Social Proof: How To Accelerate Your Sales With Social Media

Hey. Hey. Andy Neary here. Before we dive into today's podcast episode, think back to how you came upon this podcast. Maybe it was through a post, a share, or one of your own peers shared this podcast with you. I don't take any ads. I don't take any sponsorships. The only way this podcast grows is through word of mouth. So if you would be so kind to share this with a peer, with a teammate, with a friend, a family member, I would be forever grateful to you. This is how we impact more business professionals, and this is how this podcast grows. All right, let's dive into today's episode. Hey. Hey. Welcome back to Bullpen Sessions. My name is Andy Neary, and this is episode 266. Today, I am going to share a sales formula that we leverage here at Complete Game Consulting that has helped us turn our social media connections into more conversations than we know what to do with. And I think it's going to help you, too. So if you're sitting out there right now tuning in, and you're one of my faithful insurance professionals, first and foremost, thank you for taking the time to tune into today's episode. But you have probably also heard me talk about the need to create content until you're blue in the face. You have heard this from me time and time again. And even with all of the preaching I've done about content, you're still not creating any. And even if you are creating content, you're not creating enough. Why is that? Well, today we're going to solve that. And today my job is to convince you what content can do for your business development efforts if you follow this sales formula. Now, this formula is not something I read in some coaching and training book or something I took in a sales coaching course. It is a formula I stumble upon just a couple of weeks ago when I was thinking about what content has done for our business. And that formula is very simple. So if you got a pen and a piece of paper, I want you to take it out right now and write this down. Here is the sales formula that we use today to turn our content into conversations with prospects. Value multiplied by volume equals sales velocity.

Let me say it again. Value multiplied by volume equals sales velocity. What does that mean? Well, in the game of content, the more valuable content you create.

And the more often you create it, you will create more opportunities with with prospects. I like to keep things simple. I'm a simple man, so hope that formula makes a lot of sense. So when we look at our content here at Complete Game Consulting, we Take a very simple approach. It's is the content we are creating bringing value to our audience. Every Monday morning, I block out three hours of time. From 8am to 11am Central, I block out three hours of time to create our company's content. You cannot get ahold of me during those hours. It has gotta be a very special reason why you found yourself on my calendar Monday mornings. Because that's the time I commit to creating content. Why? Because I have seen the impact it has on our business.

And I don't know about you, but creating content's a hell of a lot more fun than picking up the phone and calling a bunch of people who have no clue who I am. You see, one of the biggest challenges you have right now is you are not viewing content. You're not putting content on the same level as a prospecting activity as you do. Picking up the phone as you do sending an email to a prospect. It is the same type of activity today. It's that important. And so you first and foremost have to start giving content more credit than you're giving it right now. I know it doesn't create any overnight win. That's why you're hesitant right now. You are so focused on creating overnight wins. I understand that picking up a phone can turn one conversation into a booked appointment tomorrow morning. I get it. However, let me challenge you here.

Wouldn't it be nice if you had more prospects, know who you are? How would it feel.

To have a prospect who already knows you when you pick up the phone and call?

You see, content can do wonders for your business as long as you're willing to place importance on actually creating it. And this is where, if I've convinced you that you should be creating content, your second.

Hurdle exists, and that is the mindset you're applying to your content. There is not a week that goes by that I don't hear from an insurance professional who is attempting to start to build out a content strategy. And the following hesitations pop up and following questions. Number one, Andy, how are people going to react when I post this? Hmm. Okay, we'll talk about that. Number two.

How much content is too much content? When is it too much? And number three, when is the perfect time to post all legitimate questions? But these are thoughts going on in your head right now that is preventing you from creating content because you're letting some mythical algorithm in your head control your thoughts and your actions. Yeah, there's algorithms on LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok, and all the platforms, but at the end of the day. You can't let yourself be controlled by those algorithms. When I look at the content we create here, I apply one simple filter to the content we create. Will this piece of content bring value to my audience? If I believe the answer is yes, I will create it.

Now, it is the one question I stress over the most. For as long as I've been creating content, every morning when I wake up, every Monday morning I wake up, I'm still nervous. Believe it or not, with the content I know I'm going to create that day because I want to make sure it's of the highest value to our prospects.

It's so funny because I can feel myself as I drink my last cup of coffee of the day at about 7:50 in the morning, 10 minutes from, you know, my, my content creating block of time, those nerves start to ramp up because I'm like, I feel like I'm about to take the stage because I'm about to produce content that's going to help drive our business. Now I also share this from a place of empathy that if you are hesitant or nervous about doing this because you're just getting started on your journey, I totally get it. I remember when I started leaning into content a few years ago, I had all of the same fears you do. What are people going to think? How are people going to react? I was deathly afraid of getting that one negative comment. I can remember one of the first articles I wrote on LinkedIn.

