Prospecting: Critical to Success

by Craig Templeton
Sales Training Techniques Inc.
Napa, California

For too many years our home office people and field managers have unfortunately with the paradigm* that agent retention has and will continue to be about 20 percent after four – five years.  Recruit 100 agents – keep 20; that’s about as good as we can do because that is what has taken place in the past.

Dave Hilton, past president of the Million Dollar Round Table, recently said (while reviewing the top four home office priorities expressed by CEOs), “If we concentrate on their fourth priority, production, their top three priorities will take care of themselves!”  The top three priorities were profits, unit cost and overhead. 

Taking off on Dave’s conclusion, you might ask, “What does that have to do with prospecting?” Well, every manager that I have ever talked to has said, “My agents leave the business most often because they didn’t get enough appointments!”  Isn’t it true that prospecting leads to appointments, appointments lead to sales, and sales lead to agent success and retention?  How often has an agent gone out of the business doing 100 cases per year?  In other words, if the focus is on the prospecting for adequate appointments, higher numbers of sales will follow, and this will result in higher agent retention rates.

 A New Paradigm

Thank goodness there are some sales managers who are creating a new paradigm!  Their agent case rate is 90-100 per year on average and agent retention is 65 percent after five years.  In addition, Sales Manager A is a teacher and mentor for Sales Manager B, who is producing the same case rate and high retention.  The message is clear – with proper agent control, discipline, coaching and focus, the prospecting results are staggeringly exciting!

What makes the difference between the Old Paradigm and the New Paradigm?  The answers are simple but elusive.  I can only give you the tools that I have learned and used as an agent, as well the tools that Sales Manager A and Sales Manager B are utilizing. 

I have had a rewarding three years on the “Seminar Circuit.”  Personally, some of the most exciting things are what I have learned, not about successful agents, but those who fail – the “80 percent group” who come into the business to be successful and just don’t last.  If our industry wants to continue the old paradigm – hire 100 agents to get 20 (find the needle in the haystack), then profitability and unit cost will be the benchmarks.  If we can take on new management styles and agent accountability, a new paradigm will surface with productivity and agent retention solving the home office blues.  It is being done today!  Isn’t it $worth$ the effort to set new standards that increase retention by three times and the case rate by two and one-half times?

Agent Profile

Before this can be done, we must recognize the psychological traits that the “80 percent group” seems to possess that stall achievement.  Consider the following Agent Profile:

1. A low level of self-discipline;
2. A lack of ability to focus;
3. A strong need to feel worthy on a minute-to-minute basis; coupled with,
4. Too many options to keep busy and feel worth; and,
5. A strong dislike of prospecting appointments.

I have talked with agents in over 2300 seminars in the last three years.  Hearing their problems, and asking for their solutions to the prospecting problem, I am absolutely convinced that my agent profile is correct!

Agents openly admit that they see themselves in the “Agent Profile.”  They tell me that they are willing to de disciplined to success; that they did not come into the business to be their own boss and self-employed: that they truly didn’t come into the business for its freedom and flexibility.  These are things one gets out of the business only after they master the work of our business – prospecting for appointments.

Keeping in mind the agent profile, is it any wonder that 80 percent fail?  If Sales Manager A and Sales Manager B have increased to 65 percent by getting the agent case rate hovering 100 per year, why don’t the home office executives and sales managers learn their techniques for success?  Agent retention and case rate go hand in hand, but you cannot have high retention rate without a higher case rate.  Case rate comes first, and this comes by having and maintaining appointments.

 Prospecting discipline is the answer

The answer then is high discipline placed on the agent to prospect routinely! The discipline is supplied by the management.  The prospecting process is similar to a basketball coach and his team.  The time, place, duration and daily practice routines are clearly controlled by the coach. 

In the book, The Game of Work, the author says, “If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.”  Think of what this means.  By having precise measured activities – numbers of calls, prospecting blocks of time and measured appointments – you can then measure your success.  Where to be, when to begin, how long to continue, what to accomplish, and finally the freedom to quit because you have won the game, daily!

The successful agent is one who makes a habit out of doing the thing the unsuccessful person fails to do – prospecting.  The unsuccessful person is one who does not allow himself or herself to be uncomfortable long enough to be successful.  Prospecting is uncomfortable; prospecting is hard work. 

Very simply, Sales Manager A and Sales Manager B have taken the choice out of prospecting for their agents.  They are instituting a precise prospecting practice time and place with measured prospecting goals.  Most importantly, they supply their agents the discipline necessary to get adequate appointments to meet their goals.

In a short time, the agent provide disappears because the manager supplies the discipline, makes the agent focus and takes away the options.  The agent, therefore, is provided with self-satisfaction (“I feel worthy”) by successfully mastering prospecting for appointments. 

Yes, there is a new paradigm and because of it production is up…retention is up; production is up…profit is up; production is up…unit cost is down; production is up…overhead is under control. 

*Paradigm is a limited perspective caused by our experiences.  It prevents us from seeing beyond our experiences and, therefore, we accept what is and not what can be.

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