Losing Motivation and Drive

[Milkman1265]

Has this happen to anyone? First 2 years i'm aggressive, im marketing, im networking, sell sell sell.

after 2 years, im too relaxed sitting in office doing nothing and waiting for referrals.

Im not happy at the current situation but i lost the drive to go out to sell again.

How do you get over the laziness and just go out and make more money?

 

[cdavis]

Hi Milkman,

What motivates you? What was making you aggressive the first 2 years?

I am a very competitive person. When I get down and find myself being lazy I create a competition with my friends in the industry. I HATE losing. I don't care how lazy I am feeling I refuse to lose!

My advice to you is know yourself and what makes you tick. Then execute on it.

Good Luck =)

 

[VolAgent]

It sounds like you got comfortable.

Do what CDavis said and find something that motivates you. Or find a young hungry producer like you were two years ago. Or both and try to outproduce him.

 

[Sales71]

Has this happen to anyone? First 2 years i'm aggressive, im marketing, im networking, sell sell sell.

after 2 years, im too relaxed sitting in office doing nothing and waiting for referrals.

Im not happy at the current situation but i lost the drive to go out to sell again.

How do you get over the laziness and just go out and make more money?

Its normal I think you now make a good amount of money. Maybe dream of something nice you want to buy like a new car and see if you can sell a lot to make the monthly payment..or something like that.

 

[djs]

It happens to everyone.
Go buy a new car, get a new bill, and you'll need to produce again Okay, that is probably bad advice

Set some goals and strive to meet the goals. Put them up on the wall, not just in your head. Make a big deal about achieving the milestones of your goals.

For instance, say I want to grow 300 policies / $500K GWP this year. What do I have to do this month, this week, today to make that happen?

Without a goal to accomplish, you will flounder. If you ignore your own goals, you will flounder. If you get distracted from your goals, you will flounder. Stay focused. Be realistic, but challenge yourself.

Then have people you know hold you accountable to your goals.

Dan

 

[Milkman1265]

great advice, i will try to do it.

it the beginning the motivation was, im out on my own, im going to do this and show people i can. the more resistance i had from carriers the harder i worked to say this is what you could have gotten from me.

i tried to be a problem solver for everyone and help as much people i can. now i seen so many people, i stopped "caring" as much. i feel "jaded" if that describes me.

i think i've got comfortable and a sale is no longer a reward to me.

maybe its the market im in, all small business and homeowners, its not challenging, i want to do something bigger

i know the pipelines are drying up, very little new business, but renewals are there but i know if i continue this way the renewals will leave and i'll end up with nothing.

 

[Josh]

I think it's great that you see it happening. Most P&C agents have that happen, it's especially bad after about 20 years.

We don't know what makes you tick, so it's trixy to answer your question. If you've been busting your gut trying to produce because you needed XYZ, it might be worth coasting for a little bit. When I run (something I should do more) I usually will start off walking and then I hit a point where I want to pick up the pace. After a little while I get tired and feel like taking a break. If I do that for long enough I find myself wanting to pick up the pace again. It's possible you're just on a slow cycle (which we all need) and that it'll spike up for you. You might also want to find a hobby or two to actually spend some recreation time doing. All work and no play may make jack a dull boy, but all work and no play also makes the work harder. I work hard and I enjoy it, I also spend a healthy amount of time playing video games and doing other things. I don't always have the luxury of the recreation, but it's important to make time for it if you can. It'll make your work time much more productive and it helps me feel more excited about working.

That's just my take on it, but good job building your business!

 

[CaptiveGuy]

If you are comfortable and making decent money good for you and you deserve it. You can call your current book of business and try to cross sell or ask for referrals (or pass this off to a CSR).

You could also hire a hungry producer teach them the ropes and have them go hunt for you. It seems like you started strong and got to a good point but if you can't go out and sell anymore you have to hire someone to do it for you.

 

[Josh]

if you can't go out and sell anymore you have to hire someone to do it for you.

I'd be extremely surprised if that worked. It's very difficult to find good producers and good producers want to be paid well. Finding a CSR to take the mundane activities off the table to free up time to generate new business can work well, but that's still leaving the main issue to be addressed.

Depending on how much service work you have going on, you might be surprised with how much that is bogging you down. Even just getting a few phone calls a day can disrupt a sales rhythm. About once a week I end up working very late in the evening to catch up on a bunch of things and get ahead. I have a lot of work with respect to my website and other things that I can do at night, not so much a good time to call on businesses or residences to generate new business though. Probably not the solution for you, but even if you just blocked off half a day once or twice a week to do nothing but prospect and ignored your other calls/responsibilities, that can help too.

 

[cdavis]

It happens to everyone.
Go buy a new car, get a new bill, and you'll need to produce again Okay, that is probably bad advice

HILARIOUS!