Practical pointers; various phases of field work discussed in a manner designed to afford aid and suggestion to the man with the rate book

Foreword

IN my previous books, "Efficiency" and "The Psychology of a Sale," I have presented condensed statements of the fundamental principles of Life Insurance Salesmanship, with the design of furnishing a sound foundation for field work. The present volume is intended to supplement the former in rounding out the education of the agent.

"Practical Pointers" treats essential phases of the Life Insurance agent's business. It is an aid to self-improvement and increased efficiency. The directions given are thoroughly practical and have been extensively tested in successful agencies. In my personal observation scores of common-place agents have developed into first-class salesmen through the adoption of the principles and practices advocated in these pages. I have no hesitancy in affirming that, by this means alone, the majority of Life Insurance agents may increase their productiveness from fifty to one hundred per cent in the course of a year.

Someone has said : "Men of achievement are not so often those of the greatest intellect or ability, as those who turn their knowledge and talent to the best account." Experience proves that in our business the agent who enjoys exceptional natural gifts is frequently surpassed by one of ordinary parts, who makes the most of his limited ability. The principal purpose of the following papers is to point out practical methods by means of which the average Life Insurance fieldman

iii may enhance his efficiency and increase his bank account.

It is believed that managers and superintendents of agents will find this volume of service in supplying subject matter for agency "talks." The greater part of the material has, in fact, been so used with results that encourage me to recommend it to others charged with the duty of instructing fieldmen.

IV

Contents

PAGE

Chapter I

Efficiency — Definition of Efficiency — Demand for Efficiency — Methods of Efficiency — System as an Essential to Efficiency : . 1

CHAPTER II The Efficient Agent — Description of the High-Type Life Insurance Agent — Qualifications and Conditions Fundamental to Attainment of Efficiency — Essential Elements of Success. . . 4

CHAPTER III Life Insurance as a Vocation — Latter-day Standards of Qualification — Demands and Rewards of the Business — Methods of Securing Permanent Success. . 10

CHAPTER IV

To the Beginner — A Brief Expression of

Advice and Encouragement. . . 13

CHAPTER V Purpose — Absolute Necessity of a Definite Aim — The Stimulus of Ambition — Going Forward Step by Step. . . 16

CHAPTER VI That Blockhead Word — Nothing is Impossible — The Force of Determination — A Practical Resolution Suggested. . 19

CHAPTER VII page

Habit — Its Force and Effect on Character — Some Desirable Business Habits — The Value of Forming Good Habits and Suppressing Bad Ones. ... 22

CHAPTER VIII System — Its Place as a Factor of Success — The Essential Elements of an Efficient System — Practical Suggestions for the Agent — System Should be Simple. . 25

CHAPTER IX

Prospects — 1. Where to Look for Prospects — The Straight Canvass as a Source of Supply. 2. Definite Standards for Gauging Prospects — Utilizing Policyholders — Various Methods of Finding Prospects — 3. The Use of Form Letters and How to Make Them Effective — 4. Specimen Form Letters Which Have Been Successful — 5. Testing Prospects and Eliminating Deadwood — Closing at the First Interview 29

CHAPTER X Policy Illustrations — The Disadvantages of Using Policy Illustrations — How to Avoid Their Use — The Forcefulness of Personal Presentation 48

CHAPTER XI

Competition — The Faults of the Novice —

How to Treat Competition — Mistakes

to be Avoided — Tactful Side-Stepping

— Hints as to Conduct in Competition —

Difficulties and Dangers in Using Ratios. 52

CHAPTER XII

Delivering the Policy — Duties Involved in It and Opportunities Afforded by It — vi

When to Make a Detailed Explanation page of the Contract — How to Secure Extra Issues — Forestalling the Twister. . 58

CHAPTER XIII

Settlements — Getting Paid for the Business — Three Favorable Occasions for Securing a Satisfactory Settlement — Argument for Cash with Application — How to Make the Business Renew. . 62

