High Growth Agencies Pre-Close Prospect’s Commitment

25 Apr High Growth Agencies Pre-Close Prospect’s Commitment

A System to Assure your Producers have the Skills to meet with Prospects, get Pain Identified and Confirmed, get Solutions Identified and Confirmed and get the Prospect’s Commitment to Fire the Incumbent

Is the actual process of selling a science or an art? Are salespeople born or developed? Can you teach mature producers (with existing learned behaviors) to improve their success factors in a sales call, leading to more wins? Is selling something that can be learned?

Selling is both science and art. Some people were born to sell, others have to learn it. Anyone who is smart enough to read an insurance policy is also smart enough to improve their skills. But please, don’t be disappointed if your producers aren’t begging you for help to improve their selling skills. Furthermore, don’t be disappointed when they say

• I’m too busy for training.
• Been there, done that and it doesn’t work for me.
• It won’t help. All my prospects care about is price.
• Why don’t you spend time finding us better markets?

There are four Selling Styles: Price, Coverage, Relationship and Services. Most producers have adopted a style that is a product of their previous business culture and sales experience.

The Price Guy had a niche and a special program. He pitched price and it has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. (All they care about is price). That’s because, price is all he’s capable of talking about.

The Coverage Guy generally started out as an underwriter at an insurance carrier. What did they teach him? They taught him coverage, contract language, limits, and how to underwrite an account. It’s his strength. So he’ll always lead with coverage, backed up by price because he knows how to work the underwriter system.

The Relationship Guy grew up at the country club. His dad taught him to introduce himself to everyone, always be friendly and some day it’ll pay off. And it has. He builds relationships, let’s them know he’s an insurance guy and welcomes the opportunity to quote on their insurance. He quotes and if he gets it, rings the bell. If he doesn’t, he’ll keep developing the relationship and call it a long term strategy.

The Services Guy, in most cases, is your most successful producer. He understands how to build relationships, knows coverage and contracts, knows loss control and claims management and he’s got great underwriter relationships. He’s the complete package and he’s growing, because he knows how to find pain and get it confirmed. He knows how to help the prospect develop a complete solution to their problems and get it confirmed. And he knows how to get a commitment before he spends too much time doing the heavy lifting and investing agency resources.

If your agency has a strategy to beat the incumbent (see last week’s blog) your producer walks into a sales call knowing where to find the prospect’s pain. Without a strategy your average producer walks into a sales call hoping the prospect will give them a chance to quote.

When there is a solid strategy to beat the incumbent getting the prospect to fire the incumbent becomes a real possibility for your agency, and part of a system that you can drive as a leader. It’s a system you can train. You can create and develop more competent salespeople that know how to win accounts or walk away and not get used. This leads to greater confidence and success.

For more information on the iWin Agency Growth System, contact The Wedge Group.