Free Financial Wellness Comes With Big Issues
I lost a big deal today. I did my usual…threw a note pad across the room, yelled my favorite profanity and walked around the office. I even sat in a product meeting and heard about all the cool new BrightDime features coming out soon. Nothing took away the sting of knowing that 10,000 people are losing the opportunity to improve their financial well-being. Losing this deal reminded me how employers do not understand the financial problem facing their employees. Please keep reading. It’s important. After you finish, please comment and share your thoughts.
First let me offer some context. A 10,000 employee company wants to offer financial wellness to its employees and asked for a proposal from various institutions. Let’s call the company Acme. I had already met with Acme several times. They understood how BrightDime financial wellness platform changes people’s behaviors, gets employees on the right financial path and offers coaching every step of the way. We are different. We are the most comprehensive and sustainable program in the market. This was our chance to change people’s lives. I was already interviewing coaches that would fit this specific company’s needs and had drawn up a marketing plan to fit this company’s culture….I was excited. You know what happened next. We lost the deal! Our product is better though. Seriously, much better and not expensive. Acme ended up going with a local financial institution that offered financial wellness for free. The word free is your cue to yell, “RED FLAG RED FLAG!”
Here’s the deal with financial institutions that offer “free” financial wellness: to state the obvious, they are in the business of making money and do not give away their services for free. In the end, the employers or employees pay. These institutions and other wellness companies offer seminars, webinars, lunch and learns and product info under the pretext of financial wellness. This style of financial wellness has very little to no impact. More importantly, the institutions offering “free” financial wellness ARE going to make money somehow. Sometimes they may make it by lending to consumers through credit cards, auto loans, or mortgages. More debt is not the answer! The bottom line is that the employees’ wellness is more likely to be harmed than helped. By choosing the “free” option, Acme ended up costing themselves in the long run. More importantly, their employees are likely not being put on a sustainable path to financial success.
Financial success means that employees have sustainable budgets, are paying down debt, have an emergency fund, are reaching goals and planning for retirement. They need a coach that only has their best interest at heart and is willing to help them at every stage in life.
BrightDime Financial Wellness…we do it the right way!
For more financial wellness content, go to: https://blog.brightdime.com/