Bryan W. Adams
Copyright © 2013 Legacy Safeguard, LLC All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review or scholarly journal. First Printing: 2013 Legacy Safeguard, LLC 2300 Highland Village Road – Suite 300 Highland Village, Texas 75077 www.LegacySafeguard.org Ordering Information: Special discounts are available on quantity purchases by insurance companies, insurance marketing organizations, managing general agencies, associations, and others. For details, contact the publisher address listed above. U.S. trade bookstores and wholesalers please contact Legacy Safeguard: Telephone: 866-903-1827 or Email:
[email protected]
This book is dedicated to: My parents, Allan and Gail Adams, for dedicating over 50 years of their lives to helping people plan for the inevitable and giving dignified service to the families they served through their funeral homes. They taught me the principles of hard work, ethics, integrity and how to put others ahead of myself. They also taught me that anything is possible, and that I could accomplish anything in the world if I set my mind to it. That’s one of the best gifts I’ve ever received, and I can’t wait to pass it on to my kids. To my miracle son, Asher, you inspire me every day! And, to my wife, Robyn, who supports my dreams more than anyone else. I definitely out punted my coverage when I married her!
I would like to extend my appreciation and thanks to our team at Legacy Safeguard and Integrity Marketing Group for making this project a reality. You have supported me through all the blood, sweat, and tears and keep striving to be the best you can every day. I want to personally thank Steven Prince, who takes all of my crazy ideas and makes them become a reality. You’re the smartest and most gifted person I’ve ever met. Thank you for all that you do! I thank the Lord that He placed you in my life and lets us do all of these things together! I would also specifically like to thank Allen Pauley, Lisa Cooke, Kendall Spence, Katy Barr, Aaron Livingston, Mike Froseth, my business partners and all of our marketing team for all of your hard work you put into this project. Without you, this would have never have happened. In addition, I would like to thank all of the incredible insurance companies, and all of our dedicated marketing partners that work with us. I also want to thank all of the tens of thousands of insurance agents that use our service and marketing systems. You are the reason we work so hard to provide tools such as this to help you better serve your clients. You inspire us every day to push harder and stretch farther than I ever thought possible. Please keep letting us know how we can better serve you as you provide these products and services to the community you serve. You make all of this worthwhile!
Bryan W. Adams is the founder and CEO of Legacy Safeguard, LLC a company dedicated with helping members leave a lasting legacy and be remembered long after they’re gone. Bryan is also the Managing Partner for Integrity Marketing Group, LLC which is one of the leading insurance marketing organizations (IMO) with over 35 member IMOs and 105,000 combined insurance agents serving the Senior Market. Bryan is considered one of the nation’s leading experts on final expense planning. His marketing systems have helped thousands of agents successfully provide their clients with over $1 Billion USD of life insurance coverage to help cover their final expenses. He also speaks frequently across the country about the importance of leaving a lasting legacy and final expense planning, and consults with some of the leading insurance companies to help them offer the best products to this market. For speaking requests please email
[email protected].
Introduction ....................................................................................... 13 1. Preseason – Begin with the End in Mind........................................ 17 2. Be a Star Player – Serve Your Clients with Another Major Need . 19 3. Don’t Be One Dimensional – Final Expense Planning is Not Just Funeral Planning .................................................................... 24 4. A Name Everyone Remembers – Don’t Let Your Clients Become a Faceless Name on a Family Tree ................................... 26 5. Regular Season Game Plan – Focus on One Game at a Time ..... 31 6. Preparing to Become a Senior Market Champion – Do This One Thing and Advance to the Postseason..................................... 34 7. The Postseason Begins – First Round Bye Weeks are Not an Advantage for a “Hot” Team ......................................................... 37 8. Get in the Game – Offer Legacy Safeguard to Your Clients ......... 39 9. Run the Option – The Final Expense Life Insurance Products You Need in Your Game Plan ......................................................... 44 10. How to Make Every Day “Game Day” – A Proven Marketing System to Help You be Successful ................................................. 47 11. Unlimited Draft Picks – Legacy Safeguard’s Referral System ... 50 12. Senior Market Champion – Now Get Ready for Next Season ... 56 13. Build a Dynasty – Repeat this Plan Year After Year and Become a Dynasty.......................................................................... 58 14. Postseason Playbook – Your Key to Postseason Success ............ 61
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Growing up I learned two things…we’re all going to die and I love football. Let me explain. I grew up in a small town in West Texas where my parents owned and operated funeral homes. With Adams as a last name and our family owning a chain of funeral homes called Adams Funeral Homes, you have to become accustomed to the “Adams Family” jokes. And yes, I’ve heard them all! I was raised in a really small community where you know everyone and everyone knows you. I was also raised in a time where kids worked. So for my sister and me, we worked in our family funeral home from the time we could open the door and say, “Welcome to Adams Funeral Home.” My time spent in and around the funeral home taught me a lot of valuable life lessons and opened my eyes to the reality of death at a very early age. Most kids don’t have to deal with death very often, other than the death of a pet goldfish, a family dog, or maybe the
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passing of a grandparent, but for me I saw death literally every day. I was always amazed by how many families came into the funeral home and didn’t have any plans in place, leaving a huge burden on their families when the surviving spouse or children had to pay for their mom or dad’s funeral. While I never really wanted to become a funeral director, I did want to help people address this major need that is going to affect all of us one day. Therefore, I got into the final expense life insurance business to help people plan for the inevitable and take care of their final expenses. Along the way, I’ve been fortunate enough to help develop some of the best final expense products in the market and some of the most successful marketing systems with many of the leading life insurance companies in America. Being raised in Texas taught me something else that has also become a lifelong passion of mine. You see, in Texas, FOOTBALL IS KING! For as long as I can remember, I’ve loved all sports. I’ve loved playing them, I love watching them, and I love studying the strategies it takes to become a champion. I really don’t care what
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sport it is. I’ll watch anything…well, except soccer. I’ve never figured that one out, and I hope my kids don’t ever figure it out either because in Texas, there’s only one football. While I really enjoy watching different sports, there’s just something special about football. My favorite time of year is the start of football season! There’s really nothing like it! When I was in high school I did what most young men in Texas do…I played football. Unfortunately, I played on a team that for decades had a tradition of losing. We were the laughing stock of our district, and no one ever took us seriously. We were the team other schools booked for their annual Homecoming game, because those schools knew they would at least get a “W” if they played us. We were perennial losers! By the time I made the varsity team, my teammates and I decided we had had enough! Even though we weren’t the biggest, fastest or the strongest, we had decided that we would do whatever it took to become successful and win our District that year and make it to the Postseason playoffs. This may not sound like a big deal for you, but for Ralls, Texas this had not been done in over 30 years. Plus, our current team wasn’t anything special athletically, so the expectations outside of our locker room were pretty low. That offseason we had a player-only meeting where we discussed what we wanted to be remembered for and what it would take to achieve all of our goals. Our motto became What Ever It Takes! We had T-Shirts made, and we had signs hung all around our weight room
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and locker room to remind us that we would do What Ever It Takes to become champions and make it to the Postseason. That season we went undefeated throughout the entire regular season and went on to win our District, and even our Regional Championship. We pushed into the playoffs where we eventually lost a heart breaker before we could make it to the State Championship game. Along the way, five of us were named to the All-State Team (I was Honorable Mention All-State but I still count it!) and we changed the way our fans expected our team to play. This experience taught me some great life lessons that have helped me throughout my life, including setting goals that stretch you to be more than you can ever imagine. I learned how to follow a game plan, as well as, how to do What Ever It Takes to get you to where you want to be. Now that I’m working in the Senior Market, I realize that there’s a similar need for a successful game plan. I hope this book helps you better understand the need for helping your clients plan for their final expenses. I also hope it helps you develop a successful game plan to get you through the Regular Season, into the Postseason, and on to becoming a Senior Market Champion!
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Begin with the End in Mind Before each season starts, every sports team prepares and practices to make sure that they are ready to do everything they can to be successful during the upcoming season. The coaches meet for months to outline strategies, the players workout to make sure that they are in good shape going into training camp and ready to play at their highest level, and the fans follow their favorite team’s preparation in anxious anticipation for the upcoming season. Everyone is also thinking about what it will take to win a championship this year! Successful people always begin with the end in mind as Stephen R. Covey outlined in his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. As Covey described, “Beginning with the end in mind means to begin each day, task, or project with a clear vision of your desired direction and destination, and then continue by flexing your proactive muscles to make things happen.”
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Beginning with the end in mind for Medicare agents is thinking about what you’re going to do after the Medicare Season ends, so that you can leverage all of the new clients you have served this season and maximize your potential in the Senior Market. As you gear up for this Medicare Season, you need to begin with the end in mind and think not only about the Regular Season (Medicare Advantage Season), but also the Postseason where real champions are crowned! This game plan is all about helping you become a champion in the Senior Market and will focus on how you achieve that once the Regular Season ends and the Postseason begins. If you will use the steps outlined in this game plan, you will not only have a successful Regular Season, but you will also better serve your clients in another major need that they have.
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Serve Your Clients with Another Major Need If you want to be a star player in the Senior Market, then helping your clients with just their Medicare plan is not enough. Seniors have other major needs that need to be addressed, and one of the most obvious needs is planning for their final expenses. Final expense planning is one of the most overlooked pieces of the financial planning puzzle and one that seniors need help with understanding and planning for. Let’s face it, 100% of humans (including your clients) are going to die, and there needs to be a plan in place to help protect their family from the unexpected cost and burden of their final expenses. According to research from the Life Insurance Market Research Association (LIMRA), a surprising number of Americans have no life insurance protection at all and they don’t have an insurance
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agent to go to for help. The following is some interesting research from LIMRA that will show you the opportunity in the final expense market.
Only 44% of U.S. households have individual life insurance. This is a 50 year low!
30% of U.S. households (35 Million households) have no life insurance protection at all1
50% of households (58 million households) say they need more life insurance – the highest level ever1
70% of women and 62% of men believe that life insurance is a necessity and all people should have it2
60% of consumers don’t recall being approached to buy life insurance in the last two years2
8 out of 10 households need basic insurance but do not have an Agent1
A primary reason Americans purchase life insurance is to cover burial and final expenses1
And, seniors are America’s fastest growing market, and they need your help with final expense planning! 1. 2.
LIMRA – Facts about Life 2010 Facts from LIMRA – Life Insurance Awareness Month, September 2012
As an insurance agent who serves the Senior Market, you’re probably scratching your head in disbelief that this is really happening. This research is from the life insurance industry’s leading authority on market research, and it shows that there’s an incredible
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opportunity for agents to better serve their clients with life insurance…especially since so many people need this coverage. LIMRA’s research also found that 78% of life insurance shoppers with previous relationships with their agent bought life insurance when their agent presented it to them.2 According to this research, there is a huge need for agents to present life insurance products to seniors. And, since you’re the trusted advisor to your clients, they are also more likely to buy life insurance from you. All you need to do is present it to them! In addition, we have discovered that when an individual has had to plan for the funeral of a loved one, they realize how important it is to have a plan in place to protect their family. Most of the time, they are completely caught off guard when a death occurs, even if their loved one had been very sick. The family goes down to the local funeral home, and they are shocked at the costs associated with planning a funeral. All too often, the kids are planning the funeral for their parents, and they end up not agreeing on what to do and how to pay for the funeral. Many times they are even forced to pass a hat for everyone to pitch in to help pay the cost of the funeral because the funeral home requires full payment of the funeral before the services occur. This is on top of all the stress, confusion and grief that accompanies the loss of a loved one. Without proper planning, this can really be devastating to a family!
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So what are the chances that your clients have planned a funeral before? Well, let’s do some simple math to figure this out. If your client is 65 years old and their parents were let’s say 30 years old when your client was born, then their parents would be 95 years old today. With the U.S. life expectancy of around 78.3 years of age (U.S. Census Bureau Life Expectancy Study 2010), chances are your clients’ parents have already passed away, and your clients would have been responsible for making their parents’ funeral arrangements. It is just as probable that they also have already planned for their in-laws funeral and maybe even for a sibling or a spouse. Therefore, there is almost a 100% chance that your Senior Market clients have had to personally plan for a funeral before. Because of this, your clients don’t want their family to go through the burden of planning their funeral without the money to pay for it. They know how difficult it was when they went through it themselves, and they want to protect their family from it now. They just need you to bring it up to them!
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In addition, most Americans don’t have adequate savings to pay for retirement, much less their final expenses. Teresa Ghilarducci, a professor of economics at the New School for Social Research, estimates that 75% of Americans nearing retirement in 2010 had less than $30,000 in their retirement accounts. This is a major issue, because many kids think that mom and dad will have the funds to pay for their funeral expenses when that day comes. Considering this research, most people’s parents will be penniless and not have any money, much less any funds to pay for their final expenses.
