The AUM pricing model is prevalent in our industry but in many cases, the pricing is significantly disconnected from the real value being delivered.

Depending on your expertise and your client base, you might add value through tax management or estate planning advice. You might add value by fostering a positive attitude in your clients about investing, talking clients down from the ledge and helping them avoid a bad decision when volatility shakes the market.  If you're working in the life-centered planning space, you might create value by forging life-long relationships that make you indispensable to your clients. 

And that's the rub for our industry: we're pricing based on investing, and less so on the real value we're adding. Clients and prospects think they're paying for portfolio performance, so it's almost like we're giving away the planning and advice piece of the pie for free!

So how do we change this backwards structure? How do we price our value?

Matthew Jackson is a director in the financial services division of the pricing consultancy firm Simon Kucher & Partners. He specializes in the area of the psychology of value communication and digital presentment. He also has a Master of Arts degree in classics from Oxford University and holds the Chartered Financial Analyst designation.

In this conversation, Matthew Jackson and I discuss eight different pricing models and how to determine which one is right for you and your clients.