And it was an article where I challenged other brokers and I was pretty crass about it. And I remember a comment I received from one broker out of the Midwest and it was a pretty direct comment towards me. And that one comment, despite the fact I had a lot of people who really liked the article because I was speaking the truth, that one comment almost caused me to take the article down.

And I want to share that because again.

I know if you're at the beginning of your content journey, you're going to have those fears and it's okay.

But I'm here to tell you, if you're willing to lean into building a content strategy for your business, your business will never be the same. Now this brings up another comment I often hear from other insurance professionals who are starting on their journey. Is they immediately, before they have even posted their first video, they've written their first article. They instantly are comparing their content to somebody like mine. So I'll get comments all the time. Andy. I just, I'll never be as good at creating content as you are. And.

I immediately push Back on that, because here's the issue that I have with that statement. You are comparing your chapter one to my chapter nine, chapter 10. I've been creating content for nine years. If you're just getting started, you are not going to be as good as me. And that's not. That really has nothing to do with talent. It has everything to do with time. I've been doing this for nine years. I have gone through nine years of failure, trial and error, trying things that don't work to arrive at the place where I am today. Creating content. If you're just beginning, you've got to get started. Quit competing, comparing yourself to others who are also creating content, because the only thing that's separating you from them is time. That's it. Hi, it's Andy Neary, and thank you for listening to the Bullpen Sessions podcast. Did you know the ideas shared on this show are things we actually specialize in helping you implement? If you're an insurance professional and you want to turn your credibility into consistent client acquisition, visit completegameconsulting.com and schedule a free strategy call. Again, that's completegain consulting.com to request your free strategy call. All right, let's jump back into today's podcast episode.

And if you're really doing content the right way, the only thing you should be focusing on is are you bringing value to your prospects? Who cares what other people think? Who cares how other people react? Like your peers? You have one job.

Just bring value to your prospects. It's that simple.

And when you think about the sales formula, that formula I shared. Value multiplied by volume equals sales velocity. Here's what I have learned. The more I give, which is giving a lot of the good stuff away for free. The more I lean into that and the more often I do it, the more content I create.

We can literally see our pipeline start to increase.

We sit in a position today, and I'm very blessed for this November of 2023 that we are generating almost one lead a day from LinkedIn because of our content.

Again, I don't know about you, I'd much rather do that than have to pick up the phone every day and call a bunch of people that have no clue who the hell I am.

So am I convincing you? Am I. Am I giving you the ammunition you need? The permission you need, maybe the little kick in the ass you need to get going on this? This. You're going to be sitting down in the next couple weeks to do your 2024 planning. Where in that planning is social Media content going to be a part of that strategy.

You know, when I talk about value plus multiplied by volume, right. One of the things I started doing with our content about 2 months ago is I started tracking.

How our content was performing. So every week when I sit down to plan the week's content, by the way, tip. Little secret. I don't sit down and plan a whole month of content. I do it week by week. I don't overthink the process. But what I do to do to make sure we're creating the right content is I sit down and first and foremost, I look at the analytics. I look at how did last week's content perform as far as impressions and engagements go? You have that filter, you have those analytics on your LinkedIn profile. I look at that every week and I want to say I want to see how our content performed. Now here's my strategy. I apply to our content every week. I will come up with ideas or concepts that I want to teach. And a lot of it has to do with mindset more than tactics. And I will use those posts in the upcoming week as pictures, as photos. So when you look at our content on LinkedIn and you see the photos of me where I'm telling a story, I'm using that content for a very specific reason. What's the reason? Well, I want to see how it performs. I want to see what stories and messages resonate with my audience. And then when I look back at that week, when it's done, anything that performed very well will become one of my coaching videos in the near future. And it might even become one of the podcast episodes in the near future. This episode I'm recording right now comes directly from a LinkedIn post I made about two to three weeks ago.

So we have a very legitimate strategy to what we create, and it's. We track our metrics, we track the analytics of how they're performing. And I can tell you this, the second we started tracking, it forced us to get better with the value we were bringing. And the second the value increase, guess what happened? The impressions, the engagements increased and followed by that followed. That was more leads, huh? There is no coincidence there. So as you sit and look at a building a strategy, number one, I'm going to tell you, you got to bring a lot more value than you think you are right now. You have to teach your prospects to do what you sell, almost as if you're teaching them to do it theirself, do it themselves. A lesson I learned from a mentor of mine is people come for the information, they pay for the application.

