Drivers of client satisfaction: A study of financial advisors and client service techniques

Organizations are increasingly being challenged with the necessity of increasing bottom-line profits. Some earlier research has shown that if clients can be retained for a long time by an organization, those clients become more and more profitable. Other research has looked at clients from the point of view of satisfaction and what that term really means. If it could be shown that certain ways of servicing clients would keep them more satisfied—and loyal—to an organization, then organizations might want to include these specific practices in their strategic plans.; The present study proposed to identify four drivers of client satisfaction—financial, learning and growth of support staff, internal business processes, and client needs—to which sales people in the financial services industry (financial advisors) might pay attention in order to have satisfied clients. A new survey was developed to capture the responses of a random sample of 2,000 financial advisors concerning specifics of these drivers.; The results of the survey analysis showed that only one driver—the financial driver—was significant to the advisors in keeping their clients satisfied. The dependent variable was a satisfaction index developed by the subject organization to measure client satisfaction of its top clients. Length of service with the organization was shown to be significant in predicting client satisfaction, but gender was not. Higher levels of the satisfaction index were found at higher levels of length of service. The internal reliability of the drivers was low, leading the researcher to conclude that the survey should have more validity and reliability testing. However, this study is just a beginning to determine how client service techniques may predict the long-term satisfaction of an organization's top clients.