Insurance Agent Forum

[wilkin]

For those of you using any of the many CRMs discussed, are you also using a separate client database to keep track of policy info?

I am leaning towards the Activator add on to Act for its advanced productivity features that would be great for keeping track of prospects but I already use an insurance specific client database program with all my existing clients and policy data.

Is it common to use a CRM for prospects and a separate database for existing clients?

[Newby]

Originally Posted by wilkin

For those of you using any of the many CRMs discussed, are you also using a separate client database to keep track of policy info?

I am leaning towards the Activator add on to Act for its advanced productivity features that would be great for keeping track of prospects but I already use an insurance specific client database program with all my existing clients and policy data.

Is it common to use a CRM for prospects and a separate database for existing clients?

What I used is ACT and Activator with one database for both clients and prospects. I actually used one database for two businesses. I have an insurance agency and a funeral home I market the pre-need plans for.

I created check boxes in ACT for Insurance prospect, insurance client, FH prospect, FH client. Many of the insurance agency clients and prospects live in the same town as the FH prospects and clients so I didn't want the databases to be separate.

I would just create the fields within ACT that you track in your other database and import them. Create a new Tab for "policy information" and put all that info there.

Just because someone is sold doesn't mean they are no longer a prospect for the additional services.

[wilkin]

Originally Posted by Newby

What I used is ACT and Activator with one database for both clients and prospects. I actually used one database for two businesses. I have an insurance agency and a funeral home I market the pre-need plans for.

I created check boxes in ACT for Insurance prospect, insurance client, FH prospect, FH client. Many of the insurance agency clients and prospects live in the same town as the FH prospects and clients so I didn't want the databases to be separate.

I would just create the fields within ACT that you track in your other database and import them. Create a new Tab for "policy information" and put all that info there.

Just because someone is sold doesn't mean they are no longer a prospect for the additional services.

Newby- Would I be able to then search and create a list of policyholders by carrier and/or plan type, ie life, health,group?

Are you using something other than Act w/Activator now?

[Paradigm]

Originally Posted by wilkin

Newby- Would I be able to then search and create a list of policyholders by carrier and/or plan type, ie life, health,group?

Are you using something other than Act w/Activator now?

Check out avidian prophet-- works within outlook and does all that including sales automation. I have it set up by sales stage and insurance type but you can use any sorting you'd like as there are over 30 optional fields.

[Newby]

Originally Posted by wilkin

Newby- Would I be able to then search and create a list of policyholders by carrier and/or plan type, ie life, health,group?

Are you using something other than Act w/Activator now?

With ACT you can do a simple search just by right clicking within any field and doing a search. If the field has a drop-down list that will show as your search options.

If you want a more complicated search such as clients in zip code 45678 that you haave not contaacted within the last 12-months, you build a quiry (also pretty simple within ACT) and you can save the quiry once you build it so that becomes a simple search also.

A big advantage of ACT is that you can buy a million different books on it like Act for Dummies. It helps.

I am currently testing out i-relay due to I need it in several locations. I like what I see with i-relay so far except it is very uncustomizable and many fields are not usefull to me.

[wilkin]

Originally Posted by Newby

I am currently testing out i-relay due to I need it in several locations. I like what I see with i-relay so far except it is very uncustomizable and many fields are not usefull to me.

i-relay is hosted correct? I can see that as an advantage if you want/need to access it from several locations, but what happens if the company hosting it goes out of business?

Newby, have you looked at Prophet? Is it as capable as Act for insurance agents?

[al3]

Originally Posted by wilkin

For those of you using any of the many CRMs discussed, are you also using a separate client database to keep track of policy info?

It really does not matter what "works" for other agents... what matters is what works for YOU... and you can only find out by trying different office procedures.

I use SugarCRM (on my web server) to keep all my "people" data: leads and accounts. I convert a lead to an account when they make application for a policy. (Some people just keep everyone as accounts and don't bother with the lead feature but I like it.)

