Door knocking Face to Face in 2024

[rmhaire]

I did an interview on the topic a couple years ago for a podcast. One of the hosts is a forum member (@NAF1138). He actually posted earlier in this thread. FWIW, here’s the video:

Dang Bro. You're almost as pretty as I am. Key word being almost.

 

[Txmade99]

You’re right. My commute isn’t usually too bad. I agree with you about driving over to the west side of the Metroplex. For some reason, as congested as the Dallas side seems. Tarrant seems far worse!

Home Service is the original method of selling FE. But rather than placing on bank draft, the agent collects the premium directly from the insured each month. This gives the agent opportunities for add on sales, cross selling, and referrals. It’s really a system of relationship marketing. Most agents refer to us as debit agents, which is old terminology that came from the way we handled agency accounting back in the day.

I did an interview on the topic a couple years ago for a podcast. One of the hosts is a forum member

Oh okay, I assumed you might have been with American National. I was hired to work for them at one point and time but never did. They seem to be the only debit agents left in Dallas. I haven't seen anybody pick up payment since 2017 or 2018. It's a shame because I always thought that was good method of doing business. Are you compensated for picking up payments or is that just part of business along with selling? I think it's neat you don't have to necessarily worry about new leads as much because of the high renewal/loyalty rate being that you speak to your clients often.

 

[Txmade99]

Caveat, not an agent.

I don't know what it is like now, but 50 years ago in the south, in VA and TN that was the case for the most part.

I about got shot twice and met some vicious dogs, but overall there were a lot of very nice people.

Yeah, I've definitely saw cases this past year alone of cranky homeowners shooting, sadly it was mostly kids knocking on the wrong door. One happened 2 weeks ago where a Uber driver got called to pick up a package from an elderly man. When the Uber driver arrived, the elderly man accused the Uber driver of trying to rob him and shot. He claims he never called Uber and that someone kept calling his phone that whole week demanding that he put thousands of dollars in a package and they would send an Uber driver to pick it up. He seemed a senile old man but still deadly. These cases of course are few and far between, but still gotta be careful out there.

 

[shonceman]

Oh okay, I assumed you might have been with American National. I was hired to work for them at one point and time but never did. They seem to be the only debit agents left in Dallas. I haven't seen anybody pick up payment since 2017 or 2018. It's a shame because I always thought that was good method of doing business. Are you compensated for picking up payments or is that just part of business along with selling? I think it's neat you don't have to necessarily worry about new leads as much because of the high renewal/loyalty rate being that you speak to your clients often.

Home Service as a delivery method had certainly been waning due to mergers and acquisitions among the various debit carriers. Subsequent to that, some of the largest carriers completely abandoned the home service model.

In Dallas, only two captive debit carriers remain - American National and Kemper. But over the past decade or so there’s been a resurgence of interest in home service, partly due to the re-entry into the market by a couple of the independent FE carriers.

Yes, we’re compensated for collections. Our first year commissions are lower than typical FE commissions, but our renewal commissions are SIGNIFICANTLY higher to compensate for the extra service we typically provide. Renewal commissions also last for the life of the policy, unlike most FE contracts.

As far as leads go, I’m not gonna lie. I was using FE leads when I got back into the debit market. I was selling FE, but kept running into people with no bank account. No company would draft from a DE card back then, so I started placing those folks with a home service policy. I also did a fair amount of door to door cold canvassing. But the larger my agency has grown, the less I’ve had to rely on leads. It is pretty great, after some years of hard work, to have enough renewal $ to keep my lights on whether I sell anything or not.

 

[NAF1138]

You’re right. My commute isn’t usually too bad. I agree with you about driving over to the west side of the Metroplex. For some reason, as congested as the Dallas side seems. Tarrant seems far worse!

Home Service is the original method of selling FE. But rather than placing on bank draft, the agent collects the premium directly from the insured each month. This gives the agent opportunities for add on sales, cross selling, and referrals. It’s really a system of relationship marketing. Most agents refer to us as debit agents, which is old terminology that came from the way we handled agency accounting back in the day.

I did an interview on the topic a couple years ago for a podcast. One of the hosts is a forum member (@NAF1138). He actually posted earlier in this thread. FWIW, here’s the video:

This was one of the very best interviews we did. You were a wealth of great information on a topic that isn't much discussed anymore.

 

[noah]

Good questions. I talked to some someone at digital BGA for telesales, and was told you need 8 states to start out with and I believe more if your going to do inbound and as for your second question on how do they spend most of their day...from the 3 agents I talked to it seems they work from 8 or 9 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. doing outbound calls. I would be absolutely worried about getting bored chained to the phone all day.

For the rest of the 3 questions, I would like to know as well. What is the persistency and failure rate vs face to face.

Nobody has any red meat on this because they are selling kool aide to millennials and gen zer’s.

How many guys past 50 are drinking the kool aide ?

 

[NAF1138]

People say one thing but in action do things differently.

With that said, I'm still in favor of agents doing face-to-face sales if they really wanted to. It's probably better than ever considering the seismic shift to telesales that has happened and continues to happen.

Alas, the trend is not in favor of the traditional way.

I think the seismic shift to telesales is agent driven not consumer driven. But I could be wrong. You probably have data on this.

What percentage of their total leads do your top producers close on average? What percentage of the total contacts do they close on average?

Not trying to pull you into any kind of gottcha, but if those numbers are lower than what happens in face to face sales I think it backs up that people prefer to do these things in person. Not that you CAN'T sell by phone, or even that you shouldn't...but prospects I think, in the aggregate, would prefer to work in person which puts the in person agent at an advantage in that respect.

The phone agent can get way more at bats. So they have their own advantages, but it's about how you leverage what you got.

 

[shonceman]

This was one of the very best interviews we did. You were a wealth of great information on a topic that isn't much discussed anymore.

Thank you, Nick! That really means a lot to me.

 

[jdeasy]

Thank you, Nick! That really means a lot to me.

It was aright!!

 

[Rearden]

I think the seismic shift to telesales is agent driven not consumer driven. But I could be wrong. You probably have data on this.

What percentage of their total leads do your top producers close on average? What percentage of the total contacts do they close on average?

Not trying to pull you into any kind of gottcha, but if those numbers are lower than what happens in face to face sales I think it backs up that people prefer to do these things in person. Not that you CAN'T sell by phone, or even that you shouldn't...but prospects I think, in the aggregate, would prefer to work in person which puts the in person agent at an advantage in that respect.

The phone agent can get way more at bats. So they have their own advantages, but it's about how you leverage what you got.

My opinion: the shift to remote work in our industry runs alongside what's happening in all industries due to COVID.

In addition, the final expense industry has always lagged behind from an innovation standpoint compared to other industries.

Think about term insurance and Medicare: those industries developed e-apps and remote-friendly sales processes years before final expense carriers ever did.

In our free lead program where we track numbers very closely, our top telesales agents close 12% to 15% of total leads received weekly. Last month, 60% of our free lead agents were closing over 8% of their leads. Of course, this number fluctuates and has dropped in recent weeks closer to the mean.

The top ones do a mixture of pre-set Facebook generated appointments in combination with outbound calls. Every other agent strictly does outbound calls to leads only.

I agree: with two agents of equal skill, the face-to-face agent will always close at a higher percentage. However, telesales agent with a well-designed system has the potential to scale his or her activity to overcome the close rate detriment to meet or beat what the face-to-face agent can write.

Personally, I don't think one is better than the other. And I don't see the fears of lower persistency panning out based on the numbers I've reviewed over the past few years. This is only speaking of my company's results and no one else's.