Fee-based (aka advisory) financial planners typically charge a percentage of assets under management (AUM) for watching the money and making trades/recommendations etc. The rate is nearly always on a descending scale with the more AUM the lower the fee. The scale might be something on the order of 2% on the first 100K, 1.5% on the amount between 100K and 500K, 1.25% from 500K to 1M and 1% from 1M on up. These rates are probably on the low side industry-wide. Suginami suggests not using a planner that deals in commission-generating sales but a comprehensive, holistic planner will always deal in life insurance (including annuities), disability insurance and long-term care insurance, all of which are commission based products. For the larger investment portfolios, fee-based is a better choice in most cases. The adviser can "cherry pick" funds from different fund families and can blend them with stocks in a way that is difficult or impossible to do without the advisory designation. It could also be argued that a fee-based planner has more incentive to grow the AUM since that means more money for him (although an ethical planner should always want to manage his client's money for the client's sake and nothing else). On smaller amounts, say, under 100K, it might not make sense to go with fee-based planning since in most cases, the fees exceed what commissions would be for those amounts.
Hope this helps. The bottom line is, find a planner that you are comfortable with on a personal level since the relationship is of utmost importance. And, I might add, unless the product he is recommending is of the fixed or guaranteed interest variety, avoid any adviser that promises you a rate of return in order to get your business. You are basing your professional relationship on a promise that he doesn't have the ability to keep because it's dealing with a situation over which he has NO control.

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1983 M-B 240D-Gone too.
1976 M-B 300D-Departed.

"Good" is the worst enemy of "Great".