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What
Do Successful Gorillas Do to Become Successful?
By Matt Hicken, Senior Consultant
As one of the Senior Consultants at Bill Good Marketing, I have heard this
question many times. Successful Gorillas (often referred to as Silverback
Gorillas) aren’t that different from you and me. So what are they doing
differently?
There are really three things successful Gorillas do:
First, they have all of the Five Critical Elements in place. I want everyone to go back and read over those critical elements in detail in the last Gorilla Times (Q2). I will only explain here what the most successful Gorillas are doing with each one.
- The first critical element is: "Every contact with a Client or Prospect results in an updated record." I know that most of you are thinking that this is in the bag for you, but I would bet that when you see "updated record" you are thinking about just a Note. This element involves more than that. You have to really get to know your Clients to have a good enough relationship for them to give you referrals. Unless you are very good at remembering everything about your Clients, you have to put the information you gather somewhere. Things like hobbies, life events, responsiveness to your recommendations, family, and interests all need to be logged into the System so that the next time you call Velda Oldebucks, you know that she played bridge with her friends the night before. Sales is a numbers game, but those numbers have lives, and the more you know about them, the more sales you will make.
- The second critical
element is: "Every Client and Prospect gets a message every month
on a topic of interest to them." Silverback Gorillas make sure they
do this 100%.
- The third critical
element is: "Every Client and Prospect gets a personal contact from
someone in your office at least once every 90 days." Successful Gorillas
will take advantage of this call to find out more information, especially
about more money the Client or Prospect might have that the RR isn’t already
aware of. They will also use this call to again remind their Clients and
even their Prospects that they would be happy to help the Clients’ and
Prospects’ associates, too.
- The fourth critical
element is having 80% of Clients’ and 50% of Prospects' money recorded.
Successful Gorillas will really push this on their Weekly Statistics Report.
(This information is found primarily on the second page of the Report
under the Opportunity Stats section. Look at the stats for "Missing
Last Opportunity Review Date" and "Over Opportunity Review Interval.")
- The last and most import element is that you have a prospecting strategy in place that is going to get you to your goals. A prospecting strategy is a brief statement of the kind of Clients one wishes to acquire and the method by which one would acquire them. This includes marketing to Clients, connections and cold leads. It isn’t just for specific Prospects. Silverback Gorillas will keep this marketing line flowing. Their production doesn’t look like the market, with peaks and valleys. They follow this strategy consistently.
The second thing that separates the Silverback from the regular Gorilla is leadership ability. I think President Eisenhower defined how this trait can lead to success in this quote:
Leadership
is the art of getting someone else to do
something
you want done because he wants to do it.
The ability to sell a concept as well as a product is what makes Silverback Gorillas successful. If you aren’t familiar with this way of selling, you should read page 3-7 in the Marketing Reference Guide. The main idea is to figure out what a Client or Prospect needs via a questionnaire, then present what you can do to fill that need. To start this process with your Prospects, I have written my own version of the questionnaire style of selling. Click here for a copy.
If they say no to an appointment when you use this script, it is for one of three reasons: they lied in their answers, they aren’t too bright, or they don’t trust you enough yet. There is little you can do about those first two things, but for the third one, since you now know what they want, you can send them that information in the targeted Monthly Drip we’ve already talked about.
If they do set an appointment, then in that meeting, you should ask more questions to make sure you know exactly what they need and make appropriate recommendations. Once you make your proposal, ask your closing question and then shut up. You will close the business you are generating through your prospecting strategy.
The third thing that successful Gorillas do is build their team as they are instructed.
I used to work in a factory where we made aquariums. My job when I started was to cut the glass, silkscreen the signs, vacuum-form the plastic filters to the right shape, and on occasion, package it all up for shipping. I am sure you are thinking that I did everything, but I didn’t. There were four other guys doing exactly what I did. Then the upper management in the company got a bright idea: they put the guy who was the fastest and best glasscutter on that job, and that was all he did. Then they took the best silkscreener of the group and put him on that job. They followed the same process with each one of us. Oddly enough, production went up. Why? Because we had the right people doing the right jobs. When the production got so fast and in demand that we couldn’t keep up with it, we noticed that the guy who cut the glass was getting behind. So we hired another glasscutter.
