When it comes to prospecting and cold-calling, there are few stories more compelling (and inspirational) than Ben Feldman. What is equally irresistible is to speculate on what lessons from Ben Feldman can be carried forward today.
Ben spent his life in East Liverpool, Ohio, a river town of 20,000. He was one of nine children of Russian immigrants. He never finished high school and, at the age of 16, went to work for his father at $5.00 per week. Ben was short, stout, and balding, and spoke slowly and deliberately with a distinct lisp.
He began his career with New York Life in 1942, and worked there until 1993. Over his 50-year career, his sales volume exceeded $1.5 billion; with a third of it coming after he “retired” at the age of 65. During his peak year, he topped $100 million. His daily record was $20 million.
Ben developed a niche target…the owners of small industrial corporations that were flourishing in eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania in the years after World War II. He would drop in on business owners without an appointment. Prior to his visits, he would gather information about the company from the standard Dun & Bradstreet reports. He knew the key players in the business, the value of the company, and if the company was profitable. On many occasions, he would drop in with an illustration that he had previously prepared for $1-2 million in coverage.
Ben was quietly brash. He knew of one prominent Youngstown real estate developer who had successfully fended off Ben’s efforts for weeks and months. Finally, Ben dropped in unannounced, and asked the businessman’s secretary to take five $100.00 bills into her boss with this note, “If I don’t have a good idea, you can keep the money.” Ben was ushered in…and left the meeting with a $14 million insurance policy.
Power Phrases
Ben was famously known for his “power phrases”, aphorisms that were designed to woo clients and inspire him:
Would Ben Feldman’s Methods Work Today?
Is Ben Feldman a quaint anachronism of a bygone sales era, or a source of inspiration for financial advisors today as they consider the most effective methods to find new clients? What are Ben Feldman's keys to success that might be instructive for today’s financial advisors?
Is comparing the methods of Ben Feldman to the methods of today’s financial advisor an unanswerable question, equivalent to comparing Babe Ruth to Miguel Cabrera? Possibly. Or does it just confirm that the virtues of hard work, persistence and motivation are timeless and will get a financial advisor just as far in 2013 as in 1942?
What do you think?
[For more on Ben Feldman, you may want to look for this book, The Feldman Method. It’s out-of-print, and you also may find it in your local library.]
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