In Practice

Finders, minders and grinders are all critical members of successful retirement plan service teams, and growing an advisory practice will require all three skill sets working in concert.

The formula behind successful firm marketing and public relations in the retirement planning industry includes a combination of authenticity, clarity and consistency.

Some subsets of Millennial investors are just as likely as their parents to seek professional financial advice, according to new research from Phoenix Marketing International.

Total U.S. retirement assets reached $24 trillion as of June 30, up 2.8% from $23.4 trillion measured on March 31.

A new study suggests it is a lack of awareness among college students and young professionals, not a lack of interest, which has led to the advisory industry’s...

Women rarely take steps to maximize Social Security benefits, and only about a third say they work with a professional financial adviser, research finds.

A new Schwab Advisor Services study explores industry attributes that attract professional financial advisers to the registered investment adviser (RIA) profession.

Defined contribution (DC) plan sponsors are already adopting defined benefit (DB) best practices in plan design, but plans could benefit from more DB-like investing and communication.

It’s an important question for advisory firm owners to ask, says Independent Financial Partners CEO William Hamm, Jr.: What happens to my clients if I have to quit...

Research from financial analytics firm Cerulli Associates shows more than a quarter of 401(k) participants look to their plan’s recordkeeper as their primary source of retirement advice.

Ranging over a number of factors that impact branding and differentiation, panelists at the 2014 PANC in Orlando, Florida, discussed what builds a retirement plan adviser's brand.

For industry executives on one panel at the 2014 PLANADVISER National Conference, retirement plan sponsor and participant education is a three-part effort.

On the third day of the 2014 PLANADVISER National Conference, the chief executive officers of Pershing and LPL Financial spoke about how their firms are supporting advisers.

A new report from the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) asks whether household expenditures commonly change with age for older Americans.

There is no end of things to benchmark in a retirement plan, and measuring advisers’ own services are especially key from a number of standpoints, said panelists at...

Approximately $720 billion in defined contribution (DC) plan assets was eligible for distribution but remained in employer-sponsored plans in 2013, according to a report from Cerulli Associates.

Retirement specialist advisers used to sell the idea of getting participants engaged, getting them to allocate their savings appropriately—but today advisers must take a different approach.

The 2014 RIA (Registered Investment Advisors) Benchmarking Study from Schwab Advisor Services finds employees look beyond their base salary for meaningful compensation.

Surprisingly, only one-third of retirement plan advisers know their gross and net margins, said Blake Thibault, senior vice president and adviser with Heffernan Financial Services.

The retirement planning industry has long been characterized by a shift from defined benefit (DB) to defined contribution (DC) plans, but advisers still face great opportunity in serving...