Sales and marketing

Are you writing as much business as you would like? Has your revenue been steadily increasing over the last six to 12 months? Do you want to write more business and increase your revenue in the next 60 days?

Most group business renews on January 1. So you are going through the craziness of putting your 12/1s and 1/1s to bed. Carriers are late with numbers. Groups are asking you to take their plans to market. You are playing defense as sharks circle your groups more this time of year. Welcome to the busiest time of year for most brokers and consultants.

Over the years of working with benefits professionals, I have seen three common mistakes that are costing them business and raving fan referrals. More importantly, these three mistakes also are costing them money through staff and infrastructure expenses.

Crossing the value gap should be a top priority for benefit sellers. The value gap is a chasm that exists between how most advisers sell, which buyers view as ho-hum, and a wonderful place where relatively few sellers travel, but buyers love. Taking your buyers across the value gap lands you in a place where buyers are more frequently willing to buy and where you'll have more fun than a kid in a candy store.

After 10 years as a sales coach to benefit professionals - both core and voluntary - I have had an epiphany of sorts. My epiphany was this: Sales success is really very simple, regardless of your product or service. It boils down to this:

The Employee Benefit Adviser App is a must-have resource for benefit brokers, advisers and consultants who help employers build and manage their group benefits programs, be they health, retirement, voluntary or non-insurance. Choose from our helpful apps and download them today!

To sell is to close. It is the penultimate conclusion. Selling is of no value unless one can close the sale in a timely manner.

To be successful in the sale of voluntary insurance products the agent will have to be transformed into a member of the business owner's employee benefit advisory team.

My practice as an ERISA attorney is devoted to working with financial advisers to help their retirement plan clients reduce their administrative cost, minimize their fiduciary liability, and maximize retirement savings at a flat fee.

Almost 80% of employers anticipate that there will be an increased demand for access to savings and investment advice about their 401(k) plans, according to a new survey from Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

One of the more contentious issues of last year's health care reform debate, whether health insurance companies should be allowed to sell policies across state lines, was the focus of a hearing by the House Committee on Energy and Commerce's Health Subcommittee last month.

Thorough knowledge of this HR necessity will set you apart as a benefits administration partner for your clients.

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?