I was drinking coffee with one of the producers I first trained and he reminded me of a story. "Do you remember that time we were out and you made me cold call all day?" he said. "I went from business to business dropping off our marketing card, introducing myself, and then following up on every interaction.
"After that day, the strangest thing began to happen. I started slowly writing business. That day you showed me the key to sales. In fact, you didn't want me to be an insurance agent—you wanted me to be a sales person."
This former "student" is now the owner of his own insurance agency and my biggest friendly competitor. I trained him well, giving him all of my tools and tricks. Our sales approaches are completely different, but I think he would agree that our foundation of cold calling, prospecting and upfront agreements helped him be the success he is today.
During the last 15 years, our agency has trained a handful of these students, some grabbing our tools and others turning away.
We really don't care for "insurance agents," who are typically just average salespeople. What we are trying to develop are professional sales people. If our "students" follow our teachings and system, they have a great chance to become rock stars.
As a sales manager, I have had both great successes and failures. One student in particular, Brett, has been a great success, but not for my company. Here's his story.
Brett and I met 10 years ago; he joined our company about 2.5 years ago as a manager of one of our in-process agency acquisitions. As the acquisition opportunity died, we saw a major opportunity with Brett.
We had an immediate need for a personal lines customer service agent. He tweaked the position, injecting some new policies and procedures. Brett set the table for our CSA that currently manages that position in our Parker City, Ind., office.
After the personal lines gig was over, we moved Brett to our commercial lines division where he spent a few months learning the commercial lines side.
After a couple of months, we moved Brett out into the wonderful world of insurance production. Brett was on his way to becoming a producer.
Our approach with our producer "students" has always been to throw them to the wolves for the first 3 months. This allows us to see what natural gifts and talents they possess. As sales manager, I work with them daily, reviewing calls and showing them our sales process, but letting them fumble and stumble around, getting hit in the face with rejection. Our role at this point in the sales process is to polish, but never mold.
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After Brett had spent his time with the wolves out in the field, our current marketer moved to one of our other locations. In our agency, the marketer is a dedicated person who works with the producer to facilitate data collection, application completion, carrier submissions and final presentations. Producers sell, but the marketing person's role to do the "magic behind the curtain," which the producer then reviews.
When the marketer asked to go to our South East office, I sat down with Brett. He was tired of getting punched in the nose, so I offered another route to success. Instead of moving into Stage 2 of my program, I would bring Brett back in house. He would serve as our producers' marketer. Here he would receive firsthand product knowledge and at the end of one year, he could return to production and begin his sales career.
Brett agreed, and it was probably one of the best business decisions I have ever made.
My partner and I charged Brett not with doing the job, but creating it. We knew the marketing position was not a perfect fit for him, but with Brett's knowledge of the other aspects of our company, he could create a system that would allow the producer who replaced him greater success.
About 6 months into the new position, my partner and I had breakfast with Brett. As we asked about the next 6 months, he mentioned that he was thinking about moving to Columbus, Ohio, where he had family. We agreed to revisit in March and game plan his exit if that was his final decision.
Brett decided to move to Columbus in June and start a career there. We found an experienced marketer to replace him.
As Brett was looking to relocate, he had a unique opportunity. With his extensive skill set, what did he really want to do? I encouraged him to stay in our industry. He was an amazing employee for us, had great communication skills, and if he stuck with our industry, he would have success.
I called my friends in the Columbus area. One old friend had been president of the life insurance division of a property-casualty company we used to represent. Another contact was the second in command at another insurance carrier located in Columbus. I recommended Brett highly to both.
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Both were interested in speaking with Brett, and then other calls began coming in. Although there were a few opportunities, the one that most intrigued Brett was a commercial sales position in a developing area of Columbus. He would be the new commercial producer and be able to use his training to develop a book of business.
I will not guarantee Brett's successes, but I think Brett would. We're working with a couple of agency owners on a fair compensation program weighted toward production of new business and a disappearing salary.
We crunched some numbers using a fair but low base. The agencies Brett is looking to partner with both offer 75 percent new and 25 percent renewal. Although I think these percentages are a little high using our business model, they seem to work for these agencies.
Using a matrix of diminishing salary and increased production and a good renewal retention, our projections show Brett's income will hit six figures in 4 years.
The formula we used started with the amount of money he would need to maintain his current standard of living and then worked back to the number of calls or activity he would have to make daily to hit that goal.
Brett will be using a prospecting system that we use in our company, hitting his daily active counts including email, phone, drop-offs and LinkedIn.
The key to Brett's success during the next 4 years will be his activity and easing into his role as "Brett," not trying to copy or replicate my exact style. I'll continue working with Brett, as he has become a friend. If he needs some advice or assistance, I'll be here. But for now, I'm off to find my next student.
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