The Door Knock Life

[DayTimer]

So your cold door knocking a targeted list in middle class 3-4 bedroom homes ?

I am knocking suburban Bucks county outside of Philly. No list ... but I do have the canvass.com app so I suaully know the name(s) of the homeowner(s). I know nothing else.

Single family homes, 3 to 5 bedroom, built anywhere from just post-WWII to within the last few years.

What are you selling these " middle class " people ?

Whatever they want.

 

[DonP]

So your coming off the street cold door knocking $300 k homes and their letting a stranger in the home and giving you a check ? I understand doing with low income but I honestly can say I can't name one person I've ever known middle class that would buy any policy from a stranger off the street . I'm shocked your not seeing massive rejection across the board with so much fraud out their . I'll try it for a week .

 

[rousemark]

So your coming off the street cold door knocking $300 k homes and their letting a stranger in the home and giving you a check ? I understand doing with low income but I honestly can say I can't name one person I've ever known middle class that would buy any policy from a stranger off the street . I'm shocked your not seeing massive rejection across the board with so much fraud out their . I'll try it for a week .

Middle class folks will welcome you into their house..

 

[DonP]

Rouse were talking about cold knocking . Were not talking about having a lead card in hand .If this is true nobody should ever buy a lead again . It's a waste of money . I've never heard you say you cold knock all day . Matter fact I see you buy leads .

 

[Tahoe Ray]

Middle class folks will welcome you into their house..

What do you consider middle class?

 

[rousemark]

Rouse were talking about cold knocking . Were not talking about having a lead card in hand .If this is true nobody should ever buy a lead again . It's a waste of money . I've never heard you say you cold knock all day . Matter fact I see you buy leads .

I have only recently tried buying leads and I am revisiting that idea. I cold knocked for many years. The reason most people don't do it is they are fearful of the constant rejection they will have to endure. Even when I was doing it on a regular basis, there were times I would be stricken with severe cases of call reluctance.

 

[rousemark]

What do you consider middle class?

In this area, it would be people with household incomes of $40K-$100K and homes in the $150K -$250K range.. It will vary with the part of the country in which you are working..

 

[DonP]

My skin is tougher than leather . I'd love to cold knock 5 days a week if it were financially feasible. Time is our most valuable asset . I just believe you can make much more net money working 20 leads were somebody took some type of action to fill out than cold knocking . How is your time best spent to net the most ?The problem now is getting the leads at a reasonable cost .

 

[DayTimer]

Warning: Long-a$$ post but I believe there are some nuggets for the door knocker and non-door knocking agent alike.

What do you consider middle class?

In this area, it would be people with household incomes of $40K-$100K and homes in the $150K -$250K range.. It will vary with the part of the country in which you are working..

It will vary, as @rousemark said, but his range is very accurate I believe.

I am finding that the folks most open to sitting with me are couples with children who both work and have a combined income between 60k and 125k. They live in a $350k+ home that they paid $150K - $250k for 10 to 15 years ago. Most think they are paying too much in taxes but their biggest financial problem is the volume of interest they are paying and poor spending decisions.

They have little to no retirement savings and have no idea how to begin saving for their kid's educations because they are often negative cash flow, i.e. borrowing a little bit more each month just to make ends meet. Most advisors don't want these folks. But these folks are gold. The hard part is convincing them they are not beyond help. Many resist not because they are already working with an advisor (most are not). Many resist because they are doing so poorly they are embarrassed to share their true financial state of affairs with an advisor.

I also have had success with some high income earners, especially those who are in high tax brackets and are tax talk sensitive and attracted to an legal tax reduction message.

The best prospects in terms of finding the need and selling the solution on a one call close are the retired or near-retired folks 62 to 74 or so who have assets and incomes that make it prudent to do some additional planning so that they can maintain complete control over their money while alive, control what happens to it from the grave, and assure that they never run out of income.

Rouse were talking about cold knocking . Were not talking about having a lead card in hand .If this is true nobody should ever buy a lead again . It's a waste of money

Buying leads is not a waste of money for most agents who buy them.

