Andy Neary argues that to create more sales appointments you must "give more than you ask." Drawing on 20 years in the insurance industry, he contrasts traditional prospecting (cold calls, door-to-door) that only asks for business with a content-first approach that provides value via email, text communities, webinars, social media, and keynote talks. By prioritizing give activities over ask activities you earn the right to request meetings and should see more appointments and higher sales in 2023.
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In this video, I am going to share what I believe is the number one secret to help you sell more.
When I got in the insurance industry 20 years ago, here's what I was taught when it came to prospecting. I was taught to pick up the phone and make a bunch of dials. And I was also taught to get in my car and go door to door. When you think about the traditional methods of prospecting you and I were both taught, the problem with that formula was it required me to do nothing but ask of the prospect, right? Everything. Every time I picked up the phone, every time I knocked on a door, what was I doing? I was asking. I was asking for a meeting. I was asking for business. Ask, ask, ask, ask, ask. Quite frankly, I became an asshole. However, I was completely missing how I could create more appointments, create more opportunities, because I wasn't giving. You see, the secret to creating more sales opportunities for you is to give more than you ask. What do I mean? Well, let's talk about this in our business model today. Our business model from a business development standpoint is all built on giving. Giving. If I go out every single week and I give through our content, it's going to give me more confidence to make the ask. So every week we have a very simple strategy when it comes to our content. We're going to focus on giving a lot of value through email, through our text community, through our webinars, through our social media. I do the same thing when I stand on stages and give my keynote talks. You see, the more I give, the more right I have to ask. So today, with as much daily content as we create, when I reach out to a potential prospect, I'm going into that engagement with the attitude that you almost owe me a meeting. And I don't say that to be cocky or brash. What I'm saying is I know mentally that I have given you so much value that I have earned the right to. So if you're struggling right now as a producer to try to create more appointments, to create more engagement, look at your current activities. Are they ask activities or are they give activities? You need to be giving more if you want to ask more. In fact, you need to be giving to even earn the right to ask. So when you look at your prospecting strategy for 2023, look at all the activities you're deploying on a weekly basis. If there's more giveaway, then there is ask, you're going to be setting more appointments, you're going to earn the right to ask for the business and you're going to see your sales go to a whole new level.