I run a lot of quotes and illustrations in PDF format. I could if I wanted to easily upload these to the Sugar database for storage and retrieval. However, I don't. For me it is a waste of bandwidth. I keep a folder on my desktop where I keep these PDF files, labeled with the person's last name. After about six months I purge the folder of old quotes no longer needed (for prospects who never bought.)

When I call a prospect or client I have their SugarCRM record in front of me... which are short HTML files... takes no time at all to pop up on the screen (with copious log of previous conversations and other data (wife name, cat/dog's name, kid's school, etc.) If I need to look at the quote it is easy to find in the desktop folder... and the file does not have to be downloaded from the web server to see it. That saves a bit of time, especially on life illustrations which are large files.

The only time I upload the PDF illustrations to SugarCRM is if I'm going out of town and I think I might have to access a "case in progress" info while on the road (via a laptop, a hotel computer, or the Safari browser on my iPhone.)

FYI, SugarCRM is free... if you place a low value on your time... because it will take a bit of effort to install it and get it running. If you are looking for a web-based system, you might try freecrm.com and see if that works for you. I used it for a while until I discovered SugarCRM which was a slightly better fit for me... especially since I have my own dedicated web server (costs about $2,000 a year... from pair.com on which we run our jaya123.com service for small businesses (but not insurance agencies... not a good fit there.)

Al

[Newby]

Anybody know how to replace a keyboard on a Tosheba laptop.

Usually when I hit a "b" it types 2-bs but now it is apparently starting up with the "a" also. POS!

[al3]

Originally Posted by Newby

Anybody know how to replace a keyboard on a Tosheba laptop.

Usually when I hit a "b" it types 2-bs but now it is apparently starting up with the "a" also. POS!

Piece of cake. See one of the links here:
replace a keyboard on a Toshiba laptop - Google Search

Perhaps this:

How to remove keyboard from Toshiba Satellite A55 laptop.

Start with a good cleaning before replacing it.

Al

[Newby]

The perfect solution for me doesn't exist yet. It would be as simple to customize as ACT, web based (but only if you need it in multi-locations by more than one user) sync with a Palm, or other PDA and have automation using Word documents and e-mails like Activator.

I-relay would be great if I could customize it easily.

[patch36]

I tried the other online CRM's and went back to ACT. It is too easy to run labels, lists, ect from ACT to go to one like sugar or freecrm, for me.

I did sign up for GOTOMYPC.com, so I could access ACT from all my computers whereever I am as long as I have internet.

It is what works for me, to each their own.

[Newby]

Originally Posted by patch36

I tried the other online CRM's and went back to ACT. It is too easy to run labels, lists, ect from ACT to go to one like sugar or freecrm, for me.

I did sign up for GOTOMYPC.com, so I could access ACT from all my computers whereever I am as long as I have internet.

It is what works for me, to each their own.

And that does sound like a good solution that I would consider BUT my ACT and WORD and VISTA and Activator are getting a LOT of conflicts ever since I upgraded to VISTA and the new microsoft products last January. Mainly Word keeps crashing.

I'm just ready to try the online thing.

[patch36]

Originally Posted by Newby

And that does sound like a good solution that I would consider BUT my ACT and WORD and VISTA and Activator are getting a LOT of conflicts ever since I upgraded to VISTA and the new microsoft products last January. Mainly Word keeps crashing.

I'm just ready to try the online thing.

I initially went to Vista and then back to XP and now I am back to Vista on all of my computers except the one I run ACT on. All I do with the computer that has ACT on it is run ACT on it. We access it from our other computers via gotomypc.com, even at the home office, rather than using networking. That way ACT does not have to be installed on all of the computers, just the ACT computer.

I had issues getting networked with ACT, so I gave up and went to gotomypc.com.

I am having no issues with Vista that I didn't also have with XP. I did start from scratch and reformatted the computers with Vista as the operating system rather than trying to install it in a new partition. I set up on my main computer a 2nd harddrive that is where all my files are stored, so all I had to do was reinstall my applications and waste a day of a weekend getting everything back up to speed.

[Newby]

Patch,
With Go to My PC can two people who are different users in ACT be working on the Act database at the same time from remote locations?