A Lesson On Success From My Conversations With Top Insurance Advisors

When I did this exercise, our marketing, our sales approach literally shifted. It became so simplified and clear about who we are meant to do business with.

Hey. Hey. Welcome back to the accelerate your insurance sales podcast. Andy Neary here. How you doing today? I'm going to share one of the most important lessons I've learned in quite a long time. Just off of some recent conversations I've had with some of the top advisors in the insurance industry. And it's got us very clear about who our ideal client is. And I think it's going to do the same for you if I host this episode the right way. Over the past few weeks, I've been fortunate to connect with some top level advisors, some people we've been fortunate to do business with. And I wanted to share just some lessons I learned from these conversations and just observations in these people that I really think can go a far way, a long way for you to get clear on who you're meant to do business with. Because I have to tell you, after having these conversations, these check ins, some of them were just text check ins, man, I feel really clear right now about who we're meant to do business with. And I wanted to do this episode because last week I put a post out on LinkedIn about the fact that I had three conversations with separate prospects that I told them not to hire us. And I got a lot of interesting comments off of that, that, well, that's bold to say no. But I'll tell you, the only reason I was confident to look them in the eye on Zoom and say do not hire us right now is because I am so clear on who we're meant to do business with. And it, it was off the back end of these check ins, these conversations I had with these advisors. And you know, I gotta be honest, over the past two to three weeks, two to three months, we've talked to a lot of prospects who just aren't a good fit for us. And it's, it's been a little frustrating. You know, people who are reaching out and they're just kind of casual about their success, they're just kind of wondering what we do or how we can help them. But you can just tell off the conversation they're not very serious about doing anything. And as a team, you know, we have our conversations about these, these calls in our weekly meetings and it's been a little frustrating. But now that I've had these check ins, and one in particular that I'll talk about and I'm, I hope these gentlemen that I'm going to name here are okay with me given their names because I admire the living hell out of them. But having the conversation with these three gentlemen in particular.

