Delivering insights since 1998
IFA MarketWatch was founded in 1998 by serial FinTech entrepreneur, Colin Turton. The earliest concept of IFA MarketWatch was to unlock the rich source of competitor and marketing intelligence residing in the marketing communications received by UK Financial Advisers.
When MarketWatch was launched over two decades ago the market was very different. Social media and platforms did not exist. Almost all marketing communication received by financial advisers were in the form of hard copy postal items sent to advisers by Life Companies and Fund Groups. So MarketWatch literally started with an army of people manually scanning postal items into our database. All very different from today’s world.
MarketWatch has continually evolved over the decades to reflect the major changes which have taken place in both market structure and communications media. In particular, we have reflected the increasing role of the platform movement and more recently, the ubiquitous blend of both email and social media by those organisations seeking a share of voice with Financial Advisers.
Informing the game for the UK’s largest financial services organisations
Today, we have a long-standing team of specialist Analysts who track the adviser communications activity of some 500 organisations.
Many of the UK’s largest Fund Groups, Platforms and Life Cos are long-standing subscribers to IFA MarketWatch. We continually monitoring trends in the sector and will continue to evolve the service, ensuring our users have a complete view of the board before making their moves.
A bit more about our founder
Colin’s background has included pan-European Financial Services management consultancy with PricewaterhouseCoopers and Ernst & Young where he specialised in Applied Distribution Strategy, working with the boards of some of the EU’s largest Financial Services organisations. Colin is therefore well versed in the critical need for high quality real-time competitor and marketing intelligence. This is the staple of what MarketWatch delivers today to the Fund Groups, Platforms, Life Cos, Product Providers and Digital Marketing Agencies.
Colin is also the founder and CEO of the leading and multi-award winning AdviserAsset which provides Financial Advisers with a range of online product switching and best advice tools.
In a broader market sense, Colin has previously been a Technical Adviser to the All Party Parliamentary Committee on Insurance and Financial Services, and also an adviser to DGXV of the European Commission, the executive arm of the EU responsible for European financial services legislation.
Colin continues to be hands-on involved in the running of the MarketWatch business on a day-to-day basis.