Does your financial advisor write their own content?
You should not assume they do, even if it looks like they are.
Ghostwriting happens in the publishing industry. A similar practice takes place in the wealth management industry.
Is this allowed?
Here is FINRA's Regulatory Notice 08-27:
Registered representatives may not suggest (or encourage others to suggest) that they authored investment-related books, articles or similar publications if they did not write them. Such a publication created by a third-party vendor must disclose that it was prepared either by the third party or for the representative's use.1
I’m no lawyer and never give legal advice, but it looks like this kind of thing is allowed if it is in a disclosure.
Ah, disclosures! They may not contain sparkling, readable prose, and they may be in small print, but oh how illuminating that print can be.
So, don’t look at the name at the top of the article you are reading from a financial advisor: look at the disclosure at the bottom.
Let me illustrate…
Do a Google search of the following:
“Finance Lessons for Your Teen” blog
Copy and paste exactly what I wrote in the previous sentence into a Google search.
Though Google’s algorithm can dictate results, you will likely notice several blogs and writings come up with very similar content. You may also notice a disclosure at the bottom that the material was developed elsewhere.
And voilà!! You have an article that appears to be written by an advisor that was not, in fact, written by said advisor.
This does not mean that every wealth management firm who has used this kind of marketing service should be avoided. It simply means, contrary to first impressions, that they may not write much of their content.
To give financial advisors the benefit of the doubt, it could be that they don’t even know the marketing program they use for the website includes blogs with their name on it. Regardless, I think it’s important for the public to know whether financial advisors are writing their own stuff or not.
Don’t get me wrong. Many writers have some kind of team helping them—be it grammar and spell checkers, editors, researchers, etc.
Writers aren’t an island.
I use an editor—be it another person’s imperfect eyes or AI’s imperfect digital oversight, suggestions, and titles—and source the work of many others; for the most part though, the writings that land in your inbox Monday mornings or you find online at other websites with my name on them have been composed by yours truly.
A financial advisor doesn’t need to be a writer to be a trusted financial advisor, but they do need to earn your trust.
Obviously.
Just make sure to read the fine print.
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Sources:
1. “The Obligation of Firms When Supervising their Registered Representatives’ Use of Marketing Materials to Establish Expertise” published May 20, 2008. Accessed online: https://www.finra.org/rules-guidance/notices/08-27 (October 31, 2024).