Yeah, we're fired up. We are very clear on who we're meant to do business with. Which is making it a lot easier again to say no to the wrong people. But open the space to letting the right people do business with. And we're already seeing the benefits of that. It's like just this freedom of knowing who we're meant to do business with. The universe has helped bring the right people into our world in the last week or so. It's been awesome. And I'm going to share an exercise I did a couple of weeks ago that I think is going to help you out to really get clear on who your fit is. So yeah, you know, like I said, last two to three months, been talking to a lot of, a lot of prospects who just probably aren't a good fit for what we do. And the reason that's important that you say no to these people. Let's start, start here because I think in the insurance industry one of the problems I see is we like to put revenue on a pedestal. So we're going to bring in anybody for the sake of revenue. But all that does at the end of the day in the long run is damage your revenue because these are people who are going to leave you in the end. And it can also damage your reputation if you bring in the wrong people not only with the market but with your own team. I've been there where I've brought in the wrong clients in my insurance career for the sake of my commission, only to have my account exec team want to punch me in the face six months later. And so I think it's important that you've got to get really clear on who you're meant to do business with. I, I say this on stage all the time. I'd rather have a book of business, a half a million dollar book of business working with people I absolutely love and treat my team like royalty versus a million dollar book of business that half my clients frustrate me and treat my team like crap. What's the point in that? And so today I just want to talk about share these conversations I've had with these three gentlemen and ironically as I think about it, all their names start with C. I wonder if there's a common theme there too. But anyways, so this all started a few weeks ago off of a random text check in that I had with a Gentleman I've been fortunate to get to know work with a little bit, Casey Strunk. Casey, if you're listening in man, mad respect, brother. He runs Strunk Group out in Phoenix and if you, if you follow this guy's content in any way, shape or form, you know, this guy is just a driven individual. I was fortunate to meet him at a conference a couple years ago. He attended the two day retreat I did with some peers in the industry a couple years ago as well. And this guy's just driven, you know, above and beyond growing his insurance business. This guy is driven to get better in all areas of life. He, he has started a, a rise and ruck group in Phoenix. I believe that came out of our two day retreat where he had a chat with Dominic Frankini. I can't remember that Casey. Correct me if I'm wrong on that. But anyways, Casey's just a driven guy. He reached out. Want to know what I'm doing with our one on one coaching these days? But you can just tell when I have these conversations with. He's very focused almost to the obsessive point in which I absolutely love. Some people look at that as a negative trait. The most successful people are obsessive about success. I, I hate to break the news to you, but I love what this man stands for. I love his content. I love how he is just striving to be better in every area of his life. He hires coaches for business, he hires coaches for fitness. Right. He's just, he is just trying to be better in any way, shape or second. Conversation was with Chris Hamilton. You know, I talk about him a lot. He was actually one of the first clients I've had the chance to work with when I started Complete Game Consulting. He reached out to me, saw what I was doing. This was 20, man. This is before the pandemic, 20, 19. And he's like, hey man, can I spend a couple of days with you? I just want to, you know, I'm, I'm growing a book. I got a successful book. I'm managing my team. I'm just struggling with time management, put myself out there. I don't have time to prospect. He was one of the guys I really spent a lot of time with early in this business which gave me the confidence, quite frankly that I knew what I was doing in growing Complete Game Consulting. So I owe a lot of where we are today to Chris and putting his faith in us. But I had a check in with Chris a couple of weeks ago on a Friday night. End of the week, we've been trying to connect and so we caught up by phone and just had an awesome conversation. You know, one thing I love about Chris as well is his curiosity. He is constantly trying to get better in all ways, shape every, every way in life. We were talking about, you know, the challenges he has running the team at Hotchkiss. He's trying to grow his book, but he's strapped for time. You, he's obviously got his content game dialed in, as you're well aware of. And he's a dad, he's a husband, and he's got kids playing baseball and all the nuances that go with that. But we talked about health, what he's doing to try to streamline and improve his health. And we were comparing our blood panels and comparing our. I was telling him about my DEXA scan scores and what he's doing to try to get six pack abs in his mid-40s. Like, this is what I love about these people. They're motivated to be the best they can be every single day. If you see the three words behind me, are you watching this video? Consistency, persistency, patience that defines people like this. And then my third conversation was with Colton Storla. Some of you probably see he is definitely putting out a lot more content these days. He's an advisor up in Iowa. I got a chance to meet Colton just through content. You know, he reached out to me at one point a couple years ago, had a chance to work with him. He, you know, we met each other in person a couple years ago. I went and did a workshop for his team and another guy that I am just, I, I, I respect the hell out of because of his drive. Former athlete, played college football, running back. And, and again, you just watch this kid. I got to share this. Colton, I hope I don't expose you here too much, but this guy had to have a surgery on his hip a couple years ago, about a year and a half ago. And I was hosting a workshop, virtual workshop, the next day or two days later, I can't remember. And all of a sudden, as I jump on the workshop, I see Colton come into the Zoom room. And I was shocked. I'm like, wait, dude, you had surgery yesterday? And here he was laying on his couch, probably hopped up on pain meds, yet he was still there taking notes, attending this workshop. I mean, this is what I'm talking about, folks. But Colton is constantly striving for better. You know, he's constantly improving what he's doing with fitness, doing with business. And you know what? These three guys and, and we work with plenty more like it. But these three conversations I just happen to have, what ties these guys together, and I'm not just meaning guys for males, but guys and women together, is they're curious, they're consistent, and they're competitive as hell. Talked about that in a previous episode. When other people look at him in the face and say, dude, slow down a little bit, aren't you happy with where you're at? They're not, because they know they have. There's more in them. They know they're capable of more. And I actually chuckle when I listen to other people in the industry look at these guys. Sometimes they're teammates with these guys and say, oh, I can't do that when these guys are literally giving their teams and their peers the blueprint of how to have success. But here's where I want to get to the point with this episode, is after connecting with these guys, it got me fired up again to go out and do business with the right people, the people that are meant to do business with us, the people that allow us to do our best work. This episode is brought to you by True Captive Insurance. What if you could take full control of your health care strategy without the financial burdens of traditional insurance? At True Captive Insurance, they make that possible. As the only captive in the nation that puts up the majority of collateral on your behalf, they provide financial flexibility from day one, making them an advocating partner for their customer success. 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Take the next step. Today, visit True Captive.com and discover a smarter way to manage healthcare that is True Captive.com. you know, after having these conversations, I sat down with our team and we started talking about who, what makes these people so good. Because when we work with a certain kind of individual, the results are off the charts. They're number one producer on their team, they're having record sales years. The testimonials we get are fricking amazing. And when we work with somebody who's not a fit, it always ends leaving a bad taste in their mouth and our mouth too. So what separates and what do we need to do to go find these people? So what I did after having this conversation, these conversations over the past few weeks is I sat down and I did an exercise and I listed out who are our top five clients we've done business with in the last year, who are my favorite. And then likewise, I made a list of the five people, five companies we did business with that we probably shouldn't have. I probably said yes when it should have been a no. And here's what's so interesting. On the plus side of the people we love to do business with, what I learned was whether we worked with that individual producer individually or we worked with a team.

The reason they were such a good fit is the person who hired us. So it could be the producer for themselves, it could be a sales leader, an agency owner. They are just like Chris, Casey and Colton. They're driven, they're curious, they want to get better every single time no matter what program we provided for them, that is who hired us. And on the flip side, the five we probably shouldn't have done business with in every single case, the person that hired us, I shouldn't have done business with, they're the. They're not like these folks over here. They're not as driven, they make excuses, they're looking for quick wins. They view us as a sales manager, not a coach. And what's interesting is on the negative side, the people we probably shouldn't have done business with, they referred us to the other people we probably shouldn't have done business with. There was such a clear dividing line. And when I walked away from doing this exercise, what I did is I sat down, I said what makes these, these advisors, these sales leaders such an ideal fit for us? And I literally drew out who these people are. Age.

