The Annuity Lead

The absolute worst thing you can do when selling annuities is to use a “one size fits all” sales process, marketing annuities in the same way to each of your prospects.  Think about it – just like no single pair of pants really fits everyone in the world, every one of your prospects will respond differently to the many emotions and motivations involved in the annuity buying process.  For example, one buyer may be swayed by the security offered from the guaranteed payments of an income annuity, while another may respond more to tax-deferred benefits of fixed and variable annuities.  It’s up to you as the agent to understand your prospect’s specific goals and needs to have success at annuity selling.

But how do you begin the process of understanding your annuity prospect?  You can’t really ask, flat out, “Tell me about your secret motivations.”  At best, your comfortable will feel uncomfortable and move on to another agent, while at worst, your meaning could be misconstrued, leaving you in an uncomfortable situation!  Fortunately, there are a few conclusions you can draw from the basic information your client provides as part of the initial consultation.  For example:

• How old is your annuity prospect?

The age of your client should be one of the key factors in determining how you market annuities to him or her.  Elderly clients have different concerns than young couples or families. For instance, they may not respond as strongly to the idea of their investment growing over time compared to the benefit of a guaranteed regular payout.  So if you stress the right benefit to the right age group, your annuity selling is more successful.

• Is he or she married, and if so, are there children in the family?

Parents typically have a vested interest in providing for their children’s future, whether through savings for college education or a sizable nest egg that will be their legacy once they’ve passed.  You can use this desire for stability and security to your advantage in the annuity sales process, with projections of future annuity value.  Such projections would have little impact on someone single and age 80.

In addition to this basic information, you need to pick up on the subtle clues that your annuity prospect is dropping throughout your meetings.  One great place to start is with the question, “Tell me about your financial history.”  Of course, all agents use this question to get a feel for the size of their clients’ wallets, but we’re going to extend it further to uncover some of the more hidden motivations.  Instead of just breezing through their responses, ask them to reflect on the financial decisions they’ve made. 

If, for example, your prospect lost $50,000 on a failed small business start-up, ask how they felt afterwards.  If your client exhibits fear at the thought of losing so much money, try to market annuities that feature guaranteed returns over time.  On the other hand, if your prospect expresses frustration over what that money could have been doing over time, he or she may be more susceptible to pitches that revolve around long-term gains or tax-deferred benefits.

Pay special attention to any specific statements – either yours or the prospects – that cause your client to become uncomfortable or emotional.  These statements are the key to discovering the hot-button issues that you can use to tailor your sales presentation and increase your annuity sales success.  Don’t think you can get away with repeating the same tired message over and over again – by learning to understand your annuity prospect and implementing a customized sales message, you’ll dramatically increase your annuity sales and make customers for life.

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People are so used to junk mail that they’re often disappointed when their mailbox is empty!  As much as they like to complain, everyone wants to have something in their mailbox when they get home at the end of the day.  As an annuity agent, you may have heard that direct mail campaigns are a great way to reach potential clients and good for annuity marketing.  Of course, as with any advertising medium, direct mail has its pros and cons.  However, many annuities agents have found that this annuity lead generating method offers some of the best return on investment for your money.  The following are some of the advantages of annuity direct mail campaigns:

1. You can target your advertising. Annuity agents get their leads from various sources – for example, you can target all new home buyers in your area with a direct mail piece that emphasizes annuities with guaranteed payments as a way to ensure they’ll always be able to make their mortgage payments, even if they’re unable to work. You can also target a certain income, age or area, depending on the type of annuity leads you desire.

2. Annuity direct mail campaigns are easy to measure.  Finding out how many people saw an ad in the newspaper or on television is nearly impossible to measure, but studies show that most people will look at a direct mail piece, even if they later throw it away.  Even this single look-through is enough to fix the image is in their minds.  In addition, you can measure response of the piece by including a coupon or an offer for a free gift if they make an appointment with you.  In general, the response rate for direct mail is about one percent – not bad for most forms of advertising and a staple of annuity marketing.

3. You can be creative with direct mail.  You can incorporate colorful, eye-catching graphics into your piece, or send it in an envelope to stand out from the many direct mail postcards floating around out there.  You can put together an educational newsletter that offers prospects quality information in addition to your annuity sales message.  Best of all, you can incorporate different messages into each piece, and send them sequentially as part of a targeted drip marketing campaign.

