A sales career is a great decision. With it we can reach out to the masses and offer products that not only can change someone’s financial future but prepare them to deal with the accidents that happen to us all in life.
My challenge to you today is to decide; decide on what kind of career you will have in Insurance sales.
You can become an agent that is focused on making money. Your commission could be the overriding factor in all of your customer dealings. Yes you have a family, bills and obligations. You have a lifestyle you want to continue and goals to achieve.
As a result of this kind of focus people get sold products they don’t need. They get policies they can’t afford to keep. All because this “UL” policy pays a higher commission than this “term” policy. Who cares what is best for the customer, right? It’s the salesperson we must be more concerned about.
No! A thousand times no!
When a sales career moves strictly into the money potential found in a sale, salespeople can lose the reason why they got into the career in the first place. That is one of the reasons I believe it’s not always in an agents best interest to start him off selling his family and friends. Many new agents use the relationships they have established in the past to further their endeavors in insurance. They set appointments and sell people they have a prior relationship with.
There is nothing wrong with selling family and friends who have a need for your product (don’t believe that everyone needs what you sell; I don’t need maternity insurance at this time). There is something wrong when the only reason a new agent sells his family and friends is to generate commissions for himself. If an agent comes into this business looking to use his family and friends for his own personal benefit, what hope is there for the new prospects he will meet?
Decide to make a difference in sales. Instead of selling people products based on your potential commission, sell them what they need and want. Show them how the plans you propose can meet those needs and wants. Then when you close the sale and collect a check you can be assured that you have not only given them what they need but what is best for them. These policies are hard for another agent to come in and replace.
Sad to say, there are agents who are so concerned about getting paid that they go in and replace good policies a client already has. If your client took out a cash value policy 10 years ago and now their health is bad but you want to sell them a new fully underwritten policy because you believe the cash value in their present policy will pay for the new one, ask yourself this question; is it truly best for this client, under these conditions? If the answer is no, then please reconsider your actions.
Decide to be a professional in this business; decide to do what’s best for your client first. Money always follows when we do the right things.