This is a marketing, not a sales job

Unless you have some massive book of business where you're getting 3 to 5 referrals a week this is a marketing job. It's 80/20 - 80% marketing - 20% selling.

How long does it take to close the average deal (presentation + app) - no longer than an hour. The math is simple - even 5 deals a week is only 5 hours of selling out of 40.

If you're meeting with clients, even doorstep to doorstep is 2 hours per day and only 10 hours out of 40. And if you're qualifying correctly you're not doing a bunch of presentations that don't end in sales.

And now we get back to that over 80% of your week is marketing. That's 6 hours a day that needs to be spent either generating leads or calling leads back.

The reason for the high failure rate isn't because agents can't close deals. It's because they spend so little time marketing they never reach interested and qualified prospects.

If you think this is a sales job then:

• Try to sell someone a plan who has little to no interest. Sales books will teach you how to turn disinterested people into sales - give it a shot

• Try to get someone to commit before they're ready to do that app. Sales books will teach you how to close people quickly. Be my guest.
  

None of it works....but it's fun to read. What sales book do teach is basic sales skills that are indeed necessary for this job - but by no means will turn "I'm too busy, call me next week" people into clients.

You can try to fish with a spear if you want. You'd better be patient and damned good. I'm neither. I'd rather cast a net over the side of the boat, scoop up a ton of fish and throw the ones I don't want back.

At the end of the day I have fish in the fridge - the guy with the spear is still staring at the water.

You need A LOT of prospects - even if your goal is 2 or 3 apps per week. Not many agents are closing better than 1 out of 20 regardless of the lead source. You want three apps? You won't pull it off with less then 60 leads a week.

If you're manually dialing and getting 4 lead an hour that's 15 hours a week on the phone for 3 deals. Here's the problem - when I can you'll get 3 deals out of 20 leads that doesn't mean immediately. 1 may close in a day or two - another might close in a week and the last might close in 3 weeks.

Because of that it gives the new agent the illusion that "this isn't working" and the throw in the towel quickly. Maybe 2...3...possibly 4 days of telemarketing they say "hmmmm, 4 days of this and only 1 deal - it doesn't work."

You need the pipeline - and I can't state with enough aver (hey, that makes me look intelligent!) that you NEED a pipeline of leads before you start putting in consistent deals.

How much in the pipeline? 100. You need to amass 100+ leads before anything will start happening consistently. Most agents pack it up way before 100 leads are generated.