Episode 121: Positioning YOU to Close More

Meet Mike stromco. With over 1000 presentations, 2000 business consultations and author of six books, Mike Stromso is one of America's most in demand speakers. Leading insurance industry authority. Mike is the ambassador and founder of the Unstoppable Profit Producer program and the Be Unstoppable Boot Camp and has been featured in numerous publications including Independent Insurance Agency magazine and Rough Notes magazine. Mike creates massive success for others and has coached, advised and shared the stage with top achievers like NFL world champion legend Joe Theisman, the two billion dollar TV saleswoman Forbes Reilly, ABC hit TV show Secret Millionaire, James Malenchak, best selling author of 20 books and sales guru Jeb Blunt. Rudy Rudiger, the man who inspired the hit movie Rudy, Chicken Soup for the Soul, creator Jack Canfield, original shark in the TV show Shark Tank and inventor of the infomercial Kevin Harrington.

I'm here in San Diego at the Be Unstoppable Boot Camp. This is Mike Stromso's event and it's really cool to see so many people, literally hundreds of insurance folks, professionals from all over the country, all over the world and they're here to learn how to be unstoppable, how to learn how to do some new marketing, some of the new digital things that are going on in the marketplace. You get a chance to be all in with some of the greatest minds in the industry.

Mike has appeared in numerous media including Access to Experts, Fox News, espn, Real Talk, San Diego.

Grow.

Mike has been honored by several organizations for his charitable donations and philanthropy with over 100,000 given back to charities and other organizations in need through the Unstoppable Charities foundation he founded and Stromso Insurance Agency referral programs since 2005, including the boys and Girls Club foundation honoring Mike with the prestigious John D. Stromso Helping Hands Award and named iaoa's Selfless Agent of the Year. Mike Stromso is one of America's most in demand speakers, leading insurance industry authority. Mike is the ambassador and founder of the Unstoppable Profit Producer program and the Be Unstoppable Boot Camp.

It is our pleasure to introduce our coach, mentor and friend, the unstoppable Mike Stromso.

Thank you so much Unstoppable Team for that incredible introduction. Welcome everybody. This is Mike Stromso. Welcome you officially to the next episode in the Unstoppable Profit podcast. This is a very special podcast because what you just saw is exactly what I want to talk to you about today and it is called the Pre Disposition of a Lead. When in other Words, what you want to do, your thought process, your promotional program, the processes, the second P, the third P, meaning the promotions, your processes, the second P, which lead to the third P, which is the promotions in your marketing arsenal should always, should always, should always include a predisposition to the lead to automatically close them so that when you arrive, it's super simple to close the deal. So what does a predisposition look like? That's why I intentionally put that video that you just watched at the very beginning of the podcast. Or if you're looking at this, listening to this podcast only, go onto YouTube, go to YouTube.com search unstoppable profit producer. Click on the video section and you will see all of our podcasts, including this one. You can watch the video as well as listen to it. But that was an example for you to teach you about how to predispose a crowd. And that example was. That's something that I show when I get to speak to audiences. I predispose them on a covert basis with something like that. It's a strategy. It's something that ultimately reaches their minds and their hearts and sets them in a position to do business even before you get to that point. So let's take this to the nuts and bolts of the insurance agency business, or any business, for that fact. I learned this years ago and and back then it started with a simple six step process. I'm going to share that with you in just a moment. But what I also know in my study of promotions and marketing over the years, I'm looking at a sales statistics sheet that I learned about a number of years ago that at the end of the day still holds true. But here's the facts. 48% of salespeople never follow up with the prospect. What does that mean for you? That means the only competition that you have is that you make for yourselves. Don't let that happen to you, my friend. And if you pay attention to what we're teaching today, it's never going to happen to you. So get ready to one, make a decision. Two, take action. And the other fact for you is 80% of sales are made on the fifth to the 12th contact, the fifth to the 12th contact. But I need to tell you the truth today, that has changed. And in the words of the late, great John Wooden, John Wooden said, failure is not fatal, but failure to change might be. If you want things to change, you need to change many things in many ways all the time. We need to constantly be changing. We need to constantly be pushing into areas of discomfort.

