Franklin Templeton unifies acquired CRM systems, aligns with client needs using Dynamics 365 Sales

A new era for Franklin Templeton

Franklin Templeton began as a small New York brokerage firm under financier Rupert H. Johnson in 1947. In its 75-year history, the company has grown its managed assets from $2.5 million to more than $1.3 trillion. While its investments have expanded beyond its initial mutual fund products, the Johnson family has transformed Franklin Templeton into one of the largest asset management companies in the world.

Over the past two decades, individual and institutional investors have come to prefer passively managed index funds. Sensing this shift in attitudes, Franklin Templeton acquired four firms (including Legg Mason, a close competitor) to expand its multi-asset, equities, fixed income, and alternatives offerings.

As Franklin Templeton diversified its own portfolio depth, it also made significant investments in organizing its financial technology to ensure the organization could provide the type of service clients want. It was essential for Franklin Templeton to connect the full breadth of its services to both individual and institutional investors. For individual investors, core products include mutual funds, ETFs, and retirement plans. Whereas institutional investors can invest in equity, fixed income, alternatives, and multi-asset products. 

CRM growing pains

Due to the acquisitions, client data was spread across multiple CRMs within the Franklin Templeton ecosystem. Marketing and sales teams operated on different CRM platforms than departments focused on client onboarding, client services, portfolio analytics, and more. 

These data silos created challenges when it came to cross-selling and upselling Franklin Templeton financial products to its individual and institutional clients. For example, if a sales representative took note that a potential client was interested in, say, real estate investing, that information was siloed in the sales department CRM system, leading to missed sales or service opportunities across departments. 

“With many CRM solutions supporting only one specific line of business, it was challenging to standardize both business processes alongside the technology stack,” says Jakub Jan Boczowski, VP Information Technology at Franklin Templeton. “Information about client interactions was stored in different platforms and much of the sales related processes were happening in separate applications without any trace back to the main source of client data.”

Starting with a proof of concept

Prior to the Legg Mason acquisition, there had already been an initiative to build out a single, company-wide CRM architecture. But, as that major acquisition unfolded, the technology team shifted toward a cloud-based CRM solution. While a one-size-fits-all solution seemed like a distant goal, the team felt that the CRM system with the most flexibility would be ideal for its integrations. It could provide the best user interface while also having an easy-to-deploy, adaptable technology stack.

“Our focus on data migration and onboarding users was essential to address customizations and improvements in an agile manner after going live,” says Boczkowski. “This would allow us to reduce the scope and leverage out-of-the-box features instead of reinventing the wheel.”

How the CRM system could provide the depth of data and analyze information was dependent on how users would interact with the platform. So began a trial period testing various CRM solutions, including Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales. The technology team created a proof-of-concept that encouraged a feedback loop between the team developing the solution and its users. 

“Our decision on which CRM platform we would choose was preceded by a diligent selection process, including multi-month proof-of-concept with other platforms,” says Boczkowski. “Dynamics 365 Sales got better feedback from users who were invited to these proof-of-concept trials. This resulted in better capabilities for integration with the rest of our ecosystem.”

Building upon Dynamics 365 Sales had to be as intuitive for its users as possible—it would need to provide detailed client data and usher in a more collaborative atmosphere between sales, marketing, client services, and other teams. A simple-yet-powerful data visualization tool like Microsoft Power BI could improve how Franklin Templeton understood its clients in real time, on a company-wide scale. For instance, one of its offerings, Franklin Templeton Academy, helps educate clients on investment concepts, professional development, and product knowledge. Tracking a client’s progress through this touchpoint could show sales and marketing teams how informed its client is on a related investment product.

Many users were familiar with a slew of different CRM applications and finding the right one had to address user comfort. “Having users coming to one CRM platform from different CRM platforms, or from custom solutions we built over the years, has made user interface a very important factor for adoption,” says Boczkowski. “People are coming with their own habits and expectations. For us, UI is being continuously improved, thanks to user feedback and usage metrics. What makes it possible is Dynamics 365 Sales’ flexibility and the different options for customizations—like the possibility to use Power Apps or existing Power BI dashboards.”

Ultimately, the decision to move forward with Dynamics 365 Sales was solidified due to the technology team’s open-mindedness and consideration of how this would improve the end user’s relationship to the client. This feedback loop also helped to sort out how the potential CRM solution could be altered in real-time environments down the line.

Behind the scenes, developers were able to reuse many of the APIs and data management processes that had already been implemented. For example, the technology team connected Dynamics 365 Sales to previously established APIs designed for MuleSoft, which made it much easier to customize without needing a major overhaul. 

The one-platform future

Beyond these recent acquisitions and the shift to a single CRM platform, Franklin Templeton has gained invaluable insight into the needs of its clients while continuing its competitive drive into the future. The technology team can scale up, integrate, and reference client data more efficiently than before.

“This is reducing complexity of deployments, so we can push improvements very quickly,” says Boczkowski. “Every two weeks we are introducing new features which helps in adoption of the platform.”

Previously, the maintenance of multiple CRM systems had multiplied the responsibilities for the technology team and as Dynamics 365 Sales becomes the Franklin Templeton standard, they can focus their efforts into a one platform future.

“Our goal is to make Dynamics a one-stop shop for sales,” says Boczkowski. “We implemented multiple sales-related processes so users don’t need to go anywhere else than Dynamics.”

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