CHAPTER XIV

The Blues — Typical Temperament of the Salesman — Worry and Anxiety to be Avoided — Remedies for the Blues — Rewards of Salesmanship. GQ

CHAPTER XV

The Viewpoint — The Dignity and Nobility of Our Business — Life Insurance as a Vocation for the Young Man — Why More do not Succeed — The Proper Mental Attitude 70

CHAPTER XVI

Waste. Waste of Time — Causes of Waste Time and How to Remedy Them — Waste of Words — How to Economize Speech and Make it 'Effective — Putting Thought Behind Words — Excessive Verbiage Creates Confusion — Waste of Energy — Importance of Conserving Energy — Ways in Which Energy is Wasted 73

CHAPTER XVII

Sentiment in Business — Its Presence Often Unsuspected — Can be Made a Factor in Securing Our Object — Tact Necessary in Appealing to Sentiment. . . 83 vii

CHAPTER XVIII page

Pointed Policy Presentation — How to Convey a Clear-cut Definite Idea — The Principle of the Concentrated Appeal — The Method That Makes the Strongest Impression 86

CHAPTER XIX Luck — Its Nature and Common Delusions Regarding It — Good Fortune is Invariably the Result of Preparation — Good Work the Surest Way to Command Good Luck 90

CHAPTER XX After Hours — The Value of Leisure Time — Why the Salesman Needs to be Careful of His Spare Time — Some Suggestions for Turning After Hours to Good Account 94

CHAPTER XXI Telling Talk — 1. Quality of Work More Important Than Quantity — Simple Rules for the Use of Speech — The Essential of Telling Talk — Mental Preparedness the Basis of Effectiveness — 2. Ideas, not Words, the Important Thing — Methods of Making the Policy Presentation Interesting — 3. The Salesman's Talk Must Have a Definite Purpose Behind It. Finding Out What Will Interest the Prospect — Conditions Necessary to a Successful Canvass — 4. Pointed Talk in the Approach — How to Overcome Excuses — Creating Interest by Curiosity and Suggestion — 5. Talk Derives Force From Feeling — Simplicity in Stating the Proposition — Proper Regard for the Prospect's Interests — The Mental Attitude Will Determine the Effect of Talk. ....... 100

viii

CHAPTER I EFFICIENCY

THE object of these papers is to promote what should be the chief desire of every Life Insurance agent, — the desire to increase his efficiency. It will be well, therefore to begin with a brief general discussion of Efficiency.

Efficiency is the ability to do things effectually, it is the essence of success. Efficiency is fitness, ■ — adequacy. It is the justification of endeavor. If you can not do a thing efficiently, there is no excuse for doing it at all.

In this day the highest Efficiency is demanded in mechanical and human service. Poor work will not be tolerated in man or machine. Our particular business affords evidence of this. The companies and the public require a considerable degree of knowledge and ability in the Life Insurance agent, and the more capable he is, the greater recognition he receives in patronage and promotion. The time is fast approaching when there will be no place in our business for the inefficient man.

There is one road to success in any vocation. It is Efficiency. It is open to every man who realizes the need for self-improvement and is willing to make the necessary effort. The only obstructions to advance on this highway are cranial elephantiasis and hypertrophy of the ego. The man who is self -sufficient and omniscient must be allowed to "gang his ain gait to the deil."

There is no man of ordinary physical and mental calibre but can become a first-class Life Insurance agent if he will. It may take years of hard work and diligent application. More than anything else it will require incessant effort in the direction of increased Efficiency. But a rich result will surely follow honest endeavor.

The ranks of Life Insurance solicitors are filled with mediocre men. The "hundred thousand dollar" class seems to be the limit of attainment with the majority. This is because they cease to aim at self-improvement after acquiring the ability to earn a modest livelihood.

Just as soon as a man relaxes the effort to increase in Efficiency, interest in his business begins to wane. He gradually falls into a rut and becomes a common drudge. His work is twice as hard as it need be and not half as profitable as it might be.

Is it worth while to master a business which will secure to you complete independence — a business in which the demand for high class men is infinitely greater than the supply? Are you willing to devote five or six years of constant endeavor to that object? If so, you may be assured of ultimate success.

