Newbie agent here

[Laurent]

Hi everyone, I am new to the forum. This forum is quite informative. I currently work in a call center selling whole life and term insurance. My employer provides a base of $31k and 20% com on what I sell. I am looking at two companies to get into the business, one is Met Life and the other is Prudential. The only thing that disturb me, they both want a project 200 (strong natural market). I can barely put together five names beside 200 names. Please advise. Thanx
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[James]

Hi everyone, I am new to the forum. This forum is quite informative. I currently work in a call center selling whole life and term insurance. My employer provides a base of $31k and 20% com on what I sell. I am looking at two companies to get into the business, one is Met Life and the other is Prudential. The only thing that disturb me, they both want a project 200 (strong natural market). I can barely put together five names beside 200 names. Please advise. Thanx
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The 200 projects are quite telling, remember this is a people's business and I am for one a strong supporter of it. Now I know many here can not stand these projects and think it all chuck and jive, yet about everyone of them will likely suggest that going captive is smart decision for the training. Yet the one part of the training that most all captive companies do is what they all say is a waste of time?

Now I have had more than one down and dirty battles over this, yet several that once said this and that is now all about Neighborhood Marketing and Positioning which is the key to the 200 Projects! Now if you have lived for any amount of time in which you are now, I can not imagine you can not come up with a substantial amount of names. You can use Family, Friends and people you do business with, such as dry cleaners, floral business's etc etc...

Just don't let it get to ya, likely if you have a problem getting 200 names talk to the recruiter or trainer and likely they will come up with options. Or just pull 200 names out of the telephone book and market to them, I would choose businesses or the yellow pages. Or go to your local library and look up the Reference books, the libarian will let you know what you need, business's and the books they have, have names of owners, years in business, SIC Codes and telephone numbers and go to town plus the amount of employees and other good stuff.

 

[Frank Stastny]

Although I dislike the concept, James does make a good point.

It is a good beginning to obtaining the skills to successfully learn to prospect. Learning how to prospect is the life blood of the insurance industry. Without having the skills to get your own "leads", selling insurance can be a huge up-hill battle.

It does not have to be family members and friends. In fact, I would specifically stay away from family members and especially friends if you value their friendship.

Use the phone book or invest less than $100 and buy a list of a thousand names tailored to the demographics of the people/businesses you will be selling to and pick out 200 names.

That isn't much different than when I started selling insurance. I was handed a voter registration list and told to "go get-em".

 

[Alston]

Project 200?

It was Project 100 when I got started in 1985.

I told my manager that I didn't know very many people and that I felt uncomfortable contacting family and friends. I worked the phones for hours a day and turned into a pretty good telephone prospector. I had a very good first year. I think the only person I sold to my first year, that I had known prior to coming into the business, was myself.

A lot of agents have gotten a fast start by contacting friends and family. However...

YOU NEED TO FIND A SUSTAINABLE PROSPECTING METHOD TO LAST IN THIS BUSINESS.

Call your friends or family or don't call your friends or family. Either way, if you want to stay in the business long-term you have to generate a steady stream of new prospects.

If I were starting over and I had a Project 200, I think I would contact them in my second year. By then I would be polished enough to get referrals based on my abilities and not based solely on my previous connection with the referer.

 

[Laurent]

I would like to thank everyone for their reply. I would like to take the advice of buying leads than follow the direction of contacting friends and family in the second year after I know what I am doing. Both Met life & Pru offer a salary with a com for a short period until I am able to build my practice. Are there any short falls in any one of these companies? I am trying to choose between the two. Thanks in advance.
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[TXINSURANCE]

This is what turns me off with these outfits - they have no marketing strategy and expect you to solicit family and friends. In other words THEY ARE CHEAP and won't spend the money on REAL marketing.

This is why the burn out is very high in the business. If they want 200 tell them spend some money, do some advertising and get some leads.

However that being said $31k base PLUS commission is a great opportunity to LEARN for when you progress on your own (which you will at some point).

