The insurance field is highly competitive, incredibly complex, and constantly changing.
For the most part, consumers choose insurance based on price. Oftentimes, customers don’t even interact with agents or brokers directly. They simply head over to price aggregator sites, compare costs, and go with one of the more affordable options.
Add it all up, and it can be tricky for insurance brokers and agencies to close more deals.
To generate more sales and increase customer loyalty, insurance brokers need to differentiate themselves from their competitors. Instead of simply selling products, they need to transform into strategic consultants.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at five insurance sales tips you can use to become a trusted insurance advisor whom customers rely on for years to come.
1. Always be helping
The play (and subsequent movie) Glengarry Glen Ross introduced a new phrase to the salesperson’s lexicon: Always be closing.
That might have worked out well enough 30-plus years ago. But in today’s increasingly competitive business landscape, where customers have endless choices at their fingertips, a new mantra is required: Always be helping.
Becoming a trusted insurance advisor starts with positioning yourself as someone who’s always there to help—not someone who’s always selling something.
Insurance agencies would be wise to heed this advice.
According to a recent study, customers are increasingly looking for brokers to help them. More specifically, brokers reported:
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73% of employers need help with compliance and reporting.
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63% need help communicating insurance information.
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53% need help managing open enrollment.
One recent report found that less than half of Americans trust insurance brokers. When you’re always helping your clients and are never too pushy, you become more trustworthy—which puts you ahead of half of your competitors.
2. Anticipate prospect and client objections, pain points, and needs
In an age of ever-increasing healthcare costs, companies are increasingly looking for brokers to serve as strategic consultants. In fact, 83 percent of brokers say that more and more employers are depending on them to help manage the organization’s healthcare spend, according to a recent study.
When agencies and brokers position themselves as trusted insurance advisors, they become a valuable part of the team. To this end, to help control costs, 78 percent of brokers have added new products and services to their portfolios over the last 12 months, the same study found.
Not sure which products and services your customers want? Use analytics to remove all doubt. If a big percentage of customers recently added on a new service, for example, maybe more of them want it, too.
Bottom line: The better you’re able to anticipate your clients’ needs and offer solutions, the more likely you are to develop loyal customers.
3. Invest in new tools to increase efficiency and ensure compliance
When’s the last time you upgraded your proverbial tool belt? If it’s been a while, it may be time to consider whether investing in new technologies makes sense for your brokerage or firm.
Are you providing the best tools to your team and your clients?
The right tools and technology will help you get more done in less time while ensuring your products are fully compliant. Not only will this enable you to spend more time on each client, but your small team will also seem much bigger.
4. Be available and communicate effectively
Strategic consultants are there for their clients. They pick up the phone, they answer emails, and they accommodate their customers’ schedules.
Your brokerage or agency will be in better shape if you create a culture that emphasizes the importance of responsiveness and answering customer questions quickly.
Most customers agree that insurance companies use confusing language. The more simple and direct you can be in your communications, the better.
5. Consider your team
If you’re an individual broker, you can control your own approach to work and run things the way you want to run them.
It’s a bit different for agencies. Your firm will have a harder time being seen as a strategic consultant if your team isn’t engaged with its work.
It is, therefore, critical that you hire well, train and mentor your employees, and support professional development to keep your team on the cutting edge of the industry. Invest adequate resources in your employees, and your entire team can collectively become a strategic partner.
Become a trusted insurance advisor and grow your business
When you keep your existing clients happy and earn their trust, you increase the chances that they’ll see you as the solution to their insurance needs. As a result, you can grow your business steadily without having to resell to customers too frequently or struggle to manage increasing churn.
To learn more about the tools you need to transform into a strategic consultancy, click here.
