Successful marketing of Commercial Lines requires a detailed plan. The first step is to assess where you are right now. In this first of a three-part series, Jack Fries examines the preliminary steps that an agency should take in marketing Commercial Lines.
As Yogi Berra said, “If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll probably end up some where else.”
Determine the classes of business that the agency now writes. You might be surprised at how many different classes of business you serve. Try to determine if you have knowingly, or unknowingly, written a large number of a certain class of accounts. This makes you an expert. Then take advantage of this expertise to expand your writing in this class of business by using the reverse referral method described in the article, “Question Your Prospecting and Sales Methodology.”
Most agency marketing plans are reactive, rather than proactive. In other words, without a plan agency CSRs and producers react to unsolicited phone calls. Responding to these calls, rather than contacting your existing accounts to develop those accounts, is like fishing for minnows from the back of a whale.
Review all accounts to determine the lines of business that you aren’t writing. At renewal you should review with the client their exposures to loss and their need for such additional coverages as Umbrella or Excess Liability, Employment Practices Liability, Health insurance, Key Person Life, Long-Term Disability, Long-Term Care, etc.
An important fact to remember is that the more policies you write for a client, the longer you will retain that account. Also, an agency’s hit ratio is far higher when making proposals to an existing customer, rather than to an unknown prospect.