Investment Banker Use Cases & Pain Points
How CRM companies can build value for non-technical Investment Banking Personas.
There is a big problem in the world of Investment Banking. They do not have a single source of truth for their relationship data. It's true. Many Investment Banking firms and employees are taking notes on a word document or in an excel spreadsheet. Of course, you also have the trendy napkin notes, you know, all the details of a meeting that you scribble down on a napkin.
The real problem is none of those notes make it into a CRM. This means none of that data is secure. This also means that when a banker leaves the firm, his knowledge walks out the door.
When I was leading market research for a CRM SaaS startup around the pain points that Investment Bankers have, I had an opportunity to speak with a former Investment Banker that told me a story that resonated with me.
Jeff Uken had a great use case to share. He was your typical banker and lived the problem that most of them face. His notes on meetings, events, phone calls, relationship information with buy- and sell-side clients were scribed in word documents, excel spreadsheets, or note pads. These were password-protected, so there was some level of security.
However, when Jeff left his bank for his next adventure, his notes, word documents, and spreadsheets were as good as gone. The firm had no way to access the years of notes and relationship data he had been saving. The firm didn’t know his personal password to the word documents; they were out of reach. This also means that his fellow bankers had no idea what he was working on with clients. So when his workload was divided out to the remaining bankers, they were essentially starting from scratch. Maybe an email here and there.
The bank was left with a painful realization. They had no way of using Jeff’s data and no way of retaining the valuable information Jeff had been collecting for the years he was working at the firm.
It was this story that led me to research pain points and use cases for Investment Banks.
Use Case #1 — Investment Banking Firms Need a Trusted, Single Source of Truth.
Pain Point: Remember Jeff’s Story? Investment Bankers are not tech-savvy people. And they are definitely NOT inputting data or information into a CRM like Salesforce or HubSpot. They require an easier way.
Having a trusted system of record that will automate most of the manual data entry while providing the entire firm insight into the collective relationships of that firm is key. However, there are also security concerns and legal mandates from the SEC. While the value of a Single Source of Truth is the ability to share Rolodex’s, there is also a need for some security and Chinese Walls.
Creating a divisionary system, or groups, so that certain communication can be blocked off from certain teams while also sharing the benefits on your shared Rolodex is a differentiating factor that will surely bring success to SaaS companies who are trying to target this security-sensitive verticle.
Use Case #2 — Investment Banking Firms Need a Way to Create Repeatable Steps for Success & Drive Business Development.
Pain Point: Each banker thinks they have the secret sauce. Some might. What is apparent is that the firm needs a way to identify the sales steps and stages that are the most successful and repeat that success across all the bankers. Investment Banks need a way to create repeatable steps that will lead to deals being closed quicker.
The solution is making available the ability to create custom stages that are clearly outlined. This is clearly aimed at investment banks who want to stay on top of opportunities, deals, contacts, and tasks from pitch to close and have an eye on what legal documents, marketing materials, and contracts were sent and to whom.
This allows the team(s) to manage long-term relationships and stay compliant. It also allows for controlled collaboration with key members and helps to amplify your collective network of buyers and sellers you are nurturing.
Customizing your deal lifecycle stages into easily repeatable steps is key to continued business development.
Use Case #3 — Investment Banking Firms Need a Platform That Helps Build, Manage & Nurture Their Long-Term Relationships.
Pain Point: Investment Bankers are managing many relationships over long periods of time. Some can be as short as six months, but many can be twelve months or more. There are plenty of opportunities for details to fall in between the cracks when you have cycles that long.
The solution here is to have a system of records where key team members know where each relationship stands. What meetings have you booked? What important details are in the email conversations? Have we sent them CIMs? Have we pitched to them? Have we found buyers? What have we sent to them? Have we sent out marketing materials?
This will allow your bankers to focus on transactions and easily advance deals through stages while keeping the team up-to-date. Tracking these relationships is key and pulling actionable insights is what sets bankers apart from others. This controlled collaboration is highly effective and results in successful relationships that lead to closed deals. Connecting the right buyers with the right sellers.
Use Case #4 — Investment Banking Firms Need a Platform That Will Automate Manual Tasks
Pain Point: Let’s be honest here, Investment Bankers are not going into Salesforce or HubSpot and filling out all the details of the lunch meeting they had or the phone call they were on with a big client. They are not logging email communications or notes. And when they are on a call, they are jotting notes down in a word document.
The solution here is to sync their email accounts, calendar events, word documents, excel documents, phone calls with their single source of truth.
But there is a challenge here; if your firm is large, you may have several teams. You might be held by SEC rules and regulations that you are not allowed to share certain details. So while automating the ingestion of data (an enriching that data with Crunchbase, Pitchbook, and clear bit), you also need to be able to set Chinese Walls so the firm can stay compliant. This means drawing clear boundaries around your teams so that data can not pass or be shared.
Use Case #5 — Security
Pain Point: Investment Banking is heavily regulated. And as such, there are strict rules that need to be adhered to just to stay out of hot water with the SEC and other government regulators. At the same time, sharing some information (legally) is key to a bank's success.
