IAM1415 – Founder Helps Insurance Agents get the Right Lead for the Market

Tim Connon is the Founder & CEO of ParamountQuote. He grew up in Florida working with his father from a young age selling security systems. Tim quickly realized the ideas behind sales and marketing, he then grew up and got licensed to sell life insurance. After this, he started his company and began providing life insurance to seniors for final expenses.

• CEO Story: Tim was tired of working for somebody else. Figured out how to do it right, when he was not given any leads. He took the challenge and go the next level and build his own brand helping other agents create more leads in the life insurance industry.
• Business Service: Telemarketing reaches seniors by offering insurance services. SEO Website Optimization.
• Secret Sauce: Keeping things very simple 20-minute process through telemarketing.
• CEO Hack: Investing in the system – proper call structure.
• CEO Nugget: Find the right system, look for someone who did it invest in it, and duplicate it.
• CEO Defined: Being the leader, and captain of the ship. The decision-maker provides everything that is needed for the employees.

Website: paramountquote.com

LinkedIn: tim-connon

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Transcription

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00:19 – Intro

Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long inter you? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresham Harkness values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of. This is to the I AM CEO Podcast.

00:46 – Gresham Harkless

Hello, Hello, Hello, this is Gresh from the I AM CEO Podcast. I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Tim Conan of Paramount Quote. Tim, it's great to have you on the show.

00:55 – Tim Connon

Thank you. Thank you for having me. Love being here.

00:58 – Gresham Harkless

Yes. Excited to have you on as well. And before we jump into the interview, I want to read a little bit more about Tim so you can hear about some of the awesome things that he's working on. Tim is the founder and CEO of Paramount Quote. He grew up in Florida working with his father from a young age selling security systems. And Tim quickly realized the ideas behind sales and marketing. He then grew up and got licensed to sell life insurance. After this, he started his company and began providing life insurance to seniors for final expenses. Tim, great to have you on the show. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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01:26 – Tim Connon

Yes, absolutely.

01:28 – Gresham Harkless

Well, let's make it happen then. So to kind of kick everything off, I wanted to rewind the clock a little bit here a little bit more on how you got started, what I call your CEO story.

01:36 – Tim Connon

Okay, so basically the way everything started was kind of. I found myself in a lot of. So in this industry, it's kind of interesting. There are a lot of different ways that agents can go about making a living. They can work with an IMO that will provide them with free leads, and they just give them a reduced contract level, usually reduced commission on their sales. But hey, they don't have any marketing costs, they don't have any overhead expenses. So therefore, you know, the agents are typically happy as long as it's a decent commission that's paid to them for the hard work they have to put in. Because sales are going through a lot of nos to get to a lot of yeses. The law of large numbers is very much in play.

So the idea is that's where I was at one point and I was a little comfortable, but I always found problems with the places I was at. They either were just, they, whenever they were giving free leads, they were just basically kind of treating every single agent as if they were a full-on employee kind of, you know, a lot of pressure was put on me and things like that and eventually I just got tired of it. I just decided to move on. Once I realized my abilities, once I realized how good I was at my job, how good I was at connecting with the senior market, connecting with people, and helping them get coverage for their families, I realized that I was good enough to do this on my own.

And that's exactly what I did. I took off left everything behind and started Paramount Quote. And that's pretty much the way it's been. And I started investing in marketing, getting in touch with seniors, and just basically picking up where I left off, just with the additional overhead costs that come with running a real business. This is just that simple. So that's basically what started Paramount Quotas. I was sick and tired of fulfilling other people's dreams and really just wanted to fulfill my own. So that's basically what started all this. And ever since then been putting every waking moment into just making this brand something great for seniors and really for everyone else out there. Even for future agents who would want to come on board and be a part of our organization.

03:35 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, that makes so much sense. I appreciate you, Sharon. Sick and tired of being sick and tired, so to speak, where you have that opportunity to say that, hey, I love that there's a quote that goes along the lines of nothing ventured, nothing gained. And I think there's probably a lot of people that wonder if they have it within them, you know, so to speak, to be able to kind of go on their own, whether it be in, you know, completely in a business or even some form, shape or fashion, you know, just taking those steps. So I love that you, you win and you actually did that because I think there's so many times people don't exactly, you know, I guess challenge themselves but take it upon themselves to kind of even level up to some degree.

04:11 – Tim Connon

Exactly, exactly. And it is a challenge. And anyone who wants to stay where they're at and they're comfortable by all means that's perfectly fine. To each their own. People who want to, who find themselves in a comfortable setting should stay there because that's good for them. But you know, any business is going to take a little bit of risk and you got to have that in you if you really want to go to that next level. And that's just what I did. And I just, I did. Case in point, I couldn't do it anymore. I had to do what was best for me. And what was best for me was taking things to another level.

04:44 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, absolutely. And I think sometimes when the quote-unquote, comfort becomes uncomfortable because, you know, you feel like you could do more and you want to get more, you want to see more. It's kind of a, I don't know if I should say requirement, but it feels like it is to kind of take that jump and that leap and to go to that next level. So I know you touched a little bit upon like how you're working with your clients, how you serving them. Could you take us through a little bit more about that? Tell us what it looks like and how you serve the clients you work with.

