Reflecting on an award-winning 51-year career, a
top producer urges his colleagues to appreciate and
embrace the importance of their profession.
By Moe Silverman, CLU
The greatest sale I ever made was very early in my career. It was in 1958 when I convinced a young
lady named Judi to marry me.
As with any recent college graduate
and young professional, I had no idea
what was in my future. I soon started
selling life insurance policies around
Indianapolis for American United Life
Insurance Company.
Within several years, my career and
family had grown together, and in my office, you could see evidence of both. On
one side of my desk, you would find a
stack of new policy applications from the
client base I was gradually building. On
the other side, there was a picture. Judi
was in the center of that picture and around
her were our five children. By then, I had
already made hundreds of sales, but that
picture wouldn’t have been possible without that first, greatest sale.
The most important career
Looking back, I realize I have sold
life insurance policies in seven different
decades. I love our business. But why?
You’re constantly struggling to compete
for business, and you never win. Actually,
that is why I love it. The beauty of the
product is that the consumer is always the
winner. All I have to do is tell a prospect
how it works and, if I’ve done my job,
they will make the purchase.
“I send kids to
college. I put
a roof over
people’s heads.
And I put food
on the table.”
Life insurance brings security and peace
of mind. It allows you to help people ful-
fill their life goals and dreams. Because
of the product I sell, I can take families
in crisis and help put them back together.
Because I’m a life insurance salesman, I
always show up at exactly the right time,
with exactly the right amount of money!
The burden of “financial services”
Over the decades, the product hasn’t
changed that much. But I wish I could say
things in our industry haven’t changed
that much either. They have.
I’m a life insurance salesman. That’s
what my business card used to say. That
job title alone was enough for everyone to
understand how I could help them. Now,
our roles must be broader in scope. Our
industry, along with our entire economy,
gradually got wrapped up together into
this world of investments.
We wanted to evolve into something
more. The behemoth companies in our
industry celebrate that, but I could argue
that’s become our detriment. The lines
are all blurred now. We’re in the financial services business, and the “consumer
wins” attitude of the industry has fallen
by the wayside. We’ve come a long way
with the help of computers and flashy presentations, but if we focus too much on
dazzling a prospect with technology and
numbers, we take the emotion out of it.
People still buy life insurance for the
same reason they did when I first got into
this business: because they love someone.
Life insurance is not a purchase people
make through the purse strings — it’s