Now as to methods of Efficiency. The first and most important is the formation of correct habits of work. In order to do this you must adopt certain broad principles and the details of your business must be regulated by certain fixed rules.

The mechanical inventor first makes sure that his engine is sound in its basic construction.

EFFICIENCY 3

Then he improves it with a view to producing the utmost Efficiency. He knows that if there is any flaw in the fundamental features, the dynamic results will disappoint his calculations sooner or later.

So you must be sure of your foundation before you proceed to make your methods more effective. I shall offer you a basis on which may be built a structure of efficient personal habits and business practises. Suggestions for the formation of these will also be given. Nothing will be proposed to you but what is perfectly practicable, nor anything but what has stood the test of exhaustive trial.

The general aids to Efficiency embrace every kind of improvement of which you are capable. Mental and physical culture, all sorts of accomplishments and every variety of knowledge, are such aids.

The specific aids to Efficiency are theoretical and practical knowledge of our business. When you turn this information to account in your field work its value will be measurable in money.

System in your business is essential to Efficiency. The former will be greatly promoted by the use of the card index and the "Time Record." The adoption of these helps has been known to increase production from 50 to 100 per cent in numerous instances and I doubt if any man selling insurance would fail to derive appreciable benefit from their use.

Chapter II The Efficient Agent

THE high-type Life Insurance Agent of todayhas a broad view of his business and a sense of its responsibilities. He realizes that the estimate of his company entertained in the community depends mainly upon the impression created by himself as its representative. He is no longer a mere salesman, actuated solely by the desire to secure commissions. He performs the role of expert adviser to prospect and policy-holder, and accepts the obligation of Efficiency entailed by that position. As an exponent of the principles of Life Insurance and a supporter of the Institution of Life Insurance he appreciates the beneficial effects of competition and respects the rights of his competitor. His conception of Life Insurance leads him to see in it opportunity, not for a job, but for a career.

This elevated attitude of the Agent toward his business is reflected in the general attitude toward the Agent. He is now welcomed where formerly he was tolerated, at best. He is now the subject of confidence where formerly he was the object of suspicion. The insuring public is beginning to look upon him as an important factor in social and commercial economics, and to treat him with the degree of trust and respect accorded to the lawyer and the physician.

The extent to which this regard for the Life Insurance Agent is enjoyed in any particular

4>

THE EFFICIENT AGENT 5

case must depend upon the character and efficiency of the individual. You may qualify yourself to exert a wide and strong influence in your community. You may become the counselor and authority in Life Insurance matters to a numerous clientele. At the same time you may promote the general interests of your profession by aiding in the important work of educating the people.

The attainment of Efficiency by you depends upon certain fundamental qualifications and conditions which we will now proceed to discuss.

It is essential that you should be possessed by a serious purpose and an adequate sense of the dignity of your business. In the present age salesmanship is recognized as a profession, and Life Insurance as the highest and most lucrative branch of it. It affords scope for all the talents that a man may bring to bear upon it. Its rewards are practically unlimited. Its achievements entail a satisfaction which can not be derived from selling goods or cultivating land. There is no calling in which a man's work is more productive of benefit to his fellows than it is in Life Insurance, honestly and industriously pursued.

The spirit in which you prosecute your business must be one of whole-hearted devotion to your work and determination to make yourself as efficient as possible in it. This is a matter of creating the right mood or attitude and maintaining it habitually. The papers which follow will assist you in doing so.

Efficiency is the quality of fitness and the ability to do things rightly and adequately.

Though we have long striven for mechanical Efficiency in the machinery and appliances employed in the industries, it is only within comparatively recent years that attention has been paid to the Efficiency of the human factor.

The first discovery in this connection was that the average man does not exceed 60 per cent of his potential Efficiency in his work. It was then ascertained that, with scientific training, the Efficiency of an average individual may be increased to a degree approximating 100 per cent of the possible. And finally came the realization that the efficient man has more practical ability than an inefficient man of greater natural talent. That is to say, a man of mediocre qualities who knows how to turn them to full account is a more effective workman than another of much greater qualities who does not know how to apply them.

