The 3 Pillars Of A Strong Year Pt. 2 | 7 Figure Annuity Sales Podcast | Ep. 231

On this week's episode, we're going to talk about three pillars of a Strong year, part two.

Hello, everyone. Welcome back to this week's episode. I am Chad Owen. This is Caleb North. And I'm just going to leave it at that. Every year I have an explanation of who or every time I have an explanation of who he is. Every year. Man, I've known you for a long time.

I know it.

God, I knew you when you since 2012, when you had three hairs on your chest.

I don't have many more.

Okay, so part two, first decade later, a decade.

Last year was the mark of a decade.

You don't even match the tree rings, man. It's like you should at least be up to 10.

Now I know I was, I was thicker back then too.

That is true.

So I've actually done the opposite of the tree.

Okay, so last week we talked about the leads that as being one of the pillars. What's the next pillar?

Yeah, the right sales process. Okay. We didn't intend for this to go into two or three weeks worth of episodes, but it's gonna go into three.

Something like this. When you're talking about pillars, it's not just something you hit lightly. And actually, if you're part of our agents academy, which if you are not a part of that, why I don't get. Because you know what, there's so many people in other industries that spend tens of thousands of dollars on education and our industry for whatever reason, for the majority, like, well, I don't want to spend. I'm just barely getting by. College isn't cheap and I'll assure you I'm not going to get on my in front of talking to you and start talking about my political viewpoints and what you need to believe. I'm going to talk to you about the. This is annuities. This is what we do. This is how we help people. I don't have some agenda behind that. There's a straight education. So go on to rragentsacademy.com we have any level anybody could afford and I assure you everybody could afford at least one levels. Why we're just literally in a 15 to 20 minute podcast. We're telling you three pillars, but we have complete back end exact explanations of how I do that. Not only supporting documents that go with that, the exact documents I use in appointments. And that is not a shameless plug. Oh, it is a shameless plug. Yeah. I have no shame whatsoever in this. This is. We spend hours and hours and one of our Partners actually puts. They have. They run one of these very large Facebook pages. And, man, I respect him so much because he says what I think a lot of times, but he actually says it. And he goes, if you want something I'm proud producing for free, then you meet. You imply that I have no value and my time has no value. And I'm sitting there going, hanky waving. Hanky waving. I mean, it was so awesome. Because that's true. 18 years plus. I've been actually 18 and a half years now I've been doing this. And if you want everything for free, that means I have no value and my time has no value. And. And we spend so much time and your time, I mean, we take care of this. I mean, it's clearly a lot less valuable. I mean, hello, yeah. Three Chesters, three hairs versus.

I'm not at Sasquatch levels. But say once. No, I'll do the whole. Dude, I'll. I'll walk through fire before that happens.

Let him walk across these coals.

But boy, how we get sidetracked. So easy. But we spend so much time outside of me just running appointments of. This is what we need to talk about. Caleb comes up with these topics, and it's funny because he goes, I got three pillars and we're gonna do. This is this week's podcast. I'm like, oh, no, this one is definitely going more. Because pillars have to be stable.

Right.

They need to be rock solid. Because the only thing a pillar is used for. Yeah, of course it's decorative. But the pillars we talk about are for structure, for stability, to build something on it.

Yeah.

I mean, I've watched people build houses before and then put the pillar on this house, and they'll go to knock down that overhang, and then tire over overhang will come down. But then they have some pillars that look really pretty and you knock them down and they weren't supporting.

Right.

We only want to deal with supporting pillars here. This is not for show. This is not for decoration. This will help you be successful in this business.

That's right. So pillar to the right sales process. The right process is what you do and how you do it.

Yes.

Okay. You can do the right thing the wrong way and it's wrong. Yes.

Just like the wrong thing and the right thing at the wrong time is the wrong thing.

Right.

Huh. Interesting. Say that again.

You can do the right thing the wrong way, and it's wrong.

So give me an example of the right thing the wrong way.

Okay. You've got a client that Needs an annuity. You sell the annuity based on fear.

Good job.

It accomplishes the same thing. It's just the way you got to that is wrong.

I just tried to stump the chump with it.

I paused a little longer than you do usually.

That was a long pause, man, in your head, you're going, fight, flight, or freeze. Okay, I'm gonna freeze for a moment, and then, okay, let's fight.

And I could actually see your ey going wheels turn. But you had it in there. I knew you had it in there.

Somewhere deep in the archives.

But it came out. That was a good, good response.

I'll add that if. If leads are like the fuel to your car, the process is what will determine fuel efficiency. Okay? Now, Chad drives a big red truck for fun, not for fuel efficiency.

