Be a Better Broker
kers making an effort to sell consultatively fail. When questions arise about product issues, the natural tendency is to
answer them. Thus, when a prospect asks about HSAs or
some other benefit-specific question, the tendency is to fall
right into the product-presentation trap and begin discussing solutions before the problems are identified.
To avoid this pitfall and stay on track, the best option
is to defer answering the question. Use a response like
“That’s a good question, but it’s getting the cart before
the horse. First, we need to get more detailed information
to understand how that might work for your company.
Does that make sense?” If they persist, be brief with the
answer and get back to completing the fact finder.
One of the great advantages of a careful fact-finding
process is, if you run into strong resistance (usually from
HR), you can always get a census to complete a product
spreadsheet. And you have some useful information to
utilize in preparing your proposal. Nothing is lost.
Fact-finding is difficult to do well. It takes practice—
practice you can do with associates or even a spouse. Rules
to abide by:
1one-and-a-half pages. Once the initial presentation is
made, you will be given the permission to get all the
Keep the initial fact finder short, preferably one to
additional information you need to do a complete analysis
of the benefits, including census and payroll information.
Remember, when a doctor does a routine physical, he only
gets “vital” information and bases any additional testing
on those findings.
2was my biggest problem—yup, the “product presentation” trap.) Ask the questions, listen to the answers
Don’t go into lengthy explanations. (For years, this
and take good notes. If questions arise, defer them or respond with short, to-the-point answers and get back to
the fact finder. You may even want to hand a copy of the
form to the decision maker while you ask the questions.
You should be able to complete a well-crafted fact finder
(I call mine a “discovery form”) in about 10 to 15 minutes
if you don’t get into too much detailed explanation.
Remember, at this point, the purpose is to get information,
not diagnose problems or present solutions (products).
3Always complete the form in person or on the phone.
Proper completion requires your personal assistance.
It is imperative that the decision maker or whoever is
giving you the information understands its importance. If
you e-mail or drop off the form, it will usually get shuffled
to HR and it may take weeks to get it completed. If that
happens, you have lost much of your opportunity.
4Proposal” presentation. Make a comment followed
by the request such as: “Mr. CFO, from looking at
Set the appointment for the “Benefit Strategies
this information, I am sure there are a number of strategies we can present that will help you achieve your benefits objectives more effectively. When would be a good
time for us to get back together to review our findings?”
Give yourself five working days, in most cases. You don’t
want them to think that it is too easy. (It isn’t.)
The information that you get in the initial fact-finding
session should be sufficient to expose compliance risks
and assess sales opportunities. This requires sufficient information about the prospect’s plan design to give a clear
picture of current benefits. It does not need to include a
census or payroll information; this will be obtained after
initial diagnosis. My fact finder (discovery form) can also
be viewed on my website.
Once you have sufficient information, you are ready to
prepare a Benefit Strategies Proposal. The primary purpose of the Strategies Proposal is to establish the need for
the employer to engage the employees and to develop a
benefit partnership that will not only accomplish employer objectives but also meet employee needs more effectively. This proposal must be distilled into an executive
summary that is not more than two pages in length with
lots of white space.
The recommendations in the summary identify strategies
that need to be evaluated more carefully with their
partner, the employees. A comprehensive employee
benefits survey is
normally recommended to gain employee feedback and
input. The body of
the proposal contains all necessary
support material, in
appropriate sections, to support
the recommendations presented in the executive summary. Sections may include information on Section 125,
COBRA, defined-contribution strategy, HRAs or HSAs.
One of the interesting and exciting benefits of utilizing
a consultative strategy is that you can get out of the prod-
Pitfalls are more of a problem
to veteran brokers than those
with just a year or two in the
business. The reason is that
they have a much greater
tendency to fall back into
“tried and true” selling habits.