The latter-day demand of the public for increased and better service has stimulated Efficiency in every direction, but especially in that of salesmanship. The old crude methods of selling passed away with the drummer whose worth was measured by his ability to "mix" and his capacity for liquor. Today, salesmanship is reduced to a science and an art. To make his mark in it one must be a man of exceptional parts. The salesman is the most valued man in the commercial community. The demand for his class is greatly in excess of the supply.

ESSENTIAL ELEMENTS OF SUCCESS

So many elements go to make up the Efficient Salesman that, although we shall touch on most of them in the course of these papers, we may at present consider only those which are essentials, — those without which he cannot hope for any considerable degree of success.

Success in salesmanship is impossible without a foundation consisting of thorough knowledge of

THE EFFICIENT AGENT 7

the goods, belief in their excellence and confidence in the concern putting them out.

This foundation should be built on lines broad enough to embrace all the interests affected by the operations of a sale. The salesman who has no thought beyond his commissions is not superior to a peddler. He will have developed into an Efficient Salesman only when his consideration extends to the interests of his employer and of the purchaser.

If you would become an efficient agent of your company you must saturate yourself with the conviction that there is no better company nor any better contracts than its. You must know its special points of excellence and be familiar with its policies. You must have that pride in your Company that will prompt you to guard its prestige jealously, and that sense of affiliation with it that will lead you to promote its interests energetically. You must entertain a feeling of loyalty toward your manager and a genuine regard for the welfare of the agency of which you are a member. You must have a full appreciation of your obligations to prospect and policyholder, and rigidly perform them.

Acquire this attitude — work in this spirit — and you need have no concern for your own interests. They will flourish as surely as grass will grow on watered ground.

Be square — not merely honest, but strictly fair and just. You can create no more valuable asset in your business than a well-founded reputation for integrity and square-dealing.

Life Insurance has been truthfully described as "the best paid kind of hard work in the world." Success will require the exercise of energy, but you may be sure of ample reward for every hour of earnest and intelligent effort.

Cultivate earnestness. It will afford you motive power and give you balance. Let earnestness characterize your work. Maintain an earnest interest in Life Insurance and everything pertaining to it. Join your local Life Underwriters' Association and take an earnest part in its proceedings. Make an earnest resolve to embrace every opportunity of increasing your efficiency as a Life Insurance Agent.

Confidence is essential to the end you have in view. You must believe in yourself and count on success as an ultimate certainty. If you have confidence you will not lack perseverance. Without it your progress will be uncertain and by stumbling steps. You must be confident of yourself before you can influence others, and nothing will beget in you this feeling more surely than honesty of purpose, consciousness of ability and conviction of the worth of the thing you have to sell.

ABOVE ALL THINGS,— BE THOROUGH!

Be thorough. Whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing well — is, in fact, worth doing as well as you can possibly do it. Genius has been described as "the faculty of taking infinite pains." The man who is faithful in the performance of details may safely be entrusted with the greater tasks. Precision in minutiae is the very essence of Efficiency. The mathematician's minor calculations must be correct; the logician's premises must be sound; the mechanic's adjustments must be perfect; the artist's hair lines must be true; otherwise the final result will not represent Efficiency. And so, the salesman who is painstaking and conscientious in the least of his processes is he whose efforts are most effective in promoting his own interests and whose services are most satisfactory to his employer and to his patrons.

THE EFFICIENT AGENT 9

Efficiency is the faculty of doing things rightly and effectively. It follows, then, that in order to exercise this faculty we must be, ourselves, fit and equal to the demands of our task.

The mechanic who would neglect to keep his drill or his lathe in good order could not produce high grade work. The machine which the salesman employs is composed of his body and his brain. He must develop these to their utmost capacity and maintain them in a constant condition of fitness, if he would be Efficient.

