The Importance of Data Collection and a Drip System | 7 Figure Annuity Sales Podcast | Ep. 233
Podcast conversation (Chad Owen and Caleb North) about collecting client contact data and using an email drip system to generate annuity sales. Chad emphasizes long-term value of collected emails (years-long follow-ups), reports substantial production aided by drip campaigns, and Caleb outlines practical recommendations (content quality, calls-to-action, minimum list size, and costs). Closing includes call-to-action to contact Caleb for the 'Stress and Rocking Chairs' drip content.
Questions this video answers
About 15 years.
He says almost 5,000 addresses (and possibly up to ~10,000 when including inactive/opt-outs).
Approximately $37 million.
About $4–5 million.
Generally no less than 100 to 200 contacts.
Chapters
On this week's episode, we're going to talk about the importance of data collection and having an email drip system.
Hey, everyone. Welcome to this week's podcast. I am Chad Owen, the annuity sales coach, and this is Caleb north, the annuity expert case designer extraordinaire.
I like it.
I think that's an upgrade from Robin ever given.
Definitely an upgrade.
Yeah, that's. That's. Well, anything is an upgrade for Rob. I mean, even Batman. I mean, come on. What is Batman? He. The only thing cool about Batman is. Well, I don't know. His house is pretty cool.
It's going to say his car.
I would take that car.
Yeah. He's literally a millionaire vigilante that has an awesome. Billionaire vigilante that has an awesome car.
Yeah, but he can't.
What's Batman?
He can't commit to a woman. If you can't commit and you're sewing your oats. Yep. Sorry, Batman.
I'm sure he's got plenty of oats to sew. Billionaire vigilante drives a nice car.
Okay, why do we get. You know what? Like I said, either love us or you hate us. And because we're real and this is actually how we do life together.
It is.
We'll be talking about something, and we end up talking about nothing for a long time.
It's amazing how we can talk for.
Hours and about nothing. So. Okay.
But we are going to talk about something.
Collection.
Yes. Data collection and an email drip system.
You say data.
I do say data.
Data.
You got to get. You got to pronounce it right. That's. It's got to be data, not data.
I was going to make.
Is there a Y in there? There's no D, a Y or D A. I is data. D, A T, A.
So I can't control it right now. I'm going to tell you this joke after, and if y' all are listeners and you want to hear the joke, you're going to have to just call me, because I'm not saying it over the air.
Yeah, you better not. We've already potentially could be. Okay, so data collection.
Yes.
Not data collection. No. Data collection. Oh, my gosh. You're corrupting me.
Corrupted data drives, decisions. Okay. Context, even just practically, for Chad's business, your lead trackers have literally, like, caused and prompted the decision to terminate lead companies and to increase allocation with lead companies because of the way the numbers are. It just takes the emotion, the feeling, all the stuff out of it. And it's like, is it effective? Is it not Is it efficient? Is it not?
Yeah, but that's not the data I was talking about.
About what was the data you were. Data you were talking about.
The data was talking about is the data you collect from your clients.
Okay.
Yeah. Because. And I get what you're saying. You're right.
Yeah.
And I should have specified.
Sorry.
If you would ask for more data, we would have got this corrected probably from the beginning. So I look at. I've had a drip system for probably 15 years right now. I think I have almost 5,000 email addresses now. I have way more than that, but we always have that opt in, opt in, opt out option on our unsubscribe. So, I mean, I could have probably 10,000 emails at least. I mean, it's probably more than that, but people die, you know, they opt out, they don't. They're just not a fit for you. But if it wasn't for that data that I had collected, as far as their name, their phone number, their email address, I would lose out on millions of dollars of annuity production.
Yeah.
And I think of last year, I think I ended up at what, 37. 30. 30. 37 million. And. Oh, God, I tried so hard to get over 40, and it just was not going my way. Um, partly my fault. I. I actually mentally checked out where my drive was. Just like, I don't know. I got three appointments this week. I'm good. I really want to go hang out with my family. I just, I was not. And I was ready for our European trip. I just. I just wasn't where I should have been.
