Retirement income strategy on the back of a fag packet

BritishInvestor

cfw1994 said:

BritishInvestor said:

cfw1994 said:

When I said "I like my finances in a box that I can easily understand" - some people, and especially those close to the industry, revel in the mystery of what is in the detail of things - heck, the FA/IFA industry is almost predicated on making the need to manage things complex, and something people should pay for - when sometimes, it isn't necessary!

Surely that's an outdated view? Loads of IFAs creating podcasts, courses, publishing books etc. 

Is it?  
You tell me - you're an IFA, (or FA?), right?

Sure, there is a LOAD of information online in podcasts etc.   What are your favourites?

My only 'recent' IFA experience was a seminar by a very well regarded company locally: it was pretty awful !!   
I guess I should say "awful to anyone with a vague handle on their finances" - I imagine there were may have been one or two at the seminar who found something useful, but to me (& SWMBO), as people with a faint interest in where we are, fiscally speaking, it was *incredibly* rudimentary.  No really useful detail offered up in a 3 hour afternoon session.

What do you think?

@tchallaghan93 - my only advice to you is to live a little first, rather than just focussing on retiring ;-)

As this is a retirement forum I think Justin King's podcast is a good listen.
https://www.theretirementcafe.co.uk/episodes
I'm not really sure you could reasonably expect anything too advanced at a typical seminar when you consider what their target market might be (Mr Average in terms of financial literacy). As you point out, anyone with a decent financial grounding might not be a typical attendee.
FWIW If I were a private investor (and no longer regulated) I would love to start a blog helping people with the building blocks of financial knowledge - e.g. risk vs return/how to spot something that looks to good to be true etc. to help steer them in the right direction and do my bit to stop suboptimal behaviours.

bigadaj

I believe tcallaghan was a prospective actuary so might consider lion taming (ok it's a step beyond accountancy but why not live a little in ambition terms).

DairyQueen

Blimey...

If I hadn't been poring over spreadsheets for the last few years then Mr DQ would be up to his backside in HRT.

For us, the devil is in the (tax) detail.

Albermarle

FWIW If I were a private investor (and no longer regulated) I would love to start a blog helping people with the building blocks of financial knowledge - e.g. risk vs return/how to spot something that looks to good to be true etc. to help steer them in the right direction and do my bit to stop suboptimal behaviours.

Pretty much what this forum tries to do in fact.

BritishInvestor

Albermarle said:

FWIW If I were a private investor (and no longer regulated) I would love to start a blog helping people with the building blocks of financial knowledge - e.g. risk vs return/how to spot something that looks to good to be true etc. to help steer them in the right direction and do my bit to stop suboptimal behaviours.

Pretty much what this forum tries to do in fact.

Yes, I agree, but a blog would allow me to indulge in a random in-depth topic that only my mum would read

cfw1994

BritishInvestor said:

Albermarle said:

FWIW If I were a private investor (and no longer regulated) I would love to start a blog helping people with the building blocks of financial knowledge - e.g. risk vs return/how to spot something that looks to good to be true etc. to help steer them in the right direction and do my bit to stop suboptimal behaviours.

Pretty much what this forum tries to do in fact.

Yes, I agree, but a blog would allow me to indulge in a random in-depth topic that only my mum would read

What is there about the regulations you work under that prevent you from blogging?
I wasn’t aware of a barrier to the blogosphere....indeed google can help give you tips: https://creativeadviser.co.uk/financial-adviser-marketing/how-to-create-an-ifa-blog-that-actually-gets-read-3-quick-tips/
Better to do that than squirt one-line replies to threads here, if you want to help people, surely?

BritishInvestor

cfw1994 said:

BritishInvestor said:

Albermarle said:

FWIW If I were a private investor (and no longer regulated) I would love to start a blog helping people with the building blocks of financial knowledge - e.g. risk vs return/how to spot something that looks to good to be true etc. to help steer them in the right direction and do my bit to stop suboptimal behaviours.

Pretty much what this forum tries to do in fact.

Yes, I agree, but a blog would allow me to indulge in a random in-depth topic that only my mum would read

What is there about the regulations you work under that prevent you from blogging?
I wasn’t aware of a barrier to the blogosphere....indeed google can help give you tips: https://creativeadviser.co.uk/financial-adviser-marketing/how-to-create-an-ifa-blog-that-actually-gets-read-3-quick-tips/
Better to do that than squirt one-line replies to threads here, if you want to help people, surely?

