Let’s just jump right in to JV’s and endorsed mailings. This is something that is so underutilized, it’s ridiculous. In the marketing world, joint ventures are the life blood of many, many companies and they make people hundreds of thousands and millions of dollars on a regular basis by

-list sharing or mailing to each other’s lists and

-cross-selling to each other’s lists of customers.

So it works online well and it works offline as well. Most people just don’t do it because it takes a little bit more effort than most are willing to put in. This is going to make you so much more powerful than all the other agents out there that are just scraping the bottom of the barrel to get leads. By doing this, you’re going to get access to the best clients, and potential clients, that you can possibly get.

That is because its coming from a referral of somebody they are already doing business with, an endorsement, and you know that they’re obviously a buyer because they’ve currently been purchasing something from the other individual that you’re joint venturing with.

(more…)

The first thing to remember when you’re doing direct mail is that the list is everything. The best direct mail piece in the world is no good if you send it to the wrong list, or to a bad list, or to a bunch of people who have already moved and aren’t there to receive their mail. So, focusing on, and getting, a good list is key to making your marketing pieces perform well.

Write that down. The list is everything.

How do we go about getting a good list? First of all, it’s important to know who your best customer is.

Do you have a lot of customers in a certain geographic area? If so, then that’s probably a good indication that you can mail to that area and be successful in getting clients. Do you have a lot of people who own a certain type of home, or a certain type of car, a boat etc? These types of things give us demographic information that tell us “this is the type of individual that I want to mail to”.

Just taking a zip code and saying, “Okay, I’m going to send a mailing piece to everybody in this zip code” is the most common approach to direct mail. And trust me, there’s a ton of bulk mail blasting out there. Taking this “shotgun” approach with your money and with your mailing can work, but it’s not the way to really get the best results and return on investment.

(more…)

The idea of being on the news or being on the radio or being highlighted in the newspaper or magazine may not appeal to you, but what I can tell you is you’ll get some very, very qualified and quality clients from using this strategy.

1. The first thing to do is to develop relationships. Unfortunately, I know this is a pain in the neck, but you’re going to have to identify who the folks are that you want to develop relationships with. Is there a talk radio show that talks about finance in your area, or family finances, family planning, financial planning etc.? You can easily relate to that subject matter as a protection specialist or emergency preparedness specialist etc.

(more…)

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.

(more…)

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.

(more…)