Selling TEA

Financial services professionals, (insurance agents, financial planners, financial advisors), are in the business of selling financial products and services. What are financial professionals really selling? I like to think that they are selling TEA. Allow me to explain. Coincidently, my personal initials are T.E.A. and my beverage of choice is hot, strong, British tea. By saying they sell TEA, I mean, they sell their Time, Expertise, and Advice. Think about it. Before these professionals sell any financial products they must first sell themselves and their personal services.

The ultimate question is: if you are selling your time, expertise, and advice, what is your rate of exchange? Everyone gets the same amount of time, which is 86,400 seconds per day. Once expended, those seconds can never be recaptured. Basically, you are expending your life energy every second of the day, . . . and I ask again, “What is your rate of exchange?”.

An insurance agent, for example, sells policies. The amount of time and effort required for each sale is about the same, regardless of the face amount of insurance represented by the policy. Agent earnings, in a commission-based system, are in direct proportion to the amount of premium per policy. You can increase your rate of exchange by selling larger amounts of insurance with higher premiums or by selling more policies. Obviously, selling more policies takes more of your time and energy. Selling larger policies, however, yields larger income per policy. Conversely, selling larger number of smaller policies requires more expenditure of your valuable time and effort. This can be accomplished by choosing to attract only clients who fit the profile of your ideal client; one with a better fit for your expertise, advice, and the expenditure of your time. Take time to clearly define the quantitative and qualitative characteristics of your ideal client. Develop a written Ideal Client Profile and use that as your key marketing piece. Accept only new clients who look like your ideal client profile (take a pass on others).

Keep selling and remember TEA! Your objective is to maximize the rate of exchange for your life energy.