Understanding Information Seeking Behaviour in Financial Advisory

In light of the financial crisis, it has become even more critical for financial service providers to remain competitive. This paper discusses new perspectives on the problems of today’s advisory services, including the customer’s dissatisfaction with personalization and individualization. Thereby we draw on research in human information behavior, particularly Wilson’s model, which provides a promising framework to better understand the information behavior of clients and in turn helps us understand some of the ITenablers
of individualized financial services. Our findings are supported by data collected from mystery shopping episodes and focus group discussions.