1.Create a valuable tool that you can send to their list.
It’s so important to be developing some of this stuff like an emergency preparedness plan or an inventory record book or an insurance shoppers checklist, etc, that you can say, “Hey, Mr. President of the Association (or Mrs. President), I have this great tool that would be valuable to your members.Would you willing to let me mail it out to them or send them an e-mail and have them go to my website and get it?”
This is a great way to position yourself as the expert, offer something of value before you ask them for something.
2.Develop relationships with the Presidents or the leaders of these associations to get endorsed mailings.
Selling is an art that evolves through time. Through the years, we have seen insurance companies and individuals achieve tremendous success by employing various methods of getting more leads. In the past, a provider could become a big business just by using one way of gathering prospects. The conventional methods of getting insurance leads include telemarketing, direct mail, face-to-face selling, radio, and print media.
However, the reason why a lot of those who engage in insurance sales eventually fail in their craft is because they lack foresight on the direction of their business. The advent of advanced technology as well as the new laws have inevitably brought forth a revolution in sales and marketing.
Last night I was watching “Pursuit of Happyness” (with Will Smith) on the bed with my wife. It’s really an inspiring show.
He went through hell to achieve his dreams, and it shot me back to my time as a new insurance agent that was like Chinese Water Torture.
Luckily I never had to endure the types of difficulties he faced, but there were certainly times where the future was bleak.
When I started as an agent, I had nothing given to me.
Okay, okay… I take that back, I did get a phone book and telephone.
I had dropped out of college in order to start this job cuz I was getting married in about 6 weeks. The big boss painted a beautiful picture for me. He sold me on the lifestyle, the money, the freedom, the GOLF!
So I gave up college and took up cold calling and getting kicked in the shorts instead.
I worked 2 jobs just to pay the bills. (My night job just about killed me, not kidding. I smashed my thumb open and then cracked my skull on the concrete floor. I’ll tell you about it sometime.) Our first Christmas married my entire commission for the month was $349.
For Christmas dinner we ate hot-pockets from 7-11. My wife (living 2000 miles away from her parents) cried when she called them on the phone.
Not one of my favorite moments. HOWEVER, these experiences drove me to be better. To accept nothing less than complete financial success and the freedom and security that it brings with it.
I realized that I needed to be BETTER, more Valuable to the market to get paid BIG money.
So I studied everything I could about persuasion, sales, marketing, advertising, copywriting. That study led me to develop the Value For Life Newsletter.
This newsletter is one of the best ways on the planet to get new leads, referrals, and increase commissions by cross-selling. http://www.massretention.com
So at the end of the day, like Will Smith’s character in “Happyness”, I feel extremely blessed to be able to achieve my goals in life. And I know ANYONE can get what they desire, if they work SMART and hard.
To more leads and bigger commissions,
Beach Broker
PS. I know I’ve promised to offer the monthly newsletter to everyone on an ongoing basis. Things have been crazy around here. Big commission just had a new baby boy, and we’ve been working on a new AWESOME live internet TV show for our subscribers, so that’s been taking up all my time.
They finally arrived! After 1month of waiting my Smith Tycoon sunglasses showed up. They are pretty much the coolest glasses around. (I’ll show them to you in the next video)
I have to make this quick because I have to go have lunch with my Grandma. She’s invited me over for Retirement community lunch. So lets get to it!
It’s true, our awesome group of agents in the Insurance Mavericks just keeps growing, and impressing me at the same time. Hopefully Jeremy won’t mind that I highlight him here, but he did such a great job I can’t help but show you.
First here’s the email I received from him this week.
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BB,
Wow! The first edition of my “Value for Life” is grossing me [right now] a lot of good e-mails giving me kudos!
I have nothing in there about insurance because I don’t want it to have to go through compliance of my carrier! I consider it my Personal Newsletter.
I am so glad I spent $50 on this project. I look forward to doing it in September! Hopefully, the bridge will be crossed between customer to client! It really is better than sending a postcard or anything else I’ve done to connect with current clients.
One other thing, is I only sent it to my “A” clients [you know, the ones who don't squeak so they don't get the grease]. The greatest clients who get neglected because they don’t have a complaint.
attachment: my VFL edition. The costumes are great, hope you enjoy mine in my newsletter.
