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... take an inexperienced producer or CSR and turn him or her into a capable Life department staff member. It is very important that you have every newly hired Life employee read this section, no matter what his or her experience level. This section gives the new employee a good overview of what is expected of the position. THE SEVEN ACTION STEPS TO THE SALE We have developed a sales procedure for you to use that comprises the entire Sales and Marketing' section of this Guide. This process is used to turn a prospect into a satisfied client and requires seven totally independent action steps, performed step by step. Both producers and CSRs will need to know what these steps are and how to perform those expected of them. The seven action steps are: Action Step 1: Prospecting building a reservoir of prospects Action Step 2: Pre-Approach sending letters to prospects to prepare them for appointment setting Action Step 3: Setting the Appointment making contact to sell the agency's concept and set the time and date of the initial appointment Action Step 4: Qualifying Interview face-to-face meeting where you probe to find out needs, desires, and buying motives, and where you conduct an extensive fact-find to gather necessary information Action Step 5: Presentation/Close the buying interview during which you present your insurance proposal and sell the prospect on the program Action Step 6: Policy Delivery/Client Building the process of turning the new customer into a loyal and long-time client, beginning with a personal delivery of the policy Action Step 7: Obtaining Referred Leads getting qualified leads from clients that you can feed back into your prospect ...

... obvious what should be sold. That's why we've included information in this Sales and Marketing' section on the dominant-needs sale, when it's appropriate, and how to go about making it. But until a trust relationship has been established between your Life and P/C departments, and until you, the P/C agent, feel comfortable with the Life insurance sales process, we encourage use of the two-sale concept. The seven Action Steps can be used and adopted for all types of Life insurance sales, from the simplest Term sale to the most complicated total financial planning sale. In the Sales Campaigns' section, you'll find more detailed information and marketing ideas for specific types of Life insurance. ACTION STEPS ACTION TRACK Seven Action Steps EXPLANATION OF THE PROCESS Action Step 1: Prospecting building a reservoir of prospects Action Step 2: Pre-Approach sending letters to prospects to prepare them for appointment setting Action Step 3: Setting the making contact to sell the agency's concept and set Appointment the time and date of the initial appointment Action Step 4: Qualifying face-to-face meeting where you probe to find out Interview needs, desires, and buying motives, and where you conduct an extensive fact-find to gather necessary information Action Step 5: Presentation/ the buying interview during which you present your Close insurance proposal and sell the prospect on the program Action Step 6: Policy Delivery/ the process of turning the new customer into a Client. Building loyal and long-time client, beginning with a personal delivery of the policy Action Step 7: Obtaining, getting qualified leads from clients that you can. Referred Leads feed back ...

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... start asking some questions. They quickly discovered that they spend twice as much on insurance and investment products each year as they do for their mortgage. They also realized that they probably shouldn't have their insurance spread among so many brokers. They aren't receiving all the discounts that are available to them, have some potential gaps in their coverage, and don't have a single professional who can advise them on the big picture. What's more, neither could remember when any of their four brokers had actually spoken to them. Judy and Mark are in the process of moving all their business from the four brokers and consolidating it with New Strategy Brokerage that was referred to them. Judy and Mark: Bad service coupled with large rate increases sensitizes us to view everything that comes from the insurance companies negatively. A reservoir of bad will has developed that will take a long time to change. SCENARIO C: HEATHER After Heather's divorce, she decided to move all of her insurance — and potentially her investments — to another brokerage. A VP with a leading manufacturing firm, she plans to retire in 10 years. She owns a late model SUV, a condo in downtown Toronto that's mortgage free, and $250,000 in Life insurance, plus $125,000 in RRSPs and $10,000 worth of GICs with her bank. When Heather called a brokerage near her office, the broker recommended a new company that was offering very competitive rates. She agreed and placed her Auto insurance with Best Rates Insurance Co. on a monthly pay plan. Six months later, she purchased a Condo package ...