 

[James]

Yea them cheap run of the mill companies that may or may not be here tomorrow like NYL, Mass Mutual, Hartford etc etc really don't know what the hell they are doing! I think we all should understand and let them know that having a history of 150 years in business and basically the "Icons" of the business really need to learn how to sell Insurance Policies, dang fools! I mean really, you have to learn how to prospect and you also have to understand they are not interested in your marketing ability. No they expect you to prospect within your neighborhood I guess they have other areas covered, you think?

Then again it is up to the agent to decide how they want to do business, personally I have no desire to be on the phones making cold calls for the rest of my life! While Health sales are good and pay good they do differ from other insurance sales, such as Life, DI, LTCi etc etc...

Understand, basically if you take a job with a major life carrier more than likely they'll expect you to prospect within your community, it is their strength. I would also add that I know of more than one agent that is a life long captive agent and quite happy. In fact they are doing really well and don't spend countless hours everyday making cold calls, now imagine that!

Of course like everything else, there is more than one way to skin that proverbial Cat.

 

[Frank Stastny]

I would like to thank everyone for their reply. I would like to take the advice of buying leads than follow the direction of contacting friends and family...
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I don't recall anyone saying anything about "buyin leads". That would be a disastrous thing for you to do starting out. Especially while you were on some kind of "salary".

I said "Buy a List", not "leads". "Leads" will cost you a fortune and 90% or more will be no better than calling names off of a list.

Learn to prospect and you will never be without someone to see and will be ver successful. No better time to learn to prospect than when you are getting paid even if you don't sell anything.

Paying money for what they call "leads" will break you in a couple of months.

 

[Alston]

I don't recall anyone saying anything about "buyin leads". That would be a disastrous thing for you to do starting out. Especially while you were on some kind of "salary".

I said "Buy a List", not "leads". "Leads" will cost you a fortune and 90% or more will be no better than calling names off of a list.

Although I disagree with Frank regarding the quality of bought leads, I agree with the rest of his posting.

I'm not against using new school techniques or technology even though I am a gray-haired veteran. In fact I design and program my own website and rarely make a face-to-face sales call or sell to anyone who hasn't visited my website.

However, the advice that I'm giving to my son, who is at about the same stage in his career as you are, is to train using the old model.

As important as it is to make sales as soon as possible, long-term success is determined by how much you learn in the beginning and less about how much you earn.

Learn how to prospect by phone or other old-school techniques before you buy start buying leads. Your closing ratio will be much better if you wait.

 

[Frank Stastny]

Although I disagree with Frank regarding the quality of bought leads, I agree with the rest of his posting.

I'm not against using new school techniques or technology even though I am a gray-haired veteran. In fact I design and program my own website and rarely make a face-to-face sales call or sell to anyone who hasn't visited my website.

However, the advice that I'm giving to my son, who is at about the same stage in his career as you are, is to train using the old model.

As important as it is to make sales as soon as possible, long-term success is determined by how much you learn in the beginning and less about how much you earn.

Learn how to prospect by phone or other old-school techniques before you buy start buying leads. Your closing ratio will be much better if you wait.

Al, after posting that I figured that you respond to my comment about the quality of purchased leads. I agree with the rest of your information also.

I can only speak from personal experience about the "leads" that I have purchased in the past. Over the last fourteen years I have tried every thing available to make prospecting easier, most of them many times. The one method that has been consistently the most productive for me has been calling from a list.

Almost without exception, the people who respond to direct mail leads have, or claim not to have, any recollection of filling out the card and sending it in. I have had limited success with purchased internet leads. (Maybe I was not getting them from a reliable source.)

I talk to agents who spend hundreds of dollars per week on direct mail and telemarketed "leads". Those "leads" are obtained from a list. I can take the same list, make more appointments and sales at a dramatically lower cost. However, it is work. That's what I do, work.

I didn't like using the phone when I started selling insurance and wasn't very good at it. (I still don't like making those phone calls.) However, it didn't take me very long to realize that selling insurance is work and the work part is prospecting. I knew that if I was going to be successful I would have to learn to be extremely good on the phone or be an "also ran". If an agent will learn to prospect, those same skills will apply when making a presentation. Selling insurance is the easy and fun part, almost anyone can do that.