Marketing: Cold Calling Question

[lisar1208]

Insuranceguru, in what capacity did you use sales genie to obtain the leads? Did you work from the list of basic consumers or did you target a certain market?

 

[InsuranceGuru]

Insuranceguru, in what capacity did you use sales genie to obtain the leads? Did you work from the list of basic consumers or did you target a certain market?

We targeted our market, selling to small businesses with under 5 employees (we were selling individual health insurance products).

Most of these were simply Mom&Pop shops, businesses from the home, and sole-proprietors working for themselves out in the field.

 

[fastrack1]

This sounds like apologetic begging...

I realize it's not what you want to hear, but absolutely nobody cares about a "Free Friendly Farmers Review". Most would rather go on a root canal appointment.

If you don't come up with some compelling marketing - you're doomed to failure. Nothing personal against Farmers, most all insurance companies don't have a clue about direct response marketing.

A mailing:

"If I Can't Lower Your ________ (auto, homeowner's, whatever line) Premium - I'll Give You $250."

You need some impact...

So how much money have you paid out to date?

 

[bobson]

1manshow... Great Thinker!

She makes most of our cross sell calls also. The original producer gets the first six months for a chance at a cross sell, then it goes to the telemarketer and the producer gets zero commission.

I went back this morning and copied off a lot of your past posts and put them into one word document. I think if someone wants to make it in the P&C business, they could do a lot worse things then putting your systems together from the outline of your posts...


Have you considered getting rid of producers in favor of your telemarketer?

What do your producers do? Do they actively solicit business away from what your telemarketer is doing or are they just running the quotes for your telemarketer?

 

[1manshow]

Thank you for the kind words.

We're down to two producers right now and one is primarily life/health. They have the option of buying the telemarketers leads as they come in and working them or the leads go to the house and my CSR's do the follow up and sales. CSR's are bonused on production levels so they are usually glad to chase fresh leads. Life/health producer has access to all house accounts for soliciting life/health/med sup. leads and keeps pretty busy with those alone.

We could do very well without producers at this point with all the prospects now in our database. We currently have thousands of quotes entered into our system categorized according to x-date and current carrier that will continually be re-solicited until they become a client or ask to be removed from our list. By categorizing them according to carrier, we can target certain carriers when they file for substantial rate increases, etc. Really makes the prospecting job a lot easier.

 

[bobson]

We could do very well without producers at this point with all the prospects now in our database. We currently have thousands of quotes entered into our system categorized according to x-date and current carrier that will continually be re-solicited until they become a client or ask to be removed from our list. By categorizing them according to carrier, we can target certain carriers when they file for substantial rate increases, etc. Really makes the prospecting job a lot easier.

Do you need another telemarketer or life/health salesman???

Kidding aside, what is your procedure on following up on x-dates? That seems to be the last piece of the puzzle? Say they don't buy, do you just send out another quote in 6 months or does your telemarketer do more phone work?

Also, what kind of process does your life/health producer follow?

 

[1manshow]

Telemarketer follows up on all preferred/superior insurance scored prospects after 30 days. They have already received 3 pieces of mail from us, including two gifts.(reciprocity, i think they call that) then open xdates are sent an unsolicited requote at the 6 month point with a form letter asking if we can "throw our hat in the ring" again. They are then put on the telemarketers "to do" list for callback prior to the next renewal. She simply calls them back and asks if they mind us sending info. from time to time as we come across deals we think might benefit them, then she asks what they thought of the last quote, handles objections, etc. She has our CSR's shedulers on her PC so she can even set an appt for the prospect to come in while she's got them on the line. Only problem with that so far has been us getting cheated out of unscheduled afternoon golfing outings.

Life/health gal shoots from the hip most days, she has two scripts/pitches she uses. For long term clients, she calls and apologizes that while reviewing their file it appears we have never asked about their life ins.?? Shame on us !! She also gets the monthly client review sheet that we complete for every new P & C client. It is a short form the CSR's fill out in the initial interview asking about other lines of business and whether they would be receptive to a call about life insurance in the future. She also gets to follow up on all our 90 day welcome letters. We do a three step mailing to all new clients at 30, 90 and 180 days and the 90 day letter addresses life insurance/insurability and our concerns that they should have it explained by a professional...yadda,yadda...




I only wish I had a prospect database when I started 20+ years ago. In my first five years, I went through the Cole directory a total of three times. That's 40K+ names x 3 !!
Who ever said this business was easy didn't start out like I did, that's for sure.

 

[bobson]

. Only problem with that so far has been us getting cheated out of unscheduled afternoon golfing outings.

Damn her anyway, forcing you to make sales instead of playing...

On the ease of business...

Have you ever thought about putting a package together teaching your system? Or how about opening other offices?

It seems like you could open an office anywhere, follow this sytem and be up and running, off to the races.

Finally any more info on Xanatek? Do you like the system still?

We use another agency management system and the follow up can be electronically managed it is just such a hassle. The system is not very user friendly. I don't think an insurance agent even offered any input some days.

 

[1manshow]

My system is simply hard work, consistent follow up and some creative thinking thrown in....nothing the average agent isn't capable of doing.

No other offices for me, thought about it a few years ago and it was very tempting to try to prove what I've learned over the past 20 years would work in a scratch agency in a growing market......decided that a Wife, 3 kids, hunting trips, fishing trips, golfing, camping, kids sports, family vacations are enough to keep me busy between working once in a while

Xanatek is head and shoulders above the rest. Who else offers several, two day "boot camps" yearly for agents to get together,
share ideas and be taught new methods of utilizing their management systems ? No one that I've ever heard of. And... it was created by and managed by a successful P & C agent.

 

[gstker]

Cold calling is hard. Where are you getting the leads from? Are you targeting a certain market? Are you sure they are not on the do not call list?
(sorry for so many questions)
You do have good questions that you are asking.
I would say your opening is something you could work on. For instance I would not say that I am new with Farmers. You don't want your call to sound like a telemarketer and you want them to think you are experienced for them to trust you and let you into their homes.
I sell Home/auto/life and most of my closing are done via fax, internet or on the phone.
Is farmers requiring you to go to their homes?

would you so kind to share with us how you go about seeing over the phone?