You have to put the right people in the right positions. Then when there is a bottleneck, you can easily identify its source. You may just need to hire someone else to help alleviate the load. The biggest excuse I hear for not getting a necessary team member is there isn’t enough money. I can understand that, but let me point something out: You can only go so far with the number of team members you have. You might have to take a "leap of faith" to be able to move on. If you need to, call one of our consultants to talk it through before you "leap."
Just three steps to
greater success . . . good luck in becoming the next Silverback!
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The
Year of the Prospect
By Bill Good, Head Gorilla
In the Chinese calendar, 2003 is the Year of the Goat. According to Chinese
tradition, this year is a time of harmony, tranquility and understanding.
In the Financial Services calendar, 2003 is the Year of the Prospect. According to me, this year is a time of hard work, persistence and toughness.
My Year of the Prospect fortune cookie reads: "Hard work, persistence and toughness will reward you greatly because this year is the best year to prospect in your career."
In the Year of the Prospect, you will re-build your business. If you have plunged back into the prospecting waters, here are some things to consider.
Find a Campaign
I define a campaign as "a series of steps or actions taken in a given market that produce predictable results." Ideally, these predictable results will be profitable. But often they are not . . . which is why you must test your campaigns.
When you start prospecting (or decide to continue prospecting), your most important objective is to find a campaign that delivers predictable, profitable results. Once you have found the campaign, your objective becomes running the campaign with sufficient volume to deliver your target number of new Client relationships.
I know countless financial advisors who made it into the high six or seven figures with just one campaign. Perhaps they just got it right the first time (unlikely). Whenever they got it right, they had enough sense to keep doing it.
The key, of course, is finding the campaign that produces predictably profitable results.
Finding = Testing
There is no shortcut to this equation: finding = testing.
Testing means holding as many things constant as possible while you send
enough messages or phone calls to get a valid idea of whether the results
are predictable. If you send too few messages or calls, you can miss an
otherwise profitable campaign just based on the statistical margin of error.
The key word is enough. How much is enough?
Testing Cold Call Campaigns
In a cold call-based campaign, as few as 250 calls can tell you whether your idea is a flop. 250 calls should take 5-8 hours on the phone. If you are not averaging 2-3 Prospects an hour, you must change something. (I’ll talk about what to change momentarily). There are not enough hours in the day to generate enough leads at any lesser response rate.
Let’s say you call for ten hours and produce ten Prospects (cherries). These ten leads should produce two appointments. Assuming your selling skills are professional grade, you should close one of them.
That would mean (assuming predictability) that it takes 10 hours of prospecting to produce the lead that opens an account. But what if you are not closing 1 in 2? What if you’re 1 in 5? That means you have to work 50 hours making cold calls to generate the lead that opens the account. You have no time for anything else. See what I mean about "not enough hours in the day?"
If you are not generating the required number of leads per hour, try these ideas to see if you can make the campaign work:
- Push up the number
of dials. Calling businesses, shoot for 40. During evening calls,
your minimum target is 60. Sales is a numbers game.
- Listen to how
you sound. If you sound like you are sucking a lemon or are too tired
to get out of bed, guess what? Prospective Clients also couldn’t care
less. Tape-record your side of the conversation. Listen. How do you sound?
- If you have pushed
up your number of dials and are still not averaging 2-3 Prospects per
hour, change your offer. Instead of: "I have some important
information on what’s called a tax-free municipal bond fund. Have you
ever heard of one of these?” try: “I have some important information on
an investment that lets you participate in the upside of the stock market
but protects you against downside risk. Have you ever heard of what’s
called an equity indexed annuity?" Change your offer 2-3 times.
