3 Marketing Mistakes to Skip

Don't sell insurance. Don't sell financial planning Don't sell investments.

And here are three other sales and marketing mistakes to avoid…

1. Selling Drills

Selling these is the first marketing mistake and one of the biggest.

You're selling the tools, not the results your prospects and clients want.

When someone goes to the hardware store to buy a drill, he doesn't need a drill. He needs to make a hole.

Selling the drill's features won't work as well as selling the way to make a perfect hole.

Stop selling drills. Sell the results people want:

Protecting their families from financial ruin.
Having a worry-free retirement.
Having a way to make money without all the hard work.
Having a way to pay less in taxes in retirement.

2. Selling Everything

A second big marketing mistake is having a vague niche that encompasses everyone and everything.

"I work with families and businesses to help them with all their financial needs" is not a niche, and it will not make you appear to be different than every other financial and insurance professional in your community.

Yet, when I look at advisors' LinkedIn profiles, I see some variation of this from hundreds of them who think they're differentiating themselves from other advisors.

People want a specific solution, designed for them, to address their specific problem.

They want an expert.

And, interestingly enough, there's a great deal of proof out there that suggests you become more attractive to people who are not in your niche when they perceive you as an expert for someone else.

3. Selling Something Meh

A third marketing mistake is not having an "Easy Yes" offer that sets you apart.

"Helping people plan for their future" is not an offer.

Talking about LEAP or Infinite Banking or being a CFP is not going to win you enough of the clients you want.

You need to create an offer that makes the right prospect feel stupid if he turns you down.

Here's an example: "If, like me, you're concerned that your children might be stuck paying for your care if you end up in an assisted living facility and run out of money, let's set up a time to talk."

If you're talking with someone who's concerned about that, how foolish would that individual feel to say, "No, I don't want to talk about solving this problem"?

If you're talking with someone who's concerned about the taxes that will come due in retirement, you might say something like this: "If you believe, as I do, that paying more taxes in retirement than you pay while you're working is a likely, but unhappy possibility, let's set up a time to talk so that I can show you a way to prevent that, using the Internal Revenue Service's own rules."

Could you see someone with that concern saying, "No thanks. I'll just deal with it when the time comes"?

That's not likely to happen. This means, of course, that some people won't be a good fit: "I don't mind paying taxes, whatever they are. It's my civic duty."

That's not a fit.

Have an ideal client and a result you can offer that client.

The tool might be financial planning or insurance, but what you sell is the result they want.

And know how to tell those ideal clients why you are the only one they should be talking to about this.

Sandy Schussel is a coach and practice development consultant for insurance and financial professionals. He has served as an MDRT Academy trainer, is on the faculty of the InsuranceProShop and is a preferred mentor with InsuranceWebX. He has served as the national sales training director for a broker-dealer and life insurance company. He is the author of two books, The High Diving Board, about overcoming fear and Become A Client Magnet, about attracting and keeping clients. Schussel's scheduling calendar is available here.