05:12 – Tim Connon

Right. So basically the way it works is we have two different types of marketing right now. The primary marketing that I'm specializing in is a lot of telemarketing, reaching out to seniors, and things like that. And they just get a call from one of our preliminary screeners and they just simply ask them, are you interested in final expense life insurance? They say yes. And then that's when that becomes a callback for me or an agent to call.

And then the other one is, of course, website optimization, SEO, search engine optimization. People can fill out a quota on our website and they can see all the top-rated carriers nationwide, they're available to them and they can pick one out. And then upon them picking one out, they'll get in touch with one of our agents and they can further qualify them for the product and figure out what's exactly best for them and then get them enrolled. It's actually a very simple process.

06:02 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, absolutely. But like you said, I think you said the law of the numbers. I think that was a phrase that you said. I imagine that it's so important to kind of make sure that you are reaching out to enough people because I imagine it's probably not just one call, one person that fills out the form and then you can go and be done for the day.

06:17 – Tim Connon

Exactly, yes. It takes a lot of people that, that's just the way, the way it works, especially in the business of sales. It is the law of large numbers. You have to talk to a lot of people daily in order to hit the right numbers that you're seeking to hit. That's just the way it is. Some people don't feel comfortable moving forward, and that's perfectly fine. The main part is connecting with the people who are comfortable moving forward and helping them. And then the other ones, you can follow up with them and try to reach out later and see if they're ready. And it's just as simple as that.

06:47 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, absolutely. It's a process just as you kind of talked about with your journey. And when we're providing products and services to our potential clients, it's also a journey for them as well. Sometimes when you call, reach out, or talk, it's, you know, right then and right there is the perfect time. Sometimes it ends up being later on.

07:04 – Tim Connon

Exactly, exactly.

07:06 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome, Awesome, Awesome. So I want to ask you now for what I call your secret sauce. This could be for yourself personally, the business, or a combination of both. But what do you feel kind of sets you apart and makes you unique?

07:16 – Tim Connon

What sets us apart and makes us unique is that we keep things very simple. A lot of, a lot of people in this industry, what they try to do is because telesales is a very. Everything's done over the telephone for us. So telesales is a very new somewhat frontier in the life insurance space. A lot of people are used to going into people's homes and doing home sales. For a home presentation, you have brochures that you can provide to the client. You have different illustrations you can show them, you can break down, you can bring them a chart of the funeral costs and things like that so they can see it tangibly and understand and better pick their policy. We don't have any of that.

We have our voice, we have the phone. And a lot of people in this industry tried to take the whole at-home presentation and translate it into the phone. Doesn't work that way. It will not work. It'll take hours to explain it. I've seen places that do an hour-long presentation and by the time it's finished, the client is very much turned off from the product. They don't want to spend that much time on the phone. They're just, they're just here to hear the value of it and the pricing and to get themselves covered. That's it. And we broke it down to a very simple process. Our process only takes about 20 minutes to help a client get a policy and that's it.

And then they're done, they're good to go. And then we send them the thank you cards and our emails with all of our contact information in case they ever need their agent. And they are all good and they're very happy with it because it's a quick and simple process. We don't have to go on long rabbit trails into all these different things about the policy. The main thing is it will provide X amount of benefit for your family and it has these couple extra riders attached to it and here it is. And the client says okay. And that's really the secret sauce. We keep things very simple. We don't need to spend an hour on the phone with the client to help them get a policy.

09:02 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, that makes so much sense and I appreciate you sharing that. And I imagine that from your years and years of years of kind of experience and work, you've probably been able to kind of distill down what are those essential things. And I don't know if you ever heard this Steve Jobs quote where he says a lot of times to get to simplicity actually takes more work than it does to get to the complex. Because a lot of times when you're starting or sometimes even when you have that first quote-unquote sales cob sales call, you kind of throw up the verbal throw up on the employee, on the potential client. You're telling them all the things about all the products and all the benefits and all those things rather than actually providing what is the value that you want to provide. So it sounds like you guys got that down to a science.

09:41 – Tim Connon

Exactly. Because the need is very simple. The need is that these people are looking to make sure their families are taken care of. The final expense is very much aimed at a low-income individual. That's the senior market. People who just are on a fixed income, don't have money set aside to take care of their funeral. And a final expense life insurance policy can fill that need. And that's what the need is. So we just get right to the point with our clients. We understand that you, you know, are looking for X amount of coverage to make sure that your son is taken care of when you pass away and that he doesn't have to have a financial burden. And the client says yes, exactly. And then we go from there and we help them get enrolled. It's this, It's a very U.S. it's, as I said, a simple process.

11:21 – Gresham Harkless

And a lot of times excellence comes in a simple way to be able to kind of translate that information, you know, to people, to actually know your craft and not get caught in the clouds and in the weeds and everything in between, rather than just providing the value.