4. While annuity direct mail may seem expensive up front, it’s relatively high return on investment means that the cost is actually low compared to other forms of advertising, like TV or radio ads.

When planning direct mail for your annuity marketing campaign, you should consider several factors:

• It’s always best to use a professional copywriter and/or graphic designer to create your direct mail pieces.  You want to put your best foot forward, so include their fees in your direct mail budget.

• Make sure your message is clear on your direct mail piece.  Many people don’t understand what annuities are, and because you’re licensed to sell insurance, they may think of an annuity as life insurance.  Be very specific about your product’s benefits.  A jazzy piece will do you no good if you’re getting calls from people who want something other than what you offer.

• Save money by using bulk mail. All you need to do to take advantage of these discounted rates is get a free permit from the post office that allows you to use bulk rates.

• Consider using a dip annuity marketing campaign, where you send targeted direct mail pieces during certain intervals.  For example, you might send out different pieces at an interval of one month each.  Each piece should look different and should focus on a different aspect of your sales message.  Because most consumers have to see a message seven to ten times before they actually make a decision, this will keep your name in front of potential customers until they’re ready to buy.

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Take a second to think about today’s advertising landscape.  Annuity prospects are exposed to dozens of conflicting sales messages every day – to have success with annuity selling, you’ve got to find a way to cut through the clutter.  In this second installment of the guerilla annuity selling principles series, we’ll take a look at one easy way to get your message across: marketing with information.

Today, corporations and sales executives spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on ads that are designed to be humorous and memorable.  However, while these messages may provide a brief burst in market recognition, they don’t always measure up in terms of sales conversions.  Do you remember the sock puppet dog that was the mascot of dot-com bust Pets.com?  Even though people around the world could correctly identify which company the puppet represented, it didn’t result in more dollars coming in to the company.

What people really crave is information – not catchy jingles or memorable mascots.  If you give them good information in your sales message, you’ll have them knocking down your door with more business than you can handle.  But what qualifies as good information?  In general, it should be both concise and specific, demonstrating your annuity’s benefits without being bogged down by obvious sales messages.  The specific type of information you should provide depends on which marketing method you’re using.

• Direct Mail

With annuity direct mail, you have a limited amount of time to capture a prospect’s attention, so your information needs to be short, sweet and to the point.  Come up with three to four single sentences that describe your annuity’s strongest benefits.  For example, consider something like “Earn a guaranteed return of 4.5% on your investment, while the stock market tanks.”  If you want success with annuity marketing and annuity sales, you must immediately answer the prospect’s question “what’s in it for me.” 

• Seminars

When you’re hosting an annuity seminar, keep in mind that people have shown up for the information you’ll provide – not to hear an hour-long sales presentation.  Speak openly and honestly about the benefits of annuities, not annuities.  In other words, your presentation must be about safety, tax savings, savings on social security tax, lifetime income.  Sell the benefits, not the product. Be that guy that tells it like it is, and be refreshing with your honesty and candor.  Even if you turn off some prospects because annuities aren’t the best fit for them, you’ll impress other attendees with your honesty and likely convert more of them into customers than you would rattling off standard sales copy.

The truth is that people can smell an advertising pitch from a mile away, and are more likely than ever to simply ignore it.  Don’t believe me?  Studies have shown that Internet users don’t even notice banner ads anymore because they’vebecome so attuned to subconsciously detecting and disregarding advertisements.  In this advertising-happy climate, the one thing people long for more than anything is good, solid information.  If you’re the one that fills this need, you’ll find yourself overrun with new customers and clients, ready to give you their money.

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If you’re in annuity sales, you already know that you need to have annuity leads that will generate sales to stay in business.  Some of these leads will come from traditional advertising, but if you rely on advertising alone to generate annuity leads for your business, you’ll miss some opportunities as different people pay attention to different sources of information.  You want a multi-pronged approach to generate annuity leads.

The good news is that advertising isn’t the only way to generate leads – you just have to be willing to think outside the box to generate a full compliment of annuity leads.  The following are just a few innovative ways to generate annuity leads to get you started:

• Networking

Networking is the new buzz-word in marketing, but many people don’t understand how easy it is. Networking is more than just joining the local chamber of commerce and attending their after-hours business events.  Every organization, club and group you are a member of gives you an opportunity to meet new people and share what you do for a living.  You never know who is in the market for an annuity – some of your best clients could come from people you meet in your weekly pick-up basket ball game!  Joining civic groups, sitting on the boards of nonprofits or even just talking to people while you workout at your gym or shop for your groceries are great ways to network.  When asked what you do, don;t say “I sell annuities.”  State it in terms of their benefit, “I help people generate a retirement income they cannot outlive.”

