It can be difficult to sell insurance especially when you're taught to sell the wrong thing at the wrong time. That's exactly what your company insurance sales training sets you up to do, consistently selling the wrong thing at the wrong time. It rarely works to approach any process in the wrong order, and it's especially problematic in this situation.



The simple truth is a buyer will not buy nor will they allow you to hold a real sales conversation until or unless they first believe they have a problem or challenge. They must not only believe they have a problem or challenge, but they must also want to solve that problem or challenge to produce a specific outcome or result. Without an admitted problem, and a desire to overcome it you can't hold a legitimate sales conversation.

You're trained to call a total stranger on the phone and sell them on the idea of holding a sales conversation with you. It sounds like it would be a good idea because you need appointments or you can't sell, but it only sounds like a good idea to you. It sounds like a terrible idea to the people you're calling.

In that conversation you're selling the wrong thing at the wrong time. It's a conversation that shouldn't be happening in the first place because there isn't any value from the buyer's perspective. And the buyer's perspective is the only perspective that matters.

Yes, you want to help a complete stranger become a new client but you have to do it in the right order to make it consistently happen successfully. So when you're reaching out to a complete stranger no matter the medium or venue your first objective is to get their attention and interest. If you can't grab their attention and interest it doesn't matter what you do or say because it's lost on the stranger.

When you get their attention and interest you now have an opportunity to sell them, but not on what you think. They don't know you, like you, or trust you; and they don't have any reason to at this point. Their focus in on themselves and what they want, keep it there.

Sell them on getting more information about the problem based outcome they're looking for. That means you have to be focused on your niche, the way you work with specific people producing specific outcomes. When they give you permission to show them or tell them or share with them they're giving you permission to hold their attention a little longer. And that's exactly what you want and need.

Next you deliver this information, and it must be valuable information not a pitch selling you and some insurance product. This stranger must get the information they need and want. In the process they learn a little about you and begin to think well of you. Use this information to sell them on the idea of having an experience with you.

Don't confuse the experience you're offering with a sales conversation because this person, who has moved from being a total stranger to knowing a little about your solutions, isn't ready to give you permission to hold a sales conversation yet. And when or if you try to push this relationship you run the very real risk of getting ousted out of their life forever. Sometimes they will ask for this conversation, and when they do by all means go ahead with it because they're telling you they're ready and giving you permission.

Whatever form you choose for the experience you offer make sure this experience is building and nurturing a relationship with them. This experience may be spaced out over time, or it could be a face-to-face group experience lasting anywhere from an hour to an entire day. Whatever you choose the objective of the experience is to nurture the relationship and sell them on the idea of a sales conversation with you.

The experience should stimulate the potential client to ask, ?How can you help someone like me?? At this point you're finally ready to sell the right thing at the right time, a sales conversation. You both understand and agree there is a problem or challenge important enough for the potential client that they at least want to have a conversation to discover how it could be dealt with in a way that produces a desired outcome.

The objective of this conversation is to understand your new potential client's current situation and desired future. Ultimately you're selling the outcome and results this desired future produces not an insurance product. It's amazingly easy to increase sales when you're concentrating on selling the right things at the right time.

In the process you're attracting ready buyers to you rather than chasing down people who don't want to talk to you. You're building relationships with both the ready buyers and people who will become your ready buyers in the near future. Best of all you never have to use uncomfortable or manipulative sales tactics that destroy any chance for a lasting relationship.