Remember that People come for the information, they pay for the application, they still have to hire somebody to do it. And if you're the person who is bringing them all this free value, you're the one they're going to hire.

So I'm here to tell you you've got to bring more value than you are today. Now let's talk about the volume. Andy, how much is too much? Well, in my opinion, I don't think there's ever enough. Especially if your goal is to bring value. You know what is too much content is you picking up the phone every week, calling the same damn prospect, asking for the a meeting with them. That's annoying because you're bringing no value, you're just trying to take from them.

But when you lean into content from a place of service where you are giving value, you are trying to help them win. You can't create a new enough content. You'll never annoy somebody by trying to help them.

So there isn't enough content. Today we post our goal. Between LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube, we want to post 45 to 50 pieces of content every week. Now, some of it's the same content across multiple channels, but just on LinkedIn alone, we're posting 15 to 20 pieces of content a week. And I know there's people out there who think I'm annoying, but guess what? Those aren't the people we're trying to do business with. I can tell you our business is not upset about that increased level of content. So if you think you're bringing value to your audience, which is the only filter you should run your content through, you cannot create enough. And I can tell you the second I made a decision that we are going to up how much content we create, we saw an increase in our followers and we saw an increase in the number of leads we were generating. Now, I'm speaking from my perspective, but let me bring some messages up to you that I want to share from folks that we have been fortunate enough to work with who have made the decision to go all in on content. And trust me, when they started, they had all the fears you have, but they decided to do it anyways. They decided to bring value. Some are writing articles for LinkedIn, others are doing LinkedIn lies. Others are just putting out video day after day after day after day. And here are messages we get today from these people who have committed to content.

I was getting the little hair that I have left cut today and I couldn't stop talking about how this business has become fun again.

Granted that was also after a post workout and an ice plunge. But I started this is from the client. I started a YouTube channel and I said keep it simple.

Healthcare.

Was why I wanted to build videos. And the best thing is today. I'm generally happy about going to work today and the future is bright. Think about that. This guy, when he met me, this guy was not happy. In fact, he was with a previous employer. He was actually thinking about getting out the health insurance industry just like I was in 2011. He's leaned into content. He's done it doing it the way he wants to. He's showing up as his best and he's bringing value to his prospects. And I am generally happy about going to work every day. Huh. Think about that. How about this one? This is one from one of my favorite clients I have ever had the chance to work with. If he if there is somebody I could model how to create content on LinkedIn as an insurance professional, this guy would be it. And here's a message I got from him just a week ago. I was just calling to thank you again brother. Just got off a call with a brand new 500 life prospect that came through my funnel, aka LinkedIn. That's two in the last 30 days. I'm just thankful for you and appreciate your drive and passion.

That makes business what we're doing makes business so much more enjoyable.

You see what I'm trying to get at here is when you lean into creating content for your prospects, not only is it going to generate more leads for you.

You'Re gonna absolutely freaking love what you're doing.

This is a business that everybody wants to know what the ROI is. Return on investment. If I'm gonna spend a dollar in marketing, it's got a return investment next week. How about return on Impact? That's a different roi and that's an ROI that matters the most. What would life feel like? What would the impact be on your happiness if you were showing up to work every day to prospect the way you wanted to?

Not only has content for our business done wonders for our top line revenue.

This gig has never been more fun. And we're getting these messages every single week from clients who have changed their lives because they're finally prospecting the way they want to.

So why not you? So this is my battle cry today. I know I preach content, content, content until I'm blue in the face, but I'm going to keep doing it until you finally do it. Dang it. So when you as you sit down and you look at 2024 and you develop your plan to hit your lofty sales goal, I know you're creating. You have to place content at the same level as all other prospecting you are doing. And if you just commit to upping the value you bring to your prospects, you commit to upping the volume of how often you do it, you will use content to turn connections into conversations, and you will generate more leads than you know what to do with. Please take this advice, run with it, and let's have a fantastic 2024. Be good. Thank you for taking the time to listen to today's podcast episode. Remember, if you found value in this episode, do me a favor. Give it a like, share it, post about it, go subscribe to make sure you get every episode from us every single week. And my only ask from you is that if you have anybody in your life, whether it be a teammate, a peer, family member, or a friend, please share this podcast with them. That's how we grow. We only grow through word of mouth, and I would be forever grateful if you take the time to do that. All right, now it's time for you to take what you learned and it's time for you to go out and share your message with the world. Execution, clarity and consistency is everything. Be well.