Sales and Marketing

We talk for a living. We should be experts at talking to prospects, but not everyone is an expert. Let's devote this column to discussing how we can improve our grammatical skills to improve our ability to present and close more sales.

Run a website primed for sales by putting yourself in the mindset of customers and prospects.

More brokers are taking advantage of the big change taking place in the vision care space: the connection between vision care and wellness programs.

By incorporating employee health clinics into the business structure of their clients, Matt McQuide and Rick Gantt are able to bring down health care costs while changing the way employers think about health care delivery. Not to mention keep themselves firmly entrenched as the BOR in the process.

The New Jersey Assembly on June 23 approved a bill that will require 750,000 government employees and retirees to contribute substantially more for their health insurance and pensions.

Stop working harder at sales. Instead, turn on your computer. When the dots are properly connected, data can open a whole new world of selling for you - a smarter way. Once you get over the paper tiger of scary data, you'll discover a new method of locating and working prospects that you never dreamed of before. You'll make more money with this technique.

One of my hobbies is searching the Internet for sales and marketing ideas. In this quest I look at virtually every industry imaginable.

One skill that epitomizes the successful benefit adviser is selling. From the dollar-and-cents results to the art of persuasion, benefit advisers understand the sales process. So why not use that skill to assist human resource professionals in selling their C-suite on a corporate wellness program?

Iwould rather be poked in the eye with a sharp stick than sit through a humdrum and aimless sales presentation that goes nowhere. What needless pain that is. There is something to say for sales momentum and pursuing a goal in everything you say and do.

For the benefit professional who hates making cold calls or following up on direct mail, networking can be the next best alternative. But, like any marketing strategy - and yes, marketing is necessary - networking requires consistency of action over a period of time. Too many benefit professionals join a local Chamber of Commerce, go to one or two events and fail to generate even one appointment and then never return, believing that networking is a waste of time and energy.