We had launched FINQA, a fee based financial planning and advisory firm for Individuals last year. Like all startups,we thought it was a great idea and assumed that people would sign up for Financial Planning in droves as it would benefit them.
Guess What ? We were wrong.
Not everybody got the value of financial planning or were unwilling to pay a fee for advice.
Then we launched an e-book called Fin10. It had 100 facts on the basics of Personal Finance and was generic in nature. First it was priced and then we made it free.
There were some folks who paid for it, but the number of folks who downloaded it for free was quite interesting. However, a greater insight was that since money is a very personal topic (hence the word Personal Finance) most folks want to do it on their own rather than trust a stranger. They wanted something which could be interactive rather than just basic facts.
Ofcourse the army of rogue insurance agents and Bank salesmen masquerading as advisors and selling inappropriate products hasn’t helped the cause of the retail financial industry and has painted everybody with the same brush.
However, the scale of financial literacy in India is still quite large and there are folks out there who want to learn stuff and do the right thing – On their own.
To facilitate this, we recently changed the model of FINQA from fee based financial planning advisory to ‘Ask Unlimited Questions’ via email / phone as and when you need information – And get answers specific to your requirements.
For those who prefer a DIY approach, we have started work on a book called ‘The Blueprint’
It’s essentially a guide to help you craft a blueprint for your financial life and wealth creation.
It will be divided into sections, starting out with basic essentials you need to know about personal finance, and then help you plan your money and investments based on your individual situation. It will also include real life examples and case studies from situations we have experienced with our clients so that you can relate to the stuff better.
Unlike other Personal Finance books, It will also come with an Excel ‘DIY Financial Planning’ model which you can customize to create your own personal plan. AND you can talk to an advisor at FINQA if you get stuck.
A couple of folks suggested, “Make finance fun” or “Make an App or a game” !!
We thought about the idea but realized that we aren’t here to entertain people. The subject of money is a very important one and a perception exists among a lot of folks that it’s very complex so they would rather not think about it.
Through this book our aim is not to make finance fun or gamify it…but more to simplify it and put stuff in your personal context so that you can relate to it better. And more importantly, TAKE ACTION.
Wealth creation takes knowledge, but more importantly time. Read Alok’s strategy and how he “shaves of some parmesan cheese whenever he needs money” I love this example 🙂
When I started working 10 years ago, I was ignorant about a lot of stuff and just let a lot of money lie idly in my bank account. One of the reasons for this book is to also help those who are just starting out so that they can get a headstart and not make the same mistakes I made.
Please have a look let us know what you think about The Blueprint here.
P.S: The Blueprint is a working title and if you have a better suggestion for a name that will better communicate what we are trying to do, please feel free to share your suggestion below.
Thank You.
Vikram Kohli
Personal financial problem is indeed their Abhik. But here’s how few people around me approach for financial planning. They don’t read. They ask colleagues, parents, friends where they invested, and that too in month of December when investment proof need to be submitted. People I guess ignore financial planning because it involves calculations and its not easy to do. And then getting advice from third party always give perception that this guy might be getting commission out of selling me bad product(trust issue).
Pls check app called Walnut if you haven’t, they read transactional SMS and given overall view of my spending. If along with spending, I can get recommendations on where should I invest, it will be good.
And here are couple of observations for https://finqa.in/
1) First I clicked on “Ask a question” And then I clicked on “Pricing” which again show ask question, thus got confused.So a bit of usability issues with website
2) There are problems with website when I opened in FireFox.
I guess you hosted Delhi TheRodinhoods this time along with Asha. Thanks and well managed show as you have to manage between enery levels and timings 🙂
Vikram @ https://mvpbuddy.com
Rishi
Abhik: re: “We thought about the idea but realized that we aren’t here to entertain people.” I see a lot of merit in the idea of gamification. Why do you think otherwise? What am I missing?
Abhik Prasad
Thanks Vikram.
Yes, it’s a difficult problem to crack especially when most folks don’t know what they don’t know.
Also, most investments are done for ‘Tax Savings’ rather than for growing their money (with tax savings as an added advantage)
We hope to address the issues through the book (i.e. atleast for those folks who are interested in reading 🙂
I had seen Walnut and even tried it. Unfortunately, my credit card is linked to my company expenses and it was understandably showing me wacko figures…but its a great idea for a start.
Thanks for the feedback on the website. I will get the issues checked out and the UI problem too. The reason we added Ask a question form everywhere was to make it easier for folks to ask a question.
Cheers.
Abhik Prasad
Rishi, yep there is a lot of merit in gamification but I was talking more in the context of the book.
We would love to make a fun app/game but we just don’t have the budgets as yet 🙁
That’s we decided to take the book approach first…atleast those who like reading will probably give it a try.
The problem however is that most folks want to make more money (from a salary hike or quick gains through trading on the stock market) instead of a slightly more planned and longer term approach.