How to Write an About Page for a Financial Planning Practice That Builds Trust Before the First Meeting

06 August 2026·7 min read

Quick answer: A financial planner's About page should do less bragging and more reassuring — lead with who you help and what the first meeting actually feels like, not a list of letters after your name. Swap the stock photo of a handshake for a real photo and a specific description of your process, because uncertain prospects are looking for signs they won't be judged or sold to. Structure it around the reader's anxiety (Do I have enough? Am I too late? Will they laugh at my questions?) rather than your CV. Get this right and your About page becomes the thing that gets someone to actually click "book a meeting" instead of closing the tab. ✨

Here's the thing nobody says out loud in this industry: people don't put off calling a financial planner because they're busy. They put it off because talking about money makes them feel exposed, and they're not sure you'll be kind about it. Your About page is often the last thing someone reads before they decide whether to trust you with that conversation — and most advisor About pages spend that moment listing qualifications instead of building 💖 the human connection that actually gets the booking made.

What most financial planners get wrong

Walk through ten advisor websites and you'll see the same About page nine times: a photo in a navy suit, a paragraph of career history starting with "After graduating from," a wall of designations (CFP, SMSF Specialist, whatever else), and a closing line about being "passionate about helping clients achieve their goals." None of it is wrong exactly — it's just answering a question nobody stressed about money is actually asking.

The mistakes tend to cluster around three things:

Leading with credentials instead of context. Qualifications matter, but they belong in the middle of the page, not the opening line — nobody decides to trust a stranger because of an acronym.
Writing for a peer, not a prospect. Industry jargon ("holistic wealth strategies," "bespoke financial solutions") reads as competent to other advisors and as meaningless to someone who's never met one.
Never describing the actual first meeting. This is the biggest miss. The single most anxiety-reducing thing you can write is what will literally happen when someone sits down with you — and almost nobody does it.

The copy-paste About page formula

Fill in each section with your own details — this order is deliberate, it moves from "who is this for" to "can I trust them" to "what happens next."

1. Opening line (who you help, plainly): "I work with [specific type of client] who [specific situation/goal]." No adjectives about yourself yet.

2. The moment you understand: One or two sentences naming the exact worry your ideal client has. This is where you show you get it before you ask them to trust you.

3. How you got here (short, human): 2-3 sentences on your path into the industry — include one non-professional detail so you read as a person, not a resume.

4. What the first meeting actually looks like: A short, concrete walkthrough — what you'll ask, what they don't need to prepare, how long it runs, what happens after.

5. Qualifications and experience: Now they've earned their place — list them factually, no superlatives.

6. A clear, low-pressure next step: One CTA, described honestly (e.g. "a 30-minute chat, no obligation, no product pitch").

Please note: general marketing information, not financial or compliance advice — check your AFSL's requirements before publishing any claims about your services, qualifications or outcomes.

Now here's where it gets specific — because "who you help" and "what they're anxious about" change completely depending on your niche, and your About page needs to sound like it was written for that exact person, not adapted from a template.

Intergenerational wealth planner: The anxiety here is rarely about money itself — it's about family. Your prospect is often worried about a future argument between siblings, or about a parent's wishes getting misunderstood after they're gone. Your "moment you understand" section should name that directly: "Money conversations between generations are rarely really about money — they're about fairness, timing and communication." Your first-meeting walkthrough should specifically mention whether other family members are welcome, and how you handle sensitive topics like unequal inheritances or a parent who hasn't told their kids anything yet.

Pre-retiree specialist advisor: This client is often quietly panicking that they've left it too late, or that they'll ask a question that reveals they don't understand their own super. The tone needs to be calm and unhurried — no urgency language, no countdown-clock framing. Your first-meeting section should explicitly say there's no such thing as a stupid question at this stage, and describe what documents (if any) they need to bring, because "what do I even need to prepare" is a real source of pre-meeting dread for this group.

Young-professionals-focused planner: This prospect's fear is usually "I don't earn enough to justify this" or "I'll be talked down to." Your opening line should make the minimum bar for working with you obvious and unintimidating. Keep the tone conversational — first name, contractions, none of the navy-suit formality. Mention in the first-meeting section that there's no minimum portfolio size or that you work with people just starting out, if that's true, because that single line often decides whether they book at all.

How to actually put this together

Start by writing the first-meeting walkthrough before anything else — it's the section people skip and it's the one doing the most work, so don't leave it for last when you're out of energy. Interview yourself: what do you actually say in the first five minutes? What do people usually ask that surprises them to learn is normal? Write that down in plain language, then build the rest of the page around it.

Use a real, current photo — not a corporate headshot from five years ago, and not a stock image of a laptop and a coffee cup. If you're camera-shy, a photo of you mid-conversation (even staged) reads as far more trustworthy than a posed studio shot, because it implies "this is what talking to me looks like." Keep paragraphs short — three or four sentences max — because a wall of text on a page about reducing anxiety is its own small contradiction.

💡 The non-obvious tip: Put your first-meeting walkthrough above your qualifications, not below — most advisors do the reverse. Prospects skim for the part that answers "what happens to me if I click this button," and if credentials come first, plenty of stressed readers bounce before reaching the one paragraph that would've actually got them to book.

One more mechanical thing worth doing: link your About page directly from your homepage hero and from your contact page, not just the nav bar. People who are nervous about a first meeting often click through to "About" specifically to suss you out before they'll go anywhere near a booking form — make sure that page is easy to find at exactly the moment they're deciding.

Don't open with your name and title — open with who you help.
Don't use the word "passionate" — describe an action instead of a feeling.
Don't bury or omit the cost of a first meeting — unstated pricing reads as "expensive" by default.
Don't use a group stock photo of unrelated models when a real photo of you (even an imperfect one) would build more trust.
Don't make claims about outcomes, returns or performance — beyond the compliance risk, it reads as exactly the kind of overpromising a wary prospect is screening for.

Frequently asked questions

How long should a financial planner's About page be?

Long enough to cover all six sections properly without padding — usually 400 to 700 words. Shorter than that and the first-meeting walkthrough gets cut, which is the part doing the heaviest lifting for trust.

Should I mention pricing on the About page?

You don't have to state exact fees, but at minimum say whether the first meeting is free or paid and roughly what it costs to work with you ongoing, even in broad terms. Leaving it a total mystery adds friction rather than removing it — worth checking how specific your AFSL allows you to be here.

Will rewriting my About page actually increase bookings?

It's genuinely hard to promise this in isolation, and we won't pretend otherwise — your About page is one part of a longer trust-building journey that includes your homepage, reviews, and how fast you respond to enquiries. What it reliably does is remove a specific kind of hesitation for people who've already found you and are on the fence, which tends to show up as fewer people ghosting after they land on the page.

Do I need a professional photographer?

It helps, but it's not the deciding factor — an authentic, well-lit photo taken on a phone that looks like an actual moment beats a stiff, over-posed professional shot almost every time. If you do get one taken, ask for a few candid, mid-conversation shots alongside the standard headshot. 📱