Best Regards,
Jeremy
*******
And my response…
Jeremy,
CONGRATULATIONS!
Great job implementing, and I love the costume!
Good work, you are the second agent to report back to us that you’ve been implementing and seeing great results.
We’ve got a new video coming out today or tomorrow, so be on the lookout for it.
Beach
Now I just had to show you a glimpse of his letter, you’ll get a kick out of it, and it’s a great example of really differentiating yourself.
So now you see what we mean when we talk about personality in your marketing. Here’s another quick tip from some emails I’ve been receiving.
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Also, wanted to give you another tip on differentiation and making your personality “Stick” with your readers and prospects. You’ll want to create a “Public Persona Name” for yourself. Currently it says “Jeremy Snowden, Agent” that’s boring.
Create a tag line for yourself. As you know, my partner and I are the “Insurance Mavericks”. I’m helping another agent who loves Hawaii figure out a tagline for herself “A little piece of hawaii with every policy” she is going to be handing out little sandal keychains, her office is decked out in Hawaiian garb, and she’ll be putting Hawaii videos and themes on her website. (If she follows my advice.)
You could easily use the “guitar playing superagent” or something along those lines.
Let me know what you come up with.
Beach
Please leave us a comment below on what you think, questions you have, etc. We love to hear from you!
Hardees and Carl Jr. fast food chain are taking a bite out of the fast food industry and boosting profits like never before. Was it the racy Paris Hilton commercials? The answer is… Yes! That is part of it. And although I could be one of the very few men who’ve never seen the commercial or video so I don’t know exactly what she says…but from what I’ve read what is equally important it is HOW she says what she says.
Her commercial breaks away from the hum drum drab of robotic marching like lemmings going over the cliff style marketing. It appeals to the targeted audience of the men who want to over indulge. And that is exactly what Hardees and Carl Jr. wanted to do. They are using several SMARTmarketingTM principles.
1)Paris video broke away from the norm to get past the reaction oh, another one of those.
How is your marketing distinguishing you and your agency as special and apart from your piers?
2)Targeted exactly who they wanted. Men who are blue collar over indulgers.
How is your marketing targeting exactly who you want or are you specializing in generalities?
3)Celebrity attachment. Paris Hilton scores very high in recognition and her name has proven to have a long shelf life. Although she could be considered risky because you never know when she would do something again that you may not be proud to have your business associated with her, but this is calculated against the audience and odds are if she did another one of the even less clothed videos the exact same targeted audience would be there watching with the remote control in one hand and a GIANT Hardees hamburger burgeoning with calories in the other hand!
How can you use the SMARTmarketingTMprinciple of celebrity attachment with your agency. Note, a celebrity is a celebrity based on recognition so a former or current news anchor in your city as well as recognized atheletes etc can all be used for this purpose and this also has the added benefit of positioning you too.
4)Newsy. Just the fact they used Paris made the event news.
How can you make sure that you get free media by using this principle?
5)Positioned against. They are using the opposite of hum drum. A contrarian. In a world of fast food restaurants jumping on the Jared from Subway lose weight wagon and trying to become a diet destination location –Hardees and Carl Jr.s parent company is saying basically -If you want calories and sustenance and don’t care whether you have a waist line or a circumference that is described in terms of girth then Joe Lunchbucketyou are at the right location!
How can you position yourself against the competition? Polarization is not always a bad thing, but contrary just to be contrary is not the goal, find a place to make a stand such as price and say something like Your mom always said you get what you pay for so can you really afford to risk your financial future with barely get by coverage?Our agency provides you Not too much. Not too little. But Just right coverage. Easy. Fast. Dependable.
There are ton’s more we could discuss here but will not.
But in review, was the commercial controversial? You bet your bippy it was. Did it shake up the industry? Absolutely. But it was not controversial just for the sake of being controversial; it was sending the message of being something different.
Now enter the InsuranceMarketingMavericks. Controversial? Some would say yes.Different. Yes. And will they shake up the industry? You better hope so! Because we’ve been hearing from insurance agents across the nation and the challenges of running an agency are not getting any easier.
If you are like me, and one of the few who have not seen Paris Hiltons Hardees or Carl Jr. commercial then that’s fine. But it is NOT o.k. if you have not seen the InsuranceMarketingMavericks.com videos. So get more insurance leads now by taking the first step and watching BeachBroker star in a series of great videos.
