Meet your clients

Good week so far, 5 appointments set and I banged out two Blue Cross deals yesterday.

Lots of emails about selling online vs meeting with clients. If you're new my advice is to meet with everyone. If you've been around for a while and phone sales haven't panned out the way you imagined then meet with everyone. If you're successfully selling online then fine, I wouldn't change a thing. If you're not successful online, then read on.

Who wins:

Agent 1: He's not meeting with anyone. That's bull! He can sell from home, save gas and you don't have to meet people to sell health anway. He had 6 phone appointments scheduled least week, only 2 answered the phone, did a presentation for both and sold one.

Agent 2: Scheduled 6 physical appointments, ran 5 and closed 3.

At an $800 average commission agent 1 made $800, agent 2 made $2,400.

Another point I want to make is this: It doesn't matter what someone else is making. It only matters what you're making. I hear a lot of "but I know this agent Bill - he closes 3 deals a day from home!!!" Great - call Bill and ask if he's willing to pay your mortgage next month.

At this point I meet with about 70% of my clients, but I've been at this for 4 years. Had I tried phone selling when I was new I'd likely be out of this field. Would you really be that pissed if you scheduled 8 appointments a week, ran 6, closed 4 and made over $3,000 a week? At this point I have the skill level to never meet with a client, but I didn't get into sales so I could avoid human contact. In fact, it got very depressing for me to just sit in my house all day.

I think there are two main reasons agents don't enjoy running appointments; 1) No-shows. 2) No sale. Both of these can be avoided. My closing percentage when I meet with clients is over 95% - I rarely leave the appointment without an app. Why?

1) I don't set appointments with people who have little to no interest. Say it's Monday, I'm trying to set the appointment and get this: "Well...heck I know this week it out. I'm swamped. Maybe sometime next week around Thursday or so." Forget it - they don't to meet with you.

2) I do an in-depth health qualification. I'm not gonna sit with a client and be blind-sided with a pre-ex condition I didn't know about.

3) I NEVER say I'm coming over just to show them plans, quotes or to simply give them information. I tell them I'm coming over so they can choose a plan. I go over the application and underwriting process so they're well aware that I'm coming out to write an app.

4) I don't schedule appointments just to close deals. What I mean is, I need to greatly better their current situation. I'm not coming out to see a family of 4 paying $480 and the best I can do is $440 with a solid plan.

5) I always call to confirm. If they don't confirm, I don't show. I call the day before to confirm Mapquest directions - which is actually helpful since a lot of times they know a better way. But if I hit voicemail my message states that they need to call me back. No callback = no appointment.