I have a company blog but a "personal" blog would be a completely different kettle of fish. A discussion for another day.
The most efficient way to help, IMO, is to write a book. A remarkably time consuming exercise hence why my posts are truncated in nature

cfw1994

BritishInvestor said:

cfw1994 said:

BritishInvestor said:

Albermarle said:

FWIW If I were a private investor (and no longer regulated) I would love to start a blog helping people with the building blocks of financial knowledge - e.g. risk vs return/how to spot something that looks to good to be true etc. to help steer them in the right direction and do my bit to stop suboptimal behaviours.

Pretty much what this forum tries to do in fact.

Yes, I agree, but a blog would allow me to indulge in a random in-depth topic that only my mum would read

What is there about the regulations you work under that prevent you from blogging?
I wasn’t aware of a barrier to the blogosphere....indeed google can help give you tips: https://creativeadviser.co.uk/financial-adviser-marketing/how-to-create-an-ifa-blog-that-actually-gets-read-3-quick-tips/
Better to do that than squirt one-line replies to threads here, if you want to help people, surely?

I have a company blog but a "personal" blog would be a completely different kettle of fish. A discussion for another day.
The most efficient way to help, IMO, is to write a book. A remarkably time consuming exercise hence why my posts are truncated in nature

Fair enough.
Mind you, I never knew companies wrote blogs though - always thought people within it wrote them  

I read a few, sporadically.  Does your company not encourage you to write more?

Might be worth making your truncated posts clearer about what you mean (see my other reply on the SWR piece....).  Just raising a difference of opinion on something without expanding doesn’t often drive a thread forwards far: more often moderately exasperating for forum readers, I’d say.....

jimi_man

cfw1994 said:

  Just raising a difference of opinion on something without expanding doesn’t often drive a thread forwards far: more often moderately exasperating for forum readers, I’d say.....

Yes I'd go along with that. I'd read these threads and then BI posts a contrary view, so I wait patiently for an alternative viewpoint and the theory behind it, as I'm trying to pick up as much as possible, but it never comes. 

I must confess, that for that reason, I'd (mistakenly it seems) put BI down as a bit of a troll, just trying to stir the pot. 

If people are just going to post contrary opinions without qualifying them, I'd rather they didn't post at all.

BritishInvestor

cfw1994 said:

BritishInvestor said:

cfw1994 said:

BritishInvestor said:

Albermarle said:

FWIW If I were a private investor (and no longer regulated) I would love to start a blog helping people with the building blocks of financial knowledge - e.g. risk vs return/how to spot something that looks to good to be true etc. to help steer them in the right direction and do my bit to stop suboptimal behaviours.

Pretty much what this forum tries to do in fact.

Yes, I agree, but a blog would allow me to indulge in a random in-depth topic that only my mum would read

What is there about the regulations you work under that prevent you from blogging?
I wasn’t aware of a barrier to the blogosphere....indeed google can help give you tips: https://creativeadviser.co.uk/financial-adviser-marketing/how-to-create-an-ifa-blog-that-actually-gets-read-3-quick-tips/
Better to do that than squirt one-line replies to threads here, if you want to help people, surely?

I have a company blog but a "personal" blog would be a completely different kettle of fish. A discussion for another day.
The most efficient way to help, IMO, is to write a book. A remarkably time consuming exercise hence why my posts are truncated in nature

Fair enough.
Mind you, I never knew companies wrote blogs though - always thought people within it wrote them  

I read a few, sporadically.  Does your company not encourage you to write more?

Might be worth making your truncated posts clearer about what you mean (see my other reply on the SWR piece....).  Just raising a difference of opinion on something without expanding doesn’t often drive a thread forwards far: more often moderately exasperating for forum readers, I’d say.....

A lot of firms outsource blog writing to marketing firms that specialise writing syndicated content. Given the "cost" (vs what they could/should be doing) for an adviser to write a blog entry (that satisfies compliance etc) vs getting someone who is far better at constructing readable content and making compliance happy it can make sense to pay someone else to write the general content and occasionally for the adviser to write a few articles that are a bit more specific.