- You might try to
change the times you’re calling.
- If none of the above works, get a new list and start over.
Testing Direct Mail
Direct mail testing is a more expensive proposition. You need at least 1500-2500 letters for a single test. And you cannot change more than one thing at a time (envelope, stamp, form of address, number of pieces in the envelope, headline, message).
Try these procedures (one at a time) if your campaign is not working:
- Using labels? Knock
it off and send your next mailing with half in window envelopes and half
in individually addressed envelopes.
- Did you include a
business reply envelope? If not, you must.
- Change the stamp.
If your piece went out the door with a bulk mail permit number, in the
next batch, use an oversize commemorative stamp.
- No headline to your
letter? Add one. If you had one, change it.
- Review the letter. Does it engage the reader? Does it make an offer the reader "can’t refuse?" Has it worked elsewhere? You may have to re-write the letter or throw it out entirely.
Two Basic Mistakes
As you test various campaigns in search of the one or two that will build your business, keep in mind these two basic mistakes that can destroy your chances of success:
1. Get a bad idea
and stick to it.
This
is just poor or no testing, or worse, testing and not looking at your results.
2. Get a good idea
and change it.
You
create a profitable campaign, and in your desire to make it better, you
keep tinkering with it until it
doesn’t work anymore. When you get it right, just
keep doing it.
To take full advantage
of the Year of the Prospect, you’ve got to put your campaigns to the test—literally!
Remember, the keys to success are hard work, persistence and toughness.
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Referral
Consciousness
By Tony Parmenter, Senior Marketing Consultant
"Well, referrals are great--but I need
Prospects."
"I think I’ll worry about
referrals once I’m actually finding Prospects to meet with."
Any way you put it or see it, you are missing the biggest boat of business--the referral boat.
Many businesses have risen from referrals alone, and you may be surprised by just how much of your business, at one point or another, is derived from referrals.
The trick to getting enough referrals is to constantly remind your Clients and Prospects that you accept additional business through referrals. Try to make getting referrals a nearly automatic or Pavlovian response. Physiologist Ivan Pavlov trained his dogs so that when a bell rang to signal mealtime, their mouths would water in anticipation of receiving food.
We want your Clients to be trained in the same way, so that when friends, family members, or even associates from work or the club say anything about the quality of their financial planners, your Client blurts out your name and that you accept business through referrals. This is what we refer to as "referral consciousness," and it works better than putting paper and pen in front of your Client and asking for five names. The idea is to demonstrate from every angle possible that you accept referrals.
Some of the best ways to promote referrals are putting a referral promotion line in every letter to Clients and Prospects, sending an annual referral promotion letter, and holding Client appreciation events. All of these strategies (as well as others) are part of what we call Referral Prospecting Theory.
The best example that I can think of for Referral
Prospecting in a non-threatening manner is the "red spot" story.
An RR took a sheet of paper and printed a fairly large (6-7") red spot
in the middle of it, and then framed and hung the paper in a prominent place
in his office. Every Client and Prospect who came through the door asked
what the red spot was. The RR told them, "Oh, I am glad you asked.
That is there to remind me to promote referrals. I know you probably can’t
think of anyone right now, but if you ever have friends, family, or associates
who are concerned about how today’s market will affect them, please give
them my card and I will be happy to speak with them." Two things happened
from this situation. First, the RR always remembered to promote referrals
in every appointment. And second, every time a Client or Prospect came into
the office and saw that red spot, the very first thing that came to mind
was referrals. The RR didn’t even have to say anything (although it can
help, so he always did). This created exactly what we are looking for--REFERRAL
CONSCIOUSNESS. Keep the fact that you accept business through referrals
fresh in the minds of your Clients and Prospects.
