photo credit: John Griffiths

What does the newspaper industry have to do with the insurance industry?  They’re both a couple of dinosaurs that need to change some of their ways.  Steve Rubel provides the newspaper industry with some recommendations in his post.

I’m not all that concerned about the insurance industry itself, I am concerned about you the producer.  As far as the industry is concerned you’re disposable.  If you fail they’ll just bring on another new producer and retain all those residual earnings from themselves.

As a producer you face 3 challenges.

1. Your prospects have less money no matter if they’re consumers or businesses
2. You have more direct competition from the underwriters than ever before
3. Your prospects have less tolerance for marketing communications that talk about your product

If you don’t or won’t take these challenges on yourself and overcome them, just like 85% of all new agents you’ll fail out of the industry in less than 18 months.  If you don’t discover how to overcome these challenges you’ll continue to struggle no matter how long you remain in the business.  If you don’t discover how to overcome these challenges yourself many of you will walk away with a big debt you’ll have to repay the underwriter for the privilege of this business opportunity.

When it comes to motivation you aren’t lacking.  You are highly motivated to succeed and you want to make it happen now.  Some of you have even crossed the line between motivation and desperation.  Of course, desperation makes it even harder for you to succeed.

So what do you do if you want to sell more insurance than you are now.

1. Recognize your #1 priority has to be to discover how to EFFECTIVELY market yourself
2. Choose one group of people you can help, and learn everything you can about those people
3. Focus on what’s most important to them, and only talk about that
4. Develop a marketing plan to get prospects contacting you
5. Only meet with people who are looking to buy now

If a hurricane, tornado, snow storm, whatever the stormy weather that mother nature unleashes where you live was headed your way you’d listen to the weather forecast to determine the actions you need to take.  When the weather forecaster told you the alert has gone from watch to warning you’d start taking those actions.  Because of your alertness and willingness to take actions you and your loved ones would safely weather the storm.

When it comes to your business safety the alert has moved from watch to warning.  What actions will you take to prepare yourself to weather the storm?  The actions you take starting today will not only keep you safe in the near term, but they’ll help you enjoy greater success from this point forward.

photo credit: jsorbieus

In spite of what you may think sales people who are only out for themselves and don’t care about their clients don’t do very well.  Put your heart into your sales and reap the benefits.

Even though potential clients may ill use and abuse you and treat you like you don’t deserve to breath the same air as they do you have to take the higher road.  Your first objective is treat every person with kindness, respect, and dignity.

Realize if you are getting treated poorly you’re treated this way because of your own actions.  You’re positioning yourself as a pushy sales person when you should be positioning yourself as a trusted advisor.  Change the way you position yourself and you will change the way you’re treated.

Your next objective is to help the potential client get the help they need whether it involves you and your services or not.  When you have a client you must put their needs ahead of yours and protect them and their interests, or you’re treating them no differently than a transactional customer.  You can’t earn loyalty, repeat business, or referrals from transactional customers.

When you change your heart and place your focus on understanding their needs and helping them get what is best for them you’ll demonstrate you are the trusted advisor they thought you were.  You’ll also notice your sales effortlessly increase and both you and your new clients feel really good about your new relationship.

Andrea Nierenberg shares a wonderful story about the importance of respecting others even when you don’t think there’s something in it for you.   When you take your clients to heart and treat everyone with kindness, respect, and dignity you’ll not only increase sales you’ll feel good about yourself and the work you do.