While retirement account holders and other investors are perfectly happy to turn to the Internet to research financial products, they prefer face-to-face meetings when it comes to dealing with an advisor.
That's according to new research for Signator Investors Inc., an independent broker-dealer owned by John Hancock, the U.S. division of Manulife.
That's not to say that investors, particularly younger ones, don't rely on the Internet to handle a lot of their financial lives.
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Data that was collected as part of John Hancock's quarterly Investor Sentiment Survey found that investors rely on the Web to conduct transactions (80 percent); have used online tools, calculators or quizzes concerning retirement savings or income (53 percent); researched Social Security claiming strategies (19 percent); worked on budgets (16 percent); looked for life insurance (14 percent) or handled college savings (11 percent).
More than half (59 percent) would also rather do their own research on financial products online, although 44 percent also get information from financial advisors and 24 percent read up on the subject in financial industry publications.
But when it's time to deal with an advisor, overall, 66 percent of investors want it to be in person; 52 percent were also agreeable to phone contact, but e-mail finished dead last at 35 percent.
Preferences on how to do business clearly vary with investor age, since 66 percent of respondents under age 45 said they use the Internet for information, compared with 60 percent of those aged 45-64. The 65-and-up crowd would rather talk to an advisor (54 percent) than go online to get what they need. Other categories of financial activity divided up along age lines as well.
However, in every age group, investors' top preference for interacting with advisors was meeting face-to-face.
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