Enhances the Client Experience with Personalized Content

With Miles Hutcherson — AVP and Digital Automation Product Owner

400

Sellers enabled on Seismic

23,000

Seller hours saved yearly accessing and sharing content

~$1.8M

In efficiency savings from an improved seller workflow for sharing client-facing content

AllianceBernstein is a leading global investment management firm that offers high-quality research and diversified investment services to institutional investors, individuals, and private wealth clients in major world markets. As of November 30, 2023, AllianceBernstein had $696 billion in assets under management.

The Challenge

“Seismic helped solve the global problem of ensuring we had the most up-to-date marketing materials readily available to our sales teams.”

Miles Hutcherson

AVP and Digital Automation Product Owner

Streamline Operations and Improve the Client Experience

AllianceBernstein (AB) is one of the largest investment management firms in the world, with more than $691 billion in assets under management. AB provides high-quality services while embracing innovation.

Miles Hutcherson, AVP and Digital Automation Product Owner at AB, works in the client group’s digital experience team, focusing on supporting the automation of marketing materials and serving as the Seismic platform owner. The digital experience team is also responsible for the website and social selling program, focusing on creating marketing materials and integrating data into these materials to support the sales team.

Before implementing Seismic, AB faced content management challenges because various teams worldwide used different platforms like SharePoint, Salesforce, and others for marketing content. A lack of a single system for all global teams led to content sprawl, outdated materials, and inefficient maintenance of content assets. Seismic initially served as a content automation tool but later became the solution to these challenges to improve client experience by helping sellers tailor their interactions.

The primary goal was to establish a “single source of truth” for marketing materials, streamlining content management and improving data integration across the organization. “Seismic helped solve the global problem of ensuring we had the most up-to-date marketing materials readily available to our sales teams,” said Hutcherson.

The digital experience team has three overarching goals for the upcoming year: streamline operations, improve client service, and enhance reporting capabilities, all with the aim of continuous improvement in their Seismic platform to create more efficient sellers.

“Seismic helped solve the global problem of ensuring we had the most up-to-date marketing materials readily available to our sales teams.”

Miles Hutcherson

AVP and Digital Automation Product Owner

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The Solution

“Sellers can build a presentation, save it to their Workspace, have the meeting without any compliance concerns, and maintain a professional tone while turning around content for the meeting much faster.”

Miles Hutcherson

AVP and Digital Automation Product Owner

Driving Operational Optimization with Content Automation

AB has implemented several automation projects in collaboration with Seismic to streamline operations and optimize content production.

Client Meeting Deck Automation: AB uses a data feed to fill in the Seismic Live Form, which automatically populates a deck based on an existing client’s portfolio, updating content and metrics dynamically. “What it does is allow for key slides in the client services deck to be automated,” said Hutcherson. “It’s been very successful. It’s used countless times a quarter, and it’s successful enough to expand this to our separately managed accounts.”

Employee Self-Service Tool: Although not traditional automation, AB created an employee self-service tool using Seismic’s functionality, allowing retail staff to customize slides with guardrails in place to ensure compliance with financial regulations. “That’s been a huge success story for us. It allows our US retail staff to pick and pack slides based on the products we are pushing that quarter and ensure that the disclosures and performance rendered at the end are associated with the slides pulled in,” explained Hutcherson.
These automation efforts have successfully streamlined various processes within the company, saving sellers 23,000 hours yearly personalizing content.

Miles Hutcherson

AVP and Digital Automation Product Owner

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Miles Hutcherson

AVP and Digital Automation Product Owner

Delivering a Better Client Experience with Personalized Content

AB helps its sellers deliver a better client experience through mobile access to content with Seismic. Mobile access is crucial for sellers with a busy schedule with multiple daily meetings, especially in the retail space. The ability to use mobile devices, such as iPads, and features like Workspace and the presentation builder allow sellers to prepare for meetings sequentially and create customized decks on the go.

Before Seismic, preparing presentations involved accessing documents from SharePoint, making edits, obtaining compliance approval, and then conducting the meeting. With Seismic’s mobile application and presentation builder, this process has become much more efficient, allowing sellers to create presentations as little as 10 minutes before their meeting.

“In the retail space, where you are traveling between meetings, mobile access is a big advantage. Sellers can build a presentation, save it to their Workspace, have the meeting without any compliance concerns, and maintain a professional tone while turning around content for the meeting much faster,” said Hutcherson.

Working seamlessly on mobile devices is a significant advantage for AB, especially when integrating with platforms like Salesforce and SharePoint.

Improving Sales and Service Efficiency by Streamlining Manual Tasks with the Seismic and Salesforce Integration

AB uses the Salesforce integration with Seismic to manage client interactions to improve sales and service efficiency.

Seismic and Salesforce serve as a “single pane of glass” for their US retail staff. This Salesforce integration helps maintain contact records, track content interactions as opportunities, and pass data between Seismic and Salesforce.

“The integration allows us to have Seismic where folks work. They’re accessing Seismic directly in Salesforce, where they’re managing a relationship with a potential client and can send content directly from there,” said Hutcherson, emphasizing the benefit of streamlining content sharing and reducing the need to switch between platforms.

In addition, AB implemented a pre-authorization workflow within Salesforce, mainly for Alternatives content sharing. This workflow ensures that clients are qualified investors before receiving specific content. Users fill out pre-authorization requests in Salesforce, and Seismic leverages this process when sending documents. If the contact is not authorized, Seismic restricts document access, enhancing compliance in the Alternatives space.

“The integration helps track user engagement and supports compliance by automating a manual process that can be prone to human error,” said Hutcherson.

The new pre-authorization workflow allows AB to implement tighter security measures by preventing document downloads and encouraging content sharing through LiveSend to mitigate institutional risks.

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The Results

Driving Personalized Client Engagements to Close Deals Faster

Seismic addressed three main issues for the company: centralization, engagement metrics, and automation expansion.

“From AllianceBernstein’s standpoint, ensuring that our materials are up to date and relevant is the core functionality of Seismic. Seismic serves the purpose of maintaining consistency and coherence in global marketing,” said Hutcherson.

With Seismic, AB helps sellers get to market faster and deliver a personalized client experience from anywhere they are working. By saving sellers over 23,000 hours a year accessing content, AB finds ~$1.8M in efficiency savings from an improved seller workflow for sharing client-facing content.

In the future with Seismic, AllianceBernstein plans to expand to a macro-level analysis, scoring clients and measuring sales funnel success, and leverage Seismic’s data enrichment app to gather information on user interactions. This data will help AB realize connections and tailor content for individual users, ultimately driving more effective personalized engagements and closing sales funnels faster.

Improving Sales and Service Efficiency by Streamlining Manual Tasks with the Seismic and Salesforce Integration

AB uses the Salesforce integration with Seismic to manage client interactions to improve sales and service efficiency.

“The integration helps track user engagement and supports compliance by automating a manual process that can be prone to human error,” said Hutcherson.

The new pre-authorization workflow allows AB to implement tighter security measures by preventing document downloads and encouraging content sharing through LiveSend to mitigate institutional risks.