How I Wrote $937,500 in New Business in 18 Months - Part II

In Part I of this series, I shared the first five actions I felt are most critical to generating exponential new business results as a producer. To recap them they were:

1. Change your mindset.
2. Create a formal prospecting strategy (get one here).
3. Build a niche(s) of expertise.
4. Get really good at running first meetings.
5. Conquer fear by facing it.

In this post, I'll share the second five. As I mentioned before, this is not all I did, but ten of the most impactful actions that lead writing $937,500 in just 18 months.

6. Got in front of key decision makers. 

This is not new information. Every producer I've ever met knows they need to get in front of the key decision makers if they want to close the deal. However, experience has taught me that elite producers actually do it, and average producers settle.

Practically speaking, I quit reaching out to levels below the C-Suite. As you swim upstream and write larger deals, very few changes are made without the involvement or sign off of someone in the C-Suite. So I made this my initial level of outreach. 

But to engage with individuals at this level, requires a much higher degree of professionalism in your approach. It's a more challenging level to engage with. Many are guarded by assistants and strictly opposed to cold calls. I once had the CFO of a large prospect tell me the only way he'd take a meeting with me is if someone in his network, whom he respects, refers me to him. This is not uncommon. (BTW they later became a client as I learned to play by his rules.)

As one elite producer who manages a $12.5M book of business once explained it to me:

"You have to be able to communicate at the level of the people you're talking with. So if you're talking to a CEO or a CFO, you need the ability to talk about the financial markets or the news of the day and how that might relate to their business.

I'm a big believer in the theory that people are going to make a very quick evaluation on whether they like you, think you're credible, and want to continue the discussion after you walk into a sales call and you begin a conversation for the first time. So your ability to form that preliminary relationship is hugely important."

As I discuss in our An Insurance Producer's Guide To Creating Ridiculous Opportunity E-Book, I'm a firm believer that cold calling is dead. Elite producers are engaging prospects with value on a continual basis. I call this social selling. It boils down to approaching prospective customers with a value proposition.

"Elite producers don't communicate in words, they  communicate in ideas and thoughts."

7. Focused on winning the person.

What gets lost in the sales process a lot of times, particularly by producers who have a high degree of technical knowledge, is the human side of selling.

While companies get results, people get personal wins. There are human emotions and feelings that play a role in the unseen levels of the sale. The human factor has the power to increase your chance at closing the sale or completely derail it altogether. 

Change anxiety is a very real thing. And it increases in the prospect's mind the closer you get to the decision point. In order to hire you, they have to fire their existing broker(s). Elite producers are able to reduce this anxiety in these critical moments. 

I always talk about the four "P's" in winning the sales process: the Person, the Prequalification, the Program and the Price. To get a client to switch, you have to at least win three of the four. However, the most important one is winning the person. Whoever the individual making the decision wants to win, will win 100% of the time. 

Elite producers take relationship building with prospects to an entirely new level. In fact, in many cases it grows into friendships. Ultimately when the time to change comes, you want there to be more anxiety in not going with you, than there is in making the change. 

8. Brought in superior technical solutions.

Because I had spent a lot of time building deep relationships and asking very poignant, effective questions, I was unable to uncover a lot of deeper level issues not only about the business, but about the individuals who the run the business as well. 

This created a significant competitive advantage when it came to closing the sale. We were able to align our solutions with the prospect's goals, objectives and pain points, delivering them to the prospect in their own words. "You told us that XYZ was important to you because...So here a solution to XYZ that isn't currently being addressed."

In the end, we were giving them exactly what they had communicated to us they wanted. We were helping them reach their own goals.

Elite producers present superior solutions and align them to the prospects goals and objectives, using the clients own words. 

If you want to be elite, in this business it's not enough to just be a great salesperson, you have to become the preeminent technical solution for your clients as well. This is why we created Elite Tactics. Get the syllabus here.

9. Took a team-based approach.

One of the biggest mistakes I made early on in my career, and I see a lot of producers make is the hero-centric approach. Where you position yourself as the expert on everything, making yourself the "hero" there to solve their problem.

Particularly with larger accounts, I noticed a lot more success when I started bringing in teams of experts to serve the client. Instead of "hero", I became "coach." My role changed from needing to have every answer and do all the work, to the role of ultimate accountability factor. 

No one can be an expert on everything. Find the people who are experts in their subject matter and learn how to engage with them. 

10. Became uncommonly persistent and focused.

I believe minimalism breeds abundance. I write it about it in the E-Book. There is something to be said about relentlessly pursuing your dreams. But all too often we mistakenly overlook the true barriers holding us back from what we really want.

Most of the time, it's not the "bad things" that keep us from abundance, but the accumulation of all the seemingly insignificant "good things."  

As a producer, I realized I had one job - to get and keep clients. So this was the area I decided to be the best at. To do that would require a dogged, disciplined pursuit of less. Anything that didn't help create new opportunities or keep existing clients, was either purposefully discontinued or strategically delegated.

This was tough because it included a lot of good things. Things like volunteering, sitting on boards, having client meetings, and a lot of internal office activities. 

But I wanted the best. In chasing after the best, I found that minimalism breeds abundance.

Bonus #11 - Gave myself permission to take time for personal restoration.

I know I said there were ten, but this one was just as important, perhaps more important that all the others.

Counterintuitively, elite producers spend for more time outside their business then average producers. Personal restoration is critical to exponential success.

I will write about this more later, but think about the times you've worked on inspiration and motivation. You've been 100X more productive. 

Elite producers not only take time to get away and restore, but often use that time of restoration to work on their business. 

The Top Ten-ish

So there you have it. The ten most important actions you need to take if you want to have the best new business year of your career and generate exponential results.

1. Change your mindset.

2. Create a formal prospecting strategy.

3. Build a niche(s) of expertise.

4. Get really good at running first meetings.

5. Conquer your fears by facing them.

6. Learn how to get in front of the key decision makers.

7. Focus on winning the "person."

8. Bring in superior technical solutions.

9. Take a team-based approach to selling.

10. Develop an uncommon focus and persistence.

11. Get away to recharge!