Looking for Better Products to Sell. Please Help Me Get Away from EMG/Equita.

[ksigmtsu]

I am a recently licensed agent who was recruited to work with Equita, and I recently started noticing huge issues in their lead generation and price structure and I am looking for other insurance agencies to apply for assignment to so that I can continue working in good conscience. Looking around at comparative quotes from the 2 companies EMG sells for compared to several other agencies their products run up to double in Term for less face value, and I frankly cannot in good conscience sell their products to people now that I have seen this. I believe they are screwing people out of money and I do not want to be involved in it. The worst part of it for me is that their leads have currently worked out to a 0% appointment ratio out of 100+ leads (Roughly 600 bucks they screwed me out of, every lead including A leads were over 6 months old and even the A leads had been worked already). All my actual sales were self generated, and now I'm looking at their prices in comparison to other companies and seeing that I by my own ignorance have been helping them screw local people here out of money. I'm also being paid at a 55% commission, while generating my own business, with basically no help from them. I had a strong background in sales before I was recruited to do this, and frankly I feel like a moron for not doing more homework about their company now and just trusting the people that recruited me. I just cannot track down a good list of insurance companies I can apply for appointment with in order to have a good set of insurers so that I can serve people here with good products. I am licensed in Life and Health in Tennessee, and have E+O.

I would eventually like to be able to do term/UL/WL, annuities, health, mortgages and reverse mortgages, so that I could offer people a comprehensive life/health strategy, save them money, and help them be able to retire comfortably, as I am sure a lot of other people on here want to and already do. I just need sort of a point in the correct direction as to what companies are best to use as carriers so that I'm not having to do a month of research before I can get started selling non-trash policies, so my family doesn't end up starving, out in the street, in the cold, because I'm to stubborn to sell the EMG products anymore because of my moral problems with them and I'm also too stubborn to quit and go do something else.

What I am really wanting to know is the following for Tennessee:
What carriers are good for low cost term?
What carriers are good for low cost UL/WL?
What carriers are good for individual health, and group health?

 

[VolAgent]

As another Tennessee agent who is fairly new to the game, my first advice to you is to forget the idea of low cost. There are tons of low cost term carriers out there, and many of them are not worth representing. Also, I would strongly suggest finding a good mentor to teach you the business, what is appropriate for each client so that you can move up market. A career of only selling $50/mo term is a fast road to frustration, and the clients that need more advanced products and concepts will probably be reluctant to trust you and see you as an expert so early in your career.

What I have done, and I encourage you to do is to find a good career shop to join. Look at NYL, MML, MetLife and Guardians of the world. Find a good agency and manager that is willing to mentor you, do joint work and teach you to succeed. I personally joined MMLs agency in Tennessee where I feel at home, however they might not be a fit for you. I know many on the forum are strong advocates of going independent, but career is a good way to start and can be a great place to stay.

Even if you want to go independent, I would still strongly encourage you to be more focused on finding a good mentor than which companies you want to represent at this point in your career.

 

[dgoldenz]

As another Tennessee agent who is fairly new to the game, my first advice to you is to forget the idea of low cost. There are tons of low cost term carriers out there, and many of them are not worth representing. Also, I would strongly suggest finding a good mentor to teach you the business, what is appropriate for each client so that you can move up market. A career of only selling $50/mo term is a fast road to frustration, and the clients that need more advanced products and concepts will probably be reluctant to trust you and see you as an expert so early in your career.

What I have done, and I encourage you to do is to find a good career shop to join. Look at NYL, MML, MetLife and Guardians of the world. Find a good agency and manager that is willing to mentor you, do joint work and teach you to succeed. I personally joined MMLs agency in Tennessee where I feel at home, however they might not be a fit for you. I know many on the forum are strong advocates of going independent, but career is a good way to start and can be a great place to stay.

Even if you want to go independent, I would still strongly encourage you to be more focused on finding a good mentor than which companies you want to represent at this point in your career.

Care to name a few low-cost term companies that aren't worth representing and give your reasoning?

While someone isn't going to make $250k/year selling $50/month term, it is important to build a book of business because those people will be needing to restructure their policies later on, and as they get older, those policies will get more expensive. You also never know what you will generate in referrals. Most companies that sell term also offer UL products, so it's not as if you're ONLY going to sell term and making a living off that itself.

Good companies with cheap term are Prudential, West Coast Life, ING/Reliastar, Banner Life, Lincoln National, Lincoln Benefit, John Hancock, Transamerica, Western Reserve, Savings Bank Life, AXA, Genworth, MetLife Investors, etc. If you want a recommendation for a good brokerage facility, let me know and I'll send you a PM.

 

[Todd King]

ksigmtsu,
There are many companies out there to represent. I am getting a lot of agents who are quite frustrated with Equita right now, all for the very same reason as you posted. You can give me a call if you would like to check out a myriad of other companies you can represent. If you're looking for above street contracts then call me at your convenience.

