• What is Needs-Based Selling?
• How is FamNeeds™ different from other programs?
• Who should own this product?
• How does FamNeeds help me sell?
• What obstacles does FamNeeds help me overcome?
• What type of clients is this program geared for?
• What is the role of the agent in the FamNeeds process?
• Is FamNeeds easy to use?
• Is FamNeeds cost effective?

Q: What is Needs-Based Selling?

A: There are many excellent books available on the subject of needs-based selling, and a full discussion of this topic is beyond the scope of this page. However, needs-based selling can be generally defined as an approach where the clients’ overall financial needs are defined and analyzed. 

Based on the results, a plan is developed that meets those specific needs. Needs selling has been described as a three step process not unlike a photographer's session with a wedding party.

Step One: The photographer asks for help identifying who and what is important, and snapshots are taken.  (The fact-finding session)

Step Two: The pictures are developed.  (Analysis of fact-finding session)

Step Three: Clients choose the best shots.  (Presentation-Closing)

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Q: How is FamNeeds different from other programs?

A: FamNeeds is different from other planning software in that it was designed for optimal performance when carrying out a market specific task. FamNeeds is a specialist where others are general practitioners. That's why it is so easy to use and so powerful a closer of business in its target market. Software that attempts to do everything becomes too complex and unwieldy for easy use by the agent and even more so for the client to understand.

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FamNeeds  is designed for the needs-selling professional with any level of computer abilities or sales experience.

The product is designed with both the beginning agent and experienced professional in mind. It includes:

• a complete sales track to assist agents with the presentation
• the capability to use either the mouse or simple keyboard commands
• easy to follow instructions in a manual with

  • lessons in operating the program

  • a script to integrate the program with established fact-finding methods

  • comprehensive reports with detailed explanations of all fields and calculations

  • digitized 40 minute video mini-training seminar on CD

This software is designed for agents who:

• call on clients in the field with a laptop computer
• receive clients in the office for fact-finding interviews using a desktop computer
• use paper forms for interview sessions

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Q: How does FamNeeds Help me sell?

A: FamNeeds builds-in the “close” from the beginning. The client’s plan develops graphically before his eyes, as he enters information. He can literally “see the need” and the necessity for a solution. In addition, FamNeeds is designed to help you in the following areas:

FamNeeds encourages agents to prospect in the needs-rich families with dependent children environment for several reasons. First, the FamNeeds sales track was specifically designed for these types of clients, and second, is very successful in involving them in the fact-finding process. 

• Asking All the Right Questions: If you want to earn the client's respect, you must do it by thoroughness. FamNeeds eliminates the possibility of an agent's neglecting any portion of the fact-finder. A very subtle "on screen" sales track walks the agent through the complete script of the interview. The FamNeeds sales track runs the same way every time, automating the questions and making sure that you never miss an answer. Questions cannot be asked out of order, or forgotten. The sales track replaces the “canned” talk agents are often forced to memorize. At any time, however, the agent can simply stop the sales track to review or clarify a point, and then automatically pick up the track again, exactly where he left off.

• FamNeeds begins by involving the client:  The agent turns over control of the mouse or keyboard to the client, and assumes the role of “helper”. This creates a natural path toward building trust in the agent.  As the client draws his own plan he becomes involved in the process, and feelings of self-consciousness or tension are eliminated. The agent's attention can be directed toward the client, allowing him to recognize and acknowledge signals that might otherwise be overlooked.

• FamNeeds identifies the True Needs and Wants:  The key to a sale is the identification of what the client wants to do, and what he cannot get along without.  It eliminates the temptation to allow the client to claim a need which includes many “extras” or supports a somewhat luxurious lifestyle. The FamNeeds system is designed to zero in on the family's actual bare-bones needs, placing emphasis on identifying an amount which they can agree is the least that will sustain them and that they cannot get along without.  Once this consensus is reached, the sale has actually been made.

• Verifying the Margin: This is an often-neglected, but critical area. FamNeeds incorporates questions in its sales track to help you verify “up front” how much is available to fund the plan, and how much the client is willing to allocate. Helping your clients be realistic, and offering them options they can afford will not only result in more sales, but also pave the way to future business as their incomes increase.

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Q: What obstacles does FamNeeds help me overcome?

A: FamNeeds helps you overcome commonly encountered situations in needs-based selling that can result in no sale. Briefly, they are:

No need exists: often the result of poor prospecting. Unfortunately, many agents spend too much time trying to sell in a “less needs rich” situation. More sales are made when you start the process by prospecting correctly. Look where there are the most needs, and where it’s hardest to elect alternatives to the Life Insurance solution. Those places exist within the “married with children” portion of the market for which FamNeeds is especially designed.

Client did not disclose his actual need: This situation can arise from a number of causes: 

1)Interview not complete enough to reveal the need.

2)Agent failed to establish trust and eliminate tension. 

3)Agent not attentive enough to pick up verbal and visual cues from the client that would have led the discussion into areas that needed to be explored. or 

4)Client did not get actively involved in the fact-finding process.

FamNeeds automates all of the above in its basic design.

Client resists providing for the need: This usually occurs when the agent fails to establish the need amount at the level of a bare-bones necessity. If the actual need is not established during the fact-finder, it is not a “need,” but only a “wish.” The client will not accept it as the amount which must be funded, feeling that although he would like to have a certain amount, he can “get along” on less. (This eliminates the client’s most urgent motivation for finding an immediate solution and taking action.)

No margin is available to fund a solution: The amount of money left after spending on the client’s monthly “cost of living” is the key source for funding the solutions. It is vital to verify the amount available for funding a plan, and to respond with a plan that fits the client’s budget.

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Q: What type of clients is this program geared for?

A: A necessary first step to successful use of FamNeeds lies in correctly choosing prospective clients. This presentation works best where a young couple, or single parent has begun to consider how they will provide for the education of their children, or the financial security of their growing family, in the event of the premature death or disability of one, or both partners.

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A: The role of the agent (alone, or together with the aid of a supervisor) in the FamNeeds process is to use his/her professional knowledge of the products and to develop solutions to the problems that fit the clients budget, as shown on the FamNeeds report to the client.

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Q: Is FamNeeds easy to use?

A: Absolutely, in fact it's difficult to make a mistake. Wrong answers are instantly noticed and corrected due to the graphic "real time" visual image feedback of the Client's answers. Even "how questions are asked" is prompted on screen with the right emphasis on the psychology of the wording. Such expressions as, "if you die tomorrow" become, ``if something had happened to you yesterday, which of course it didn't... Or, you didn't understand" changes to, "perhaps I haven't made myself clear".

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Q: Is FamNeeds cost effective?

Do you think that a dollar a day is a reasonable price for tools that can gain you entrance to the MDRT? Earn thousands of dollars a year for you, and place you in your company's top achievers club, as well as provide you with an endless chain of qualified referred leads that do not require hours of telephoning to get. If your answer is yes, then start making money and prove to yourself how easy it can be using the power of FamNeeds. Take advantage of our Trial Offer now!

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