Stop Quoting. Start Winning: The Complete Flight Plan.

 Most producers think they lose on price. Greg's story proves otherwise. He kept an account where both competitors beat him by $15,000 and $20,000 — and they never knew why. In this episode, Randy Schwantz delivers the complete six-step Flight Plan, from red-hot introductions to cross-selling and wedge-proofing. Incumbents in commercial lines hold a 92% retention rate. Not because they are better. Because they get the last look. This is how you break it. 

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Transcript

[00:00:00] Yeah, the problem was the deal was already lost before he walked through the door. He just didn't know it yet. What happened? The producer calls the prospect, he gets an appointment, [00:00:10] shows up with a big old smile, a firm handshake, maybe a nice folder. And then he says, "Hey, tell me about your business."

And the prospect says, "Well, we make widgets. Been doing it for [00:00:20] seven years." Producer, "Oh, that's great, man. Is there anything wrong with your current insurance program?" "No, not really. I think everything's fine." "What a- well, what about service? Any issues there?" "No, not [00:00:30] that I'm aware of." "Well, what about claims?

Any problems with claims or how have they been handled?" "No, I, I think we're good." "Well, anything about coverage that keeps you [00:00:40] up at night?" "No, not really." "Well, sir, what about price?" And the buyer goes, "Well, you know, we're always looking to save money." [00:00:50] So then the producer goes, "Well, great. Let, let me get a copy of your policies, and if I can enhance your coverage and save you some money, is there any reason why you wouldn't be willing to make a change?"[00:01:00] 

And the prospect says, "No, we're open-minded. Let's see what you can do." So the producer grabs the policies, you know, goes back, fills out the app, sends it off to the underwriters, waits for [00:01:10] the price of the week to come back, builds out a proposal, pulls the buyer's logo off the internet, throws it on the front.

Now he's got a customized proposal, and he goes back and he's ready to [00:01:20] present this beautiful proposal he put together. So they get back in front of each other, and there it is. Presents it to the buyer. Went through all the stuff. Here's the coverage [00:01:30] gaps we found. We fixed these. Here's my price.

What do you think? The buyer goes, "It looks pretty good. It's pretty competitive. I like it." And then the producer tries to close on the spot, and buyer goes, "Hang on, [00:01:40] hang on. I like, I like what you had to say, but give me a couple days and get back with me." And then in the meantime, what happens? Well, the incumbent finds out that [00:01:50] this guy's coming after his business.

So he comes over with the wine and cheese basket, says to his client, "Here, you pop the top on the wine. I'll slice the cheese." Kind of hops up in his lap and says, "Look, I don't know. You don't, [00:02:00] you don't wanna do this. I, I don't know what those guys are telling you, but if it's price, we can match it.

Coverage, we can get it. Service, we can do anything anybody does. And don't you remember two, [00:02:10] three years ago, you had that tough claim? I fought to get that thing paid for you. And you've had my cell phone number along the way. Come on. Give me a chance. I, I'm sure we can handle this." [00:02:20] And then under that pressure, what happens?

The buyer says to the incumbent, "Fine, you keep it. I'll deal with the other guy." So then a couple of days later, [00:02:30] finally the producer going after the piece of new business finally gets the buyer on the phone, and the buyer goes, "Hey, man, we really appreciate your professionalism. I like your persistence and discipline, but [00:02:40] unfortunately, there wasn't enough difference to justify making a change.

But I hope you'll stay in touch next year." [00:02:50] And then the producer goes back to the office and tells the sales manager, "Man, we got beat on price again." But here's the thing, he [00:03:00] didn't get beat on price. He got beat before he ever walked through the door because he didn't have a sales process [00:03:10] to bust the incumbent relationship.

All he had was a quoting process.

Welcome to The Agency Growth Machine [00:03:20] podcast, where it's all about transforming potential into profit. And now your host, Randy Schwantz. 

Hey there, everybody. I'm Randy [00:03:30] Schwantz. I'm founder of the Wedge Group, 33 years training commercial insurance producers, and today I'm handing you the complete system, [00:03:40] all six steps. I call it the flight plan, and I think it's gonna change how you grow your book of business.