For fuel efficiency.

But his sales process is for fuel efficiency 100%. You have to know what you're bringing clients into, okay? You have to lead the process. Agents that expect their clients to lead themselves to the deal are not going to write business.

You mean I can't go up there and go, I got three different annuities. You choose. I'm the expert, but you choose which one you think is best. That's a cop out, man. It's like you find out. You go through the process, you find out the problem, you find the one that's going to be the best solution. You don't tell the client.

You.

You pick which one you think is best. If you're an expert, you're gonna. Now, it's not a treatment, okay? Now, if I have cancer and the doctor proposes different treatments based off of the side effects, that's one thing. But if the doctor goes, this is the one you use to get rid of this type of cancer. But you pick between these other two at three, and you tell me which one you want. No, the one that's going to work, that's one I want. You know, it's not a treatment. This is a solution. There's a big difference. We're not asking. We already know the symptom, right? So if you know the client wants income, pick the best income. If the client wants income with some death benefit, pick that at the client just want straight death benefit or just a straight index, then pick that. But don't go in there, present multiple and ask the client to choose.

I agree. I agree wholeheartedly. I've had some real serious conversation with agents about that same topic, and it. It amazes me. I think they do it for the. Here's an that's an example of doing the wrong thing for the right reason.

Yeah.

Okay. We just.

Okay, so what would be the right reason for that?

Well, I think the reason that they take it out is the reason is they want their client to choose. They want their client to be on board. They want their client to be confident.

In the right reason.

I'm saying it's. They're doing the wrong thing for the right reason. It' the antithesis of what we were talking about earlier. We're talking about selling the right, you know, the product the wrong way.

Yeah.

It's like inverted because you take three out there, they're looking to accomplish what you accomplish in that it's. You tell clients all the time, this is your decision. It affects your retirement way more than it affects mine. I assume that agents that take out multiple products are trying to accomplish that same thing. They're just doing it the wrong way.

Well, a lot of times. And that makes sense because you want the client to have the full say in what is done. But I have flat out, multiple times in the appointment, weekly tell you're wrong. That's not how this works.

Right.

You know, I have no problem with that. Now, I say it with respect and I'm not a jerk about it.

Sure.

But I'll say, you know what? That's. That's not how this works. That's not what it does. And you know, because people have these perceptions about annuities and say, well, yeah, but your annuities have high fees. No, that's a variable annuity that has high fees. Now, am I telling them to buy or not to buy a variable annuity? No, I'm just saying that is a variable annuity. They have higher fees, and that's a fact. I mean, the highest annuity product that I know of with a rider fee, I think is 1.5%. I think that's the highest. Do you know of any with an income rider over 1%?

Yeah, I know some over 1%, but over 1.5?

Oh, no, yeah.

I don't personally, not any FIA.

I know there's some FIAs that have fund fees as well as rider fee, but I just don't ever do any annuities that have fund fees. But the point to that is you've got to make sure that you're the expert. But the client has a say. And what is their say if they want to do it or not.

Right.

You still present the best thing, but they still have the say whether they want to do it or not.

I think Oftentimes too, multiple products get used by agents that didn't do good fact finding. So they're like not quite sure what their client is actually needing or what the client's looking for. And so they take multiple options to hope that they have it somewhere in those three.

Or they call their marketer and say, hey, give me the top three products. And I want illustrations for each of them. Oh, by the way, send me the brochures for these two. And then they lay out and. Okay, you pick. These are the top three. You pick which one.

Yeah, it's true. We did a podcast a few weeks ago about the victors mentality and assuming the deal. Right. And we, we talked in there. I'm going back to my notes here. We talked about it. It's not being arrogant if you assume it. You know, if you're solving the problem they have with the best solution for that problem, like you, it's prudent and reasonable to assume that they would want that product.

I would, I would like to talk to any Olympian and ask them if they assumed they were going to win.

Yeah, yeah.

Olympians automatically assume they're going to win.

Or any. Yeah, like watch any MMA fight or.

Anything N car, whatever, whatever it is, you know, the champions assume they're gonna win. Not all of them do.

Right.

But they assume that it's not always. A lot of times there is some arrogance in that, but it's in that fact that I've been training this for this my entire life and I'm confident that I can beat this person. Now the reality and the humility comes behind. There's always someone better.

Right.

I mean, am I one of the top agents in the United States? Yes. Are there people that are better? Yes, that is a fact. I mean, there's people that are 10 years older than me that know more. There's people that are young and weird that no more. I mean, it's not often. And I'm not saying that out of arrogance. I know how many hours I spend studying. I know. I mean, you guys don't even see the amount of times. Even this weekend, after.

