Every salesperson or sales agent dreams of becoming a millionaire. This is how one individual became a multi-million dollar insurance salesman.

More than half of recruited insurance agents earn less than $50,000 before making a quick living. So how do you make a million dollars and then more? Especially when your career involves selling insurance? For me it wasn’t about working 70 hours a week. I wasn’t inspired by any get-rich-quick insurance trade magazine article or ad. I don’t recall ever working with millionaire clients. In fact, in my case, it would take many policies to match a million dollar premium collected, let alone the commission earned. I didn’t even receive one of the 90+ insurance designations currently available.

My case involved putting together a formula that you could easily (with effort) mix to achieve similar or superior results. For me the ingredients were made up of four components.

WILLPOWER I need to convince myself that I could achieve the insurance production goals I was setting for myself. To start with, I bought a collection of books on positive thinking. Phrases such as “I can” and “I will do” stand out in them. I repeated these keyword phrases over and over again in my conscious mind and saw a steady and definite improvement in my sales achievements. Good, but not good enough.

Suddenly I was introduced to self-hypnosis and my insurance career instantly changed. This was not some hidden form of hocus-pocus, but pure enrichment that builds and builds. It begins with a client from England who was a professional hypnotist. He was intrigued and agreed to teach me how the subconscious mind automatically overrides the conscious mind. Then he gracefully taught me how to easily hypnotize myself anytime I wanted. I programmed myself for success, and success followed.

SALES SKILLS The so-called sales skills that insurance companies showed me never really improved. I quickly saw that repeating a bad habit is dangerous for your career. Now that my income was increasing, I added another piece of dynamite to hit sales goals faster. If I could double my closing rate, it was easy to see my income double.

I invested in the Dale Carnegie course for salespeople. During this course I learned the steps that must be properly covered if a sale is to be expected. What I didn’t expect was the announcement that passing the course required covering all the points in a presentation of two minutes or less. This is when I resurfaced a trait, I wasn’t using it enough.

DETERMINATION I set a goal that exceeded just passing the course. Although there were about 25 people taking the course, he was determined. Not only was I going to pass, but my presentation would be voted the best out of my 2 dozen professional salespeople. Needless to say, it took willpower, sales skills, and a lot of determination. Winning gave me a feeling of floating on high. After this I felt I could sell snow to an Eskimo.

WITHOUT FEAR I must admit that when I started selling insurance I was full of fears. He took the first 3 ingredients and one more step to prove to myself that I was now fearless. I had to do what few before me financially managed to attempt. That was making sales, breaking established rules, and doing what the “experts” thought only fools would do. I would trade my briefcase for a folder and a yellow pad. My suit and tie would be reserved for funerals, and my dress code would be neat but casual. Now I was ready for my test of not being afraid.

Without scheduling a single appointment, I opted to knock on a prospect’s door and make a simple presentation. I also programmed myself to act casually, using a “well, maybe you can’t afford it” approach if I had a final objection. I knew that most prospects have their conscious minds ready to be told that they can certainly afford it. Using the opposite effect would disrupt your conscious thought process.

Starting on a Monday morning and not working at night, I wanted to test my skills to the fullest. I started off pretty self-hypnotized and with about 50 prospect cards, some of them “leads.” Remember now, we are talking about more than 30 years ago. Without appointments I served 25 prospects and made 30 direct sales of all sizes. Not a single punch. With a premium of over $20,000 and much of it in annual cash payments, I decided to stop with $12,000 in commissions. I had achieved and accomplished my goals in just four days. Yes, with a rounded effective formula you can hit the brakes.

MY FIRST MILLION then it was done very easily. For me, it proved that I could become a millionaire, breaking all the rules. My average policy size wasn’t huge, but my closing rate was incredible. He was not wearing a suit or tie and was not carrying a briefcase. My cars were sleek new Camaros and Mustangs, and I stopped wasting time trying to schedule appointments.

There is a danger in programming yourself to achieve a certain goal. Since you are obliged to achieve it, before applying self-hypnosis ask yourself if it is good for your mind and your body to do what is necessary.

To become a multi-million dollar insurance salesman, do the opposite of what most salesmen do. Develop your own prospecting methods, submission thresholds, and closing tricks. It becomes so much easier to make an insurance sale when you’ve already made it in your mind and have the acquired sales skills to back it up.

I did it my way. You can too.