Selling Insurance – Impulse Item V/S Defensive Strategy: Article 15 in Randy’s Closing Insurance Deals series.
Hi everybody.
For those of you I have not met,
My name is Randy Mc Arthur.
Why oh why is health insurance an impulse buy – when its essential to protect everything you love and do – have an accident, have an illness, have a really sick kid – or just come down with the flu.
It’s not really the nature of insurance, you see – that makes people wait to the very last minute – it’s a dangerous bad thing called procrastination you see – and most everybody’s caught up in it.
As insurance agents – we must do everything we can – to demonstrate the unknown potential cost – we can help people; strangers, family and friends before their security is lost.
So, how do we help people resist the overwhelming urge to procrastinate? It’s tough because procrastination is totally; subjective, emotionally motivated and people know better but do it anyway.
By its definition, procrastination is not part of the objective decision making process. Take a moment right now to reflect upon the last time you put something off.
Be honest with yourself or this exercise is a waste of time. Remember, in this life, on this planet, the question is “why Now?” not why. Grab a pen and pad and answer the following questions:
1. When was the last time you put something off (what was the decision you did not make?)
2. On a scale of 1 to 10 how important (not was) but could the decision have been? Contemplate all probable outcomes and the probability of each outcome being affected by not acting for an undetermined amount of time. I want to point out that the amount of time is undetermined and indefinite because, well you meant to do it today and you didn’t. It might not ever cross your mind tomorrow or again for that matter UNTIL it bites you in the you know what and you are stuck with a huge regret that you did not have to have. (What could you have lost? What could you have gained?) Write a short concise synopsis detailing this occurrence of procrastination for your own analysis using only ultimate terms.
Ultimate Terms are terms that can not be defined any further without changing the desired meaning of the word within a very specific context. For example: The word knew v/s felt. The word knew describes an objective process of recognition by which you analyzed external data (usually empirical) and gave yourself an acceptable explanation of a past event. The word knew is an objective term with no emotional significance.
The word felt is the polar opposite to the word knew in this context. The word felt describes an emotional reaction to a stimulus. The word felt is a subjective word that has emotional significance that provides you with a justification of your explanation of a past event.
For further example: I knew he could fly v/s I felt he could fly. Your proof that you knew he could fly could be a photograph or a physics equation demonstrating his ability to fly. Your justification that you felt he could fly could be you have a very high opinion of him and have never seen him fail at anything he tried, therefore you feel like he could fly if he wanted to.
3. How many subjective words did you use in your analysis? (list them)
4. How many objective words did you use in your analysis? (list them)
5. Did you make a; necessary, well thought through, beneficial, conscious, even, decision to suspend action until you were better prepared to act? Or, did you put off acting because you did not feel like acting?
Stop reading and do this exercise now. Continue reading when you have satisfied yourself that you have completed the exercise.
We are all human beings, unique but very similar. I’ll bet good money that the number one stall that each and every one of you hears on a daily basis is “I need to think about it” “I don’t make decisions that way” “I need to talk it over with my spouse” “I need to pray about it” “This is not a good time, can you call me Tuesday after next at 3:34.02am?”
As you have proven to yourself, none of these responses are objections (what did they object to?) They are examples of procrastination and in fact, Mr. Customer, yes you do make decisions “that way” because as human beings left to our own devices we are prone to taking the path of least resistance. It is a dangerous part of our nature.
Now, how do we help them resist the overwhelming urge to procrastinate? You do not do it by telling the customer anything. You will more than likely start an argument if you start TELLING people that they are, basically, to irresponsible to take an hour or so and make a decision. You do it by ASKING questions about physical events that actually happen to people on a daily basis (6:00 news stuff) that can and do evoke strong personal emotions: (I call it a tiedown – “wow, that could happen to me” kind of stuff.)
I can provide you with more example questions than you need to start developing this method of persuasion, but that is for a later date.
For most people, health insurance is an impulse buy, though it shouldn’t be. It is part of our human nature to wait until the last minute, and you aren’t going to change it. So you might as well make the best of it. Embrace the concept of “Why now”, instead of just “why?” help everyone you can.
Go out and do what you love and the money will come.
In most cases I’m probably just preaching to the choir but I would like to point out something about me:
You really don’t have to accept me as an authority based on the content of my message alone, if you have a triple digit I.Q. and live in this country. You can just look at everything around you.
For example; how many people do you know that are happy with the amount of revolving debt (credit card) they will wake up to tomorrow morning? Just something to think about. …
My personal mission is to; first, only and always do the right thing to help people insure that, through their own choices, they are making the best decisions they can make to guarantee their success in everything they do.
If I can help you in any way just give me a call at (919)781-2018 or email me at randymcarthur@ymail.com . I look forward to hearing from you. Good luck in your endeavors and God bless you.
Thanks
Randy Mc Arthur
Thanks for stopping by my insurance leads blog.
Cheers,
Mac