Toronto-based bank of Montreal (BMO) has introduced a new website that it hopes will help Canadians plan for tomorrow, as well as promote and drive business to its financial planners in the process.
The website (www.bmo.com/confidence) gives visitors a look at the fundamentals of financial planning by exploring major life events – such as buying a house and starting a business – and providing five tools and worksheets to assess visitors’ current financial state.
The retirement tool, for example, creates a graph that shows the visitors how close they are to being able to retire when they want, given their current income and savings.
“There are plenty of other websites out there,” says Lisa Parise, director of enterprise wealth planning with BMO in Toronto. “We looked at our competitors and others and what they had to offer. Our life-stage approach and tools set us apart.”
The new website, which also features animated videos, isn’t intended to exclude financial planners from the process. Says Parise: “Planners sometimes think when there are tools out there, it diminishes the need for advice. This is a complement. We’re obviously hoping [the website] will drive calls to financial planners at BMO. The website doesn’t replace a conversation with a financial planner.”
Value for advisors
Financial planners with BMO, for example, are already sending the link to their clients so they will be better informed and more involved.
Having a website of this nature has value for financial planners, says Mike Himmelman, certified financial planner and investment advisor with Citadel Securities Inc. in Halifax: “The calculators are a tool. The website is a tool. They could be used in a presentation to a client.”
BMO launched the website,”Parise says, “to educate and empower Canadians to think about their goals and act on them.”
Canadians could use a helping hand, suggests a new study released by BMO on the same day in late October that the bank launched its new website. The study found that more than one-third of survey respondents do not have a financial plan. Of those respondents, 37% said they simply did not know how to get started. The same percentage said they didn’t believe they had enough money to even make a plan worthwhile.
The BMO website is intended to address both issues, says Parise: “We wanted to demystify the process.”
Helpful but limited
The goal is an important one, says Himmelman: “Anything to get people thinking about saving is beneficial.”
He found the website helpful but limited. The tools enable the website’s visitors to do some of the figuring out for themselves, and the site itself is “a good introduction to financial planning,” Himmelman notes, “but it is pretty simple. There are a lot of unknowns.”
Furthermore, he cautions, there may also be downside to websites that promote financial planning: “People may become overconfident about what is required. These websites get you started, but you’re not going to become a [financial planner] by listening to a cartoon for 15 minutes.”IE
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