Ruta’s review of the best ideas from the 2016 Canada Sales Congress

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By Jim Ruta | June 21, 2016, 7 a.m.

Jim Ruta | Photo: PhotoVisions

The 2016 Canada Sales Congress faculty changed the businesses of life insurance advisors again this year. Here are their best ideas I heard as emcee and speaker coach.

For adventurer Jeff MacInnis, success is “Mind over Mind”. His personal experience proves that “you either talk yourself into success or your talk yourself out of it.” “Pressure is a privilege” to him because being where performance is required is an opportunity. “People buy your Energy”.

David Wm. Brown proved everyone pays their dues. Results don’t come easy. They are always packaged with hard work and honest effort. It’s why so may people miss them. David’s coach helps him focus and that focus makes him money. He reports his activity and reviews his results regularly. It turns out reporting activity is for winners.

Introducing his planning system, “The Estate Preservation Process™”, people ask: “How does that work?” and he’s into his approach.

Helene Meyer “Asks the right questions to serve her clients best”. “If you serve people, put service before reward and people before profit, you will be successful.”

Like executive recruiters, she describes her ideal client to an “ideal client” and then asks for a referral. She gets referrals and people to volunteer themselves.

Advisors: “You are only one person in the world, but one day, when you deliver a cheque, you will be the world to one person.”

Warren Blatt uses his own business failure to connect with entrepreneurs who want to know how he survived. When he tells how life insurance saved him, people naturally ask how they can get the same protection. When you tell the right story, the product sells itself.

Delivering a CI claim cheque to his wife exposed an unexpected product value to him. Skipping long lines and slow medical service wasn’t as important as having her spouse be with her through cancer treatment.

Chris Funnell sells on the telephone. When all you have is your voice, your words and tone of voice are vital. Tone comes from your intent. When your intent is to help, people hear that and buy. Be human to connect with humans. Be a real person rather than a sales person.

For Judy Byle-Jones networking is NOT about being chosen by many but instead CHOOSING the few. She is not looking for a roomful of prospects. She is looking through a roomful of people to find a couple of prospects. She’s choosing, not being chosen. That’s the winning perspective.

Paul Tompkins is 100% focused on life insurance and the ultra high net worth market, but was quick to point out that life insurance works for everyone. His job is to mitigate risk for clients and will sell nothing that adds to it. If he won’t buy it, he won’t sell it.

“When you chase a big deal and you don’t get it, you have nothing in the mill. When you chase a big deal and you do get it, you still have nothing in the mill. Either way, when you chase big deals you are out of new business.”

Van Mueller, the king of conversation starters, asked:

Do you like being told what to do? (No)
Do you like being told what to do with your money? (No)
If not, then why do you keep telling people what to do with their money? (Ah ha!)

Instead of telling people what to do, Van showed us how to be intimate without being personal. We don’t have to know how it was before, we only need to know that they want it to be different this time. That’s the pitch.

Van “sells certainty in an uncertain world”, “provides certainty where there is none and security in a world without any”.

For Denis Bugeja, style in all areas of his business is his differentiator. “I sell life insurance” is his opening line at a party, he’ll add, “…and if you stay here long enough, we’ll end up talking about it. Now’s your chance to escape.” It gets chuckles and clients.

CI is a “Health Liability Policy” – “You can spend your own money if your health gets you into financial trouble or you can spend the insurance company’s money? Which makes more sense to you?”

Kari Leoganda keeps getting better because when you get better, your clientele and your staff get better too. She ties her values together with her systematized process – “Purpose Driven Wealth Management™”. When you understand a client’s values, you make decisions easier.

As a “Financial Doctor”, she asks questions to understand what is needed to help. It’s all part of her Concern Discovery Platform.

Lordy Numekevor “Sells Insurance Softly” and “worms” his way into the hearts of his clientele. His approach is “PaLoCa” – Sell with Passion, Love your clients like family and Care for their interests.

His semi-annual newsletter features a client business on the cover and their family story inside. Each showcased business receives a mounted copy of the cover to show off to their customer, along with Lordy. The back page is marketing used in his approach.

Success is not rocket science to Zak Goldman. We are all judged by our activity and it defines your success. Success is all about how much you are prepared to do to earn your business. Know your numbers, have confidence in them and you lose your fear of the activity and succeed quicker.

He wants wins every day from this list daily:

Sell a policy
Book an appointment
Obtain a referral

Walter Simone changes the traditional 10-3-1 success formula to 10-8-6 because of how he connects with top prospects. In a world of social media, Walter is into social mobility – meeting people under favourable circumstances.

Walter joins prominent boards to contribute. His unselfish participation leads to fellow board member participation in his business. His volunteer work is his job application as their advisor.

CI is “Waiting Time Reduction” insurance. Why wait for help, when CI can get you to immediate service at the best facility?

Aurora Tancock makes life insurance products tangible with retirement and financial plans. She services business to create new business. She talks to people who already believe and are buyers.

She speaks without charge to community groups on financial planning even when she can’t pitch her services at all. Her honest, intelligent, effort is always rewarded.

Here are 6 of Bruce Etherington “12 P’s of Practice Performance”.