Whether serving younger generations through the fee-for-service model is your core business or you’re diving in for the first time, you’ve likely noticed a shift in the industry to include this model as a growing part of financial practices. As this shift picks up speed and younger generations seek financial advice, it’s important to remember that transparency is key to your fee-for-service business model - and this includes transparency from the services you’ll provide to the fees you’ll charge.

The financial services industry has seen changes over time in how advisors get paid, moving from commissions to assets under management (AUM) to the recent shift toward fee-for-service.

Efficiency matters, both to you and your clients. Knowing when to maximize efficiency and when to slow down is important in doing your best work, in all aspects of life.

If you’ve decided to enhance your business by adding the fee-for-service model to your financial advisory firm, congratulations! You are staying up-to-date with the latest industry trends and are taking the initiative to explore new frontiers, which will allow you to serve clients you can’t today under your current fee structure.

Many advisors have already adopted electronic document signature tools for their practice to some degree, and this has been a huge win for accuracy and convenience when it comes to processing agreements. Chasing paper agreements (and paper checks) can become a huge hassle for you and for your clients.

The truth is, there are good reasons why some haven't been able to make the switch to electronic signature yet (including system interoperability issues and more), but I'd like to tell you why -- and how -- you can adopt electronic signatures starting today, if you use AdvicePay.

Back in November, we rolled out our eSignature integration, and we continue to expand our eSignature functionality. But before we take a look at all of the feature details, let's talk about why eSignature could be the best $15 you spend all month when it comes to being more efficient and providing a great client experience.

Improving Your Business Through Operations

AdvicePay Lets You Charge on a Subscription Basis

One of the major advantages of AdvicePay is its subscription payment functionality. In fact, AdvicePay was created, designed, and built specifically to provide financial planners with a compliant billing option when utilizing the fee-for-service model.

What's your Whoop-de-do level This season?

It’s the holiday season, and there’s a holiday song I’ve never quite understood. As with most holiday songs, there are a lot of versions, but I’m going with the medley of “Happy Holiday” and “The Holiday Season” as popularized by Andy Williams. And here’s the line that really gets me:

“It's the holiday season, so whoop-de-do...”

First of all, who says “whoop-de-do”? Second of all, what sort of enthusiasm is that for the most wonderful time of year* (also known as Mariah Carey’s holiday)? This expression feels like a well-intended effort toward genuine holiday excitement that just gets lost for words.

Between work and extra time with family and friends -- all wonderful, but time is the operative word here -- this season can become exhausting to the point of mere whoop-de-do levels of excitement. Managing ourselves well -- our greatest business asset -- becomes even more important during this busy time of year.

5 Ways Financial Planners Can Avoid Making Early Mistakes

When starting a financial planning firm, advisors often fall into traps around:

• Who they work with;
• How they work;
• And the systems and processes they implement.

The five mistakes listed below provide examples for how these common traps play out, and offer solutions for how to avoid them.

Growing up, I was told my grandfather was a financial planner. He had a thousand clients and hit a home run - or was it a grand slam? - with some Chinese stock. Or so the legend goes.

I was also taught about how much my grandfather cared for people - his clients, his neighbors, his family. Based on my early memories of him and the stories I’ve heard over the years, I am confident he served his clients with integrity and to the best of his abilities with the resources available to him. However, I’m not sure "financial planner" accurately describes the work he was doing - at least as I understand comprehensive financial planning today.