When it comes to marketing, all too many agents are sinners
Many agents focus on the single client or prospect in front of them instead of the "big picture" of the marketplace — and how to position themselves so that the market is irresistibly drawn to them.
By "marketing," I mean building and implementing reliable systems that generate:
- A steady "conveyor belt" of ideal prospects, predisposed to buy from you
- Maximum revenue per client
- Maximum long-term retention
Unfortunately, when agents do try to market, many commit a multitude of "sins," from which we can learn:
MARKETING SIN #1: USING EMPTY PLATITUDES
How many tired old brochures, letters, and Yellow Page ads have you seen that repeat such weary cliche & acute as:
- "We've been in business since 1947."
- "Trust, service, integrity."
- "Our people really care."
First of all, the market doesn't want to hear you talk about yourself and how great you are. Prospective buyers want to know "what's in it for them." They want someone who can solve their problems. They won't respond to the same worn-out phrases everyone else uses. Throw those old cliche & acute away. Agents use them because they don't know what to say, and because they think the purpose of advertising is "to get their name out there." It's not. That's a myth perpetuated by advertising sales reps who don't really want to be held accountable for results. The purpose of advertising is to generate real leads that turn into real sales and real dollars — and deliver a positive return on investment.
MARKETING SIN #2: BEING AN INSURANCE TECHNICIAN, NOT AN INSURANCE MARKETER
Like every other industry, we tend to focus on the "content" of what we do, rather than the process of building a business. If someone goes to school to be a dentist, they'll focus on teeth — not necessarily on building a dental practice. Agents tend to focus on insurance and insurance policies. Of course we need good technical skills in our agencies to serve our customers well, but we also need to recognize that being good does not equal getting paid.
Marketing to grow is a vital business skill that's often neglected. As Mike Stromsoe of the Fallbrook Agency in Temecula, California, says: "The biggest mindset shift I had to make was to go from being an insurance agent to being an insurance marketer. Sure, I'm still a good agent. Better than ever. But that mindset shift allowed me to grow my income nine times in 47 months. That's been huge for me — and my family."
MARKETING SIN #3: SELLING,' NOT MARKETING
Selling is the last step in the process of converting a prospect to a client. Good marketing should do both of these things:
- Put you or your staff in front of more prospects in less time, and
- Put you only in front of prospects who are already predisposed to do business with you.
In other words, marketing is the ultimate time management system — because it eliminates wasting time with low-probability prospects and fills your available time with high-probability prospects. Marketing suffers from the myth that it's manipulative. The opposite holds true. Powerful marketing systems allow prospects to screen themselves out of the process (saving you the time of meeting with poor prospects) and move themselves through your "funnel" at their own pace. These systems then deliver good prospects to you only when they're "ripe" and ready to buy.
Well-constructed marketing systems can have several elements, including everything from print ads, e-mail, Internet, fax, voice broadcast, direct mail, and other media. For example, Ed Cantu of the Cantu Agency (Corpus Christi, TX) started using a combination of postcards and display ads that drove people to a Web site that executed automatic personalized e-mail. Says Ed, "We quote 140 to 150 homes per month. Our new commission sales have increased by 170%!" (And homeowners in Texas are lucrative accounts for a Personal Lines agency!)
MARKETING SIN #4: NOT TARGETING YOUR MARKET
You can only create a "precision message" if you have a precision market. People don't think of themselves as part of a "market," but as individuals with individual problems. And it's far easier to create a message that resonates if you identify a group with common interests and needs than it is to try to sell everything to everyone.
The savvy marketer "works backwards" — by first identifying the "hungry market," then identifying products and services that meet their needs. Shaun Irwin, (Irwin Andersen Agency, Minneapolis) started niche marketing three years ago. Says Shaun, "We currently operate eight Web sites in six distinct target niche areas. We take what we learned from each one and build it on the next one or discard it. Overall, our Web site and related material have generated $383,549 in commission in three years. The ultimate lifetime value of these clients represents $1,917,745 over 10 years." By the time prospects come to Irwin, they're making inbound calls, ready to buy (Shaun calls it "automatic money!").
MARKETING SIN #5: THINKING SMALL AND GETTING STUCK IN ONE MEDIUM
Sometimes agents think of marketing as only direct mail letters, postcards or some other one-medium operation. And when they do create a winning campaign with a positive return on investment, they get stuck in that one medium.
The good news: If you have a message that works in one medium, it could very well work in many other media — and you're probably leaving money on the table if you don't test them. John Mason, (J.N. Mason Agency, Hancock, NY) is using no fewer than 13 different media to market. He started marketing about three years ago. Now this agent, based in a town of 2,000, has more than 9,000 clients — and has multiplied his income by 800%!
MARKETING SIN #6: OVERLOOKING THE EASY MONEY
Getting new clients seems to be the exciting part of marketing. But there's still "easy money" in your existing book. You've already overcome the "trust barrier." You have the perfect list — better than any you could ever rent or buy. It's the best combination you could ask for. Two or three points of increased retention can mean hundreds of thousands of dollars over the next 10 years. Compound that with the power of increased policy count and coverage, together with a proactive referral campaign from your existing customers, and the increased income can be staggering.
Andy Shifflett (Shifflett Insurance Agency, Cedar Rapids, IA) implemented a renewal letter campaign that generates a 35% response. Sixty percent of the responses result in increased premium. And the letter has helped boost his retention another three percentage points. Like all good marketing, once he set it up, it "runs itself." The same holds true of Joe Hagan's monoline cross-sell campaign. It generates a consistent 43% response from his existing customers (another case of "automatic money!").
MARKETING SIN #7: NOT DOING YOUR MATH
As I've said so many times, the "secret" side of marketing is simple arithmetic. P.T. Barnum once said, "I know that half my advertising is working. I just don't know which half." Imagine the empire he could have built if he did! Today, we can know "which half" of our advertising is working — and that information tells us which messages and campaigns to roll out and which ones to kill.
Carole Massey (Massey Insurance Services, Ontario, CA) recently ran a postcard campaign and a magazine campaign at the same time. Because she had an internal system built into her marketing operation, she knew which medium generated a seven to one return and which one lost money. Now she can test different offers — all within the same medium. That's the kind of information Carole has used to build her agency from $4 million to more than $10 million in three and a half years.
CONCLUSION
As with other aspects of running an insurance agency, marketing is a business skill: One that will reward you with more income, greater stability — and less wasted time. Take the time to develop and implement systems that deliver prospects to you just the way you like them: Ready to buy.