Citigroup Inc.'s fledgling myFi program marks the company's latest attempt to pair banking and asset management.

For Citi, which in the past has struggled to integrate its consumer offerings, myFi will provide the first clear test of whether its most recent operational changes have finally de-siloed its retail lines.

myFi, short for "My Financial Life," is being tested on Long Island, N.Y. It wraps products ranging from checking accounts to debt consolidation to financial advice.

Andrew M. Sieg, the executive heading myFi, said the program has its roots in an asset management reorganization unveiled in March by Sallie Krawcheck, the head of Citi's wealth management division. As part of that move the company drew new distinctions for itself between ultra-high-net-worth, high-net-worth, and emerging affluent customers.

While developing the new structure in 2007, Ms. Krawcheck "clearly framed out" the importance of the emerging affluent, Mr. Sieg said. "Her charge to us was, 'Build an emerging affluent business which is clearly differentiated in the market.' There is no competitor that is particularly well differentiated."

As a result, MyFi targets what Mr. Sieg called "regular folks" — those with less than $500,000 of investable assets — and it has no real floor. It is replacing Smith Barney's "Financial Life Services" program, which offered asset management to a broad mix of customers and had no minimum or maximum for investable assets.

Mr. Sieg said he hopes the myFi pilot program will eventually be expanded to many or most of the 1,051 Citibank branches, though some will continue to offer services from Smith Barney, Citi's brokerage operation.

Citi aims to maintain those relationships and, if warranted, migrate them to other units as customers' assets grow.

"Someone may finish grad school and be wrestling with issues around how to manage their debt," and myFi will help those customers find the right product and set financial goals, Mr. Sieg said.

"As they are more successful, and as they advance, it may get to a place where it really becomes time for them to have a relationship with a Smith Barney financial adviser" and other Citi services, he said. "If this strategy works well, we'd like to draw in several million people to do business with Citi."

Mr. Sieg said he is talking with several Citi units about ways they could work together to distribute myFi.

Eventually myFi could be available through the 2,518 branches operated by CitiFinancial, the $2.2 trillion-asset company's consumer finance arm, in addition to the Citibank branches. The pilot program started in December and is now in 20 Citibank branches on Long Island.

Unlike some other offerings from competitors, the myFi relationship will begin "face-to-face" — at the branch level — but migrate to call centers or online, Mr. Sieg said.

Mr. Sieg, who joined Citi in 2005 from Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc., built Merrill Lynch Financial Advisory Center, a call center and online service launched in 2000 for clients with less than $100,000 of investable assets.

Merrill remains a close competitor, along with Charles Schwab Corp. and Fidelity Investments. E-Trade Financial Services has also linked banking and brokerage services, and targets lower-end wealth management clients. This month JPMorgan Chase & Co. branches began offering Chase Strategic Portfolio, for bank customers with at least $50,000 of assets.

Mr. Sieg said he believes Citi can make itself stand out. "We can offer a level of advice and assistance that isn't offered in the marketplace today," he said. "A lot of the times a solution to a problem" for myFi customers "is not merely, 'Let's readjust your asset allocation and have less equity and more fixed income.' It's, 'You need to increase your rate of savings and consume less,' " he said.

A MyFi Web site set to launch next year will let customers consolidate all their financial information: they will be able to view their bank accounts, car loans, credit cards, mutual funds, individual retirement accounts, and mortgages — from Citi and other providers. "There will be a good deal of educational content," Mr. Sieg said. Citi recently hired Jonathan Clements, a former Wall Street Journal personal finance columnist, to help with the site's editorial content.

Burton Greenwald, the president of BJ Greenwald Associates, said Citi has not "realized the full potential" of the emerging affluent. Mr. Greenwald said cross-selling makes a lot of sense in theory but can be "very difficult to implement," though "the Citibank network provides an enormous advantage," he said. A lot of institutions are trying "to be the primary financial relationship with a client, rather than having a fragmented series of relationships," Mr. Greenwald said. But customers remain reluctant to have all their financial products bundled with one provider, he said.

Geoffrey Bobroff, the president of Bobroff Consulting, said Citi is "going after the right audience" with myFi. But younger customers are not a particularly profitable segment, he said. The baby boomers most in need of financial advice are still more likely to go to their local retail broker than to Citibank, he said. "If you are suggesting that we take our $200,000 accounts and try to serve them through that mechanism" of myFi, "I think our friends at Smith Barney and Citi better wake up, because those accounts go somewhere else," Mr. Bobroff said. "They go to a Fidelity or Schwab. It's an uphill challenge."

Originally published in American Banker.