Free insurance marketing tips await the mavericks who dare to watch these great videos!
Don’t look now, but the Mavs’ have come out from behind the curtain, and reveal their identities…kind of.
We know we look ridiculous, but it was fun and hopefully really helpful to you. (We failed to mention the reason for our silly costumes in the video, see below!)
Watch The Video Now->
As you know there are a multitude of “insurance villains” out to beat up insurance
agents and make our lives difficult. You have the Ultimate Villain Mastermind, Corporate Carl who
loves to find ways to shrink agent commissions, and IMA DRAGON the underwriter who never wants
to write any business.
We face these villains on a daily basis, and to keep ourselves anonymous, we’ve donned these
superhero costumes.
Please leave us a comment and let us know if this video was helpful (or just entertaining).
Here’s another post from a forum I contribute to. I’m getting more and more questions about this stuff, so I thought I’d share with you the question and the answer i gave.
On the forum that this came from the previous posts were saying how much they love postcards, and that letters get tossed before they even get a chance to get opened. Thats what some of my comments below reference.
Here you go…
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Hey Beachbroker,
i must say that your website is interesting and obviously you guys are trying to sell your services.But would you be willing to throw a bone to a forum member?Below is a post that i made recently (with no replies) on a DM thread.What I would add to you is that I respect your opinion on the letters - but any letter that isn’t obviously pertinent goes straight to the shredder at my house.I was thinking of doing a DM campaign with a large, heavy stock piece (maybe folded to keep post down) that is eye catching enough to make an impression in those precious seconds from the mailbox to the trash can or shredder.What are some call to action lines or headlines that you have used successfully?What kinds of stock photos - shocking pics or warm fuzzy’s?would you do a joint health and life campaign?I know that you guys are running a business but i thought i’d ask.
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My reply:
Marc, no problem on the question.
I’ve had a lot of experience in this area.
Blanket statements like “Postcards are best” is not the best advice in the world .
Of course it takes testing. For some offers postcards may prove betters, some times self mailers, and some times letters.
I’ve had much more success with self mailers than postcards, and I mailed to the exact same list multiple times. What does that tell me?
Hmmm, not hard.
I can assure you that most people never use letters the way I’ve described, and so they can’t say whether they are effective or not, can they?
There’s a couple of ways to get your mail opened. There is a long line of data and statistics pointing to letters as a better way to get response than postcards, but for your question specifically, I’ll address that.
What is your target’s biggest PROBLEM when it comes to what you offer. Is it too expensive? Too complicated? Scary? Confusing, Frustrating?
After you have identified what you most often hear in terms of a problem, (from your clients) then turn that into a headline.
I’ll use price because that tends to be a popular way that we agents sell ourselves.
“How A Legal IRS Loophole Allows Angelina Jolie To Save 27% on Her Health Insurance Premiums…And You Can Too!” OPEN TO LEARN MORE…
Then I would go into how the IRS allows business owners to write off 100% of their health and dental insurance premiums.
Why Angelina Jolie? 2 REALLY good reasons. (She’s a business owner of some type so that’s the tie in.)
1. She’s a hot superstar and you can put her picture in there to capture attention.
2. She is in a movie right now that is doing a ton of marketing, and you’ll be able to leverage their marketing to enhance yours.
Now you will show them how they can set up a company that will only cost them $12 per year to maintain and it will save them hundreds, even thousands in taxes over the course of the year, or several years. (of course hypothetical, but you get the idea.)
Another example headline would be “How Savvy Americans (use your specific city for a better effect) Are Beating The Skyrocketing health insurance Costs.” Open to learn more…
Also, have you downloaded the 100 Power Headlines and 32 Great Headline Templates from our video site? Insurance Marketing Mavericks
If not, it will be a great help to you, watch the video on Copywriting for maximum lead attraction or (maximum response), put in your email address and go download the tools.
Don’t worry, I’m not going to spam you. But I am giving a lot of value, and I need an email address to update people on the new content we put up. (For those who are offended…don’t do it.)
Hope that helps,
Beach Broker
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Beach Broker “Make Them Come To You”
PS. If you have an comment or question, feel free to post it below and I’ll do my best to respond.
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