• Offer to speak at networking events

Don’t just join your local chamber of commerce or civic group – offer to speak at their networking events.  The organizers of these events are always looking for people who are willing to get up and talk, and they can be a great way to get your name out to a targeted group of people.  Try to tailor your presentation to the group you’re speaking to.  If you’re speaking to a group of business people, talk about how guaranteed payments from an annuity can help protect them if they experience a slow down or go out of business.  Just be sure your content is informative, and not sales-oriented in nature – nothing will get you kicked out of these groups faster than if you get up and try to sell them something!

• Trade shows

You don’t have to buy an expensive booth to make trade shows work for you, although having a booth is well worth it (e.g. at an RV show or other event that attracts older investors).  Go to a trade show and walk around.  Present your information to those who have booths and to those who are just walking around the facility.  Even small cities have a few trade shows each year, filled with hundreds of prospects you can target.  If you do get a booth, make sure you use it properly.  Have a neat, well-designed display and don’t ever leave your booth unattended – you may miss a hot prospect!

• Ask your satisfied clients for referrals

Word of mouth is a great way to generate annuity leads.  After all, who better to advertise your business than a satisfied customer?  Consider offering incentives like a $50 gift certificate for each referral that buys an annuity or donation to their favorite charity.

When looking for annuity leads, don’t be afraid to try new things.  If you’re in sales or marketing, you always have to be on the outlook for new prospects to keep growing your business.  Think outside of the box and keep your business cards on hand at all times – you never know when you’ll come across someone who’s the right prospect.

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Please realize that there are three parties to the financial benefits of an annuity sale: the insurance company, the agent and the buyer.  If you seek to sell those annuities that pay the highest commission, realize that means less for the other two parties.  Do you think that the insurance company is paying you more so they can take less?  Doubtful. In most cases, if the annuity pays you an unreasonable high commission, it comes out of the pocket of the annuity buyer as a longer surrender period, higher surrender fees, a lower interest crediting rate, a higher margin or lower participation rate (in the case of index annuities) or some other features which leaves the annuity buyer worse off. Amazingly, some annuity agents think the extra commission comes out of thin air.  So in reading this post, consider what is a fair and ethical balance of benefits to all three parties when selling annuities.

Annuity commissions vary greatly, but as a broker or agent, you may want to find the highest commissions possible.  After all, you have a family to feed, a retirement to plan and bills to pay!  Earning high commissions depends on two factors – finding annuities to market that offer high commissions to agents and brokers, and gathering annuity leads with large assets that can be rolled into annuities.  If it seems as if these high-paying annuity leads aren’t coming your way, read on.  The high commission annuities are out there – you just have to find them.

• Make sure you have a large number of leads.

How can you earn high commissions if you have no one to sell to?  Advertising will bring you leads, but you can’t rely on advertising alone to bring you new clients.  You have to find some leads on your own.  You can buy leads from a company or partner with another business person, such as a mortgage broker, to share leads.  You can also generate leads from personal connections.  Anyone you know – former classmates, friends, civic clubs – may be interested in purchasing an annuity, or may know of someone else that could be a potential client.
 
• Within this large batch of leads, you’ll be able to identify potential leads that will bring in higher commissions.

Determining which leads are best requires you to “qualify the lead.”  This includes a fair bit of research.  Find out all you can about the lead, in terms of assets, mortgage information, the names of agents they use.  Do they have life insurance policies, IRA’s, 401K plans or mutual funds that can be converted into an annuity?  The larger the size of the prospect’s assets, the higher your commission will be.

• Sell annuities that have long shelf lives.

The longer the annuity surrender period, the higher your commission.  This makes sense – the longer the money is in the annuity, the more the insurance company will earn, consequently, the higher the commission they can offer you to sell a particular annuity.

• Market index annuities

These annuities usually bring higher commissions – at least eight percent in most cases.  Because of the moving parts of an index annuity, an insurance company can easily “bury” more profit in the contract as it is virtually impossible for the agent or the annuity buyer to determine what the buyer might earn, so the insurance companies may offer a higher commission to agents who can move them.  However, if a commission seems too high to you, make sure to read the terms carefully to be sure there’s nothing fishy about the annuity, as explained in the first paragraph.