The solution is to create a group structure where you have an admin at the top and several teams around the admin. The admin can control the flow of information to and from his or her seat out to the various groups your bank has. At the same time, these groups need to be walled off from the other groups, where legally applicable. This would mean sharing certain aspects of your Rolodex but not details of the conversation. So perhaps you see all the people your bank knows, but you don't see the notes taken by a certain team or the email and email subject line of certain correspondence.
Solutions that Address These Use Cases & Pain Points for Investment Banking.
Investment Banking firms need to move away from Salesforce and HubSpot. They will make you think they are a one-size-fits-all solution, but they are not. Not to mention they are cumbersome to set up and manage. It is improbable that a non-tech savvy banker will update their Salesforce after a phone call, meeting, or other correspondence. So your data is as good as lost; remember Jeff’s story.
After conducting deep research into Investment Banking Personas, Use Cases, and Pain Points, here are my suggestions.
#1 — DealCloud
DealCloud was built for Investment Banking. They understand the complex market dynamics that modern-day investment bankers and M&A advisors are up against. Without the right tools and technology at their disposal, buyer identification is arduous, due diligence tends to be slower, and getting the deal to close is much harder. They have built their platform around these ideas, use cases, and pain points.
DealCloud’s platform enables investment bankers and advisors to track activities on the buy-side and sell-side, originate and develop more relationships, create tailored buyer lists, and much more. In creating a fully configurable platform, DealCloud has enabled investment bankers, M&A advisors, merchant bankers, and corporate finance professionals to execute on their client responsibilities with speed and accuracy.
If you are in the market for the best Investment Banking CRM / source of truth, you need not look further than DealCloud. Their technology empowers bankers to harness the cumulative intellectual capital of your people and processes. With the DealCloud platform, you’ll get a single source of truth to help you manage relationships, execute deals, and easily connect with external solutions and third-party data providers.
You have the knowledge, and DealCloud has a proven track record for transforming that knowledge into actionable intelligence.
#2–4Degrees
Another great platform built for Investment Banking is 4Degrees. 4Degrees is easy to use and has a slick UI that begs to be used.
4Degrees can help leverage your network to work for you. It helps identify the right capital providers for each deal and categorize them by areas of focus, and gather their work experience and investments. With 4Degrees, you don’t lose touch with sponsors and deal flow sources because the platform provides reminders to maintain client relationships and investor connections.
Like DealCloud, 4Degrees will mine your team’s network to show where your warm introductions to management teams and investors are. Saving you time and pointing you in the direction of the right people you need to speak with to close big deals.
4Degrees has TONS of integration to boot!
#3 — MadeMarket
MadeMarket is a small team that works very closely with its clients. This is great news because as you grow, they are right there with you. As you need new features, they are all ears and will build the features out for you. It’s a great relationship to have with such powerful software.
MadeMarket has everything you need to execute smarter and push deals forward. I have talked with several satisfied customers of MadeMarket. Their platform allows for custom opportunities, deals, contacts, tasks, and dashboards, enabling investment bankers — from pitch to close.
MadeMarket provides investment bankers with an intuitive system of record and easy-to-use tools for executing transactions. MadeMarket is led by Brandon Ducharm, a former investment banker, and James Chheng, in charge of product engineering and development. Together, Brandon and James are dedicated to improving and transforming how corporate finance professionals work on a day-to-day basis.
#4 — Pipedrive
Pipedrive is cool AF! The UI is beautiful and intuitive, the customization is simple, and the setup is easy. If you are ripping and replacing, Pipedrive makes that process simple. Import2 Wizard is a simple and easy-to-set-up tool that lets you import or export your business data between favorite apps and Pipedrive. Import2 Wizard supports all important data objects in Pipedrive: activities, people, organizations, deals, notes, pipelines, users, stages, and more.
Pipedrive is one of the first CRM platforms made for salespeople, by salespeople.
In 2010, the co-founders set out to build a customer relationship management (CRM) tool that helps users visualize their sales processes and get more done. You can’t control your results, but you can control your actions. So, they created Pipedrive around activity-based selling, a proven approach that’s all about scheduling, completing, and tracking activities.
Visual pipelines are another example of the sales wisdom they built into Pipedrive, which lets you see exactly where each deal stands and has loads of smart and easy-to-use features.
#5 — Tier1
Tier 1 Fin is the silent competitor but certainly a powerful tool. I suggest giving them a look while on your journey.
Tier1 helps to quickly identify the right buyers based on historical transaction types and their preferences, leading to a higher success hit ratio when targeting buyers for a deal. Seamless communication across deal teams is imperative to be certain that deal details are not missed and ensure success in executing a deal at all stages. Centralized views into your entire deal pipeline and communications promote collaboration within your deal activities.
And like DealCloud and others, your proprietary data is augmented by industry-leading data providers empowering you to capitalize on unique insights and gain a competitive edge. Prepackaged and ready to go, Tier1 helps you convert market data into actionable intelligence to control deal outcomes better.
So there you have it, get crackin’.
CRM companies feel free to lift my knowledge and start creating platform features tailored to the stressful work-life of Investment Bankers.
Product Marketers, this is a good start for you to conduct your research to help drive your product direction towards solutions Investment Bankers need.
And if you like my research, check out my articles on Investment Banker personas.
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Scott Guttenberger