... marketing-driven strategy vs. one that's sales driven. In spite of those who claim that "marketing costs too much," here are four major reasons why just the opposite holds true: 1. Marketing bulletproofs your business against competitive attack. Most companies don't give marketing serious attention until something goes wrong. It might be the activity of an aggressive competitor, falling sales, or some internal crisis. Then everyone expects marketing to kick in instantly and solve the problem. Companies all companies are vulnerable to competitive attack when they fail to create a legacy of marketplace credibility. This means projecting and protecting the company image and constantly caring for the way the brand is perceived and appreciated. This takes time, effort, and money. But when a problem arises (and it always does) there's a reservoir of goodwill, knowledge, and value that offers protection against the attack. The hundreds of millions of dollars that tobacco companies are committing to smoking education aren't at cross-purposes with selling cigarettes. Those sales are far less important than having the public view these corporations as responsive and responsible, thus helping mitigate possible legal, legislative, and regulatory action. 2. Marketing creates your company's future. When someone calls and says, "I've known about you for years," you know that marketing has been at work doing its most important job. Here's what effective marketing contributes to a company's success: Before customers make the decision to buy, they must make the decision to go to you. The objective of marketing is to help customers form a picture in their minds that you're the right company ...

... within the protected area. Such plans are to be part of the overall evacuation plan for the workplace facility. FIRE PREVENTION AND PROTECTION There are five steps in fire prevention and protection: engineering, planning, training, inspection, and follow-up. Engineering The first step in fire prevention is to engineer the site for fire prevention and protection. This requires attention to layout, design, construction, and materials. Automatic and manually operated, fixed sprinkler or extinguisher systems may be installed. Process and work flow should be analyzed for contribution to fire hazard or impeding effective response. Planning The second step is development, documentation, and communication of emergency response plans. Plans should include: Responsibilities of managers, supervisors, employees, the public Response resources including sprinklers and extinguishers, bypass, shutdown, and reservoir systems Response personnel duties, training, and tools Coordination with public resources, such as fire departments, and their equipment and facilities, such as hydrants Means of sounding alarm and communication with affected persons Isolation and containment planning Planning and resources for disabled and others Evacuation-locally, horizontally (nearby areas), and globally Shutdown procedures and back-up Emergency communication First aid provisions and training Provision as needed of water, food, clothing, and shelter Training The third step is employee and public training: Are postings appropriate, understandable, and adequate? Are employees trained to identify and respond to emergency situations? Are designated employees trained to respond to fire emergencies? Are reviews and drills conducted as appropriate? Inspection The fourth step is regular inspection to: Ensure compliance with plans Test systems and extinguishers Verify adequacy of ...

... Chemical reactions Fire requires three things: fuel, heat, and oxygen. Removal of any of these will prevent or stop a fire. There are five steps in fire prevention and protection: engineering; planning; training; inspection; and follow-up. ENGINEERING The first step in fire prevention is to engineer the site for fire prevention and protection. This includes attention to layout, design, construction, and materials. Automatic and manually operated fixed-sprinkler or extinguisher systems may be installed. Process and work flow should be analyzed for contribution to fire hazard or inhibition of effective response. PLANNING The second step is development, documentation, and communication of emergency response plans. Plans should include: Responsibilities of management, supervisors, employees, public Response resources, including sprinklers and extinguishers, by-pass, shutdown, and reservoir systems Response personnel duties, training, and tools Coordination with public resources such as fire departments and their equipment and facilities such as fire hydrants Means of sounding alarm and communication with affected persons Isolation and containment planning Planning and resources for disabled and others Evacuation-locally, horizontally (nearby areas), and globally Shut-down procedures and back-up systems Emergency communication systems First aid provisions and training Provision of water, food, clothing, and shelter as needed TRAINING The third step is employee and public training: Are postings appropriate, understandable, and adequate? Are employees trained to identify and respond to emergency situations? Are designated employees trained to participate in response to fire emergencies? Are reviews and drills conducted as appropriate? INSPECTION The fourth step is regular inspection to: Ensure compliance with plans Test systems and extinguishers Verify ...