I don't mean to sound cocky, but most can't and therefore won't do what I do. Every successful new Edwards Jones office, for example, started door to door. But how many Edward Jones recruits fail? I know three people personally who were EJ recruits, and two failed in under a year. The third is going strong and 15 years in he still door knocks Saturdays 10 - 2 and some evenings 5 to 8 in the spring and fall.

What I am doing is the result of over 20 years of prior cold knocking b2b and b2c selling advertising, real estate, property management services, carpet cleaning ... heck, go back farther in time and I was selling newspaper subscriptions building Norristown Times Herald and Philadelphia Inquirer routes both as a kid and then again when I was in College (there used to be amazing $$$ in newspaper routes). There is a lot of how-to knowledge that comes from thousands ... and I mean quite literally thousands of cold door interactions, not just thousands of doors knocked.

Also, when I started in real estate 21-22 years ago, I was fortunate to have a manager send me to Mike Ferry school and then I also had the opportunity to learn from Bill Nasby, one of Mike Ferry's most successful door knocking students. Mike always said "Cold doors are a superior means of prospecting," and he has always been right.

D2D is not just about what you say, but how you say it (inflection) and your body language while saying it. What I "say" is that I ask questions: I have a set of questions, actually a number of sets of questions that I lead with at the door (most of my questions come from Van Mueller, but I have also borrowed from Tom Love, Sid Walker, Sandro Forte, Ben Feldman, Mehdi Fakharzadeh, and the Insurance Pro Shop's Lew and Jeremy Nason among others.

I have said in this thread before, if you get people answering the right questions you are more than halfway to their kitchen table. The questions are important. But how you ask them and your body language while asking, and while listening to their responses is far more important.

Also, you are making a some incorrect assumptions here.

For example, you seem to be assuming that I am getting in then and there and leaving with wet sig's on an app. Sometimes I am, but most of the time I am there to get a meeting scheduled for later that evening or later that week, or for Saturday, or even the next week.

And if I don't point it out most will miss the import of what I just said. I do not ever schedule appointments. People cancel appointments at a high rate (why does your doctor or dentist call to confirm). But people tend to keep their meetings. Thanks to Sandro Forte for that suggestion.

"I don't have time right now," says the prospect.

"Neither do I," I say. "Let's schedule a quick and casual 20 to 30 minute meeting when we can both be relaxed and I can share this important information with you. All the neighbors I've met with so far have found it to be very interesting, and in many cases they have found it to be downright life changing. I think you will too. I'd like to share it with you also if I may. May I?" (Straight from W Clemont Stone at the end there and I've used for FE folks as well).

Second, you are assuming all one call closes. Sometimes that is the case, especially with annuity sales and single premium whole life sales, and of course, the occasional FE, aka simplified issue whole life sale. However, more often the first meeting is fact finding and a second meeting is required to make the closing presentation.

In whirrleybird's door knocking thread here on the forum, he had tremendous success right away. He easily was outperforming me at this point in his efforts. But he also was coming off 7 or 8 years of full time door to door cold knocking selling alarms, home automation and security, and I think he even had some pest control sales experience as well ... all cold, residential, door to door. He had also spent the prior 12 months selling insurance products cold door to door b2b before he ventured into residential. The point is he had the skill set - the verbal, para-verbal, and non-verbal elements of communication down to the point where it would be a waste for him to buy leads. He was making 40 or more contacts some days, writing five or more apps, annuities, etc and also coming way with 39 leads with appointments set or at least permission to follow up.

Most agent's wouldn't come close to that performance if they haven't had cold door experience that included learning what to say, how to say it, and how to use body language to further your message and instill confidence and trust.

It can be done, but it cannot be done by most. But here is the thing about these "middle class people" ... most folks at their door ... if you can break the ice by making them laugh, and if you can then use that moment to get permission to ask them a few questions, and then get them answering those question, then it goes from being a cold call to a on-demand first appointment, doesn't it?

What do my questions look like? Here is a sequence I found through my research and borrowed from Van Mueller. Like Van, I use things everyone is already talking about - high gas prices, high lumber prices, inflation, government spending, etc. to get to the point of asking whether or not the person thinks taxes will be higher in the future, "just yes or no?"

Then, "Let me ask you - do you think taxes will be much higher - just yes or no?"

