Did you hear? Inflation cooled to 4,3% in July, down from June's two-year high of 5,0% and below the 4,5% economists had expected, helped along by cheaper fuel, slower food inflation and smaller municipal tariff increases.
This week in Seed Analytics Advisor Connect:
Upcoming events: Chances to network & earn CPD points.
Before you buy software: 3 checks for new practice software.
The whole picture, one login: Clients can't value what they can't see.
New opportunities & advisory jobs for you to explore in SA.
R12,2bn flows into high-equity funds & dual trusts gain ground.
Prompt of the week: Build your software scorecard.
Take Note
LeaderEx 2026 – Sandton, 1–3 Sept: South Africa's largest gathering of business leaders and professionals returns to the Sandton Convention Centre. Entry is free if you register online, or around R250 at the door. Details here.
FPSB Psychology in Practice – Online, anytime: An on-demand FPI course pairing a video series with an e-book on the behavioural side of advice. Paid, self-paced, with additional CPD points available on completion. Details here.
Great software only pays off when your team logs in and uses it
Three checks that predict whether a tool gets used or quietly gathers dust…
In many practices, software availability isn’t the problem. When your team actually uses it is what makes paying the license fee worthwhile. That’s why it’s important to review tools not only based on features but also how they fit with your team’s way of working.
Here are three checks you can run during a demo or a free trial, long before the decision is made.
1. Does it remove a step or add one?
A tool earns its place by removing work from someone's desk. It often helps to ask where the data comes from, because if the answer is that someone needs to re-key information that already exists elsewhere, the tool will likely not get used and adopted.
Data that arrives on its own beats data that's accurate only if somebody remembered to update it.
Take action: During the trial, pick one real weekly use case and time it using the old and the new process: If the new process isn't faster by the second attempt, it likely won't survive a busy month.
2. Will the person who uses it choose it?
The advisor signs the cheque, but the paraplanner or PA lives in the tool. If they reject it, you've bought a licence for a tool that nobody opens. The people closest to the work are also the ones who will spot the friction that a polished demo may hide, so it pays to involve them in the sourcing and review process.
Take action: Make sure the intended daily user is in the demo and give them the mandate to approve or veto. After the demo, ask them if they’d honestly use the tool, or just fall back into using the old process.
3. Does it fit the workflow you already have?
The best tool complements your process. A platform or tool that demands a new review rhythm, a new filing structure and a new naming convention all at once is often abandoned by month two. Adoption normally follows the path of most value with least disruption.
Take action: Map the tool against your existing workflow. If it slots in with minor tweaks, it’s more likely to stick. If it demands a rebuild, cost all aspects of that rebuild, including tool adoption, before you sign.
None of these three checks focuses on features. Each check asks the same question: will this tool get used and add value during a busy period?
Join the conversation…
Honestly, how many tools are you paying for but barely using?
Rebalancing shouldn’t be another task on the list
You already know which portfolios have drifted. But what prevents rebalancing is when it needs to be done manually.
Seed's one-click rebalancing removes that entirely: you can rebalance a client's entire portfolio with a single click, rather than doing it manually, platform by platform. The decision remains yours, but now without the additional 3 hours of admin to get it done.
Already on Seed?
Don't wait for review season: find the clients furthest from target allocation and rebalance them this week.
New to Seed?
Featured Section
New wealth and fin advisory career opportunities in SA
Financial Advisor (Western Cape) @ Advisek
Financial Advisor (Midrand) @ ThuthukaSA
Financial Advisor (nationwide) @ Envestpro
Financial Planner (Sandton) @ Momentum
Wealth Manager (Johannesburg) @ Centillion Wealth Advisory
Financial Planning Specialist (Stellenbosch) @ PPS
In Case You Missed It…
Industry Roundup
High-Equity Funds Draw R12,2bn of New Money. SA multi-asset high-equity portfolios attracted about R12,2 billion in new investment during the second quarter once reinvested income is stripped out. General equity funds also turned positive, taking R5 billion in net inflows, their first over the 12 months to June. Industry assets under management stood at R4,6 trillion at end-June.
Dual Trust Structures Gain Ground Among Wealthy Clients. More high-net-worth South Africans are running "mirror-image" structures, with trusts and underlying companies in both South Africa and offshore, according to Capital Legacy's Ken Newport. The increase in the annual donations tax exemption from R100 000 to R150 000 means a couple can reduce their estate by up to R3 million over a decade through donations alone.
SARS Puts Digital VAT and E-Invoicing on the Table. SARS has published a VAT Modernisation Consultation Paper proposing a digital VAT model that combines e-invoicing, an interoperability framework and e-reporting to move VAT data in near real time rather than through retrospective verification.
JSE Changes How Listed Companies Report Earnings. The exchange announced three amendments on 19 Aug: headline earnings per share moves outside the audited IFRS statements, diluted HEPS no longer has to be disclosed at all, and the headline-earnings reconciliation requirement is centralised in one place.
SEZ Reform Widens Access to the 15% Tax Rate. The draft Taxation Laws Amendment Bill would scrap the rule disqualifying Special Economic Zone companies from the reduced 15% corporate rate when more than 20% of their income or expenditure involves a connected local party, replacing it with an arm's-length pricing test.
Prompt of the week
If you want AI to help you pressure-test a software decision…
This prompt builds a reusable scorecard you can carry into any demo: the same criteria, scored the same way, for every tool you trial. It asks for nothing about your book, your clients or your practice.
How to use it:
Paste the prompt into your AI tool of choice.
Answer its questions about your own priorities, in general terms only (no data about your practice or clients).
Take the scorecard into your next demo and score the tool live, with the daily user in the room.
The Prompt:
You are helping me evaluate practice-management or reporting software before I buy it, as a South African financial advisory practice. Do not ask me for any client, financial or business data — build a blank, reusable framework only.
First, ask me to rank these three adoption criteria by importance for my practice: (1) it removes a step rather than adding one; (2) the person who uses it daily will choose it; (3) it fits the workflow we already have. Ask whether there is a fourth criterion I want to add, and if so, what it is. Wait for my answers.
Then build me a one-page scorecard: each criterion as a row, a 1–5 scale, a column for notes, and a weighted total based on my ranking. For each criterion, give me three specific questions to ask the vendor during the demo, and one thing to test myself during a free trial rather than take on trust.
Keep it blank and reusable so I can score any tool I trial, and keep it in South African English.
Did You Know? On 20 Aug 1911, a telegraph operator on the 17th floor of the New York Times building sent the world’s first commercial telegram message. It was relayed by 16 operators through San Francisco, Manila, Hong Kong, Singapore, Bombay, Malta and Lisbon, travelling around the world in about 16.5 minutes.
Till next time,
Seed Analytics Advisor Connect
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