The Closing Ratio is Queen

If cash flow is king, then selling, or the closing ratio, is queen. This is just one example of simplicity and the need for clarity in small business management. Stay focused on what matters to your agency and keep it as simple as possible. Don't complicate things; considering life is complicated enough, why would any small business owner want to make things worse for themselves?

Start first by resisting the urge to do everything. Keep to the basics and be flawless at the essentials when it comes to running an agency.

Football legend and National Football Hall of Fame coach, Vince Lombardi, is reported to have held up high a football saying the following to his recruits and returning veterans on the first day of football practice every year before the regular season opened; “Gentleman, this is a football.”

What a strange thing to have said to these men; many of whom were living football legends in their own right, professionals who had dedicated their lives to the perfection of their craft, who had sacrificed their bodies and their hearts and minds for years in the pursuit of excellence and sporting greatness .

Of course, these men knew that what he held high in his hand was a football. But that wasn’t what Vince Lombardi was trying to say. What he was reminding them all, rookie and veteran alike, is that success is a simple matter.

He was reminding all of them, and you and me today, that the road to success and glory isn’t some secret or privilege reserved for the few or some special class of people. Success is about being great at the basics and in keeping things simple.

Football is about blocking, tackling, running and passing the ball. Beyond these basic principles, there isn’t much more to the game of football that the mind cannot overcome. His charge to his players was as genius as it was simple at the start of every season; keep it simple by being great at the basics.

We can take a lesson from his approach. In our profession, selling insurance and financial services products, our great need is to embrace simplicity, to keep things simple and resist the urge to do it all…right now.

Like football where the team that blocks best, tackles best, runs best and passes the football best is usually the winner; the agent, or agency, that runs an effective organization best, markets best, and sells best…wins.

It doesn’t get any more complicated than that.

Be great at the basics. Focus on what is important to success and don’t try to boil the ocean.


Copyright © 2010 - Tony Cefalu