Grow Sales With Valuations
If you want to sell more life insurance to business owners, consider using business valuations as your “foot in the door”. SPARDATA , a leading national business appraisal expert, offers advisors a process to attract business owners, understand their financial needs, and successfully market investments, insurance, legal or accounting services or whatever product the advisor sells.
Consider for example how advisors can use business valuations as a conversation starter. Suppose you are an insurance agent and find yourself at a reception standing beside the most successful business owner in town. If you introduced yourself by saying "I am so-and-so, I sell life insurance, want to buy some?", how do you think the owner would react? Very poorly, I'd wager - because everybody knows the best way to turn off prospects is to be perceived as a PRODUCT PUSHER. Nothing turns prospects off faster than a message to the effect that you sell life insurance and you want them to buy some.
A more effective, less threatening opening line is to say to the owner, "I've heard about you. It sounds like you've built a very successful business. Congratulations!" He or she will say "thanks". You continue: "How much do you think your business is worth?" 9 times out of 10 the owner says “I don’t know” – which means the owner is about to become your newest client. To learn how to close this prospect in 30 seconds read Great Conversation Starter on our website.
This approach is completely unthreatening to owners. They respond by perceiving you as a PROBLEM SOLVER, not a product pusher. While it may delay the insurance sale a few weeks, you will be amazed at how much information owners share with you through the valuation process - building trust and confidence in you the entire time. And when the time comes to present the finished valuation to the owner (and make suitable product recommendations), the owner will be highly receptive to your suggestions.
This is just one example of how professionals can use business valuations to build relationships with business owners and expand their practices. Appraisals are much more than just a good opening line however; they can transform the way you market yourself, whether you are a lawyer, CPA or sell financial services. Indeed advisors can double their clientele and their sales by changing the way they think about valuations.
Most advisors raise the subject of valuations with their clients late in the relationship: when the owner is ready to sell the business, or dies, or gets a divorce. In fact the advisor should encourage a valuation at the very start of the relationship. Almost all owners can tell you quite precisely what their houses are worth; what their investment portfolio is worth; what their cars are worth. But when it comes to the biggest item on their balance sheet - their business - they shrug their shoulders. Studies show (and your experience may confirm) most owners have little or no idea what their businesses are worth. Yet "value ignorance" can devastate owners and their families when the owner retires, becomes disabled or dies. As a professional advisor, if you fail to educate your clients about the catastrophic risks of misvaluation, nobody else will. The problem will fester uncorrected -- until it is too late.
If this approach makes sense to you, add a business valuation expert to your team. Be sure to look closely at SPARDATA. SPARDATA is an expert business appraiser. Since 1990 we have prepared over 27,000 valuations of privately-owned businesses and professional practices. We specialize in valuing businesses with sales between $1 million and $40 million, and with from 10 to 300 employees. Our bestselling SPARDATA Reports cost $6,000 and take 6-8 weeks to prepare (or clients may pay a small premium for a rush order completed in 3 weeks or less). About half our clients use our valuations to buy or sell a business; the other half use them for other purposes such as updating a buy-sell agreement, doing succession planning, gifting stock etcetera.
Few business valuation firms have more experience and credibility than SPARDATA . Hundreds of law firms, accounting firms and financial advisory firms use SPARDATA as their business valuation provider; some of the most prominent include New York Life, MassMutual, PNC Bank, Transamerica, MONY and Piper Jaffray. Federal regulatory agencies using SPARDATA include the Internal Revenue Service, the U. S. Department of Labor and the Securities and Exchange Commission.
