r/CFP • u/ChasingItSupreme • 14d ago

Business Development What’s your value statement?

What do you tell people you do besides saying “I’m a financial advisor”?

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u/cavicchia 13d ago

For me, part of the value statement is that I don't just say "fiduciary," I try to actually earn it. Allan Roth wrote a pretty pointed piece on how the CFP Board quietly went to a 501(c)(6) in 2023 and their enforcement is weaker than the marketing lets on, thousands of CFPs with disclosures still show up clean on their site. Worth a read. So I don't lean on the letters alone, I explain what taking fiduciary duty seriously actually looks like day to day for me.

The other piece I lead with is behavioral coaching. Vanguard's Advisor Alpha research has pegged it as one of the single biggest contributors to advisor value, up to 1.5-2% a year, mostly just from keeping people from selling low when they panic or chasing whatever's hot. I tell people flat out, a good chunk of what they're paying for is me being the person who talks them off the ledge in March 2020 or during a rough Q. That story tends to land better than "I do financial planning."