We have to get comfortable being uncomfortable because life begins at the end of your comfort zone. So let me bring you some more recent statistics from my good friend Jeb Blunt spoke at a recent Be Unstoppable boot camp about exactly what it takes and the predisposition of a lead. How often you need to predispose that lead. In today's environment, Jeb said one to three touches. Touches. Now, touches could be anything. Remember, if you want to reach 100% of the marketplace, you've got to use 100% of the ways. What does that look like? Well, the only time success comes before work is in the dictionary. It takes a lot of work. So at the end of the day, you got to do the work. Those one to three touches, if you want to reach 100% of the marketplace, you got to use 100% of the ways. And yes, I repeated that intentionally because.

Phone, email, text, snail mail, video.

Social media of all types.

Slide messages, all of that. You get the drift. Which should you use? Of course, all of them. That makes it more complex, if you will. Jeb says back to the current environment. 1 to 3 touches to re engage an inactive customer. 1 to 5 touches to engage a prospect who's in the buying window and is familiar with you and your brand. 1 to 5. 3 to 10 touches to engage a prospect who has a high degree of familiarity with you and your brand but is not in the buying window. 5 to 12 touches to engage a warm inbound lead. Wow. Like a referral. 5 to 12. 5 to 20 touches to engage a prospect who has some degree of familiarity with you and your brand and is in the buying window. And here's the kicker, my friends. 20 to 50 touches to engage a cold prospect who does not know you or your brand. At the end of the day, my friends, automation is an absolute big key at the end of the day. What's your strategy? Let me give you something you can work with and let me share with you something that a number of our high performing UPP Platinum coaching members actually do. I'm going to share that with you in just a minute. Okay, first of all, here's your process and you may want to write this down. So if you don't have something to write with and write on, please pause and get it or pull over to the side of the road, get your notepad out.

One Educate. That's the topic now. What are you going to use to educate and how are you going to use to educate? That kind of takes me back to my thought process. That we teach in our Up Fast Start program@uppfaststart.com where we talk about the organic bank Healthy Juice, which is at the core of the strategy in an SEO program.

Yes, there's a lot more to it than that. Ok, at the core, at the center of the organic bank Healthy Juice is a blog or a blog surrounded by all the ways you're going to touch people. But at the beginning, think about that, a blog as an example. What are you doing in a blog? You're educated. So, hey, repurpose. It takes people. People need to hear things at least seven times. If they haven't heard it seven times from you, they haven't heard it enough. That's why, according to Jeb and many others who are, you know, authorities, if you will, in the marketing and promotional space, it takes that many touches to catch people in their attention, to get, actually get them to a point where they're ready to buy. Predisposition, predisposition. Let me try it again. Slow down, Mike. My brain works so fast, it can't get out of my mouth fast. Predisposition of a lead. Okay, one first step, educate. And if you can do it multiple ways, great to educate. Educate again. Introduce them to you. Tell them to use a word from my great friend Kelly Orchard in my local market. Prove to them what a bad ass you are and educate them. Okay, educate one. Step two, educate. Number three, back it up with credibility and social proof. If you need to revisit exactly how this unfolds, rewind this entire podcast, listen from the beginning and you'll see exactly how I do that and the opening of this podcast. Step one, educate in multiple ways. Step two, educate in multiple ways. Number three, social proof. What is social proof? It's some kind of credibility booster. Could be a testimonial, could be a copy, some online reviews, it could be some of your live references. There's lots of ways to do it. By the way, if you're going to launch a copy of an online review that somebody gave you or a testimonial, please, please, please make sure you put a picture of the person that gave that testimonial or online review along with it, side by side. It will increase the readership 27%. Yes, it will. Okay, so step one, educate. Step two, educate in multiple ways. Step three, social proof, credibility booster. Start predisposing the lead and helping them understand what other people say you've already done for them. It's not what you say you've done for other people, it's what Other people say you've already done for them. That makes all of the difference. Okay, step four, educate again. Step five, the offer. Put forth the offer. I learned from one of my greatest marketing mentors years ago, every time you put forth an offer, you must put forth a deadline. Every time you put forth an offer, you must put forth a deadline. In our space, it's a little more difficult. I'm going to give you an example of that right now in just a moment. I should say, okay, so number five is the offer. Number six is a bonus. What can you extend as a bonus? And bigger than that, you always want to be thinking with the thought process. The value of the bonus should exceed the market value of what you're offering. It's a lot more difficult in our space. But the thought process is maybe just what your income is from that and have the bonus exceed that. And that's where the predisposition of some high performing platinum members are going to share with you in just a minute becomes, okay, number seven is the deadline. All right, so educate, educate, social proof, educate, offer, bonus, deadline. And if you want to follow up after that, next comes more credibility.