And before [00:03:50] this episode's over, I'm gonna tell you about a guy named Greg. See, he was the incumbent agent on a nice manufacturing account, brought in about 30,000 of [00:04:00] revenue, and he told me what was going on behind the scenes, the part that most of us never hear about. [00:04:10] And a lot of producers live and die in commercial insurance with- without ever hearing the other side of the story.

Well, you're about to, and this [00:04:20] is episode nine. We call it the flight plan. So think about this. If you went to flight school, the very first rule they teach you is that [00:04:30] takeoffs must equal landings. Think about that for a moment. And then rule number two is always re- refer to rule number one, takeoffs must [00:04:40] equal landings.

And so it sounds pretty obvious, but think about what that means. It means you don't get credit for an impressive takeoff. You don't get rewarded for [00:04:50] elegant mid-flight maneuvers. The only thing that really counts is landing that plane. If you don't land safely, nothing else really matters. [00:05:00] And in selling, the same rule applies.

Your landing is when you get paid. And in commercial insurance, most producers plan on failing [00:05:10] maybe 50, 70% of the time, and they call it a numbers game. They say, "Well, I just need to quote more," as if volume is the answer to a process [00:05:20] problem, but it's not. So here's the number that should make every producer kind of uncomfortable.

Incumbents in commercial lines [00:05:30] enjoy about a 92% retention rate. That's 92%. That means every time you walk into an account, specifically middle market insurance, [00:05:40] there's an incumbent agent that's in control. You, unless you have an amazing sales process, are starting with a 1 in 12 shot. [00:05:50] The incumbent doesn't win because they're better.

They win because they have the relationship, and they leverage it, well, to get the last look. [00:06:00] And here's what the last look looks like. So you put in hours building your proposal. Your price is better than the incumbents. Your coverage is better. [00:06:10] And you go back in and you make your presentation, and the prospect says, "Very impressive.

Let me review my other options." And what the prospect does next is they call the [00:06:20] incumbent, and they, they say, "Hey, you're, you're about to lose this account. I mean, you're not very competitive this year." And of course, the incumbent agent, they're not stupid. I mean, they immediately [00:06:30] feel the pressure, so they go see their client.

"Hey, show me what you're talking about." And then once they see what the price is, you know, the incumbent just picks up his phone, [00:06:40] calls the underwriter, and does the same thing to them. "Hey, you're about to lose this account. They've been a very profitable account for you the last three years. I need another 10 points.

Let me know what you can do." [00:06:50] And then a few minutes later, the underwriter calls him back, "Here's the best I can do is 7%." All right. Then the incumbent presents it, [00:07:00] and it's in range, so the buyer says, "Okay, fine. Looks fair. You keep it." And he does. He keeps the business, and you just got rolled. [00:07:10] And here's the part that stinks.

You did everything right. You did everything you were taught to do. Get the policies, find the coverage gap, market it, see if you can [00:07:20] lower the price. You brought back something better than what they had, and you still got beat. And here's the truth most producers [00:07:30] never hear. When you lose a piece of business, the prospect doesn't tell you why you really lost.

They tell you what's most convenient, what's [00:07:40] easy. And in a moment, I'm gonna show you what happened behind the scenes, and it absolutely blew me away. And once you see it, you'll never [00:07:50] walk into a sales call the same way again. And the reason this cycle repeats itself is simple. When you walk in and tell a prospect that you offer great [00:08:00] service, great people, great knowledge, great value, all the buyers all they hear is noise, static.

And why? Because it's [00:08:10] the same thing that the incumbent says, and it's the same thing every other agent says. And the buyer quickly concludes, there is no difference between all these people, so I'll stay [00:08:20] with the devil I know rather than taking a chance on the unknown, even though they were a few dollars cheaper.

Hey, I've done about 500 wedge [00:08:30] workshops throughout my career, maybe even more. I start every one of them with this. Hey, if what you bring to the table is the same as what they [00:08:40] already have, they don't need you. They only need you for what you do better. Do you agree with me on that? Everybody goes, agrees, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay, good. Then get out that piece [00:08:50] of paper, turn to page two, and put down what makes you different, what makes you better. What have you got to sell? On that paper, put down what makes you different, what makes you better, what have you [00:09:00] got to sell? And then I give them about five minutes to write it out.

