CFP Board OK’s fee hike for controversial ad campaign
Despite criticism from some members, the CFP Board has OK'd a fee hike to pay for a $36 million marketing campaign | Advisers sound off
Certified financial planners will pay $12 more per month in fees starting in July to finance a multimillion-dollar public-awareness campaign approved by the Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards Inc. on Thursday.
The CFP Board OK’d a four-year campaign that will cost $9 million annually. It will be financed in part by the fee increase, which will boost the cost of certification for the CFP mark by $145 annually to a total of $325. The CFP Board is spending $9.3 million over two years from the organization’s reserve to launch the effort.
CFP certificants will now pay their fees annually but will continue to renew their certificates every two years.
The awareness campaign will target the 20 million so-called “mass affluent” Americans — those 35 to 64 who have available assets ranging from $100,000 to $1 million. It will begin early in the second quarter of next year and will be reviewed after two years.
(What do financial planner think? Find out here.)
The CFP Board said that campaign will have to demonstrate increased awareness of the CFP mark for the effort to continue at that point. The organization, whose charge is to professionalize and to police the planning sector, has awarded the CFP certificate to 62,000 individuals who pass an initial exam and follow-up requirements.
“Our mission is to grant, uphold and ensure that the CFP mark is the recognized standard of excellence in personal financial planning,” Robert Glovsky, chairman of the CFP Board and president of Mintz Levin Financial Advisors LLC, said in a statement. “By raising awareness of the certification to the public, we will indeed be fulfilling our mission and calling attention to the importance of financial planning and the CFP certification.”
The CFP Board has hired Arnold Worldwide to design the initiative, which will encompass print, television and digital media. The advertising company is known for creating a campaign for Fidelity Investments that features the “green line” motif and one for Progressive Casualty Insurance Co. that stars the effervescent saleswoman Flo.
Some CFP certificants have expressed anger about the fee hike and the efficacy of an awareness campaign. Comments posted on InvestmentNews.com have been mostly negative about the CFP Board’s plan. And in an InvestmentNews poll, 76 percent of 232 respondents said they did not support a fee hike to fund the marketing campaign.
But according to the board, its own study showed that 83 percent of certificants supported the initiative, knowing that it will be funded by a fee increase.
“A mark of a professional is public recognition,” CFP Board chief executive Kevin Keller said in a statement. “This campaign will educate consumers about CFP professionals by showing how they bring value to their clients and help their clients reach their life goals and make wise use of their money.”
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