Guarantee if you've got it. And then just start the circle again and just keep it coming, keep it coming, keep it coming until you get to the point where the lead is predisposed and they're ready to buy. Okay, in addition to that, you've got to be answering this question all of the time. Why should people do business with you over and above any and all other options available to them? You've got to answer that question in your education, in your education, in your social proof, in your education, in your offer, in your bonus, and in your deadline. Okay, so let's talk about that deadline for just a moment. How can you have a deadline in the insurance industry? You can, you just have to put it forth. Okay? And if you've done your homework, you are the authority and you can say this quote is only good until. When is that until? Well, how about five days before their expiration date, this quote expires. So take advantage of this opportunity right now because the quote expires on such and such a date, such and such a date, such and such a year, that is a deadline. If you are the authority and you have proven that you are authority in your space, there is a deadline and walk away from it. I will say this. One of the highest performing platinum coaching members that we have worked with over the years. I have witnessed it myself multiple times because this person dominates niches across the nation and has predisposition himself in the space to the point where when he gets on the phone, the prospect, he explains to the prospect exactly how the process is going to work, exactly how it's going to unfold and you know, ultimately sets an appointment. If he arrives at the appointment and they don't have the material that he had asked for at the appointment, he set like current declarations, pages and other material. He says, oh, you don't have the material, we'll reschedule the appointment when you're ready. And he turns around and walks away and they're like, wait, wait, wait a minute, where are you going? Look, I asked you to have this material ready and you don't have it ready. Obviously you're not ready to do business. I'm going to reschedule the appointment because I have other commitments where people are ready. It's amazing to me how fast they will act. And at the end of the day, my friends, that's the position in many situations that you need to take, especially when you have done the work to predisposition yourself as the authority in the particular marketplace and proven it through education, education, social proof and credibility education. Putting forth a world class offer. Yes, a video proposal supported by more social proof and more reasons they should do business with you over and above any and all other options available to them. That takes away all of their doubt, gives them every reason to go ahead and sign, and puts the offer right there before them with a bonus, with a deadline. My friends, if you do that consistently every single time, in every single way, you will win more, your closing ratio will double and you will be happier because you're winning more business. Now let me give you some super ninja strategies that have really elevated this to the next level for a couple of our coaching members. And these coaching members have agreed to, you know, share. I asked permission with them, of them, if you will, for me to share these strategies and they said it was okay. So there's something crazy about the authority and the credibility, positioning and framework when you have a book. Okay? So in today's society, it's just uncanny to me when you have a book, how people view you and position you as more of an authority. I've been privileged to author six books and one of the things that I do when I go to an event, because the event planners normally say, hey, would you mind setting up a table, talking to the people after you speak, et cetera, et cetera, you know, getting to know them, helping them, et cetera. I said, no problem. They Said, do you have by chance have something you could give away at the event? I said, yeah, I can bring a supply of my books. It's been very popular. When I give those away, I go ahead and autograph it, personalize it to them and they go, you'd be willing to do that? I said, of course, no problem, happy to do it. And I commonly view this. Now here's what I do it. I set up one of those high top round bar tables right at the corner of the table and I use that as the platform to sign the books. And it's been very common where I do that. And all of a sudden the people start to line up in line to get a signed copy of the book. Now I look at