... a successful recruiting program will require a significant amount of your time. We recommend that agency principals devote at least 5% of their time on a continuing basis to building a stable' or backlog of qualified potential producers. These are men and women who are satisfied with their present jobs, but may be enticed to join your operation when a vacancy occurs. To keep these candidates interested in your agency, you need to keep in touch with them at regular intervals. One approach that has been used successfully is to send each potential recruit a personal letter every month and invite recruits to lunch every six months. Creating a stable of candidates can protect you against the dangers of crisis recruiting. Trying to come up with a qualified producer on short notice and under pressure is extremely difficult. Without a reservoir of recruits you may be forced to hire someone immediately and in haste, which is likely to result in a poor land expensive) choice. A continuous, systematic recruiting program avoids the problems of crisis recruiting and helps put you in charge of your bottom line. Sources for Potential Producers Recruiting salespeople is a matter of prospecting, no different in principle from your effort to maintain and extend your base of potential customers . These guidelines  will show you how and where to seek out future salespeople. Your agency support staff (underwriters, CSRs, and so on) can provide a fertile source of producer recruits. These people start out with an advantage, since they already have technical insurance skills and know your agency operations. They may be hungry for the financial rewards they see ...

... is the way it has been in the past, particularly in Personal Lines, and surely that is the way it is going to be in the future. Many direct writers have learned that calling prospects at their most vulnerable time-i.e. renewal-gives agents a leg up on the competition: the prospect's present agent, broker, or insurer. Of all the Personal Lines sales programs IMMS has seen throughout the years, the most successful have been based on an active x-date solicitation program. State Farm's basic training program evolves around x-dating. Some State Farm trainers won't put prospective agents on the payroll until they have developed their own lists of x-dates. One former Allstate agent, now an independent agent, said this about company programs: "As an agency, we decided that we wanted producers selling from a reservoir of pre-established x-dates, not spending a great deal of time playing the numbers game on the telephone generating the x-date. We used our office personnel on a rotating basis, 15 to 20 hours a week, calling for the x-date." Whether it is done by office personnel or producers in the normal course of work (i.e. a process, not a project), x-dating Personal Lines seems to be the most viable, positive, pro-active way to set up a successful, ongoing sales program. COMMERCIAL LINES When sales centers or telemarketing centers were new, prospecting for x-dates of Commercial Lines proved a bonanza. The system was very simple . . . and it hasn't gotten more complex since then. One agent talks about his procedure: "The telephone dialogue is candid and straightforward by ...

... removes the knothole, but also the wall around it, and consequently we find a fuller and clearer picture of what it means to have a viable prospects that have provided us with the date of our next closed sale. Our agency primarily solicits commercial insurance and has utilized an on-going X-dating program for the past four years with a great deal of success. We entered the independent agency system five years ago from the direct agency system of Allstate Insurance Company. It took about a year to realize that for our agency to grow and succeed, we must actively solicit commercial business. Our previous experience as direct writers taught us a valuable lesson about writing insurance, and that simply is this: Very little happens without an X-date. As an agency, we decided we wanted our producers selling from a reservoir of preestablished X-dates, not spending a great deal of time playing the numbers game on the telephone generating the X-date. So we use our office personnel on a rotating basis 15-20 hours per week calling for the X-date. For the Dallas market, we investigated several sources that offered a comprehensive listing of businesses to solicit expiration dates. We wanted a source book that would provide several essentials that would profile our future client, such as industry, business name, owner's name, address, telephone number and size of firm via number of employees. With this information, we are able to target prospects by industry, size and city location. After determining the profile of those prospects that best fit our objective, we begin the numbers game of calling. Our staff is instructed to ask for the ...