When looking for high commission annuities to sell, remember your ethics.  One of the biggest criticisms of annuities is that sales people force their clients to purchase annuities they don’t need in order to draw a bigger commission.  The high commission leads are out there, and you don’t have to be unethical to find them.  Keep in mind that because of a small number of unethical annuity agents, regulation and scrutiny is increasing.  Make sure you abide by these regulations as you seek out these high commission annuities.

In the long run, it may pay to sell annuities that pay less generous commission, pay a higher yield to the client and gain you more referrals and more clients.

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Most articles in this annuity blog concern generating annuity leads.  But what you do with those leads is critical.  Unfortunate, many agents are hit and run: they make a presentation and if they don’t get the annuity sales, they’re off to the next prospect.  But be honest, this loses a lot of potential business because if you had a way to keep many of these prospects warm, they would become buyers.

If you’re honest to yourself, you admit that less than 50% and likely less than 20% of your prospects become clients.  Of all the people you have spoken with, who you considered a potential client, most never convert to business.  And it’s mostly your fault.  If you have not dripped on them with an annuity newsletter, why should they remember you or call you when they have some money to invest?  They have hundreds of distractions in life and when the desire or need for an annuity becomes compelling, they will call the first person they remember or the first person who grabs them down at the local bank.

That first person could be you if they received your annuity newsletter in the last 30 days.
Sending an annuity newsletter has several benefits:

• It keeps reminding prospects that you are available and ready to help—they remember you because they see your name and photo (on the newsletter face page) every 30 days
• It continually shows off your knowledge, expertise and breadth of resources with articles each month that cover a different insurance topic with the design to educate and not sell the prospect
• The continual monthly dripping shows staying power—that you are a fixture in the community that can be relied upon to be there, that you are reliable
• If the articles are correctly constructed with a call to action and an offer, prospects will call you and setting appointments when the prospect calls is easy.

Here’s the report from other agents:

“The very best money I have ever spent in my business is the annuity newsletter…it never fails to generate $15-20k of commissions each mailing.”

“Then out of the blue he says to me ‘you know, I’ve been reading your annuity newsletters, and I really like them. I’m going to switch all my accounts over to you.’ About two weeks later we met. …His total accounts were almost $500,000. Now he just referred a doctor friend of his to me, and I’m seeing him next week.”

As summarized in the Norvax Insurance Agent newsletter, “A lot of your prospects aren’t ready to buy that very first time you touch them. Drip marketing keeps you in the running to make that sale.”  Capture the annuity sales that now slip through your fingers by sending your prospects and clients a monthly annuity newsletter and watch business flow in.

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Are you tired of cold-calling, hand-holding and bending over backwards for customers who treat you with nothing but suspicion?  For years, the default manifesto of the annuity industry has been to get yourself in front of as many people as possible and do whatever it takes to close the annuity sale.  However, there is a better way to prospect your leads, and in this series of three Guerilla Selling Principles articles, we’ll cover the secret strategies that many agents are using to make the customers flock to them.

For this first article, we’ll cover the importance of being recognized as an expert in the annuity industry.  In this wary economic climate, selling financial products becomes more challenging, since most people want to hunker down and hide their pennies underneath the mattress.  At the same time, they trust the people they consider to be financial experts to lead them through uncertain times.  Fortunately, it isn’t as difficult as you might think to be recognized as an expert.  You don’t have to be knighted by a college or industry organization – you just need to follow these steps:

Get Published

You don’t need to publish a novel to earn the recognition that comes with being a published author in your industry.  You don’t even need to write a word as you can find inexpensive writers at elance.com and guru.com. Instead, offer to write an article for an industry publication, such as Annuity Shopper or the Annuity Market News, or for a popular website in your field.  Not sure what to write?  Start with a success story or with unique observations that haven’t really been published in the industry.  Web and magazine editors are constantly sitting around wondering how they’re going to come up with good, unique content – if you drop it into their laps, they’ll be more than happy to help you out by publishing it.

Charge for Events

This might sound crazy – after all, how can you charge for annuity seminars and events when other people are putting them on for free AND d attendees?  Here’s the thing – just charging for an event gives people the impression that the information you’re offering is worth more than the guy down the street who’s teaching for free, even if you’re giving the same information.  Even in tough financial times, people are willing to pay for what they believe to be expert financial information.  In addition, offering paid seminars is a great way to weed out clients that can actually afford to invest – if they can’t even pay a small fee for a seminar, how much can you really expect them to put into annuities?  You can most easily charge when you run your seminar through a local adult school as people are accustomed to paying tuition at a school.  A similar idea is to rent your seminar room at a college which lends an air of legitimacy. 

