"Strictly Sales" is written by the faculty of the Dynamics of Selling program. This month's column is from David Connolly, ARM.
VINCE Lombardi was fond of saying, "Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing," and, "Show me a good loser, and I'll show you a loser." In the sales profession, much ado is made of particular selling skills: strategic positioning, mirroring and matching, and handling objections, for example. We focus less often on a common personality trait of top producers: They hate to lose. Successful salespeople will tell you they hate to lose as much as they love to win.
When I was a teenager, I started working with my father, who owned a successful construction firm. My dad was a great salesman. When he met with a prospective customer, more often than not he walked out of the meeting happy, with an order in hand. What I remember most, however, is his attitude when he lost. It was no fun driving back to the shop on those occasions. He would talk to himself the rest of the day, and not in a pleasant tone. He simply hated to lose.
Later, as I began to try my hand at sales and apply what I had observed in my father and others, I learned that selling is easy. It's winning-getting prospects to part with their hard-earned cash-that is difficult. The difference between selling and winning is the difference between the top producers and the rest of the field. To become a top producer means learning what it takes to win.
One way to start is to understand the role of emotion. The insurance industry can be cold, technical and businesslike, and producers often assume this personality themselves. The super-producers are different. They may seem businesslike on the outside, but they have a fire for winning burning on the inside. To become a winner, stop holding back emotion. Allow yourself to fully feel the joy when you close a great account-compliment and reward yourself for a job well done. If you don't win, be angry. Feel the pain and vow never to let it happen again.
Another key to becoming a winner is learning from your mistakes so you don't repeat them. My father once said to me, "Geniuses learn from other people's mistakes, intelligent people learn from their own mistakes, and fools are doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over. So don't be a fool." This is smart advice that you can use right away, before you call on your next prospect. Review your sales process, identify the mistakes that led to failure and replace the mistakes with clear strategies for winning.
As an example, let's look at the typical insurance sales process:
1. Identify a prospect through a list. Make a phone call, develop rapport and get an appointment.
2. Meet the prospect in person, compliment the prospect's business, talk about your level of experience, and maybe drop a name or two of your other clients.
3. Obtain copies of the prospect's current insurance policies, negotiate for markets, prepare an application and make follow-up phone calls to the prospect for additional information.
4. Meet with the prospect again, present your proposal and ask for the business. The client puts you off because other quotes are coming in and he or she is not ready to decide. Get a compliment on your effort and a promise that the client will call after the other quotes have come in. Walk out the door, planning to call again the day before the prospect's x-date.
5. "D-day" comes. You can't get an answer from the prospect, either because he puts you off or because the incumbent agent doesn't have his final numbers yet.
6. You finally hear from the prospect, who calls to say he stayed with his incumbent agent. He thanks you and invites you to return in a year for another exercise in futility.
What is missing in this approach?
1. A goal. The goal in this example seems to be just to make friends and obtain the right to quote.
2. Pain. Pain is the catalyst for change. Remember, you're not asking the prospect just to do business with you; you're also asking him to fire his current agent. For this to happen, you must have a clear strategy and purpose-to help the prospect realize his pain. As is often said, "No pain, no gain." If you can't find three to four areas of pain, the only place to go is price-and the incumbent agent almost always wins the price war.
3. Rules. Every game has rules. In the insurance game, producers often let a prospect make up the rules as he goes along. Who wants to play that game? You should set the rules and refuse to play unless the prospect agrees to them:
-You get the markets you need.
-You get all the information you need.
-The prospect tells you what his insurance budget is.
-You get to present to the prospect's decision makers.
-You present first and get the "last look."
-The prospect discusses insurance problems he wants you to solve.
-The prospect agrees that if you solve his problems, he will fire his agent and hire you.
Don't just sell, win. Without a clear strategy for winning, you're leaving the sale up to luck. Luck is almost always on the side of the incumbent. Develop an effective strategy for clearing the hurdles on your way to winning. Use your emotion, learn from your mistakes, find the pain, set the rules and start winning. For the fools who don't want to learn from mistakes, the alternative is to keep selling-and losing.
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