3 Success Stories

I started calling with her today. Thanks for the suggestion. We are using a CRM but there is no bonus structure for this. I told her when she started that there would be a requirement to bring in 15 policies per month, any combination of auto, home, life, renters, medicare, other agencies in my area have quotas of 25 per month. I pay her $20-60 for anything over that per policy. So far she has never brought in more than 5 policies in a month. She is great at customer service and calling on warm leads and referrals. I suggested she start cold calling when she has down time which is most the time the last month. I am trying to keep her busy to justify keeping her on the payroll. I made her start keeping a tally of how many calls she is making. She is very nervous and wastes a lot of time between calls looking up each company online prior to calling, then all day she says nobody wants this, nobody cares about rates, etc. I was going to start buying auto and home leads for her but I a glad I didn't as her calling level isn't there yet and she would of blown through the leads.
 
Last edited:
Good for you Heather! Hopefully one of these days I'll have a large enough book that I can grow through mostly referrals and hire someone to do cold calling for me :) We shall see. Are you having any better luck by calling with her?
 
Wrote 4th largest client(little over 6K in premium) stemming from imitial cold call back in Dec. Wrote his electrical company. May be venturing into tree removal and the side and is having me look at the rates. He's also having me look at his personal lines, his farm acerage, and his commercial real estate. I'll also be delving into his life insurance situation. He's also putting im a good word for me with 2 of his biggest clients. All from picking up the phone and following up.

I plan to keep dialing, though going through Sandler's can't teach a kid.... I will be getting out of the office a bit more and cold calling in person.
 
Just wanted to share 3 quick stories about how cold calling does work. Granted, I'm calling for commercial property & casualty right now, which may be a bit easier than other areas. Keep in mind I'm building a book of business from scratch with a local independent office and been here just 4 months now

My first decent size account was a summer camp. I cold called beginning of October. It was just the right time! They had a new director, current agent was based in a different state, and they had a Nov. 1 renewal date. Saved them a little over 10% on annual premium and got them better coverage.

Recently wrote a local restaurant from a cold call. It helped that I frequent this place weekly, but I'd never met the owner as they aren't involved in day to day due to their other business. Fast forward 1 month and I'm now writing the other business, which is a larger account than the restaurant and summer camp combined.

Lastly, I have an appointment to go over proposals next week with a local contractor(this would be my largest account thus far-just shy of 70K in annual premium). Cold called about 2 weeks ago. They have a January 1 renewal date and had a few bad workers comp claims that are jacking their rates up. Believe it is a long shot, but the point is the cold call got me in the door.

So it does work.

Those prospects who have said they're happy now will get called back in a few months. I've only dialed through about 450 numbers thus far. I'm finger dialing all at this point and noting everything in Outlook for future contact. I also doubt I'm near as good on the phone as some of the folks on this forum. The point is, it does work. Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Cold- calling for commercial insurance is a completely different beast than cold-calling residential.
 
Wrote 4th largest client(little over 6K in premium) stemming from imitial cold call back in Dec. Wrote his electrical company. May be venturing into tree removal and the side and is having me look at the rates. He's also having me look at his personal lines, his farm acerage, and his commercial real estate. I'll also be delving into his life insurance situation. He's also putting im a good word for me with 2 of his biggest clients. All from picking up the phone and following up.

I plan to keep dialing, though going through Sandler's can't teach a kid.... I will be getting out of the office a bit more and cold calling in person.

Sounds like you struck a gold mine with this guy! One thing we do is always ask for some of their business cards and we try to refer people to our commercial clients and they always send more referrals even if its personal lines.
 
VaDwayne, how do you mean completely different beast? Same idea, to get in front of prospect and the opportunity to quote. Sure, larger premiums and more moving parts, but same basic principal. I'm still pretty new, so maybe I'm oversimplifying. Are you still cold calling commercial heavily or is your book feeding you enough referrals now to not need to cold call?

Heather, I certainly hope he turns into a gold mine. It would be great to have a steady stream of warm introductions. However, nothing has come of the relationship yet. I work the same way. I try to send my clients business. The more I can help them grow, the more it solidifies our relationship, make breaking us up on price harder, and means they eventually need more insurance down the road. It's win/win. How is the assistant doing with the cold calling during slow periods?
 
She is still really awkward on the phone but she got me in to see a health food/ vegan store and deli. She is familiar with that stuff so she opened right up on the phone with the owner. The premium I quoted was $4200 for the year and that would be my biggest account if we get this. It is looking good though.

One problem though is she is in the P & C class right now and she is failing it. I had no prior P & C when I took the class so I just assumed she would have no trouble either. Big mistake on my part there.
 
Not sure how it is in AL, but in Indiana, the pass rate is something like 60%. If too many people start to pass, they make it harder. So, it's not really an easy thing to do. You need to be careful having her work on policy changes/quoting/calling/etc if she is not license. In IN, anyone making policy changes and prospecting for insurance must have an insurance license.

On being awkward, that will hopefully get better as she does it more often. I wish you luck on your $4200 policy. Are you Indy or captive? Just curious.
 
Indy, staffing is always an issue. I am basically glued to my desk. I go out to network then I have a customer at the office needing an endorsement or something comes up that my assistant cannot do. The previous person could not pass the P & C either. When I was out one day she bound coverage, included comp, collision but no liability. Luckily I caught the mistake the next day but since then I am cautious on delegating things here.
 
Back
Top