all the other booths around me and there's nobody at their booths. And the people, those booths are looking at me with the evil eye going, what are you doing over there? That I'm not. I'm signing a book. Because people view that as an incredible source of credibility, a very higher level positioning just because you have the book. So it's not a bad idea to have a book. It's not a. It's even better idea to position it properly and use it as part of that pre design disposition strategy in your sales process. So one of our high performing members, the unstoppable Russ Castle, wrote a book on his niche, the habitational niche called growing your real estate business. Russ dominates the habitational niche on the west coast in the areas that he chooses to do business. And one of his ninja strategies is his book growing your real estate empire. And it's got the book I'm privileged to have a signed copy. In addition to that, he's got some testimonials on the back from not only real estate clients, but other insurance people in the industry who he knows and have a lot of respect for him. So he uses this as part of his dispositioning strategy. We have another high performing UPP platinum coaching member, the unstoppable Tony Shibuyama, who wrote her book called the big game playbook. Now she is an authority that dominates her niche niche nationally. Her niche is private clubs. And it was kind of happenstance that it all happened for her. She was working in her local market and one of the people in her local market that she does a lot of business with said, hey Tony, we're having a national conference for all the general managers of all of the clubs across the nation. And one of the speakers at the event backed out at last minute. We're looking for somebody to share at the event. Would you mind? And Tony said, no, I love to share. I'm happy to speak. Where do I need to be? She flew down to the great state of Texas and got on stage and completely wowed the audience. So at the end of the day, after she had wowed the audience, all the general managers are buzzing about who's this Tony? And so fortunately we were able to huddle for our one of our one day consultations and we developed a strategy and the next thing that launched onto the scene was this. So we have now further predispositioned her in her marketplace to take it to another level. It's completely open more doors than I can begin to tell you about. Props to them. A decision and Action. Remember this my friends, a predisposition of a lead, especially using effective automation, absolute key to your processes and your promotions and growing your business, creating wealth and having more freedom to live life on your terms. That's all we want for you. All we want is your success. I hope you learned lots today. I hope you were taking notes. I hope you make a decision to take action because it will change everything for you. It will lead to your next win, it will lead to your next lesson and it will help you get out there to make a difference. Be unstoppable and leave no regrets. Speaking of decision in action, I always want to remind you because I get this question all of the time. I love that podcast. Who are you? I am privileged to be with you today on this episode. My name is Mike Stromco. I'm widely recognized as the leading author, speaker and coach for the independent insurance agency industry. You can find me@unstoppableprofitproducer.com if you're interested in attending a virtual live event to learn to grow business, create wealth and have more freedom to live life on your terms. And please visit our virtual event page@uppfaststart.com that's upfaststart.com or if you're interested in a live event, just go to be unstoppable boot camp.com that's beunstoppablebootcamp.com both events are designed to share with you some of my best money making strategies proven over 35 years of research in your industry to help you grow your business great wealth so you can have more freedom to live life on your own terms. All we want is your success, my friends. And because I said I would, I'm here with this episode of the Unstoppable Profit podcast. Please make sure you join us go to unstoppable profit podcast.com make sure that you subscribe so you don't miss one episode. We're on all the networks as well. Apple Play, Stitcher, Google Play, and beyond. Make sure you connect with us. I will see you on the next podcast. Until then, this is Mike Strompso wishing you a great day. Get out there, make a difference. Be unstoppable and leave no regrets. We'll connect with you soon. See ya.

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