Sign Up with ProfNet.com

ProfNet is resource for writers, publishers and other members of the news media to find expert sources for articles and interviews.  Professionals who sign up with this resource may find themselves invited to give expert opinions for everything from small-town newspapers to major nation-wide news stations.  Sign up for this service once you’ve completed the first two steps – you’ll be able to advertise yourself as a published author and a keynote speaker at paid seminars, which will bring you even more attention from the news media.

Clip the copies of your articles and interviews which you can then send to prospects and immediately show you are the local expert.

Once you begin to develop recognition within your industry and community, you’ll find that the amount of time you have to spend cold calling leads and prospecting for new clients drops dramatically, while your income increases.

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Sure, you might start out with dreams of six figure salaries and the perks that come along with it, but the reality is that it’s a lot more difficult to make it as an annuity agent than the hotshots let on.  In fact, The Motley Fool (www.fool.com) reports that as many as 70% of annuity agents drop out of the industry within their first year.  If you’re struggling to make ends meet and wondering whether or not the industry is really for you or not, read on for more advice on making it through your first year in the field.

Adjust Your Expectations

If every annuity agent that got started in the industry made six figures in their first year, the world would be so full of annuity agents that there wouldn’t be enough customers left to make it worthwhile.  Instead of looking at the career as a guaranteed way to earn a high income, you need to adjust your expectations and think of your first few years as paying your dues to become established in the field.  Expect the cold-calling and the prospecting, and expect that you’ll earn a meager salary to do it.  Eventually, business will pick up and the grunt work of your first few years will pay off.

If you have funds to invest in your business, your path to success will be much quicker as explained at the financial services marketing blog.

Make Connections

Established annuity agents are just that – established.  Over their years in the business, they’ve made connections with customers and other financial professionals, and they’ve put their names out there for the entire world to see.  Think of your first year or two as an annuity agent as an important opportunity for you to make connections.  Join a trade organization, participate in your local Chamber of Commerce, and tell everyone you meet that you’re an annuity agent.  Eventually, the name recognition you earn from these activities will pay off in terms of new clients and referrals.

Stay Away from Shady Sales Tactics

If you stay on top of financial news, you probably already know that annuity brokers often get a bad rap.  And sometimes, it’s for a good reason – for every honest, legitimate broker out there, it seems like there’s at least one shark in the bunch, bent on manipulating and misleading customers into annuity products that aren’t right for their situations.  But here’s the thing – regulatory agencies are starting to catch up with these criminals, so if you don’t stay on the right side of the law when selling annuities, you could find yourself quickly out of business.

If you’re struggling through your first year as an annuity agent, it can be tempting to engage in shady sales tactics just to take home a decent paycheck, but consider the following statistics from CNN’s Money website as a cautionary tale:

• “Bank of America has agreed to return the money of anyone who purchased a variable annuity in 2003 and 2004 and was age 78 or older, citing high-pressure sales tactics directed toward senior citizens.”

• “Citizens Financial Group, acknowledging “‘unethical or dishonest conduct,” agreed to offer refunds to all its elderly customers who bought variable annuities in the last two years and will pay a $3 million fine.”

• “Waddell & Reed paid $18 million to settle charges that it pressured customers to exchange their annuities, generating commissions for its brokers.”

If you think the brokers who engaged in these practices are still employed, think again.  There’s no reason to jeopardize what could be a long and rewarding career on a few unscrupulous business transactions – focus on building your business instead, and sooner or later, the clients will come much more easily.

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You already know that one of the most challenging aspects of selling annuities is finding qualified leads to pitch your products to.  Cheap lists of leads rarely pan out to actual clients, but prospecting individual leads can take so much time that it cuts into your profits.  One relatively unexploited avenue is using mortgage protection leads to sell annuities.

With the current economic recession, people are worried that they may lose their jobs.  They want to make sure that the mortgage is paid and they aren’t left homeless in this situation, so they purchase a mortgage protection plan – another form of insurance – to make sure their bills are paid in case of job loss, disability or death.  In recent years, many annuity agents have found that mortgage protection leads have resulted in some of their best clients to sell annuities.  But what makes these leads stand out among others?