This desideratum depends upon fixed habits of living, founded on correct principles. These habits must embrace such matters as exercise, food, sleep, and mental occupation. No man may hope to be efficient unless he has a healthy mind in a sound body. These form the bases of attractive and forceful personality.

This is an age of keen competition and expert service. The salesman who would make a marked success must be master of his business. In order to break through the ruck and gain a position in the van, a man needs to be a specialist. These requirements demand that a salesman stick to one particular line of business — better still, to the service of one concern. He must devote himself whole-heartedly to learning all that he can about his line, and he may never cease in this process of self-education if he wishes to keep pace with the procession. The ranks are filled by mediocre salesmen because the majority abate their efforts at improvement as soon as they have attained a moderate degree of Efficiency. Most of these men are not barred from higher stages of skill by lack of ability, but by lack of persistency.

Make Efficiency your lode-star ! Aim at it constantly ! Strive for it tirelessly ! Every step you take toward it will bring you nearer to success as a salesman.

Chapter III Life Insurance As A Vocation

THE man who treats the Life Insurance business as a makeshift and a field of temporary employment should not expect to get a great deal out of it. Nor will it yield much to the "part-time" agent, unless he is moved by the serious purpose of making it his sole occupation as soon as practicable. This is addressed to men who are considering the adoption of our business as a vocation and to those who not long since entered upon it as a career.

Now-a-days the companies and the public demand Efficiency in the Life Insurance Agent. In order to achieve any considerable degree of success he must take his business as seriously as he would the pursuit of one of the learned professions. Whatever natural talents he may bring to bear upon it will give him an advantage, but his ultimate success must depend upon technical knowledge and training, — upon the attainment of business Efficiency. Somewhat tardily perhaps, the companies are beginning to recognize this truth. A number of the most enterprising now give their agents courses of instruction, a measure which will be universally adopted at no distant day.

While Life Insurance salesmanship presents a splendid field of endeavor to the man of exceptional parts, it offers to the man of ordinary ability and education a better opening than he can find in any other business. There is no calling in which the returns for labor are so sure or so great in proportion to the effort.

LIFE INSURANCE AS A VOCATION 11

Is there any other business or profession, of equal dignity, which you may enter without expense for training or stock in trade? Here you are furnished with office facilities and all the material necessary to your work, absolutely free. You have the standing and influence that arise from the representation of one of the leading corporations of your country. You may do a business netting you $5,000 in a year — or $10,000, for that matter — without any cash outlay on your part. The sole investment that you are called upon to make is time and energy.

Furthermore, Life Insurance affords you an extraordinary opportunity to build up a permanent business. In contrast to almost all other branches of trade and finance, a sale binds a customer to you for life, or for a long term of years. Under a renewal contract the effect of your work is cumulative. Each year's commissions, whilst producing a present profit, contribute to a constant increment. With moderate success for eight or ten years you will be assured of an income sufficient to sustain you comfortably, irrespective of the returns of your future work.

It is of the utmost importance that you plan the constant upbuilding of your business on a permanent basis. A little extra pains in your present work will produce great future results. Aim to make each of your policyholders a satisfied client and a personal friend. Embrace every opportunity to extend your acquaintanceship among the better class of citizens. Exert some influence in your community by taking part in civic movements, but beware of allowing yourself to be placed in a strongly partisan position. You will derive moral gratification and material profit from the expenditure of a reasonable amount of money and time on altruistic objects. Above all, strive to establish a deserved reputation for probity, reliability, good-nature and business ability.

A large proportion of men who engage in business fail. Few reach prosperity and maintain it to the end of life. Many, who make fortunes in their best days, lose all in their waning years. You need have no apprehensions of bankruptcy or loss. The market for your goods is stable, with a constantly growing demand. Has the surgeon or lawyer any such prospect? On the contrary, he usually strives for five or six years before his living expenses are covered by his fees. And when his hand begins to lose its cunning or his brain its vigor, his income begins to diminish.

Life Insurance is not without its difficulties. If it were, the ranks of solicitors would be crowded with incompetents, and the remuneration would be no more than commensurate with the ease of the work.

