Funds' Adviser Planning Tools Seriously Flawed

Two new reports from Corporate Insight have uncovered serious deficiencies in both marketing collateral and planning tools provided to advisers by major mutual fund companies.

"In studying the retirement planning support available to advisers by the top 14 mutual fund firms, we were surprised by the disparity of their marketing collateral and planning tools," said Alan Maginn, Corporate Insight senior analyst. "For example, we recognized two firms as market leaders for their centralization of retirement planning materials, and another two as laggards for poor organization on their Web sites."

This lack of organization forces advisers "to search needlessly for appropriate retirement planning information," Maginn continued. "We also discovered that many retirement calculators produced summary reports [but] lacked customization capabilities that could be used to sell clients additional products."

The two retirement platform reports review separate but related issues. The first looks at production formation and marketing materials. The second covers tools and calculators.

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Money Management Executive
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