• Someone who purchases mortgage protection wants to make sure their family is taken care of if something happens to them.  These types of people are often very receptive to hearing about other financial products that guarantee specific returns.

• Homeowners usually have the financial ability to invest in annuities or other retirement plans – more so than renters, who may be living paycheck to paycheck.
 
• Purchasing a home and taking out a mortgage protection policy indicates a certain level of financial responsibility.  Therefore, these leads are more likely to be interested in planning for retirement or for dire circumstances.

However, the real trick is that once you get the lead, you have to convert a person who indicated an interest in mortgage protection insurance into an annuity buyer.  During your initial consultation with one of these leads, there are several questions you can ask to encourage this change in thinking, such as:

• Do you feel that you are fully prepared if you become disabled, laid off or unable to work?

Mortgage protection only pays the mortgage, so how will you handle other bills?  The guaranteed returns of an annuity can be a great way to assist with these expenses if you aren’t able to work for any reason.

• Do you currently have a life insurance policy, and, if so, is it earning you the biggest possible benefit?

People who are concerned about their homes are likely also concerned about their families and spouses.  If they have purchased a life insurance policy, they may be able to earn a higher rate of return on the investment producing an annuity sale.

• Do you have additional income or savings that you’d like to grow tax-deferred?

Homeowners and professionals and who have already maxed out their 401K and IRA contributions may be sitting on substantial savings that could benefit from the tax-deferred aspect of an annuity.  If they’re interested in protecting their homes, they should also be interested in protecting their savings.

But where can you find these leads?  There are many companies that offer mortgage protection leads.  If you’re part of a big financial firm, you may be able to get leads from another division of the same company.  If you’re an independent annuity agent, consider forming a partnership with a mortgage protection agent to share business and leads for your mutual benefit.  If you aren’t able to set up a partnership or share leads within your company, try searching online for lists of these leads for additional annuity sales.

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If you don’t already know who Suze Orman is, it’s time to find out, since hundreds of thousands of people tune into her weekly show on CNN for brutally honest advice on their financial situations.  Orman is well known for her tough, but realistic advice on everything from home ownership to debt consolidation, and she’s especially popular among women viewers.  Perhaps one of her most well-known viewpoints is her aversion to annuities – something you may need to overcoming objections if your prospect is familiar with her show.

But why does Orman dislike annuities?  For the most part, her position stems from the commissions that brokers receive for selling annuities – which, in her opinion, makes them somehow less honest than other investment vehicles.  However, the truth is that annuities really do make sense in some situations, so the key to overcoming objections from Orman is to help your prospect realize that he or she falls into one of these categories.  Let’s look at some of the scenarios where annuities are a good choice:

·         If your income is high and you’ve maxed out your 401K or IRA contributions, annuities may be a good choice.

Realistically, if your prospect is at this income level, he or she probably isn’t too concerned about paying commission fees to secure the additional tax-deferred benefits of an annuity.  Despite Orman’s objections, annuities can play an important role in reducing income tax liability, just like home ownership or other retirement accounts.  There are fees associated with each of these investment vehicles, but in many cases, the costs are largely outweighed by the tax savings they provide.

·         If you prefer a hands-off approach to your finances, paying a broker a commission in exchange for advice on the best annuity for you can be worth the fees.

Many consumers are totally overwhelmed by the thought of choosing from the many investment vehicles and annuity options out there.  In this case, you’re trying to persuade the customer that the trade-off for broker fees is a reduction in the amount of time that needs to be spent managing financial accounts.  Financial advisors across the board charge for their services – if the annuities you sell your client meet their financial needs, you have every right to be compensated for your services.

·         If you need to have a guaranteed return on your money, or if you anticipate needing to withdraw your money early or take out some as a loan, annuities offer better returns and more flexible terms than other investment options.

If you’re dealing with a prospect who wants to invest for the future, but is uncomfortable with the thought of that money being tied up until a certain age – as with 401Ks and IRAs – certain annuities offer shorter surrender periods that can be very appealing.  Alternatively, if you have a client who’s wary about investing in this economy, or who has lost significant money in the stock market, they may appreciate the security of investing in annuities.  At the end of the day, it’s up to you to prove to your prospects that annuities are the best investment options for their needs, regardless of what any talking heads in the financial industry say.  If you can do this well and master overcoming objections, you’re on your way to success in the annuity business.

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