 

[ksigmtsu]

Thanks to the people that responded so quickly. I already downloaded assignment applications to quite a few of the companies listed above, I could not find applications for producer assignment for quite a few of them so I'm going to start making phone calls to those on Monday, I want as diverse an offering of companies as possible.

I do actually have an office I'm working out of with a few other people right now, the problem is that they were doing NAA then moved to EMG before they recruited me, and I think we're all on the wrong path as far as doing the right thing with life insurance is concerned. They do also have annunity and health and medicare suppliment they're doing from the same office with a lot more success, and I feel like the people there are being a great help to me, but right now it looks like their primary life leads/appointments were reliant on EMG and EMG has turned into a garbage pushing pyramid scheme. I honestly believe as a group we'd be better off door knocking with lists from the county clerks office and cold calling the phone book than we are doing leads with EMG. (yes I know about the DNC registery I'm just trying to make a point) They were actually doing pretty good till about 4 months ago, then something changed radically inside EMG when a lot of the old NAA people moved over, by their claims. All 4 people working out of the office seem REALLY down on EMG now. I know I've personally gotten 106 leads and set 0 appointments, with a ratio of:

386 calls : 73 connects : 0 appointments : 0 sales

(I am anal, I keep records of my calls and appointments and sales.)
That data was compiled with leads in 3 different counties. The last county I called about half the people said they had had appointments and 6 of them said they submitted applications. 15 of the 106 leads fit Equita criteria for replacement but they have not honored any of my replacement requests. IMO, if the leads don't at least achieve 20:5:1 then 5:1 ratios they're a total failure. (Or hell maybe I'm just an ***.) In EMGs defense, I was new to insurance cold calling when I started, so it could possibly be argued that you can attribute part of the problem to me being bad at the calls. (even though I worked in sales for over 5 years beforehand in a different industry) I would make the argument that if 10 people out of the 106 wanted to buy before I called them, I probably could have set at least 1 appointment.

Thanks again to everyone who is helping me out here with information, I really appreicate it. I've already found a pretty nifty resource if anyone needs forms for producer contract applications by googling like crazy, einsurance has a agent section that isn't password protected or anything that has links to the producer applications for 8 or 10 different companies.

NetTrac - links

After I get a bunch of calls made I may try to set something up for people in the same boat as me with links to all the applications I can find so people can apply to companies without the hassle of making 20 phone calls.

I was curious about one of the prior posts, what is a brokerage facility, what are they used for?

 

[javajnky]

Re: Looking for Better Products to Sell. Please Help Me Get Away

I agree with VolAgent. If you're just selling on price and giving everyone a fully underwritten low-priced quote, then you'll probably not last the year. It's a hard and frustrating way to make a living and I've seen agent after agent unable to get over the idea that the lowest price is always the best option.

Your job as an agent is to give your client a policy they will be approved for. And preferably approved in a timely manner. If you run into a guy who states he's healthy because he hasn't seen a doctor in 20 years and run him fully underwritten, then you're risking your clients ability to get insurance in the future on a gamble for a low price. He comes back positive for Hep C and you've just insured that he cannot protect his family with life insurance. Run him with a simplified issue policy first and recommend he get a physical and if all comes back OK then by all means, run him fully underwritten and get him a better price. You're the expert. Don't risk his finances so you feel better about the price. And some people with preexisting conditions will pay less with a simplified issue policy with some underwriting wiggle room (usually at least to Table 4) than they would going fully underwritten only to get rated.

I'm not saying that you should only write simplified. If you've got a guy who has regular physicals and knows he's in good shape then of course save him some money.

Just remember saving money is not your job. Getting policies that protect your clients interests issued is. There is always more to coverage than the price.

As for Equita and NAA, there are good IMO's out there with good solid lead programs. You just happened to get hooked up with the ones that are not.

Life insurance sales is a great career. I hope you stick with it and find a good company to work with. Nothing beats this industry for time work and money earned.

Best Regards,
John W. Fitzgerald
Pacific Home Rescue Insurance

 

[360]

Re: Looking for Better Products to Sell. Please Help Me Get Away

Two points...first Jody we have went over this at least a dozen times on the forum. EMG and EFES are two separate but highly related criters...siblings for lack of a better analogy. How the parents keep one on a pretty good path and let the other run in the ditch amazes a lot of us.

Second...ksigmtsu...don't make the mistake of lumping the entire MP market into the mess that you've found yourself in. Done correctly and there is really only one way to work that market correctly it can be highly effective and very profitable. You are correct though in that you've got to cut your losses where you're at and move on. If you've got a group of folks that need a home for MP I'd be happy to set up a time to go over the details of transitioning your group.

 

[akennedyga]

Re: Looking for Better Products to Sell. Please Help Me Get Away

If anyone on this thread has decent agencies from the Atlanta GA area... for life & health, senior etc.

Please let me know.

 

[arnguy]

Re: Looking for Better Products to Sell. Please Help Me Get Away

If anyone on this thread has decent agencies from the Atlanta GA area... for life & health, senior etc.

Please let me know.

Thanks for bumping this old thread! Try the search function or google.