Sure.
And normally I have this hard push at the end of the year, and because of the entire year of pushing, I. I just wasn't there. But I would say out of that 37 million, I would say probably 4 to 5 million of that was from people that I never would have received contact information with based off of the drip system I have.
Yeah.
So, you know, and it takes time to do that. I mean, you're not going to go buy a client list, which, number one, it's illegal to do that where you're trying to drop drip, run a client list that they're not your clients. But, you know, I have these client lists that I establish, and it's been through my radio, through my Internet leads, through my word of mouth, and I just collect this information and then I put them in a drip system. And the drip system is every. Actually, we have. Every two weeks is one particular series, and then that opposite two weeks is another. Our stress and Rocking chairs drip. And that stress and rocking chairs drip system we have, by the way, our agents can access that. And if you want to know more about that, you talk to caleb and it's calebtirementrealized.com, right?
Shoot me an email.
Yeah. And not Caleb north, because you still have that one. I still have that one, but it's Caleb. C A L E B at retirement. R E T I R E M e n t realized r e a l I z e-d.com and you can find out about this drip system, but it's literally off of my book called Stress and Rocking Chairs. And when I wrote that book, I dumbed it down as much as possible. What do I mean by that? Anything in any field, you can have this super high intellectual conversation that nobody understands.
Right.
You know, I mean, I could talk to you about stinking chickens, which are like your passion. And you go into these things about chickens that. First of all, number one, you've lost me. I don't understand what you're talking about. Recessive gene, this. Blah, blah, blah. You know, this chicken breeds with this chicken and you come out this super chicken over here. And this chicken, chicken actually can breathe fire, called a dragon chicken. And it's like, why? You know, it's just crazy. It can cook its own eggs. It's pretty amazing. You know, lace egg, it hard boils it right there and if it crack it open and it'll do over easy if you ask it to.
But that is called cannibalism, my dear children, and is in fact frowned upon in most societies.
That's because of the recession, Gene. I need to look into it anyway, so. But the point is, although I did just read this interesting article, once again, sidetracked chickens produce more eggs in the winter. Do you want to know how their chickens produce more eggs in the winter?
Share it.
They leave deer carcasses in the chicken coop and they eat the deer meat off of the carcass, which is more protein, which produces more eggs.
Well, people that think that chickens are herbivores are just. They just don't.
They just don't know.
They're omnivores, okay? They. They eat sex and meat and.
Yeah, back to stress and rocking chairs. But I wanted that book. I picked chickens because, you know, you could easily and do often talk over my head in a category really I could care less about.
Sure.
All I care about is can I eat the egg? Can I eat the chicken? That's all I care about. I don't care how it got There. But in the annuities, people do that so much that the client leaves so confused. And they write these books that, that are literally at a college degree level in their field.
Right.
And most people do not have a college degree in the financial arena, in other words, at a level that they could understand that. And I'm going, I wanted to create the stress and rocking chairs. Drip system. And you guys have done a phenomenal job at taking pieces out of the book. And the drip system where literally a client just said this today and actually, I'm sorry, this wasn't a client, I still need to call them. But this was someone that I had reached out to a while ago and they had replied to the drip system. And this is, this is what they said. They said, chad, this is the best advice for anyone who wants to protect what they have. I would like to know more about annuities. Now. This is a person that is a 2016 contact.
Wow.
And they replied back to this. If I never would have collected that data, Data, you have totally messed me up now. I'm corrupt. If I wouldn't have collected that data of the email, I never would be able to have this guy reaching out to me almost seven years later.
Right?
Trying to go, okay, I want information about this. And so you could start, I would say you need probably have what, 150, 50 to 100 emails to really I.
I, I, the way I put it, you can start it with any you realistically, but.