In the first place, Life Insurance is a technical business. You must master its principles and practice. You should be willing to devote as much effort to developing Efficiency as you would if engaged in a profession. The attorney or the physician cannot progress far or fast on the increase of skill acquired exclusively from experience. It is no less necessary for the Life Insurance agent to study and gather knowledge from every available source.

Chapter IV To The Beginner

EVEN though we term Life Insurance a business, that branch of it which pertains to the direct educating of the public and the soliciting of applications may properly be called a profession, and is quite generally beginning to be recognized as such. Estimated by its beneficent effects and by the ethical standards maintained in it, Life Insurance Salesmanship ranks with the highest professions, — those of the Ministry, the Law, and Medicine.

This is the vocation which you have chosen. It is no easy walk in life. If it were, its ranks would be crowded with loafers and incompetents. Life Insurance Salesmanship has been described as "the best paid hard work in the world." Success in it demands extraordinary effort and the possession or acquisition of extraordinary qualities. But in no field of endeavor are the rewards so great or so certain as in this. From bottom to top the rungs of the ladder are broad enough to afford footing to every man who will exercise sufficient strength and agility to climb them. There is no competition or struggle for place. Forty-nine in every fifty men admitted to the Bar or the practice of Medicine are doomed to comparative failure by reason of the limitation of their field of activity. Yours is boundless. Every agent carrying a Rate Book might write $200,000 yearly and leave scope for the operation of many more. The opportunity for the Life Insurance solicitor is practically limitless.

If we were asked what single business experience or qualification is the most valuable to its possessor, we would unhesitatingly reply — Salesmanship.

You are learning this science in its highest form and in the best school. The knowledge and experience which you acquire in the practice of selling Life Insurance will prove a valuable asset to you through after life whether you continue in your present line of work or not. Without special education you could not have chosen any calling which would have offered you equal opportunities, facilities and rewards. Earnest, persistent effort, directed toward Efficiency will bring rich results.

In the entire range of business activity is there any field that presents so vast and varied opportunity to the individual as does the business of Life Insurance? Darwin P. Kingsley, George W. Perkins and Danford M. Baker are living examples of its possibilities. To paraphrase Napoleon's oft-quoted saying anent the marshal's baton: "Every fieldman carries a president's position in his hip pocket." The Rate Book has been the stepping stone to wealth and place for thousands.

Do you appreciate the opportunities of your present field of labor? Are you completely utilizing them ? Are you making the most of your personal powers? Are you turning your time to the fullest account ?

The responsibility rests with yourself. The issue depends upon your capacity and industry rather than upon our position and environment. The latter, no matter how favorable, are worthless unless the

TO THE BEGINNER 15

former are applied to them. On the other hand, the largest success may be attained by energy and perseverance, despite the heaviest handicaps.

In the business of Life Insurance there is no royal road to success — no short cut — no easy path. As in any line of worthy endeavor, a man must work hard, must plan intelligently, must persist courageously.

Chapter V Purpose

IMAGINE a ship without a compass. It may have high power engines and every other facility for navigation and yet ply hither and thither about the seas forever, like Vanderdeken's phantom craft, without making port. Now and again it may derive some direction from the fixed stars, the rising sun, or a distant landfall, but what it gains in headway at such times will be lost in leeway at others for lack of permanent guidance.

A man without a purpose is in the plight of a vessel without a compass. He may have the capacity for great achievement and accomplish nothing. His fluctuating course will be marked by alternating stages of forward progress and drifting backward. He will have spurts of energy and fits of enthusiasm, only to be neutralized by spells of vacillation and stagnation.

The most energetic efforts must prove futile unless inspired by definite aim. Just as the men who spend the most money frequently do the least good with it, so the busiest man is often the weakest in execution. Napoleon, whose capacity for effective action was almost superhuman, attributed this great power to the habit of always having his mind made up — of constantly keeping a precise purpose before his view. I believe that it was Landseer — the wonderful animal painter — who said that the production of a picture would occupy little time if the artist