Identifying key factors affecting consumers' choice of wealth management services: an AHP approach

Wealth Management (WM) is an advanced type of financial planning that provides high net worth individuals (HNWI) and families with private financial services, such as asset management, banking, estate planning, investment management, and legal resources. The goal of WM is sustaining and growing long-term wealth of clients. Financial service providers in Europe and North America have been providing WM services for decades. However, it is only recently that some financial firms in emerging countries started to offer this service to their clients. To attract clients to adopt WM services, it is necessary to understand what influences consumers' decisions when selecting WM services. Therefore, the researchers adopted the AHP decision model to identify these factors. The relative importance of factors and alternatives were surveyed by directing a questionnaire to consumers who are using, or planning to use, WM services. It appears that, in general, customers' first concern about the WM service is the quality of service, followed by the products and the image. Further analyzes by consumer attributes indicate that HNWIs are particularly concerned about the risk associated with the products offered by the WM service providers. Thus, to attract HNWIs, special attention should be paid to the design of products with relatively less risk and acceptable returns.