And then I start asking, "Okay, what do you got? What do you got? What do you got?" And I start putting it up on the [00:09:10] whiteboard. Well, we have better service. Well, it's my knowledge. It's my experience. We have better carrier relationships. We have really good people, good [00:09:20] staff. We got a great reputation. We have good in-house loss control.

And then one guy, "Well, it's me." Okay. Another guy, "Well, it's my niche. I'm a niche guy. I'm a niche [00:09:30] expertise." I go, "Okay, good." And I write it all down, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And then I ask everyone to put on the hat of the buyer. Be the buyer, [00:09:40] and let me play these things back to you one at a time, and if it sounds the same as what everybody else is saying, you say red.

I get everybody to say red. And then if it sounds [00:09:50] unique or highly leverageable, you say blue. And so then I start to play them back. Okay, we have better service. Red or blue? Red. It's my [00:10:00] knowledge. Red or blue? Red. It's my experience. Red or blue? Red. It's our carrier relationships. Red or blue? Red. We [00:10:10] have good people.

Red. We have a great reputation. Red. We have in-house loss control. Red. It's me. What does that even mean? [00:10:20] Y- and you get my point. So if it sounds the same as what everybody else is saying, [00:10:30] God, can you imagine how hard it is for the buyer to see one from the other? So then I ask everybody, "What'd you just learn?"

And [00:10:40] someone said, "Well, we all sound the same." You're right. And so when everyone comes into the class, they all believe they are better, both in their hearts [00:10:50] and in their head, but what comes out of their mouth sounds the same, and that is one major reason that makes selling hard. [00:11:00] I mean, everybody represents the same carriers fundamentally.

You've all got good people. You got good reputations. You're local. You got all that sort of stuff. So it's almost [00:11:10] impossible for a buyer to see any difference. So when the time comes to make a decision, it's just a lot easier to stay with the incumbent. [00:11:20] And what I want you to get is that's not a pricing problem.

That's not a carrier problem. That's a lack of concrete, black and white, leverageable [00:11:30] differentiation. That's the problem. And the flight plan and the wedge, well, it helps you solve that. [00:11:40] So here's Greg's story, the guy I was telling you about. See, I was, I was living in Dallas at the time, and ironically, [00:11:50] these are my early days, I had- Three agencies in Dallas I was working with at the same time, and in agency one and two, the producers there that, you know, I was working with, they brought up [00:12:00] the account that Greg had, who was from agency three.

Greg controlled it as the incumbent. And of course, I was just doing the best I could back in those days, [00:12:10] helping, you know, agent number one try to strategize how they'd win it. Ironically, went with agent number two, that same account popped up, trying to help him figure out how to win it. [00:12:20] But then when I saw them both a month or two later, I go, "Hey, how'd you do on, you know, that, that manufacturing account?"

I asked them if they won it. [00:12:30] Uh, keeping in mind they were both from different agencies, the strange thing is they both said this: "No, I didn't get it. Got killed on price." [00:12:40] "Really?" "Oh, yeah, it was terrible." "Hmm." And so now for the rest of the story, what happened? Well, I see Greg at his agency, number three, the [00:12:50] incumbent, a couple of weeks after that.

I tell him, "Hey, Greg, you won't believe this, man. Your account came up as a prospect for the other two agencies I was working with. We were all working against you, [00:13:00] but I guess it didn't matter, because from what I heard, you just killed everybody on price." And then Greg said with a smile, "Oh, is, is that, is that what they told you?"

[00:13:10] I go, "Yeah, that's what happened." He goes, "No. Nope, nope, no." And it was about 11:45 that morning, so he said, "Let's go to lunch. I'll tell you what happened." And so we went to [00:13:20] lunch. We're having our tea and whatever we're eating, and here's what he told me. He said, "Guy number one you just mentioned, he was in there about [00:13:30] $20,000 less than I was."

That's what Greg said. He said, "Guy number two was in there for about $15,000 less."

So the buyer told Greg, "Hey, man, [00:13:40] these guys are killing you. I, I can't justify paying you $20,000 more because I like you." So then Greg told me he took his underwriter to lunch. She was with [00:13:50] Atlantic Mutual at that time. And he said, "Look, it took a gourmet lunch, two bottles of wine to convince her to reduce her price."

He said he had to work for it really hard, and that if she hadn't have [00:14:00] done it, he had no other alternatives and would've lost that account. So I told Greg, "You, you, you know what your client told those other guys?" He goes, "No, what?" He told [00:14:10] them both they were high, that they should come back again next year, and they believed it.

And that right there was my big aha, because the reality was [00:14:20] both those guys beat Greg by a significant amount. But the incumbent, Greg, has a wicked advantage. [00:14:30] And so here was the big lesson for me is that buyers really do lie, and I had the black and white evidence right here. [00:14:40] So that one conversation with Greg and those two guys changed how I looked at sales forever, and it led to the development of everything [00:14:50] else that follows, specifically the wedge sales process.

And of equal importance, the establishment of a proactive service platform [00:15:00] with 15 to 20 named proactive services you can use to drive a wedge. Because the goal is to never compete on price again. [00:15:10] Because the incumbent will get a last look and match it.

So here's the weapon. Instead of telling a prospect what you [00:15:20] do, you ask them whether they're getting it from the incumbent, not by accusing, but by being assumptive. It'd be something like this: "Hey, can [00:15:30] I ask you a question? Um, you know, when your agent comes out about 90 days after renewal to do a claims review, and they get out the loss runs, [00:15:40] scan through the open claims, locate those reserves that are set too high by the insurance carrier, and then develop a plan of action to get those reduced so you don't have to worry [00:15:50] about your experience mod spiraling out of control, causing you to overpay for insurance.

Are you comfortable how they go through that process?" And in most cases, the [00:16:00] prospect kind of pauses because no one has ever done a 90-day claims review with them. Now, they're not defensive. [00:16:10] They're just questioning whether the current agent's actually doing the job. And that right there is the thin edge of the wedge.

When, when you can get about three of those wedges in, [00:16:20] the buyer goes from, "My guy's a good guy," to, "Holy moly, why am I putting up with this?" Now, here's what I [00:16:30] want you to stick around for. In a minute, I'm gonna walk you through all six steps of the sequence. But the last one, step six, is the almost what every agency [00:16:40] skips, and it seems like.

It's the one that quietly turns one account into a decade of commission, so I want you to be listening for it. [00:16:50] So everything we've talked about across this podcast series comes together in six steps. This is the complete flight plan from finding the prospect to keeping them [00:17:00] forever. So what's step number one?

Well, we call it red hot introductions. See, most producers don't call their way to a million-dollar book. [00:17:10] They get introduced. The right prospect introduced by your top client lands at 60 to 80% closing ratio. [00:17:20] Cold calls work for rookie producers. But look, once you have a decent book, it's time to shift your prospecting efforts to red-hot introductions.

And then [00:17:30] step two, pre-call strategy. I mean, file the flight plan. Instrument check before takeoff. Before you walk in, you need to know who the incumbent is, the [00:17:40] agency, the carrier, the buyers, the revenue, and exactly what proactive services that they're not delivering on. That [00:17:50] way, there's no surprises.

You're fully prepared to do your job and drive a wedge. And then step three is the wedge. You gain altitude. You climb to [00:18:00] thirty thousand feet. You use your proactive service questions to surface what the incumbent isn't doing, and you convert that to pain. And [00:18:10] with that, you widen the gap between the prospect and the incumbent.

Because your goal is to get a BOR if you represent the carrier, and if not, [00:18:20] get a commitment before you ever go through the process of quoting and certainly before you ever present. And then step number four is Keystone. Just in case you do have to present [00:18:30] your price and coverage, Keystone helps you clear for landing, wheels down, lock the deal in place.

We call it pre-close and then present. Step [00:18:40] five is wedge-proofing. Basically, strapping down the aircraft. You don't let a storm take it out because now you are the incumbent. Put the [00:18:50] account on a written services timeline immediately. Deliver your proactive services. Make yourself impossible to be wedged by being the agent that actually [00:19:00] does what you promised.