Personality traits, habits. What kind of magazines do they read, what kind of podcasts do they listen to? We literally built out this avatar of who this person is is.

Because when I look at the products we offer.

We are now clear on every product we offer is designed for this person.

So whether it's our agency, growth accelerator, pro. Now we offer three levels there. Essentials, Elite, Expert. But it's all built for this advisor. Essentials is when this advisor, the Chris, the Casey, the Colton, they're on their way to a million dollar book. Maybe they're not quite there yet, but they're on the fast track. That's essentials. Elite is when they hit a million and they want to keep growing. That's who it's for. Expert is when they hit that point when they need to grow a brand to keep growing their business because they're running out of time because they got a book to manage, a team to manage. But they need that content awareness. That's what expert is for. And then when it comes to workshops and the private academies we host, that's when they want their team to do it as well. But at the end of the day, everything we build is for that guy, that woman. And it's gotten us so clear about who we're going to say yes to from here on out about who we're going to say no to.

So what I ask you to do is sit down and look at your current book of business. Do the same exercise I did. List out your top five clients you have today.

These are the people who let you do your best work. I am not saying the top five because you make the most money on them. No, the top five clients that let you do your best work and then do the same exercise. On the flip side, who are the five if you had to be honest with yourself, are not a good fit for who you are, for what you do Because I guarantee you will see a very clear dividing line. And what I want you to do is moving forward, look at those top five and start thinking about how you are going to attract those people. How are you building your products, your plans for that person.

How are you distributing your marketing to attract that person. Everything you do should come back to that person.

When I did this exercise, our marketing, our sales approach.

Literally shifted.

And it became so simplified and clear about who we are meant to do business with. We are meant to do business with producers who may be newer to the industry but they're on a fast track to a million dollar book. Why? Because they don't make excuses. They don't tell me their dog ate their homework. They show up, they're consistent, they put in the work. We're meant to do business with people who hit that million dollar mark. Why? Because they're going to hit a point. They're going to run out of time. But they have to keep prospecting if they want to keep growing. They need a brand that is what do we do better than anybody else? And we are designed for the teams, the sales leaders, the agency owners who have all stars on their team that they want to support.

Sit down and look at your book of business and do the same exercise because I guarantee you will be blown away by the common traits that define your best and the common traits that define find your worst. This right here should make your marketing more effective. It's going to help you get laser focused on who you are trying to attract. I know because I got this opportunity to talk to Casey, Chris and colton. I know who we're trying to do business with.

People who are driven, people who are consistent, people who show up every day, people who are competitive as hell and they love to win and they're just going to outwork everybody else and they don't make excuses.

I suggest you do the same because it will do wonders for your revenue growth moving forward. Now, I do want to make a quick announcement. I'm excited to announce that we have our next social media sales seminar May 15. It is right around the corner. In this seminar, you are going to work with me directly getting clear on your ideal prospect so you could bring your top five to the seminar. And I'm going to teach you how to attract them on social media, primarily LinkedIn. I am teaching you our LinkedIn diamond strategy, which I think is the best B2B strategy out there in the insurance industry today. It is designed for insurance professionals because that's who we are. So there is a link in the show notes. Go check it out. Get signed up. This investment of free 500 bucks is the best money you'll ever spend if you want to open up another channel. Especially if you are that advisor on the fast track to a million bucks or you're there and you're going, I don't have time to prospect. That's who this is for. So go get the link, check it out, get signed up. It starts next Thursday. It is a half day seminar. I personally am teaching that seminar. But at a minimum, here's what I want you to do. Sit down today after listening to this episode. Make a list of your top five clients. Make a list of your bottom five, start figuring out what makes them the best and what makes these folks the worst. And you will see a dividing line. You will see clear personality divides. My suggestion is you spend all of your time effort moving forward attracting the best because they're going to let you do your best work, which is great for your revenue, even better for your reputation. And Chris, Casey, Colton, thank you for letting me share your names today. You guys are absolutely killing it. I admire the living hell out of you. Keep it up guys. You are inspiring others in this business. Be good. That's all we got for this episode of the accelerate your insurance sales podcast. One of the most valuable things you can do to help us and other new potential listeners find our show is for you to rate the show and leave a review. So as a special bonus for you if you leave us a review, take a screenshot of your review and send it to me as a DM to my LinkedIn profile. I will send you a free copy of our LinkedIn Diamond Playbook, our proven four step strategy to grow your business on LinkedIn. So go right now, leave us a review, screenshot it, and send me a DM on LinkedIn. Also, please share this podcast with anyone you think would enjoy it. That's it for now.