The rate of conversion is going to, it's not, you don't have a high rate of, of responses on any given email. It's a very low response rate. The intention of it is to keep them from falling off completely. So, so it's kind of twofold, I guess. I'll go into my normal spiel about this for a second. He's twofold. Number one, it works for preexisting clients, people that you've already done business with, because it's just going to reinforce the purchase decision that they've already made. Number two, it's designed for people that maybe they were leads you got, but they didn't ever do business with you because now you're sending them information and there's going to be something that triggers, ideally triggers there.
So I've sold an annuity to someone before and they were like, man, I did I do the right thing? And then they get the drip a week or two weeks after that and they go, man, I'm so glad I did this. Right. Reconfirmed why they did this Right. And then that's true. I've had people that, for whatever reason, this guy right here, I don't, I can't remember why they said no, but now they're interested. Right. So. Yeah. And then what else?
Well, I was just going to add. I wouldn't recommend like, I don't recommend an agent signs up for it. I'm not going to turn down an agent that has no clients and they want to sign up for it if they want to start adding clients to it.
Yeah, make sure you're adding clients because if you don't have email addresses.
Right.
Don't do it.
Right. You know, but for me to recommend that you do it, I generally say no less than 100 to 200 in that range with the conversion rate that's.
There now this, it's worthwhile Medicare clients. This includes life insurance. This includes, you know, just a database of people that could benefit from what you're talking about.
Right, exactly.
Because we have people that, they haven't written any annuities, but they've been really good the life insurance for the Medicare and they're trying to figure out how to cross over from life insurance to Medicare. In other words, give other benefits to their clients. And that's where you take the email addresses, addresses and you drop drip system with.
Yeah. And over time as you add contacts to becomes less and less and less per email.
Yeah, right.
The more contacts you have receiving the email, the less that email costs per time you send.
So what is. So the more, what does that cost per month?
400Amonth.
So 400amonth. So that's basically 4800 a year. That's a $70,000 annuity.
Correct.
We'll pay for an entire year's drip system. I written millions last year from that.
So let's just say 5 million because I think I'm underestimating that. But let's just say 5 million at 6% comp. 600,000, right?
Yeah, I.
So 300,000.
We. Yeah, we did the math wrong on that.
Yeah. I is smart. So.
And this is, and that's part of what we were talking about the academy a couple weeks ago. Right. And go sign up for the academy. The reason that we talk about that is because the cost of things that can produce business opportunities is typically far, far, far less than the cost of lost business. So what do I mean by that? The cost of leads are not the greatest cost to you in this industry. The cost of good training is not the greatest cost to you in this industry. The cost of an email drip system is not the greatest cost to you. And in this industry, it's when you don't have those things in place and you end up not writing business. That's where you get hammered. But the problem is you never see those dollars leaving your bank account, so you don't perceive them as such.
I mean, think about this. I love doing cruises. We're actually about to do a cruise in a couple weeks. And, you know, you could sit there and. I've been on the ocean my entire life. I do not want to invest in a life ring saver thing. I just don't. You will never save a person without that. And what do I mean by that? We were always taught, because I used to work on a charter boat. My dad owned a charter business, and he said if somebody's drowning, never jump in after the person because they're gonna. Unless, obviously, they're considerably smaller than you. You have someone your size or bigger, you will drown with them.
Yep. Now you're both.
They will take you down with them. They just, they, Their. Their flight instinct is so strong that they're not realizing they're killing you at the same time. So you, you. You have to have that life preserver to save them. To me, my drip system is that life preserver that's always out there available even when I'm not to. For someone to grab on to.
Right.
And they, they just, I mean, I can be asleep and they could be stressed out at night because they're worried about it, and they get my email talking about something that can protect their money and, and they grab onto that ring.
Yep.