11:33 – Tim Connon

Right, Exactly.

11:35 – Gresham Harkless

Nice. So I wanted to switch gears a little bit and I want to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an app, a book, or a habit that you have, but what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

11:47 – Tim Connon

Something that makes me more effective and efficient. Really the most efficient thing I would say is I invested in a system. So, one of the things I did was I invested in a system that taught me a few things about how to run my business instead of just trying everything new and not really knowing what I was doing. So, I invested in a system that taught me a proper call structure. It was taken, so it was taken from a very well-known company in the industry. They spent millions of dollars to really understand the life of a lead for their clients. So in the million dollar spend that they took doing their research, they found that it takes about five different calls to one client in order to basically see if they're ready to move forward.

And then after calling number five, you shouldn't try to call that client anymore. And that system, after I, after I bought the model and learned about that system, I've been using it effectively and it has helped me have time in between my calls to follow up with other clients and help them with any kind of policy assistance. It provides me with perfect windows of time to do other administrative things in the background while I can still effectively sell to new clients over the phone. It's really great.

It's a five-call, technically a six-call structure, but the six-call is just one Touch. It's just basically if we get a voicemail at that point, we've already explained to the client that we're just going to go ahead and close their file and that we're sorry we couldn't reach them. We really hope they. We wish them nothing but the best of luck out there, and then we leave them alone. But On Call 6 is basically one last touch to see maybe if they got that voicemail and they're still willing to pick up the phone after that and move forward. If not, we let them go after that.

And that structure has really served. Served me and my agents very well. It has it. As I said, call one is when the. When we first get the lead, call two is an hour later, and then call three is 24 hours later. So in the middle of the day, you get 10 leads and you call all of them. And then an hour later you get a big hour of time to go ahead and take a lunch, work on administrative things. It's great. It provides a great schedule to stick with that we can all follow easily.

13:55 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, that makes so much sense. And I really wanted to highlight the point that you made about making sure that you invested in somebody who had made a large investment. So you already were setting yourself up for success by being able to kind of invest in somebody that had achieved that certain level of success.

14:10 – Tim Connon

Look for someone who did it before you did, invest in their system, and just duplicate it and you should be fine. You may have a couple of hiccups, but they're not going to be as big as if you were trying to do it all on your own without any kind of help.

14:24 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, that makes sense. Would you consider that to be kind of like your CEO nugget, The word of wisdom, a piece of advice, something you might tell your younger business self?

14:31 – Tim Connon

Definitely 100%. I would consider that if I had to do it all over again, that would have been the very first thing that came out of my mouth. If you invest in a system, vet the person you're talking to. I'm not going to sugarcoat anything. There are plenty of people out there who call themselves experts, and they're not, but there are the ones who are. And when you find the right ones and invest in the right system, you should be fine.

14:52 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome, Awesome, Awesome. Well, I wanted to ask you now my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. We're hoping for different, quote, unquote, CEOs on this show. So, Tim, what does being a CEO mean to you?

15:02 – Tim Connon

It means being the leader. It means being the captain of the ship. It means that whatever decision is made, it's, it's all, it's on you. Yeah, you're the decision-maker. You're the person that is providing, everything that's needed for your employees. And you know, the captain sails the ship and of course, if need be, every he has to go down with the ship. So I mean, that's why, that's, it's more of an incentive, of course, for the captain to keep the ship going, you know. So to me, it's, it's being a captain. It's also just being there for the crew as well. Because with being CEO comes management.

You have to manage all these different employees at all these different levels and everything. And you know, I know the mind of an agent, so management there is not difficult. But when you have say, like a secretary, things like that, that's a little bit different because they're not the same mindset as say, a sales agent. So it's something that you have to be dedicated to learning. And when you're the captain, you're going to learn it no matter what it takes. I mean, that's, you know, you're going to learn how to plug the holes in the ship no matter what it takes because you want to keep it going. You're going to do whatever it takes to keep everything floating perfectly.

16:10 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Well, Tim, truly appreciate that definition. Of course, I appreciate your time even more. So what I wanted to do now was pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners know and of course, how best people can get a hold of you. Find out about all the awesome things you and your team are working on.

16:26 – Tim Connon

For people to get in touch with me. You can easily get in touch with me through our website, paramountquote.com if you happen to be a senior and you are looking for any kind of life insurance, please feel free to go on there and check out our blogs, to learn more information. We have quote forms that you can fill out and you can look at different companies that can help you and things like that and speak with one of our agents. So that'd be really the best thing to get in touch with. Get in touch with me. We also have an email on there, so if you were to fill out a contact form, you'd go straight to our email. We can get in touch with you.

16:59 – Gresham Harkless

Okay, perfect. Perfect. Well, to make that even easier, we'll have the links and information in the show notes as well. And I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

17:06 – Tim Connon

Absolutely. Thank you. Yeah, you have a great day too.

17:09 – Outro

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes Google Play and everywhere you listen to podcasts, SUBSCRIBE, and leave us a five-star rating grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

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