10 STEPS TO OVERCOME COMPETITION by Jack Burke Remember the first time you experienced a Chinese box set? As each box opened to reveal a smaller box, you wondered with childlike curiosi...

The goal in business is to outdistance the competition and make profitable sales by producing more customer-friendly products or services. To reach this goal, you need an advantage to improve your batting average-but it's getting more difficult and complicated to obtain this advantage, let alone keep it.

Historically, a hard market is part of the cyclical nature of the insurance industry. At one time, these cycles occurred fairly consistently at about seven year intervals. However, the last significant hard market came in the mid-80s.

A hard market is characterized by increasing rates and/or reduced industry capacity, which leads to affordability and/or availability problems. In addition, both underwriting and claims adjusting usually become more stringent. In the current marketplace, these conditions are exacerbated by increased uncertainty about such loss exposures as terrorism, mold, etc., and by a reinsurance market significantly strained by the events of September 11.

Becoming accustomed to a growing economy is easy and dangerous. Although there are always pockets of problems, we forget that success is often more the result of a good economy than our business acumen. If everyone else is doing well, our major challenge becomes how to pull ahead of the pack. Unfortunately, many business people tend to get a bit lazy-and that's when we can get caught.
There are ways to become more successful, keep business booming, and give companies the opportunity to gain a competitive advantage. Here are 15 ways to develop an extra edge:

22 EFFECTIVE WAYS TO OUTMARKET THE COMPETITION by John Graham Outmarketing competitors is easy - if you do it right. This takes a combination of work and savvy, but the results ...

Out-marketing your competitors is easy if you do it right. It takes a combination of work and savvy, but the results can...

A BRIGHT FUTURE FOR SMALL AGENCIES by Chris Burand Independent agencies, even small ones, definitely have a bright future. Offer better service related to a specific product or offe...

Producer: Hello, (PROSPECT NAME), this is (PRODUCER NAME) from (ABC AGENCY). I enjoyed meeting with you in (MONTH), and I was...

ASSESSING YOUR FIRM'S RESOURCES by Bill Schoeffler and Catherine Oak Today, it is critical for insurance agents and brokers to plan their own destiny. One can never be quite c...

AVOIDING COSTLY MARKETING MISTAKES by Stephen Anderson You can no longer sit back and wait for business to come to you. That's the sure route to becoming a victim of the ch...