And in the morning, I'm going to wake up and I'm going to see, oh, boy, there's somebody out there onto that ring. I need to help save them. I mean, you may say that. Chad, that's dramatic. No, it's not. How many times have I had clients stressed out of their stinking mind, freaking out because they've lost more money in the market and they're afraid they are never going to be able to retire Right. Now. That's not a fear tactic, telling you from what people have actually told me.
Right.
And I've seen it going to appointment. Somebody starts breaking down, crying, I mean, literally crying because they're so worried about their financial situation. My drip system is literally that life preserver ring that's sitting out there at any time for someone to grab on to.
Yeah.
And that's how I look at it. And I do look at our products as life or death. For some people, because stress just jacks you up. That's why I called my book Stress and Rocking Chairs to Come Killers of Seniors. Stress because you're worried about everything. Rocking chairs because you don't have any money or health to do anything. So you sit on the rocking chair and rock your life away. So, guys, I'm just telling you it's time to start investing in yourselves. This is not like the only business in the world where you don't have to put money in. I always, when people say, how do I get into an annuity business? Just like you do with every other business. You invest in your advertising, which is your leads. You invest in your education, which is your training. You invest in your knowledge, which is just hours and hours of your own time. Doesn't cost anything to research annuities. Right. But it does cost you money to get experience driven training, you know, because nobody's going to do this for free. You guys know If I wrote 37 million last year, you know approximately what I made compensation, you know how much I made off of the academy last year? Zero. You know how much I made off a retirement realized financial Zero. Why? I'm not taking a draw. I do this right now because I really want to help people. Yeah. And that's what it comes down to. So invest in collecting your data and then what do you do? You have to have a drift system. Make it work.
Yeah.
Make sure you buy the life preserver.
That's right. And I want to, I want to add one. In typical podcast fashion, we get to the end and I always have one thing I want to add. Want to add a thing.
It's not just the podcast.
It's some practical value for those of you that are frankly in a position right now. And I agree, Chad, wholeheartedly, that there are going to be things that you're going to just flat out have to pay for. Good annuity sales training is going to be something that is, it's going to be a cost to you.
That $8 cup of coffee two times a day. Yeah.
No, you don't need that. That's true.
Yeah.
Leads marketing, almost certainly. I mean, unless you're door knocking, that's going to be some kind of something that costs time. It's time.
I mean, the most valuable thing out there is our time.
Right. I think what you, what we have, we have agents a lot of times on the front end of their careers where their hourly compensation is low enough that it warrants them to do certain things on their own versus like for you to door, knock to. It doesn't make any kind of fiscal sense whatsoever for you to try and create your own drip system. Doesn't make any kind of fiscal sense whatsoever. For those of you that are listening.
That you're thinking somebody who doesn't. I mean, creating a drip system. No, no. It's not my skill set.
Right.
And I'm not going to take the time to research it. I'm going to have something that's already done, that's established, it's proven. Why would I try and create something that's already out there?
I agree. Yeah, I agree. I will say there are a couple of things that if you're looking at drip systems or writing one, whatever that looks like, there are a couple of things that you're going to want to have in spades. Number one, quality content.
Yep.
Right. It's not. If every email is a sales pitch, you might as well not even put people into it because they're going to unsubscribe after they get a couple emails. Okay. So it has to have value to them. Number two, a call to action. And that's where the value for them meets value for you.
Yep. That's good.
So.
So next week episode, we'll actually talk about why it's important to collect data as far as your sales data. That way we're not wasting all this stuff you put together. Sure. Like, because you know what, in all fairness, I, I probably called Caleb and I just said, hey, I wanted the importance of data collection and drip system and Caleb's like overachiever. I'm gonna figure out all that data stuff and I'm gonna figure out, I'm gonna make it. I'm gonna make this entire thing. So. Yes. We're not gonna make, we're not gonna have that good a waste. So hope this helps you guys. You have a great day. If you are interested in the drip system, always reach out to Caleb and put it in the comments. We have links that you can click on to get in touch with Caleb. So I hope this helps you Have a great day and happ.
It.
