Direct Mail to Home X Dates

jdlash

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Who here has experience sending a mock quote to home x dates and then following that up with a phone call? I have a telemarketer and am looking to put together a program that she can get a decent response rate for me and generate some leads.

I have tried working with loan officers and I only have 3 home carriers, so I'm not able to find (the lowest rate) enough to keep them happy long term.

Any ideas are greatly appreciated!
 
Back in my old days we had a telemarketer who would call on Cole X Date lists. She was getting enough leads that it made sense. If you mail before calling, it will typically double your telemarketers capture rate (at least that was my experience..) However my telemarketer was going through a LOT of names/numbers so if you start adding up the postage/cost of mailing random quotes it probably doesn't net out to being worth it.

When we did mailings & then followed up w/ calls for LIFE insurance it doubled our response rate & those people were within our existing book so I don't know if that result would apply to totally random home x dates w/ mock quotes.
 
Back in my old days we had a telemarketer who would call on Cole X Date lists. She was getting enough leads that it made sense. If you mail before calling, it will typically double your telemarketers capture rate (at least that was my experience..) However my telemarketer was going through a LOT of names/numbers so if you start adding up the postage/cost of mailing random quotes it probably doesn't net out to being worth it.

When we did mailings & then followed up w/ calls for LIFE insurance it doubled our response rate & those people were within our existing book so I don't know if that result would apply to totally random home x dates w/ mock quotes.

Thanks for the response. I was just thinking that even if the mailer got a .5% response that would cover some of the cost and then the rest could be made up with the increased response rate on the telemarketing end.

I do well with referrals and need some sort of program to get 5-10 more home auto packages per month.

I'm open to ideas for anyone that wants to help a struggling agent in Michigan!
 
I am an indy. I have 6 auto carriers and 3 auto/home carriers to package business. I'm the owner. Just a single man operation.
 
From my experience, almost nationwide, you'll get a 1% response rate and if the mock quotes are reasonably accurate, you'll close the majority of the responses.

You can improve the response rate by following up with phone calls / emails / whatever.

I know agents who do this and get as high as a 3% response rate (their metrics) but they have carriers who are buying market share, so it helps.

Reality check though.....
This is a decent way to grow a book of business. Given the expense though, you will probably spend the FYC to grow the book. Not bad, but just realize its a long game play, not a short game.

If you have a strong auto offering and can cross-sell with the home, you will do better.

Dan
 
Michigan is a state that insurance scores, so getting a fairly accurate quote is the part I am trying to figure out.

I have no problem spending 100% of the fyc as the agency doesn't need any extra money coming in, just needs to grow.

This type of business sticks for years from my experience. The problem for me lately is getting it in the door!
 
You won't get 100% perfect quotes, the idea is to get the phone to ring and then work from there.

The quotes do have to be 'close' though, or else you lose trust with people when the real rate is higher than the mock rate. Some difference is easy to explain, a 30% difference gets to be much harder.

For insurance scores, you can buy credit scored leads, which can be used as a factor in the mock rate. It isn't perfect, but it does help. Some carriers are much more sensitive to the insurance score than others as well, so it becomes a bit of a challenge.

Dan
 
Who sells credit scored x dates? Do you recommend Cole, or someone else?

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You won't get 100% perfect quotes, the idea is to get the phone to ring and then work from there.

The quotes do have to be 'close' though, or else you lose trust with people when the real rate is higher than the mock rate. Some difference is easy to explain, a 30% difference gets to be much harder.

For insurance scores, you can buy credit scored leads, which can be used as a factor in the mock rate. It isn't perfect, but it does help. Some carriers are much more sensitive to the insurance score than others as well, so it becomes a bit of a challenge.

Dan

I was thinking about this and I think I figured out what your talking about. Your talking about ordering homeowner lists with credit scores right? Just scrap the x date part as it isn't all that important.
 
Use both.
xdates are important, more so with home than auto.

People tend to pay their homeowners insurance for the year so your response rates are a bit better if you can try to line up with their xdate.

Dan
 
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