Insurance Agent Forum

[Hollywood]

Any comments qualifying whether lead purchases are for an individual, a team, or an agency, etc. would be highly appreciated.

Thanks!

[medicarebenefitsdirect]

I would love to talk to the person who owns this captive agency. I work with a 50 year old business that did the same thing for 30 years. Over the last 20 years they have hired people to focus and become experts in specific areas of insurance. When we did that the business growth was amazing. We are now the largest independent auto and homeowners agency in SC. I actually became partners with them to specialize in the senior market. It works really well. Trying to do everything will always hold you back from your true potential.

[Jeff]

Originally Posted by CHUMPS FROM OXFORD

HometownQuotes has a $1 per lead special going on right now. I still haven't signed up.

One prominent Forum member took Hometown up on their offer and thought they were some of the worst leads he has ever received.

I tried htq about a year ago... had them for a couple weeks and did okay. Looked like I was maybe competing against 1-2 other agents. Then they ran a $1 lead promo. Went downhill from there. So many agents were trying them it was impossible to reach anyone. Haven't used them since.

[ABC]

I spend my money on my website.
SEO per month is $600
PPC per month $400

[CHUMPS FROM OXFORD]

$600 on SEO. Wow. What are some of the specific things you are spending that money on?

Sheepishly, I must admit that I spend $0 on SEO. I do it all myself. Maybe not a good idea.

Spellcheck was used in this post.
WebNanny was not used in this post
CharlottesWeb was not used in this post.

[somarco]

I suspect somewhere between $0 and $600 there is something you can live with.

I too am curious what you get for $600 per month.

[the producer]

Everyone needs to be spending as much as they can on SEO or else they just letting the next guy steal their customer...

[CHUMPS FROM OXFORD]

But...a lot of SEO stuff you can do free...and quite effectively.

[souldeux]

I do all of my own SEO stuff.

Which goes a long way towards explaining the following oddities:

-I'm the #2 Google result for "offer high commission independent agent georgia" even though I'm not a GA.

-I'm the #4 Google result for "maternity coverage only ga," which I sincerely hope does not result in many calls.

-Someone found my website on SlutsHQ dot com. I won't even begin to dissect that one.

-Two people in Israel have visited my website. Woohoo!

Maybe I should get someone to work on this.

[retread]

Originally Posted by souldeux

I do all of my own SEO stuff.

Which goes a long way towards explaining the following oddities:

-I'm the #2 Google result for "offer high commission independent agent georgia" even though I'm not a GA.

-I'm the #4 Google result for "maternity coverage only ga," which I sincerely hope does not result in many calls.

-Someone found my website on SlutsHQ dot com. I won't even begin to dissect that one.

-Two people in Israel have visited my website. Woohoo!

Maybe I should get someone to work on this.

I have a 78% rating, and I haven't even published yet!! I haven't had time to work on my unfinished site in 3 months. Just recently pulled my site using domaintools dot com, and had a good laugh!

[gzpxyj]

Anybody has any good suggestions on lead vendors? I would like get some suggestions on life insurance lead.

[ABC]

I hire someone that only does SEO and spends about 12 hours a month working on my site.
Link building, directories, website changes and other stuff that I don't know. These computer guys starting talking back end google SEO stuff and I can pay attention for a while. The SEO industry is changing so rapidly that unless its your full time gig I dont think one can keep up on it. The true SEO guys go to all of the conventions and stay on top of everything daily. The majority of web site developers still think meta tags mean something. They dont.

In 2006-mid 2008 I was ranked number one in 18 of my 25 search terms. Then google changed everything. I dropped pages overnight. Now I am back to the 1st page but instead of #1 I am between 2-7.

By July I hope to be number #1 or #2 on 50+ search terms. Then combine a PPC campaign along with that the web surfer searches anything in my state regarding health insurance I am showing up.

[GreenSky]

I don't spend any money on leads. They are investments. If I earn $7 for every $1 in leads, how can they be considered a cost?

Rick

[Merlin]

Originally Posted by GreenSky

I don't spend any money on leads. They are investments. If I earn $7 for every $1 in leads, how can they be considered a cost?

Rick

and by this reasoning you are telling me that my gas/food/utilities/internet....wife....cost nothing???? as long as I make more then I spend...kinda like the sound of that

[somarco]

No one ever makes a profit on their wife. If you are real lucky, you break even.

[CHUMPS FROM OXFORD]

I wonder why women like shoes so much.

[Hollywood]

Manolo Blahnik

[AtlantaLife&Health]

Originally Posted by souldeux

I do all of my own SEO stuff.

Which goes a long way towards explaining the following oddities:

-I'm the #2 Google result for "offer high commission independent agent georgia" even though I'm not a GA.

-I'm the #4 Google result for "maternity coverage only ga," which I sincerely hope does not result in many calls.

-Someone found my website on SlutsHQ dot com. I won't even begin to dissect that one.

-Two people in Israel have visited my website. Woohoo!

Maybe I should get someone to work on this.

"offer high commission independent agent georgia" There are zero searches for this term on Google each day. So there's really no benefit of being ranked #2.

"maternity coverage only ga," There are zero searches for this term also.

You have to learn how to target your keywords and get them ranked.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Originally Posted by ABC

I hire someone that only does SEO and spends about 12 hours a month working on my site.
Link building, directories, website changes and other stuff that I don't know. These computer guys starting talking back end google SEO stuff and I can pay attention for a while. The SEO industry is changing so rapidly that unless its your full time gig I dont think one can keep up on it. The true SEO guys go to all of the conventions and stay on top of everything daily. The majority of web site developers still think meta tags mean something. They dont.

In 2006-mid 2008 I was ranked number one in 18 of my 25 search terms. Then google changed everything. I dropped pages overnight. Now I am back to the 1st page but instead of #1 I am between 2-7.

By July I hope to be number #1 or #2 on 50+ search terms. Then combine a PPC campaign along with that the web surfer searches anything in my state regarding health insurance I am showing up.

SEO isn't that hard. A lot of the time, these so called SEO gurus get your site ranked for meaningless terms that aren't even searched that often. Share some of the terms you are currently ranked for and I will let you know if it means anything at all for you.

[souldeux]

"offer high commission independent agent georgia" There are zero searches for this term on Google each day. So there's really no benefit of being ranked #2.

"maternity coverage only ga," There are zero searches for this term also.

You have to learn how to target your keywords and get them ranked.

Oh, I certainly didn't mean to come across as being proud of those things. They're odd data points that have snuck in without my trying. I never would have noticed if my Awstats didn't show someone having clicked over to an article from one of those terms -- and yes, each one of those only happened once. They're useless.

[finalexpensejim]

$1500 a month on average

Split between telemarket, dialer and mailings

I'm a big fan of AT LEAST 2 different sources for leads, if not more