- 11,995
As many of you know I've added selling marketing lists to my portfolio and as such I frequently get calls from agents looking for advice about cold calling. Since not everyone that has questions picks up the phone to call, I thought I'd put this bit of information out there.
Cold calling is a numbers game, that's not news to anyone. What most people don't realize is that some lines of insurance are fantastically better to call on than others. If you're thinking about cold calling for insurance you should probably consider a few things before picking up the phone.
Is your product a commodity type product such as health insurance, auto, homeowners, med supps, etc? When you're cold calling you only have a brief moment to explain to the prospect why you're calling and why they should listen to what you have to say. "I'm calling because I'd like to save you hundreds of dollars on your insurance" is about as compelling of a reason to call about insurance as one could imagine. If you're an independent agent (or at least competitively priced), you'll know right upfront whether or not you have a solid prospect and if you do, the terms of the engagement are clearly defined. Make sure to set the expectations appropriately on that first call too. "Bob, if I can save you at least $200/year (or whatever the number may be), would you be willing to make the change?" Maybe he says yes, maybe he says no, but at least you know what to expect walking into it (and so does he!)
For products that aren't commodity type products such as life insurance, annuities, ltc, spwl, etc you're going to have more of a challenge. Often times there is not the sense of urgency on these products and so you're trying to create a need that isn't already there. It can absolutely be done, but the shotgun approach of "Hi, would you like to buy some insurance" can be much less effective. On products like this your entire approach should be based more on a specific value proposition. For example, if you have a list of folks 60-70 with estimated high net worths and you want to talk to them about an annuity, you may want to pitch a SPIA to give them an instant monthly income. There needs to be a hook of some sort to make them want to talk to you which unfortunately, sometimes comes at the expense of reaching as wide of an audience as you'd like to. The good news about calling on these products with the specific pitch is that you can call through the same list multiples times using different pitches and reasonably expect that you're going to get a different result because you're doing something different. Sticking with the annuity products, maybe the first time you called through pitching SPIA products you completely missed the prospects that have CD's they wanted to get a higher interest rate than the bank is giving them, but had no interest in the income. Calling through the same list and using a script aimed at that need, something to the effect of "Hi Mary, I'm calling you today because I'm helping folks who have CD's with their bank earn higher interest rates with guarantees; is that something you'd like to learn more about?" could easily result in getting sales and commissions that the first approach would not have been able to. Again, products like these take time to market and a more methodical approach, but that's why the commissions are typically much higher.
So what lines of insurance are best to cold call for? Most of them, but the response rate to commodity products like auto, health, homeowners, and medicare supplements are going to usually run higher than the bigger ticket products and require less effort.
Thanks for taking the time to read this and hopefully it was insightful.
Happy Selling!
Cold calling is a numbers game, that's not news to anyone. What most people don't realize is that some lines of insurance are fantastically better to call on than others. If you're thinking about cold calling for insurance you should probably consider a few things before picking up the phone.
Is your product a commodity type product such as health insurance, auto, homeowners, med supps, etc? When you're cold calling you only have a brief moment to explain to the prospect why you're calling and why they should listen to what you have to say. "I'm calling because I'd like to save you hundreds of dollars on your insurance" is about as compelling of a reason to call about insurance as one could imagine. If you're an independent agent (or at least competitively priced), you'll know right upfront whether or not you have a solid prospect and if you do, the terms of the engagement are clearly defined. Make sure to set the expectations appropriately on that first call too. "Bob, if I can save you at least $200/year (or whatever the number may be), would you be willing to make the change?" Maybe he says yes, maybe he says no, but at least you know what to expect walking into it (and so does he!)
For products that aren't commodity type products such as life insurance, annuities, ltc, spwl, etc you're going to have more of a challenge. Often times there is not the sense of urgency on these products and so you're trying to create a need that isn't already there. It can absolutely be done, but the shotgun approach of "Hi, would you like to buy some insurance" can be much less effective. On products like this your entire approach should be based more on a specific value proposition. For example, if you have a list of folks 60-70 with estimated high net worths and you want to talk to them about an annuity, you may want to pitch a SPIA to give them an instant monthly income. There needs to be a hook of some sort to make them want to talk to you which unfortunately, sometimes comes at the expense of reaching as wide of an audience as you'd like to. The good news about calling on these products with the specific pitch is that you can call through the same list multiples times using different pitches and reasonably expect that you're going to get a different result because you're doing something different. Sticking with the annuity products, maybe the first time you called through pitching SPIA products you completely missed the prospects that have CD's they wanted to get a higher interest rate than the bank is giving them, but had no interest in the income. Calling through the same list and using a script aimed at that need, something to the effect of "Hi Mary, I'm calling you today because I'm helping folks who have CD's with their bank earn higher interest rates with guarantees; is that something you'd like to learn more about?" could easily result in getting sales and commissions that the first approach would not have been able to. Again, products like these take time to market and a more methodical approach, but that's why the commissions are typically much higher.
So what lines of insurance are best to cold call for? Most of them, but the response rate to commodity products like auto, health, homeowners, and medicare supplements are going to usually run higher than the bigger ticket products and require less effort.
Thanks for taking the time to read this and hopefully it was insightful.
Happy Selling!
