State of Compliance 2025: What Firms Need to Know

If you're keeping up with the news, you know that 2025 has already brought several significant shifts to the compliance world. In the last month alone, the SEC has consolidated power, and now – an executive order requires presidential approval on any regulatory changes. Other governing bodies, including the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, have also undergone major transformations.

Beyond the evolution of enforcement priorities, client behaviors are changing, and marketing and digital communication strategies are adapting.

As a result, the way firms approach compliance is shifting.

Here are the top trends to consider as you set your compliance priorities for 2025.

You're not super likely to get pulled over for having an expired license plate tag. But if you run a red light? Lights and sirens. And when the officer runs your license, you'll likely be cited for expired tags – and maybe an old unpaid parking ticket – in addition to your reckless driving violation.

This is a useful analogy for where enforcement seems to be headed. Regulators are expected to prioritize fraud and abuse cases over minor policy violations in 2025, but that doesn't mean compliance teams can ignore procedural risks. Recordkeeping failures are still wrong.

To protect your firm, it's important to develop policies and procedures that are fit for purpose – which is to say, designed to detect and flag specific things on specific channels. Adopting this approach to supervision can help you detect and prevent fraudulent activities while remaining compliant with broader regulatory guidelines.

Your marketing department is going through a major shift.

Clients aren't just looking for firms on Google anymore; they're turning to AI-driven search tools like ChatGPT and social media to learn about investment strategies, banks with competitive rates, and the best insurance providers.

People are actively seeking financial guidance like never before. Google Trends data reveals a massive surge in searches for financial advisors, reaching the highest levels since the start of the pandemic. This again shows that serving as a trusted advisor has the potential to generate huge opportunities for firms in times of uncertainty.

To keep up, you need to be able to supervise new channels (TikTok, direct messaging), different content formats (video, text, voice, interactive content), and AI-generated content while making sure your compliance program can handle the increased volume.

To manage this effectively, firms should implement:

• Clear procedures for evaluating new digital engagement channels. Defining what elements must be present in order to roll out a new channel is a critical first step.

• Platform-specific policies catered to various channels. Review and risk-assessment processes are different for social media vs. text messaging and need to be defined.

• AI-driven review systems to monitor content efficiently. Thoughtfully implemented AI tools can help you boost productivity and streamline compliance workflows.

• Off-channel monitoring systems, which are designed to detect any messaging that's errantly taking place on non-allowed channels

Firms with compliance teams that use built-for-purpose technology tools to scale and successfully support marketing's 'be everywhere' strategy have a lot to gain – including recruiting power, productivity tools that drive field success, and more new business.**

As the field connects with clients in more places and benefits from increased engagement, compliance teams become increasingly nervous about the potential for reputational harm.

In today's polarized, highly charged environment, a single word in a social post — even if unintentional — can severely damage your brand. Firms must strike a delicate balance between empowering their field to build a personal brand and maintaining strict compliance standards.

Firms must implement proactive supervision strategies, combining monitoring software (hard controls) with robust advisor training (soft controls) to mitigate risk before it escalates.

For example, a well-tailored lexicon (hard control) is a simple tool that flags specific keywords so compliance can catch a potential violation before it becomes public. Lexicons save time by making sure your team stays focused on the highest-risk activities. At the same time, channel-specific field enablement (soft control) helps reduce the number of violations that get flagged.

AI offers huge opportunities for efficiency, but it also introduces compliance risks related to explainability and oversight. To be successful, you need to have a good handle on what your AI is actually doing so you can confidently adhere to privacy and security expectations. How?

Start by creating a cross-functional AI committee that includes compliance, marketing, and business development folks. The committee gives everyone who has a stake in the success of your deployment of AI a seat at the table. Together, you can discuss the pros and cons of rolling out a specific AI functionality. Taking a collaborative approach to implementing AI is critical to success – not just for any one firm but for the industry at large.

This year marks a pivotal moment for compliance teams. With fewer procedural enforcement challenges to navigate, firms have a unique opportunity to proactively refine their compliance programs. What you do in 2025 will define your firm's ability to thrive in 2026 and beyond.

This is the year to take a strategic approach to:

• Balancing reputational risk with compliance supervision

• Defining fit-for-purpose policies for digital communication

• Expanding compliance workflows to match marketing's 'be everywhere' strategy

• Crafting a plan for the responsible use of AI

• Using AI-driven technology to scale your compliance program

Take advantage of this opportunity. The more proactive you are today, the more prepared your firm will be to meet client expectations and outperform competitors for years to come.

To start, learn why having a 'be everywhere' marketing strategy matters so much.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice.