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The Power of the Personal Note18 Apr

There’s a simple business communication tactic that can have a huge impact on how your clients and prospects feel about you and your organization—the handwritten, personal note. Here’s why personal notes are so effective in building strong client relationships and how to use personal notes in your smart-marketing strategy.

Why personal notes work. Marketers often use customer relationship management systems to create regular “touches” with clients and prospects. A CRMS brings discipline to the communication process, which can be helpful throughout the sales cycle.

But CRMS aren’t enough to build real relationships with real people. You also need one-to-one communication with your clients and prospects, and there are many ways of doing this. You could send an email, a LinkedIn message or a text. You could send personalized letter through the mail.

But the gold standard in business communication is the handwritten note. Here’s why:

It’s unusual. In a typical business day, you’re lucky to get one handwritten note.
It’s almost guaranteed to get past gatekeepers and reach the decision-maker’s desk.
It sets you apart by making you a person who is perceptive, attentive and memorable.
Most important, it makes the recipient feel that someone they do business with cares about them enough to take the time to put pen to paper.

Follow these six tips to use handwritten notes effectively in business marketing and communication:

Look for opportunities to write. Find reasons to send personal notes to clients and prospects, such as thanking someone for his or her loyalty or a referral, sending congratulations or condolences, sharing news or extending an invitation to an event.
Make it truly personal. You are writing to one individual and this should be reflected in the content and tone of your note. The recipient should never feel he or she has received the same note you sent to 10 other people. And you should handwrite the address on the envelope, too.
Use proper stationery. You’re representing your company and yourself as a trusted service provider, so high-quality stationery bearing your company’s brand is a must. Ask your marketing team to design nicely formatted note cards and envelopes; it’s a small investment with a big payoff.
Practice. If you’re unsure exactly what you want to say, write a draft on your computer first so you can edit and polish your message before you write it by hand.
Make note-writing a habit. Set aside 15-20 minutes per week to send notes. Make note-writing a scheduled event and a regular business practice.
Train staff to write notes. Every person on your team who interacts with clients or prospects—or who seeks referrals to generate new business—can be trained to write personal notes. It’s a powerful way to strengthen all kinds of business relationships.

Take a minute right now and think about the people you do business with, especially your most important customers. Which ones could you write notes to today?

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Is Your Business on Social Media Overload?

Relationship Selling Has Changed. Have You?

CRMs When? Why? How?

Jean M. Gianfagna is a marketing strategy expert and the founder and president of Gianfagna Strategic Marketing which provides marketing strategy and creative services to leading business-to-business and consumer marketers. Read her blog for more marketing tips at http://www.gianfagnamarketing.com/blog.

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Life Insurance: Hurt By a Me-First Culture?17 Apr

Image: photostock / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I’m not sure why I bother reading women’s magazines sometimes. I guess I feel some sort of female obligation to subject myself monthly to articles with headlines like “OMG! Is Your Boyfriend Ever Gonna Propose??” and “5 Easy, Breezy Ways to Look Like a Kardashian!!!”

I hit an all-time high for eye rolls last week, though, when I took a quiz in one of those magazines entitled “Are You the Star of Your Own Life?” I was deemed lacking in the celebri-me department, apparently, for not demanding that my hypothetical BF spend my entire hypothetical birthday with me, for planning to thank pretend co-workers if I’m pretend acknowledged at work, and other similar crimes. The quiz suggested that I “treat myself like an A-lister” and “assemble an entourage” to boost my score.

I hated what this quiz said about journalism, about women (or at least perceptions of what women should be) and, most importantly, about our culture in general. Are we seriously this self-absorbed?

But maybe we are, at least a little. We live in an era where the “personal brand” has become paramount. We line up for reality TV show auditions. We photoshop our personal Facebook pictures. (This same magazine issue contained a how-to guide.) We tweet about things only we care about — “LOL! This Saved by the Bell re-run is soooo funny!” We check in on Foursquare so our friends can know crucial things, like the fact that we had Chipotle for lunch and were named Mayor of Fancy Pants Dry Cleaners.

At the same time, we’re ditching the loyalties that used to take up our time. We’re freelancing or job-hopping among many companies, instead of sticking with one. We’re getting married later — or not at all. The number of single households is growing.

We often blame lack of education, or client procrastination, or agents themselves for the fact that life insurance coverage is at historic lows. But maybe our culture is really the bad guy. We’re no longer loyal to companies or the 2.5-kids family model. Our allegiances are increasingly with ourselves — and life insurance does nothing for us once we’re gone.

Of course, that’s the cynical view, anyway. To be sure, there’s a lot of the opposite going on, too. Many of us are using social media to connect in meaningful ways with other people. There’s evidence that volunteering is becoming more popular and community involvement is on the rise. Our later-in-life marriages are, statistically, more likely to last. And multi-generational households are also becoming more common, as the sandwich generation takes care of its kids and parents.

So maybe my post-inane-quiz thinking is wrong, merely a bout of moodiness brought on by inhaling too many perfume ads. Or maybe I’m right. Or maybe it’s a little bit of both.

You’re out in the field — what do you think? Can we blame at least some of the life insurance slump on the fact that our culture is possibly becoming a little too preening?

Let me know what you think in the comments section below. I’ll likely respond, but it could take awhile — I’m busy recruiting for my entourage this week.

Corey Dahl is managing editor of Life Insurance Selling and life channel/social media editor for LifeHealthPro.

For more from Corey Dahl, see:

Buffet Economics

A Story to Help You Conquer Price Concerns

PPACA Debate: Both Sides Are Right, In a Way

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7 Great Accountant Jokes17 Apr

A young accountant spends a week at his new office with the retiring accountant he is replacing. Each morning, as the more experienced accountant begins the day, he opens his desk drawer, takes out a worn envelope, removes a yellowing sheet of paper, reads it, nods his head, looks around the room with renewed vigor, returns the envelope to the drawer, and then begins his day’s work. After he retires, the new accountant can hardly wait to read for himself the message contained in the envelope. Surely, he thinks to himself, it must contain the great secret to his mentor’s success, a wondrous treasure of inspiration and motivation. His fingers tremble anxiously as he removes the mysterious envelope from the drawer and reads the following message: “Debits in the column toward the file cabinet. Credits in the column toward the window.”

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Kansas Officials: Agency Changes to Improve Services16 Apr

Brownback’s administration is reviewing bids from five companies that are all based outside Kansas or are affiliates or subsidiaries of out-of-state companies. The administration plans to issue three contracts this summer, with each company operating statewide so Medicaid participants have a choice of managed-care coverage.

Most of the 385,000 Kansans receiving state medical assistance have managed-care coverage through private contractors, but the overhauled Medicaid program, to be called KanCare, would be the first time Kansas has brought the disabled and elderly, including those in nursing homes, into such a system. An increased number of Kansans needing relatively expensive long-term care (LTC) services would be covered by managed care.

Legislators reconvene April 25, and advocates are expected to push lawmakers to “carve out” services for the developmentally disabled from the KanCare contracts. Advocates persuaded the Shawnee County Commission to adopt a resolution Thursday asking Brownback to reconsider the overhaul, The Topeka Capital-Journal reported.

Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, a Topeka Democrat, said the news conference with the governor, three cabinet secretaries and Colyer, the architect of the Medicaid plan, shows Brownback’s administration understands it still faces a “hard sales job.”

“There’s a lot of skepticism about this whole issue,” Hensley said.

The reorganization will move oversight of the state’s five hospitals for the mentally ill and developmentally disabled from SRS to the Department on Aging, along with other services for the disabled and mentally ill. The Department on Aging also will take over some regulatory functions from the health department.

It will become the Department on Aging and Disability Services. The health department will oversee Medicaid’s financial management, and SRS will become the Department of Children and Families.

SRS Secretary Phyllis Gilmore said that as part of its new, narrower focus, reorganized her department will seek to hire at least 20 additional social workers to help children in troubled families.

Colyer said: “The point of this is focus, and so what we’re trying to do is focus on core missions.”

- ab

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Don’t Let Fear Get in Your Way of Your Goals16 Apr

Yes—and it comes from a source that you usually think of as your ally: your mind, especially your subconscious mind.

When you have fears or concerns about what you believe it will take to achieve a goal or about what will happen after you achieve that goal, you may subconsciously sabotage yourself to avoid success.

Take Laura, for example. Laura started writing a book with a specific goal for completing it but never seemed to get there. When she considered what she thought would happen after the book was completed, she quickly realized that she had many fears, including the fear that the book would be criticized or that it would raise her visibility and make her a target of attention or that success might pull her away from her family.

When you have underlying thoughts like this, it’s no surprise that you stop pursuing or at least slow down in taking action toward your goals.

To find out if you have any “goal stoppers,” ask yourself: “What’s the worst that could happen if I accomplish this goal?” and “What will it cost me to achieve this goal?”

Make a complete list of your concerns about taking action to accomplish your goal and of what might happen if you accomplish it. Take a moment to actually write them down. Some of your concerns may seem a bit far-fetched—even silly—when you put them down on paper, but some will feel very real.

The truth is, however, that those events you fear may or may not come to pass. We often scare ourselves by imagining the negative outcomes of our actions. If you’re stopped from moving toward your goal by fear, you will never know what you could have accomplished. In order to move ahead powerfully, you’ll need to remove those fears.

There are techniques to help you overcome your self-limiting fears. Try them—it’s worth the effort.

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Do Something That Scares You

A Cure for What’s Ailing Your Sales

How to Create Success Behavior

Jack Canfield, America’s success coach, is the founder and co-creator of the billion-dollar book brand “Chicken Soup for the Soul” and a leading authority on peak performance. If you’re ready to jump start your life, make more money and have more fun and joy in all that you do, get your free success tips from Canfield now at: www.FreeSuccessStrategies.com.

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Know Your Life Settlement Rules16 Apr

New York

In New York, a number of new requirements took effect in 2010. The New York Insurance Law requires that life settlement providers and brokers provide consumers with an information booklet that explains what a life settlement is, advocates that consumers consider all of their options and offers tips and questions to ask. New York remains vigilant regarding so-called stranger-originated life insurance (STOLI). The state wants consumers to know that if they are asked to or plan to buy a new life insurance policy with the primary purpose of selling it for cash to a third party, then this may be a transaction that is prohibited.

Like many other states, New York requires that providers and any “life settlement intermediary” be licensed with the state and file an annual statement, among other requirements. Any life settlement provider or intermediary must file copies of business forms for approval by the state.

Agents, brokers and providers must understand that New York regulations may go beyond state borders in some instances. According to the New York Insurance Law, regulations apply to any life settlement contract made, proposed to be made, or solicited with a resident of the state or any owner physically in the state.

Illinois

In Illinois, life settlement contracts and disclosure statements must be filed and approved by the state before they can be used. A person shall not operate as a settlement broker without first obtaining an insurance producer license from the director and completing the settlement broker training requirements. An insurance producer shall not operate as a settlement broker unless the producer has been duly licensed as a resident insurance producer with a life insurance line of authority in Illinois or the insurance producer’s home state for at least one year.

General guidance

Each state regulates life settlements differently, so agents need to contact their department of insurance, or equivalent, and frequently brush up on any changes in life settlement licensing and regulation in their state.

Market potential on the rise

The market for life settlements is coming back strong after several down years following the recession. Research firm Conning recently reported that the gross potential market for life settlements for this year is $198 billion, and the firm expects about $3.8 billion in total face value policies to be purchased as life settlements this year.

See also: Boomers Ready for Life Settlement Option

The baby boom generation, the 76 million Americans born between 1946 and 1964, has begun to reach retirement age, but many of them have no savings. However, the dire retirement picture for boomers is counter‐balanced by this generation’s unprecedented investment in insurance. Life insurance, and specifically life insurance settlements, can be the lifeboat.

The market for life settlements is growing and will continue to be bolstered by retiring boomers. Life insurance agents who learn and follow the newest regulations can have a tremendous impact.

Stephen E. Terrell is senior vice president of sales, marketing and public relations at The Lifeline Program, a life settlement provider based in Atlanta. Terrell oversees all aspects of marketing, including the P3 Program (Production – Performance – Profit), which enables agencies and agents to build a new market with life settlements, broadening revenue and increasing commissions. For more information, call (770) 724-7300 or visit www.thelifeline.com. Or follow Terrell on Twitter @LifelineProgram.

For more on life settlements, see:

Don’t Allow Term to Lapse Without Taking a Second Look

Life Settlement’s PR Savior

Business Changes Can Mean Life Settlement Opportunities

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It’s Friday. Do You Know Where Your Retirement Plan Is?15 Apr

Photo credit: graur razvan ionut

You are probably reading this on a Friday afternoon, with weekend plans crowding your mind. What needs to be done around the house? Do I have time to visit a friend for lunch? What do I need at the grocery store? Your clients are probably doing the same. With so many short-term plans to be made, it’s sometimes easy to overlook our long-range goals, like how will I fund my retirement?

So you, and your clients, probably didn’t know that this week was National Retirement Planning Week, did you? The event was sponsored by the Insured Retirement Institute (IRI) and a group of financial industry and advocacy groups to promote awareness of funding a secure lifestyle when our working days end.

I listened in on a conference call to kick off the event on Monday. The statistics were pretty sobering: 62 percent of baby boomers believe their financial situation over the next five years will be either the same or worse and 70 percent of middle-income boomers say they will not have enough money to make ends meet when they retire. And fewer than half of boomers have consulted a financial professional. The situation is worse for women as they enter their retirement years.

Further, more than half of workers have yet to calculate how much money they need to live comfortably in retirement, said Nevin Adams, co-director for the Center for Research on Retirement Income, Employee Benefit Research Institute. What’s more, the percentage of workers who report they plan to retire after age 65 has increased to 37 percent this year, from just 11 percent in 1991. “Yet half of the retirees we surveyed this past year report having to leave the workforce unexpectedly due to health reasons or downsizing or closure” of their workplace, Adams noted.

Yet if the general public needs to be educated on retirement planning, maybe advisors do as well. One of the speakers on the call, Katie Libbe, vice president of consumer marketing and solutions for Allianz Life, said advisors are “extremely hungry” for knowledge about how to map out a retirement income plan for retirees and pre-retirees. Advisors are well versed in helping their clients build their assets in the accumulation phase of their financial lives, but may lack the knowledge about how to handle the distribution of those assets when clients are in or near retirement. “Do you take a bucket strategy? Do you build a floor? How do you sequence out the distributions? Do you start with non-qualified or qualified money? Do you keep the Roth until the end for legacy planning for heirs?” Libbe said. “It is actually so much more complicated than just building a portfolio.”

Libbe cited a survey by Retirement Income Industry Association that indicated only 20 percent of financial advisors are knowledgeable in retirement income planning. Allianz, she said, sponsors seminars on the topic. “They are usually standing-room only.”

One area where consumers lack sufficient information is when to take Social Security. As Rob Kron, director and head of investment and retirement education at BlackRock, said, most people are ill-prepared to make that important decision. “We bought Social Security in ignorance. There is no user or buyer manual when making this purchase with your first job, so we don’t know how to redeem it,” he said.

But there is some good news. Surveys suggest retirees and pre-retirees feel more confident about their future when they consult a financial professional. And they want your advice: Libbe cited a survey that showed 61 percent of boomers fear outliving their money more than death.

And awareness campaigns, like this week-long event, can help. But as Libbe suggested, perhaps it could be longer.

“Maybe National Retirement Planning Week should be a month. There’s a whole month for life insurance awareness, so maybe we deserve a month, too,” she said.

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Iowa, Nebraska OK Special Use Disability Sales15 Apr

(AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo)

Two Midwestern states are opening their markets to disability insurance products aimed at clients with high incomes.

The governors in those states, Iowa and Nebraska, have signed bills that permit underwriters to sell special use disability insurance plans on a surplus lines basis.

Petersen International Underwriters, Valencia, Calif., an underwriter active in the market, says the moves will expand the market for specialized disability insurance products aimed mainly at professional athletes and other insureds with high incomes and, in many cases, unusual or complicated insurance needs.

Petersen International says its compliance department played a role in building support for the special use disability bills.

All lawmakers in Iowa and Nebraska who voted on the special use disability product bills ended up voting in favor of the bills.

Gov. Terry Branstad signed the Iowa bill into law, and Gov. David Heinemann signed the Nebraska bill into law.

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Money Is Time15 Apr

“The greatest predictive indicator of money is the current use of time.” It was on my morning commute that marketing genius Dan Kennedy dropped this bomb through my car’s speakers. I had been listening to and reading Dan’s work for days, almost non-stop since I had received it. But it wasn’t until that moment that I truly “got” it.

The old “time is money” platitude sounds good but has lost a bit of its punch since you first heard it. But, like it or not, the amount of value you can add is severely limited by the amount of uninterrupted, focused, productive time you are able to invest in your endeavors. Because added value is the only thing than can create financial equity, then it behooves you to get serious about how you invest every minute of your time.

Before I lose you to some sort of resistance thinking (“Who wants to watch every minute that closely?”) consider this: Love takes time, friendship takes time, recovery takes time. Everything is a function of how we spend our time. Money just happens to be easier to quantify.

When we have no detailed plan for our time, stuff will just happen to us rather than the other way around. Apply this to your clients’ financial planning, and you’ve added an entirely new dimension to what’s possible and necessary to derive the most beneficial outcome for them. After all, what does that million dollars mean when no use for the money is attached? If there’s no purpose for the money, does the money still have value?

Give a lottery winner $10 million, and he’ll go bankrupt in a few years. But give the right punk kid with a dream $5,000 and he’ll create magic and change all our lives. All he needs is a little time.

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Time Is Money: 4 Time Management Tips

Your Business Blind Spots

Make Your Business Wishes Come True

Adam Cufr is a founding principal of Fourth Dimension Financial Group, LLC. He is the creator of the web-based coaching program The Life Insurance Blueprint, a prolific blogger, and an expert author on Ezine Articles. For more information, go to http://adamcufr.com/blog.

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S.O.S: Simplified Online Strategy14 Apr

Time is of the essence. In today’s fast-paced world, information is shared at an astounding rate. New apps and blogs pop up across the Internet so fast that we can’t possibly keep up. Everyone needs a little help and I’d like to share my tools for what, for lack of a better term, I call my Simplified Online Strategy (S.O.S).

The key to keeping things simple is to find the resources that work for you. This becomes more significant as you create and build your online presence. There are online tools for banking, note-taking and note-sharing, data tracking, web traffic, and brand management (business and personal). We need these tools because what people discover online about us now is how we will be perceived in the future. People no longer need to meet you in person before formulating their initial impression of you. Your online brand is the new first impression.

So, how do you keep things simple while managing your online experience? Here are a few tools that I use to keep myself organized.

Documentation and note-taking: For this, I use a free online tool called Evernote, which allows you to log into your account, type notes and save emails and Web pages. Evernote also has an application and is compatible with virtually every computer, mobile device and phone on the market. The tool syncs automatically, so you can pull your information from wherever you are (assuming you have Internet access or cell phone reception). As part of your free account, you receive 2GB of free space with the option to purchase more as needed. I use this tool for the following purposes:

Documenting notes from training events

Note-taking during phone calls

Saving important emails and webpages that I want to reference quickly

Tracking web traffic: Google Analytics is one of the best resources for tracking website traffic and data. If you are not tracking your website, you are missing a significant opportunity to understand what works and doesn’t work for your business. Without tracking, it’s very difficult to develop an effective content strategy.

Shortening and tracking URLs: Whenever you share something on LinkedIn, Twitter or Facebook, it’s helpful to be able to track data regarding the link. For example, you may want to see who is sharing and talking about your link, how many clicks it got, which countries readers are coming from, and which platforms they are using. To do this, I use Bitly, a website that allows you to do all of the above.

Social media tracking and brand management: There are many, many tools out there; however here are some that I have grown accustomed to using.

HootSuite: This is a social aggregation tool that I use to manage my activity for Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Foursquare all under one platform. There is also a reporting function and timing function that allows you to schedule tweets and status updates, and track results. The good news is that Hootsuite allows you to integrate your Google Analytics account for a more centralized hub supporting your online activity. To do this, simply upgrade your free account to the Pro Plan.

SocialBro: I use this exclusively for analyzing my Twitter activity. It provides in-depth metrics on your followers and the people you’re following. Not to mention, it’s free!

Klout: You can monitor your level of influence in the realm of social media via Klout, which analyzes how influential you are across a range of topics.

Keeping things simple

The key is to not overwhelm yourself and take on more than you are able to manage within the time you allot yourself. Each time you learn a platform and apply it to your business, another one is popping up around the corner. It’s important to find the tools that fit your style and comfort level; then, master them in a way that helps drive your business forward and doesn’t distract you from your goals.

Build a plan for your activities, select the tools to accomplish the plan and, most of all, have fun doing it! If you come across tools that you like better or feel are more efficient, leave your notes in the comments so that others may learn from your experiences as well. After all, social media is focused on collaboration, engagement and building relationships!

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