An entire section of your Marketing Reference Guide (if you are using Gorilla 2.x®) is dedicated to this. In the Prospecting Basics section on page 10 or 11, depending on the version of the manual you have, you will find a section entitled "Referral Prospecting Theory" (you can also find this section online in the Document Library if you do not have the Guide). This section contains ten Steps to Total Referral Consciousness. Read this section thoroughly and then implement it.
Referrals are one of the greatest resources
for growing your business, and the main reason they are not a bigger part
of everyone’s business is because it is hard to keep them fresh in your
Clients’ and Prospects’ minds. Implement the 10 steps and start down the
road to a referral-based business today.
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10
Tips for Getting Along with People at Work
By George M. Akerley
1. Keep a tight rein on your tongue.
How you say something counts for far more than what you say. How many times have you been chastised on the job by your supervisor and walked away angry because of the tone of voice used? When confronted with a difficult situation, always say less than you think. Curbing your tongue in a stressful situation will be more likely to create fewer stressful situations because how you handle yourself in a crisis will give others confidence in you and in their ability to bring problems and issues to your attention.
2. Be careful what you promise to others.
If you intend to make promises, you had better be prepared to keep them, no matter what the cost. The easiest way to lose the respect of others is by guaranteeing things that you are either unable or unwilling to deliver. When you tell someone that you intend to do something, it is your responsibility to see to it that you follow through. Others will note an irresponsible attitude and be wary of approaching you on any level in the future if you continually break your promises.
3. Be kind and encouraging to others.
Never let an opportunity to show
kindness or encouragement to others to pass you by. Praise good work, regardless
of who did it. Sometimes you can turn even the most hardened of your fellow
workers into real softies once they realize that you are not afraid to compliment
them or give encouraging words, despite how they may perceive you ordinarily.
At the same time, when giving criticism, do it helpfully and gently, never
spitefully. Show concern for others’ feelings and well-being. You will benefit
greatly from even the smallest kindness shown.
4. Take an interest in other people.
Learn about others’ interests, their homes and families, and even their problems. Gaining the confidence of fellow workers is made much easier when you demonstrate that you have a caring attitude. When others are joyful, rejoice with them; when they are troubled or in mourning, be sympathetic. Let everyone with whom you have contact, no matter how humble, realize that you regard them as people of importance.
5. Be cheerful.
We all carry a load of some sort, and although the old saying "misery loves company" is still widely held up as truth, keep in mind that making others miserable is truly a disservice. Don’t dwell on your minor aches and pains and small disappointments. Maintaining a cheerful attitude at all times will not only make others more comfortable in your presence, but you will feel better as well.
6. Keep an open mind.
Don’t
let yourself get into arguments. Discuss things with people rather than
arguing. Being disagreeable is likely to put others off; they will much
prefer to deal with those who have a calm and reasoned approach. When confronted
with a situation that you either disapprove of or dislike, keep this in
mind: it is the mark of a superior mind to disagree without being disagreeable.
7. Be mindful of only your own vices and virtues.
Refuse to discuss others’ vices or problems. Don’t allow gossip to rule your life. Tearing down another to prop yourself up is an extraordinary waste of time; furthermore, it can be very destructive. Especially in the workplace, morale is vitally important. When we lift our voices against others, we open ourselves to the thought, "I wonder what they say about me behind my back!"
8. Be careful of others’ feelings.
Humor at another’s expense is rarely worth the trouble. Not only that, the hurt and pain felt by that person will often come when least expected. Take into account another person’s feelings before you poke fun. Things said in jest are often the sharpest barbs to be felt.
9. Pay no attention to what others say about you.
Remember, the person making snide or rude comments about you may not be well informed. Live in such a way that what is said about you cannot be taken to heart. Let your own actions determine how others see you, and they will not believe the negative things said.
10. Don’t worry about credit that is due to you.
Do your best. It’s the best you
can do. Concerning yourself about how much credit you receive will only
burden you with more stress. Let others see your work ethic, and you will
be able to take pride and pleasure in a job well done.
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© Copyright 2003 by Bill Good.
All rights Reserved.