Becoming Motivated?

[Cenla Agent]

Well said. If you can't motivate yourself in sales the lights go off and the tow truck shows up. That's all the motivation you should need.

My thoughts exactly!

 

[Crabcake Johnny]

Well then again my wife just went to work after 7 years at home - so I made the money or we picked out a cardboard box.

I learned never to hire new agents who have working spouses. It's generally over before it starts if their spouse's income can pay the basic bills.

Hiring people gives you a lot of insight into what people actually do. i'd have agents call me bitching that they didn't close a deal that week. I'd ask them to walk me through the day before starting at 9am and go hour by hour. Of course, they couldn't get past 10:15 after they called their 3 leads.

That's why motivation and working hard can become an issue. I have no idea how some of these spouses cope. I'd hire agents who didn't put a deal together the entire month. Who the hell are they married to? Their spouse doesn't say "Ummm, honey. What exactly are you doing for 8 hours a day?"

 

[Agent5913]

I find that if I'm down, making 100 calls seems to solve everything.

Bingo, I made calls for 5 solid days last week, made 14 appointments, wrote 8 life aps, 4 autos and 2 fire policies.

What I didnt say was that Im through all of those appointments and I cant get motivated to get back on the phone and call another 5 days worth either.

Just go do it, I dont want to but it makes me a check and the baby needs new shoes.

Go heels!

 

[James]

I would make a presentation that is very generic that will make the audience really wonder if their planning is on target. I have done many of these types of meetings over the year, one can talk about some of the common mistakes families make and give examples. One thing I have used recently that goes back to my "free insurance audit" is giving an example of shopping my home and auto insurance, I saved 4000. Now to me that is real money, through in potential savings on other insurance and you make folks start to squirm. I developed a relationship with a P&C guy and send him that business to "audit" and I do everything else. You can talk about the danger of counting on group health, disability and life. I could go on and on. I haven't started on the necessity of naming guardians and wills and trusts and the pitfalls to be carefull about.

With older groups I tend to talk about Bene's, people that are 70 plus in age, they likely have some old contracts laying around and who knows who the beneficiary is, things change over 20-30-40 years! Offer up the "Free Review" and the next thing you know you are going thru a pile of WL, Annuities that was brought piece meal and they wonder if they can start creating a higher standard of living or give more to their favorite charity or Niece for college.

Yet, the HELOC is most interesting subject, esp. if they are within a decade of facing College payments for little Johnny. Which basically a perfect lead in the cost of loans!

 

[midwestbroker]

What I have learned in sales...

1. Sales cure all.

When you are down and out, go sell something. Nothing like a sale to get the ball rolling.

2. Surround yourself with people with your ideas

Find another agent to work along with. When I started in the business, I worked with an agent and we would have call contests. Who ever set the most appointments in 1 hour got lunch. Granted that was with Mega (I cringe as I type that) but it taught me how to set appointments. Of course, you can do this with someone on the board as well.

3. You can get more done if you start now

If you touch a lead, do something with it. Don't move it from one pile to another. Call it. Send it a letter. Make a call pile and go through it. Don't wait 'til tomorrow. Tomorrow is always the busiest day of the week.

 

[Crabcake Johnny]

It's extremely important to follow the "high" of making a sale with a lot of work and prospecting. That's when you're at your emotional best. What's hard as hell is pulling yourself out of a "no sales" rut.

But a lot of that is self-imposed. Agents will make 3 sales in a week then stop prospecting. Leads dry up, two weeks goes by with no sales and you're in the dumps. When you're feeling down it's extremely hard to get back into prospecting again since you're not feeling great until you make another sale.

Prospects can smell if you're successful or not. Ever notice how easy it is to close deals when you're on a roll? It's because you're more relaxed and clients get a 6th sense about you - that you're confident but not pushy.

When you "need" the sale clients can also sense that and you get a lot of "call me back in June."

 

[gradyinsurance]

One of my ideas for this presentation, was to show how that life insurance could make it possible for the homeschoolers to continue homeschooling if something was to happen to the main wage-earner (usually the husband), considering that if the husband died without life insurance, then it would be extremely hard for the wife to continue homeschooling, and having to work.

What do you think?

Dave

 

[Insuranceman]

Absolutley true ! Could have said it better. I've been there many times. The best remendy to a sales slump is to put your noes to the grind stone and prospect your a** off and know the law of number can break your slump.

 

[gradyinsurance]

Thanks for all of the positive input from the forum, on my topics. I will be incorporating some of the ideas like you guys suggested in the presentation. I've never done one for a group quite like this before, so I have another related question. What should I wear? I know it seems a little off topic, but I was planning on dressing very professionally, like a black suit, with a gray shirt and a gray tie, or is that too formal?

Dave

 

[J.R.]

Thanks for all of the positive input from the forum, on my topics. I will be incorporating some of the ideas like you guys suggested in the presentation. I've never done one for a group quite like this before, so I have another related question. What should I wear? I know it seems a little off topic, but I was planning on dressing very professionally, like a black suit, with a gray shirt and a gray tie, or is that too formal?

Dave

Dress like the people who you admire and look up to.