According to a recent PwC study titled “Technology and Innovation in Global Capital Markets,” 96% of investment bankers surveyed agree that the successful banking institutions of the future will need to be more flexible, agile, and innovative. Increasingly complex market dynamics are driving this trend, and without the right tools and technology, buyer identification is arduous, due diligence tends to be slower, and getting the deal closed is much more difficult. While technology certainly has the ability to ultimately enhance outcomes, it also has the power to reduce administrative burden, costs, and banker inefficiencies.
One such transformative technology for investment banking and advisory firms is CRM. Relationship and pipeline management software has a proven effect on a range of day-to-day activities, from deal marketing efforts to pipeline reporting. At DealCloud, we have successfully implemented over 150 investment banking CRM’s (at firms such as Raymond James, Stephens, and Perella Weinberg Partners), and throughout that process our team has solved for many of the biggest pain points that these firms face, many of which are shared issues among peer firms. As a result, we’ve developed an optimized blueprint for investment banks that allows these firms to properly leverage DealCloud’s technology. Leveraging these blueprints also increases the likelihood of a successful implementation that leads to high user adoption (and who doesn’t want that?).
From publicly-traded banks to boutique firms, every organization is unique. While each has intricate business processes and operating models that need to be accurately addressed by the technology adopted, our blueprints leverage the cumulative learnings and strategies of peer banking organizations and are therefore extremely effective in delivering a vertically-optimized solution. It’s true that some firms could spend time and energy configuring generic CRMs to fit unique deal and client management procedures, but DealCloud puts an investment banking-specific solution – backed by a team with extensive experience in the industry – to work on day one.
Continue reading below to learn more about some of the many features found within our technology blueprint for investment banks and advisory firms.
Getting started with investment banking technology
When an investment banking client signs with DealCloud and enters the implementation stage of their onboarding, our team reviews the blueprint with the firm’s platform user groups. The blueprint has been designed to capture the broad business processes that most investment banks are likely to need enabled by technology, such as industry analysis report generation, private company relationship development, travel planning, and fee tracking. From here, our team builds out the solution to fit the requirements gathered through hands-on consultation and feedback.
Track all details of an individual engagement in the Engagement Detail page
Pitch analysis
One very popular feature within DealCloud’s technology blueprint for investment banking and advisory firms is engagement tracking. Since most investment banking firms need to track the successes and failures of their pitches to both private companies and sponsors, “Pitch Analysis” dashboards are available from the outset. Having past engagement details readily available from desktop and mobile can be invaluable for bankers seeking to refine a pitch and get positioned for a win, so DealCloud makes comprehensive coverage reports and analytics available with the click of the button.
To create a Pitch Analysis dashboard, firms must simply insert their proprietary transaction data into DealCloud’s blueprint (see below), and they can see when and why the pitch was lost or won, who it was lost to, and much more. DealCloud empowers firms to get the most value out of every pitch by tracking, connecting, and displaying real-time metrics related to pitch activity.
Customized post-pitch analysis dashboards to compare all outcomes based on firm classifications
Mandate win/loss statistics can be built into dashboards in DealCloud to track and analyze performance
Counterparty tracking
Managing the lifecycle of a deal involves managing multiple involved counterparty relationships, which include all participants on all sides of the transaction. From first contact to close, and the many steps in between, DealCloud’s technology allows bankers to track the status of and activity with a counterparty over the lifetime of a deal. Firms can also notify the appropriate members of the deal team when a new milestone is reached, which can trigger a follow-up task to be assigned to the appropriate relationship managers.
Over the course of 150+ investment bank implementations, we’ve been able to distill the most important data points and analytical details that firms need for both deal-by-deal task management and “big picture” analysis.
Dashboards can show when and why counterparties passed on an engagement
Fee tracking and forecasting
Is your investment banking firm still spending time and effort manually and statically tracking fees? If so, you’re missing out on the actionable insight related to fee data that the DealCloud blueprint provides.
Since every firm calculates and forecasts fees differently, our technology allows for many unique configurations. For example, weighted fee forecasting uses custom weights that a firm has applied to estimated fees in each stage of the deal. When a deal reaches a certain stage, the estimated fee will be appropriately weighted based on the custom calculation your organization sets. From there, data is visualized in a dashboard, reflecting an accurate projection for fee collection in the upcoming month, quarter, or year.
Fee activity can also be associated with a specific company or sponsor through tagging. This makes it easy to keep a real-time, 360-degree view of a relationship. DealCloud’s blueprint helps banks uncover deeper insights from their data as well as helps them plan for the future, effectively alleviating the burdens of traditionally time-consuming or labor-intensive processes.
Organize fee tracking dashboards by status, timeframe, banker, and more
Conclusion
Our blueprint is frequently updated and is constantly being influenced and shaped by the cutting-edge activities of our investment banking and corporate advisory clients. We leverage their cumulative intelligence to make our technology “starting line” for bankers better and better. By doing this, DealCloud can move more quickly into the site enhancement process where our team finely tunes the technology to match the exact needs and specifications of each unique firm we serve. We learn about each firm’s long- and short-term goals so that we can provide consultative support and ensure the technology facilitates those goals.
To learn more about how DealCloud can implement our investment banking and advisory technology blueprint for your firm, contact us at sales@dealcloud.com.