And then step six is cross-sell. Every flight is a connecting flight. The more [00:19:10] lines of business you hold, the harder it is to move the account. Every cross-sell closes another door to your competition. So you wanna go broad, go deep. [00:19:20] You want to own the relationship. So a lot of producers operate somewhere between steps one and two.

They find a prospect, they show up, they [00:19:30] quote, they lose, they go back to step one. They never reach altitude. They don't land safely nearly often enough. They never [00:19:40] even get to learn from the crash. And the flight plan is not about being smoother on a sales call. It's about having a system, a [00:19:50] complete sequence, repeatable process from first contact to long-term retention that makes winning predictable and losing avoidable.[00:20:00] 

So think about your competitors right now. Do they have a flight plan, a systematic approach to get from takeoff to landing? [00:20:10] Do they know who the incumbent is before they walk in? I'll promise you this, most of them don't even care. They're just gonna go in there and quote-unquote, "sell themselves." Do they surface [00:20:20] proactive service failures before they quote?

Most of them don't. Do they lock the deal with Keystone before the incumbent can counter? No. Do they wedge-proof [00:20:30] their best accounts so nobody can do to them what they do to others? No, most don't. Which means if you run this system [00:20:40] consistently in every account every week, you're not competing on the same playing field.

You changed the game. You are operating at a [00:20:50] level they cannot match because they don't even know it exists. So now you know what Greg did to John and Jim, agents [00:21:00] one and two in the previous story. The game isn't decided on the day you present. It's decided in the days before you ever walk through the door.

It's decided by whether you know [00:21:10] who you're competing against, what they're not doing, and how to make the prospect feel the cost of staying put. John and Jim had better prices, [00:21:20] and they also had better coverage, and they still lost, both of them, because the incumbent had a relationship and they had nothing to counter it with.[00:21:30] 

No wedge, no keystone, no flight plan, just a proposal and a prayer. And the flight plan eliminates the prayer. It replaces [00:21:40] the hope with the system, and systems win. So here's your challenge for this week. Pick your next three appointments, [00:21:50] and for each one, before you walk in the door, answer these questions.

Number one, who's the incumbent? Number two, what do they do well? Number three, [00:22:00] what are they not doing? And four, who are the decision-makers? Who's the number one decision-maker? And [00:22:10] five, what's the commission value? How much revenue? Six, what specific wedge questions will you open with and use to get the prospect to see the incumbent's not doing their [00:22:20] job?

And then you gotta work them through, can they fire the other guy and hire you before you waste any time working, you know, and spending, doing the hard work? [00:22:30] So if you can answer all seven before you walk in, you have a flight plan. If you can't, you're taking off without one. And in commercial insurance, that's a crash just waiting to [00:22:40] happen.

Look, next week, I'm gonna get into how to hire producers who actually hunt. See, a lot of agencies are full of people who are really good at managing accounts [00:22:50] that they already have and kind of terrible at writing new ones, and there's a reason for that, and there's a way to fix it before you ever make the hire.

See, if [00:23:00] you're building a team or thinking about it, telling you, man, don't miss this one. So subscribe, share this with your sales manager, your agency owner, your [00:23:10] leaders. Before you leave, I want to tell you about the Triple Threat Solution. See, selling insurance has gone through three eras. Selling 1.0 is [00:23:20] feature benefit, that was the sales process, and yellow pads.

That's what our grandfathers were doing. Selling 2.0 became consultative selling. Ask good questions, build [00:23:30] relationships, and a generic CRM. But I tell you what, they don't match up with each other at all. And then selling 3.0, the triple threat solution, was [00:23:40] designed to displace the incumbent and has integrated sales technology, making it easy for producers to do their job and leaders to do their job.[00:23:50] 

So if you have a huge desire to ramp up growth, you could probably benefit from a legitimate sales operating system built for middle market commercial [00:24:00] insurance to have that in your agency. It includes a producer's seven steps to seven figures playbook, a leader's five steps to extraordinary growth [00:24:10] playbook, and technology built to set appointments, win the business, displace the incumbent, along with a system to retain them for a decade.[00:24:20] 

So check it out. It's called Bignition.io. And look, if you like this, leave a review. I'm Randy Schwantz. Stop selling and start winning. [00:24:30] And I'll see you next week