"Now I'm going to ask you a question I'll bet no one has ever asked you: I know you have a financial advisor, a stock broker, and insurance agent, a CPA, and attorney - a whole boatload of advisors (hint: most don't) ... but I'll bet you none of them have ever asked you this question. I just want to ask you this one last question and then I'll be on my way. I'd like to ask you this question - I'm sure you'll tell me none of your other advisors have ever, ever asked you this question. May I ask it?" (hint: let them anser "yes" ... make sure they are listening.

"So you think taxes are going much higher in the future right?

"Yes, I told you that."

"So here is the question I bet none of your other advisors have ever asked you. Are you ready (hint pause and give them a chance to nod "yes") ..." Do you want to pay those taxes?"

"well ... no. No one wants to pay higher taxes."

"You do understand that the way you have things set up right now that's not going to happen - you are going to pay those taxes, right?"

Most of the time they are simply nodding their head head slowly in agreement. Sometimes they ask "How do you know that?" Some will say "well, there's nothing you can do about death and taxes."

I say "let me ask you this: I said none of your other advisors have ever asked you whether or not you wanted to pay the ever increasing taxes coming down the pike. Was I right?"

I'm always right because 99% of advisors (if they are working with an advisor at all - most of these folks are not) are simply trying to get more money out of these folks, but none of them are showing them where to find that money).

"What if there were a way I could show you could legally avoid paying those taxes, when would you want to know about - before it's too late to plan and prepare or after?"

"Before, of course."

"If there were no cost nor obligation, and I could show you how you could avoid paying most if not all of those future taxes without spending any more money out of pocket than you already are or decreasing your current lifestyle, couldn't you find 20 to 30 minutes in the next week or so to meet with me for a quick and casual 20 to 30 minutes?"

As I said, I have several sets of questions. Each is designed to get the person to the point where they are now thinking about a problem they may or may not have known they had, and I am offering to show them in as little as 20 to 30 minutes how they can fix that problem.

Also, I am not immune to the typical experiences of door knockers: I have people who open the door, look at me, say "not interested" before I say hello, and slam the door. I have had people look out their window and look me right in the eye, turn away and go right back to doing what they were doing ignoring the fact that I just knocked on their door. I have had people tell me that I am a scam. I have had people tell that what I am doing is horrible/awful/criminal. I have had people tell me to get a real job lol.

Yesterday I was out for four hours. Only 21 doors were answered, wrote 0 apps, but I have 5 meetings scheduled as a result. I have only had two prospects who agreed to meetings no show me since I started this. Ask the right questions to find the pain, and folks will meet with you if you can convince them that you are sincere and trustworthy and that you really might have the solution to their problem(s).

I'd love to cold knock 5 days a week if it were financially feasible. Time is our most valuable asset . I just believe you can make much more net money working 20 leads were somebody took some type of action to fill out than cold knocking .

Two responses to this: First, you are right, for you and for most agents, the highest and best use of your time will be to buy leads, I am not arguing at all that buying leads is wrong or dumb or anything of the sort. Most have no business cold knocking doors unless they 1) already have the experience to make it immediately viable or 2) are capitalized well enough to work through the learning curve and also humble enough to seek some training through books, videos, etc. I would actually suggest a would-be door knocking insurance agent take on a summer sales job with Aptive pest control or Vivant home security/solar and get trained up that way.

Second, not so much a response as a reaction. I do not mean this as an insult, just an observation. When I read your posts, here and elsewhere on the forum, you tend to be a somewhat negative guy, e.g. cold calling doesn't work, lead houses are re-selling leads, call centers are about to put the indi agent our of business, middle class consumers are mean etc. And such a perspective on the world probably would not lead to a successful cold door knocking campaign. As Henry Ford is oft-quoted as having said" Whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right," certainly applies here, imo.

 

[DonP]

Day timer you'd be very incorrect in your assumptions . I'm one of the best door knockers in the country . I get in 90% of homes that answer . I'm not in the middle class mkt . Your into this and that . I'm laser focused on 2 mkts . Edward Jones is a reputable well known firm and many people know the name . Nobody knows your affiliation from a hole in the wall . Middle class people are more astute and guarded . Why would they listen to you a stranger at their door with no lead card ? You call it negativity but I call it reality. Now low income it works .But your a rock star salesman right ? Cars , real estate , b to b and pest control(?).