What makes some agents successful while others are just getting by? Is it
fate? Luck? Are the reasons so unique to every situation that they can’t be
followed by others? Or are there ways of approaching the business that explain the different results? More significantly, if successful producers share
these traits, if they have found certain paths to sales success, can others follow in their footsteps?
Finding the answers to these questions was the goal of research conducted
by the Alan Katz Group and Steven Miller, Ph.D., of Miller Marketing
Insights. A part of the Alan Katz Group’s Trailblazed Sales Project, the study
examined the attitudes, practices and processes of 200 sales professionals in
six states. These producers were insurance agents for whom individual,
small-group and senior medical insurance comprised at least 50% of their
overall business.
The reason the study focused on health insurance agents is that, by law
and regulation, medical-plan benefits and prices in a given market are the
same. No discounts, bargains, rebates or gimmicks are allowed.
Consequently, differences in sales results are caused by what these agents do,
not the games they play or their good fortune in representing a hot product.
Three Proven Paths to Sales Success
Based on their sales results over the past 12 months, the agents were
grouped into three categories. Those whose business had grown at least 20%
year-over-year were categorized as High-Growth Producers. Those with smaller increases were identified as Low-Growth Producers and those whose business were flat or in decline were the No-Growth Producers. Each group’s
responses to a battery of questions were compared to identify differences
among them. These results were refined and complemented with supplemental sources.
What the investigation made clear is that sales success is not random. Yes,
being lucky is better than being unlucky. But what’s also true is that High-Growth Producers act and think differently than their Low- and No-Growth
colleagues. Some of the differences are stark, some subtle, but the differences
between Dick’s and Jane’s results are no accident.
What also emerged from the research is that the drivers
of sales success can be grouped into three overlapping
and intertwined paths to sales success involving
attitude, business practices and sales strategy.
The paths overlap in the sense that certain
drivers reappear, in slightly different forms, in more than
one path. For example,
“customer focus” reflects
The Trailblazed Sales Project Study
The Alan Katz Group and Miller Marketing Insights conducted the Trailblazed
Sales Project Study in October 2007. California Survey Research Services
Inc. completed 200 interviews with independent health insurance agents in
six states: California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Pennsylvania and Texas. The
respondents’ median tenure in the business was 14. 3 years. Seventy-two
percent owned their own firm. Fifty-seven percent were the only producers in
their agency.
Based on the reported year-over-year increase of their individual, small-group
and senior business, 24% of the respondents were classified as High-Growth
Producers (reporting growth of at least 20%), 46% were identified as Low-Growth Producers, and 26% (reporting no growth or a decline in their business)
were categorized as No-Growth Producers.
