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Medicare agents: You can master the sales process

When I think back to my college days and the success of my friends who graduated with law degrees and MBAs, I feel proud of them and admire the hard work they put in to complete intense curricula. Part of me wishes I completed my degree with them.

I left Georgia Institute of Technology (Go Yellow Jackets!), the MIT of the South, in the middle of my junior year as a dual major in electrical engineering and information and computer sciences. I was and still am a nerd of the highest order, but when I entered sales as a profession shortly after I left college, many of my friends questioned my decision.

“Sales?!” they would always ask in bewilderment. “But Brandon, you had so much promise!” Rather than take offense, I was focused on becoming the most excellent sales professional I could be, regardless of whether I was selling security systems, high end jewelry, car service or insurance.

Image courtesy of Georgia Tech Facebook page

Georgia-Tech-courtesy-of-university-Facebook-page

Want to know what the reward of that hard work was? I was soon earning more money than all my friends — including the lawyer — and still do almost 30 years later.  In most organizations, the top sales professionals can make as much as or even more than company VPs and the CEO.

And yet there are sales professionals who barely make a living.

While there are many factors that influence whether sales professional earn 6 figures or struggle to get by, the fundamental difference between these two extremes is mastery of the sales process.

There are only a few university programs that teach students to think of sales as a process they can master. You’re lucky if the organization you work for provides actual sales training. The insurance industry expends most of its time and energy on licensing, continuing education and carrier product training for agents, but offering training on the actual sales process is hard to get from Broker Support. As a result, many agents are Ready To Sell, but not knowledgeable on how to sell.

I want to introduce you to the sales process with this post. You may have heard of a similar sales process from a different trainer because there are multiple versions of it. Here is my outline of the process that can make you a successful insurance professional:

This process likely covers what you’ve been doing instinctively, but refining how you do it will make better use of your time and make you more effective at finding and closing more prospects. That increase in effectiveness will increase your income and allow you to grow your business to 6-figure earnings and beyond.

Stay tuned next week for more on the sales process and RB Insurance’s special offer for FREE access to my 6 Hours to 6 Figures training program.

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Referrals maximize your Medicare book of business

Probably the most effective way to find your next client is by looking to the clients you already have.

Referrals are the Holy Grail of building your Medicare book of business. The credibility and trust you have built with one client automatically transfers to your new one, so you start from a hero status, not at ground zero, if your first client is a raving fan. Closing rates on referrals have always been high, too, which means referrals maximize your investment of time and energy into your business. And yet most agents still don’t ask their clients for referrals!

When I inquire as to why, many feel they haven’t earned or warranted them.  They think they haven’t built the connection that establishes the right to ask for and expect referrals. However, communication is the key to building any relationship, and oftentimes it’s the well timed, small outreaches that make us more memorable than any over the top gestures. When you communicate to create raving fans, get repeat business and generate referrals, you are simply making sure you are on the top of their minds when a friend, coworker or relative mentions a problem you can help solve.

Getting referrals is not nearly as hard as some sales people try to make it, but you do have to have a strategy. Here are my top 10 ways to stay in touch with clients:

 1. Organize your clients. Where is your list of clients right now?  If you’re like the average senior insurance agent, they’re on the floor of your back seat, stuffed in your leather portfolio, packed in your trunk or stashed in folders.  A lot of good they are going to do you in there. Get organized — at the very least, get your clients in an Excel spreadsheet. Trust me, you will be glad you did!

2. Use a Client Relationship Manager (CRM). Once you have your clients organized and electronically archived, take the next step and upload them into a CRM. This will allow you to conduct specific outreach campaigns, set up reminders and do a host of other structured, “high touch” activities. Free CRM obviously has no cost, but the most robust and agent-focused CRM I’ve seen is the Medicare Sales Engine.

3. Send a Thank You. This is the icebreaker for all your future communications. It sets the stage for elevating your clients to raving fans status.  Write them by hand (No rubber stamps!) and include a personal note to make it memorable.

4. Call them after 30, 60 and 90 days. The best time to solidify the sale and the relationship is during the reinforcement phase after the sale. Set yourself up to respond to service issues and product problems when you call and put yourself in the position to get repeat business and referrals. Show your client you care by asking how their family is doing and remember any health issues they may have gone through and needed your assistance with.

5. Remember them on special occasions. Your CRM is fantastic for reminding you about client birthdays, product anniversaries, annual reviews and more. These contacts have to be personal in nature to set them apart from what others are doing.

As you build your year-long strategy, the key is not to saturate your client with frivolous outreach or give them a sales pitch each time. You want to make sure they know you will stay in touch! I’ll share the remaining top 10 items next week.

Multiply your revenue just by organizing your Medicare book of business

Last week I encouraged you to build and organize your Medicare book of business. This week I want to show you how a well-organized book of business is the best way to maximize your return on that investment of time and energy.

Let’s be honest — gathering up all of your clients’ information and entering it into an Excel spreadsheet or CRM is tedious and time consuming.  For the DIY crowd, I suggest breaking your Medicare book of business down into small pieces by entering 10 clients a day until you’ve included everyone. For agents with an expansive clientele, think about paying a college student or your industrious child a fair hourly rate to do the data entry.

No matter how you do it, your Medicare book of business needs to be organized in order to have the most value to your senior insurance business. The investment of of time, energy and even money you make to get it that way will be returned many times over.

Let me prove it to you:

Did you know that Medicare Advantage carriers can pay you up to a $100 referral fee if you allow them to market to your clients? You don’t have to certify or actually sell the product — just compliantly give them access to your Medicare book of business, and they will do the rest. If you have 300 clients and they sell 100, that’s $10,000 for you.  Not bad for no more than a day’s worth of work, right?

What if you leveraged your own Medicare book of business and your “Existing Business Relationship” — defined as such by CMS because you have sold them a legitimate product like final expense or life insurance?  If you did compliant outreach to these clients and sold the same 100, your first-year commission could be $30,000 (a combination of initial payments and like-plan changes).  That’s three times what you would get for the referral fee!

Want to make it even better?  Those 100 people would now be worth about $20,000 a year via annual servicing renewals.  Most carriers now pay lifetime renewals, but over the first six-year cycle, your clients would now be worth an additional $120,000 for a total of $150,000 in seven years!

Yes, you still have to complete AHIP (RB Insurance is offering an incredible discount program) if you decide to add Medicare Advantage to your portfolio of products. And yes, you have to complete carrier certifications and learn which products best fit your clients’ needs. That’s all part of running a successful business. It takes time and energy, but you already have the most important element: Clients!

Leverage the hard work you’ve put into securing your clients.  Organize your book of business and look for ways to maximize your revenue.

Call RB Insurance at (800) 997 3107 to learn more about quick contracting opportunities for Medicare Advantage, Medicare Supplements, Hospital Indemnity and Final Expense. For a limited time, agents can receive 100 percent reimbursement on their 2016 AHIP certification when they make five sales with any Medicare Advantage product this AEP. Learn more here.