I want to begin by sharing several success stories that illustrate the power of a certain four words:

* A State Farm agent in Maryland tripled her life sales in March and has sold more life insurance in the first quarter than in all of 2009.

* A benefit professional in North Carolina just added voluntary life to one of his accounts by using these words for the first time.

* Another benefit professional increased his per-group revenue by 60% in 2009 using these four words.

So what are these four words? "Oh, by the way."

This is an amazingly simple technique that can be used to sell new products and services to both new and existing clients. To understand how to use this technique, let me set the stage. If you are like most of the benefit professionals I talk with, it is extremely rare that you close the sale immediately after your presentation. In most cases the presentation appointment ends with the prospect asking for some time to review your proposal before making a decision. One or two weeks later, the prospect informs you that he has chosen to move forward with you.

Rather than simply scheduling the enrollment, ask for an appointment to discuss the best strategy to enroll the group and help the employer achieve his objectives. Then follow these four steps:

1. Review the employer's goals that relate to improving employee morale, productivity or improvement in retention of high-quality employees.

2. Suggest small group meetings to enhance employee understanding of the new benefits.

3. Ask for agreement that this strategy is what would work best in achieving the employer's goals.

4. Then add the "Oh, by the way." Here are three examples:

* "Oh, by the way, while enrolling your employees in the group health plan, I will also give them a chance to participate in some voluntary life insurance. Do you see any problem with that?"

* "Oh, by the way, during the enrollment, I would like to offer your key executives the opportunity to add long-term care insurance to their benefits - would that be okay?"

* "Oh, by the way, for just $10 more per employee per month, you can add a short-term disability income benefit, which can help lower employee pressure for increased wages. Does that sound like something that you would like to proceed with?"

You can use this technique to add any product or service to your offering. The technique works even better if you happen to sell any individual major medical insurance. By asking the "Oh, by the way" question after completing each application, you will find that approximately 50% or more of your new clients will add a second product.

The beauty of this technique is in its simplicity. If you try to discuss the second product during the presentation of your proposal you risk clouding the issue and having the entire proposal ignored. If you try to build value for a new product during the initial fact-finding meeting, you risk hearing, "Right now, we only want to focus on group health." By adding an "Oh, by the way" after the decision has been made to move forward with you as the agent of choice, you make it a very simple decision for the prospect. Because the prospect is so relieved to have dealt with and resolved the group health plan issue, the add-on will not take much thought, particularly if you are asking about a voluntary benefit. But even adding a low-cost, employer-paid benefit such as a core long-term disability plan of $500 monthly (generally less than $20 per employee per month) becomes a less imposing decision.

The real beauty of this technique is that you do not have to provide a spreadsheet of choices or get bogged down in the minutia of the product details. By choosing you as the agent of choice, the prospect is placing his trust in you. He assumes that you have his best interests in mind when choosing a product for his company, so there is no need for a justification. One of the biggest obstacles to the add-on sale for most benefit professionals is their own need to over-educate the prospect on the product or service being offered. The truth is that prospects do not need or want to understand insurance products. What they do want is to be able to trust the judgment of the benefit professional they have chosen to work with.

Here is my guarantee to you: Pick one or two products that you are comfortable selling and start asking the "Oh, by the way" question with every new client, and you will increase your per-group revenue by a minimum of 50%. More importantly, you will be providing valuable coverage that would not otherwise be chosen. Right now, your clients do not know that they should add disability income, long-term care, group term life or other coverage to their benefit plan. If you simply ask them if they want to add it, they will likely say "not right now." But if you add the coverage through the use of the "Oh, by the way" technique, and they get to deliver a claim check to an insured who would not have had that coverage otherwise, you will know that this was about more than just your per-group revenue. Using this technique is about making a real difference in the lives of working Americans and the companies that they work for.