Literally recovering from food poisoning, I couldn't do anything for two days. So I'm on the couch still recovering, studying because I haven't been in the field for two, three weeks.

Sure.

So I need to make sure. Am I missing anything? Is there something new coming out? What are the current rates? I mean, I had to make sure I was up on my game. Why? Because I knew when I was coming office today I was going to be talking to clients. So the sales process cannot happen without a good education. The education cannot happen without a good training system. And that's where our academy comes in.

I think one of the things that a lot of agents probably get wrong is that they. This is just what I see. So often they will assume the client doesn't necessarily want their solution, but they assume that they want to work with them. It's what I mean is like the agents that I've talked to, and literally at this point in my career, it's thousands of agents that I talked to on the phone. It seems like they have this automatic expectation that the clients are wanting to work with them, but not necessarily with their solutions.

Especially if you get a lead, because if you got a lead, they automatically are going to sign up for you the second you walk through the door.

And that's what I'm referring to is kind of that mentality.

It's like if you. If you have a lead system, because I can't tell you how many times people have said they. It's was called a ride along back in the day. And they would run appointments with me and they would. I would actually have them make calls with me and so they would hear everything a day. They go, wow, you actually. There's people that didn't even answer the phone. There's people that you talked with that just today.

Right?

I called them. He submitted the lead on Saturday.

Right.

$350Sub in the lead on Saturday. I call him on Monday. Yeah. I decided I want an annuity now. The lead said annuity. It was all about annuities. And then they decided they did it. Did I go ask for a refund? No. Our last podcast, I talked about that. But you know what? We just need to have lead, get in front of the client, have the right system, the right process, make sure we're doing everything we need to do to help that client.

I noted this down because this is kind of to go back to what I was talking about.

Expect that leads, the people that you get in are not looking for reasons to do business with you. They're looking for reasons not to. And you need to not give them any reasons not to. And part of that is having a good process, because when you have a poor process, there's a perfect reason for them not to do business with you. They may still be looking for an annuity. They just don't want that annuity with you because the process is stinky.

This all comes down to relationships. When I meet with someone, I'M looking at reasons not to be friends with them instead of reasons to be friends with them. Because I'm literally what could be the red flags in this new relationship now, once I'm with that person and I'm either committed in a strong friendship or my wife, which I'm married to, I am no longer. Once I am married and once I am committed, that friend, I no longer look for reasons not to be with him. I look for all the reasons to be with them. So did you catch the shift there in the initial fact finding part of the relationship? I'm looking for the red flags. What are the reasons not to be with you? But once I'm committed, that is no longer ever in my thought process. It's always, why do I want to be with you? And that's all I focus on. And so the clients are doing the same thing when they're trying to find their financial. They want someone to have a commitment with. They want someone they can trust. They can make sure they're doing the right thing. But that first conversation and those first interactions, they are looking for the red flags, why they've been burnt so many times.

Yep.

Dang. That was wisdom.

Yeah, but I say all of that.

I said that was wisdom. You're like, yeah, okay, I appreciate it. Fine. Okay.

Thank you for the encouragement.

I really appreciate the words.

No, I go on and keep going.

Okay, okay.

I say all of that and I sit. And I prefaced all of that with having the victor's mentality and assuming that the deal is going to be done. The reason that those two things can coexist is because they're both true. You should assume that the deal is going to go through because you should assume that. Well, actually, you shouldn't assume this. Your process should just be that good. Yes, you should be finding the problem, exposing that problem, finding the best solution, educating them about that solution. And in doing that process right, you should assume that that's going to lead to a deal. But on the front end of that relationship, you should assume they're looking for reasons not to do the deal. So the process is what gets you from kind of what you were just describing there of people vetting you out initially to actually being committed.

I think relationships would last a lot longer. Friendships, marriages, kids, you know, I mean, wait until you have a kid. You're stuck with that relationship. You're not looking for the red flags.

Trade this one back.

Yeah, let's get the refund. What's your return policy on this one? Unfortunately, I haven't had any kids that have wanted a return policy on. I've had moments where I've wanted to return policy but not the relationship. But yeah, I think honestly we just have to look at the overall scenario. Make sure you're doing a full process. You're finding this problem and you're finding.

The solution treat and I've said this 100 times if I've said it once, treat the annuity as the means to the end, not the end itself. Meaning if you go in there and you're just selling about the great features of the product and not what those features actually accomplish, that doesn't mean anything. So the annuity is just the means to the end your process. It should be simple and it should be efficient.

Perfect. Now well I think that's now we're going to be moving to part three so next week we'll hit part three. I hope this helps you have a great day and happy selling.