A short monologue by Timothy Schucker advising life insurance agents how to stand out in a saturated market by focusing on four reasons prospects choose an agent: trust (build via setting/meeting expectations, transparency, and simplifying expertise), selling on value rather than price, ensuring convenience and disciplined follow-up, and demonstrating specialization and domain credibility.
Foreign.
So why leads buy from one agent versus another? There's four reasons that prospects buy from an agent. We've got trust, price, convenience, and specialization. Let's break these down. Let's start with number one. Trust. So here are three things that you can do to build trust with a prospect fast so that you're not being outsold by some other agent that keeps coming behind you or is selling the people in front of you. And you can't replace their business because they're writing good business. So let's start with number one, setting expectations and meeting them. Think of the conversation as a race to the finish line and each checkpoint moves you one step closer to winning. So for example, even if it's something as little as in this conversation, I'm going to go through a quick survey just to make sure that, you know, you qualify for this. And then going through the survey, that is just one example of how you can build trust by basically making small or medium sized commitments that you keep consistent throughout the entire conversation to get them to make a bigger commitment at the end. Number two, transparency and prioritizing them. So I'll explain to them that my goal is to make sure that they fully understand the programs and to see if they even qualify. If they don't understand the programs, I will let them know that I'm going to refuse to move forward because they need to understand exactly how, how it's going to benefit little Timmy so that I can help them file the claim in the future. This is called future pacing. It's a way of assuming the sale. Number three, expertise. As we go through the appointment, I will simplify insurance concepts. I'm presenting on an elementary school level, which is a massive trust builder. The guys that are always talking about, yeah, and so in clause 13, and they're reading the contract as they're going or some shit, those guys fall apart quick because they don't look like they know what they're doing. If you can explain very complex concepts to people and put it simply, they will view you as an expert in whatever you're talking about. Number two, price. Nobody wants to be sold, but everybody wants to buy. And this is why we sell on value, not on price. Because when I present them with a price and I don't tell them about anything else, then it sounds like they're just spending money just to spend money and that makes no sense. So we've got to sell on value. What is it that they're getting from us when they actually want to purchase or when they actually make that decision, right? Are they getting a life insurance policy? Are they getting a $50 a month payment? Are they getting a payout for their family member to ensure that they're not going to be financially ruined after they pass away? Probably the third one, because that's what sells. And the last thing you need to remember about price is that you also, they also need to understand what they're paying for, right? So even if that, you do just hammer on the why, but you don't touch on any of the how. They're going to see that they're getting to the destination, but they're not going to see the plane, the bridge, or the boat that you're going to take to get there. And, and if they can't see themselves getting there because they don't quite understand what that transformation looks like or the how, then they're not going to be willing to move forward or they'll charge back because they won't believe it. Let's talk about number three, which convenience. If you don't close on the first shot, Follow up. Only 2% of sales are made on the first point of contact. And so what we have to realize is that if we don't follow up, we're leaving 98% of the business on the table. 60% of consumers say no on the first four asks for, for the order. So keep that in mind when you get an objection or somebody tells you need to think about it next time because you can still be their agent. It doesn't have to be someone else. You just have to take time to do it. And what we have to also realize is that the goal of the conversation is not to get them to buy, but it's to get them to make a decision. And while that might sound insane, it's a lot easier and there's a lot less pressure on you as a sale person when the only thing that you need to focus on is to get them to decide and not to buy. Because if you want to get them to buy you, you start to get sloppy because you're focused on the wrong thing, right? You're focused on trying to convince them to get something which seems sleazy and makes you come off as a person with commission breath. But on the contrary, if you are simply trying to get them to make a decision by giving them all of the information that they actually need and sharing with them the concepts, how it works and how it applies, and then asking them how they want to move forward, they will always want to move forward with you. If they Actually take it seriously. And if you have the followed the same script that you do every time so you know where the discrepancies is, right? Also, when you call them, you are there, right? Then if they do have time to talk and you guys are diving deep into their situation, you're there, right? Then it is extremely convenient for them to buy. And so whenever they're on the phone with you, this is a great time to ask for the order. I don't want to start trying to follow up if I haven't asked for anything yet. Let's talk about number four, which is specialization. I don't want heart surgery from a brain doctor, while the brain doctor could probably still pull it off if we're being like really honest. They're not the guy that I want for the job, and so my car insurance guy is not my life insurance guy. And so my life insurance guy can come in and replace life insurance that a car insurance guy might have with me because I'm a specialist or if they have no insurance and it's between me and that guy and I have a better rap because he's also worried about pnc. I'm squared away. I don't have to worry about it because she trusts me as I'm the expert since it's the only thing that I do and I'm specialized. Another thing that can help you here is dropping breadcrumbs about knowledge and experience. So for example, whenever I'm talking with someone in a conversation, I might mention to them that I used to train agents or that I'm training agents currently. The reason I'll do that is because if I'm qualified to train, I'm definitely qualified to sell them a policy. I'll also tell them I've been in the business for quite some time now or make some sort of iteration like oh, I remember when we were doing paper application because it makes me seem like I have been doing it for longer than I actually have. If you're newer and, and if you aren't newer, then it does give credibility to the experience that you have. And the third thing is to simplify concepts. Don't over complicate these things. If you cannot explain it to a third grader and they're confused, or if you're confused trying to explain it, you need to study the concept more so that you understand it, can simplify it and communicate it to someone else so that there's no disconnect.
