to send any type of sensitive information to your client through email.”
All it takes is a lost device, or a network security breach, for email correspondence to be potentially exposed. And even a single incident of that kind can jeopardize clients’ trust and permanently damage an advisor’s reputation.
See also: Advisor Guide to Online Security.
There are alternative ways of communicating with clients that are just as easy as email, but with a much higher level of security.
The Secure Messaging tool available on the TicoonSales platform, for instance, enables advisors to send messages to clients within a safe, firewall-protected environment. Advisors can compose messages on the platform by logging into TicoonSales, and similar to an email message, they can attach documents.
When a message is sent, the information remains inside the secure Ticoon system, rather than being transmitted across potentially unsecure networks and servers.
Clients will then receive an email notification indicating that a new message is waiting, and they can log into the TicoonTouch system to access the message.
See also: 17 Compliance and Security Problems that Ticoon Solves.
Advisors are able to see when clients have viewed their messages on the Secure Messaging platform. And, clients can respond to messages through the same user-friendly system.
“It gives advisors a secure way to talk to clients,” says Hyde.
The platform allows advisors to search through their messages, and organize them by topic, by client or by date. And, all messages are stored in perpetuity in the secure Ticoon system, helping advisors meet their compliance and record-keeping requirements.