Who Buys Leads?

[moonlightandmargaritas]

We are going to be trying a different approach...hiring hourly agents (+bonus) to sell to the internet leads.

Different approach? Seriously? I could give you twenty folks (off the top of my head, and here in Tampa Bay), plus HPO and Humana who do this.

 

[LGilmore]

ralph? I think my post is lost upon you.

You're talking auto leads and yea, I would agree with you that befriending salespeople at a local dealership would be smart. For auto insurance. What about health? Life? disability?

different methods for different products, different styles for different agents. There isn't a single method that works for every market for every product. So while it's great that you mention a method for auto insurance, how does it expand over to other products? I don't insure things, I ensure people. Different market, different methods.

 

[Guest]

LG I'm not referring to the exact method but rather the mentality. In all situations I can think of ways to generate a better return than internet leads.

If your a life agent, instead of spending $2-3k on leads a month on leads, imagine spending the same amount into a website. That's a huge budget for a website and u could get an seo company and professional writers for a blog to help you rank. Same cost less work more return. You feel me?
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Great story.

I've had several of our agents tell us the same thing. One must be able to go with the information they are given: whether on the phone or if setting at your desk.

FYI: if "anyone" could make a website work & drive leads then "they" would do it. But....it is not that easy or profitable...

Also fyi its not as hard as you want people to believe. I did it myself because I like to learn new things and I hate paying for things I can do myself. And I'm doing just fine. Its learning how to fish vs fighting for the scraps. But if its not possible to DIY with an average lead budget u can easily hire an seo company. In the long run you can eventually stop paying the seo company. I can't say the same about a lead company.

 

[lhkorn99]

LG I'm not referring to the exact method but rather the mentality. In all situations I can think of ways to generate a better return than internet leads.

If your a life agent, instead of spending $2-3k on leads a month on leads, imagine spending the same amount into a website. That's a huge budget for a website and u could get an seo company and professional writers for a blog to help you rank. Same cost less work more return. You feel me?
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Also fyi its not as hard as you want people to believe. I did it myself because I like to learn new things and I hate paying for things I can do myself. And I'm doing just fine. Its learning how to fish vs fighting for the scraps. But if its not possible to DIY with an average lead budget u can easily hire an seo company. In the long run you can eventually stop paying the seo company. I can't say the same about a lead company.

I am a life agent and use internet leads. At the same time i'm also working on a website and building that organic traffic, so that I can generate my own leads. However right now internet leads are launching me, while generating my own web leads is the ultimate goal.

 

[ltcadviser]

Its not that I doubt that they cant be profitable but there are just way better ways to market. I mean for the price of a couple months worth of leads you could open a website and generate your own. I mean you can easily spend thousands on leads a month. Why not just take the money and invest in something that will generate leads for you.

I am going to agree wholeheartedly with Ralph's viewpoint here. I used to do a lot of direct mail. Spent $2000 per month. It worked. Then the Internet took over. Spent $2000-$3000 per month in leads. It worked. Then around 4 years ago I began to see a significant decline in quality of Internet leads. They stopped working. The replacement ratios were skyrocketing. Now we were in a recession and maybe the recession was creating dirty dealing with affiliates. Can't say for sure. So I figured "cut out the middle man"; build my website, create web traffic; well, as Ralph has said it is a much better avenue. I no longer spend $2000-$3000 per month in leads; there are no fake leads to request credit for; the leads are exclusive; granted they may still end up working with their advisor or go to multiple sites, but they may not. Either way, if they come to my site at least I have credibility. And I do not feel like it is a race to beat out 5 other agents. You can't put a price on credibility or branding yourself. Anyway, Ralph is definitely right here. I used to buy Internet leads; and until I tried this new approach I never would have seen the light. If you are buying leads and making a good living, that is fine. But you will do better by building a website and driving your own traffic. If I can do it, any one can do it too.

 

[Guest]

I am a life agent and use internet leads. At the same time i'm also working on a website and building that organic traffic, so that I can generate my own leads. However right now internet leads are launching me, while generating my own web leads is the ultimate goal.

This is also how I started. I've used net quote insure me and hometown for about a year and a half (prior job including) and knew there had to be a better way. I just saw the general attitude of me and everyone I worked with using internet leads vs generated leads. After a while you just get so burnt out working them.

Life guys would this be viable. Developing a good trifold about life insurance with ur contact info and going around to doctors offices and seeing if you can just leave a few in the waiting rooms for people to read. After a while I'm sure you could halve your folds in at least enough offices to generate a consistent lead bases. Its like direct mail with no postage and no list.

I think this would have a way cheaper cost and the same roi (if not better the more offices you are in) than using internet leads. This way you can dedicate more resources to getting the site up. Then once your site is up ull have 2 inbound sources.

 

[ltcadviser]

Life guys would this be viable. Developing a good trifold about life insurance with ur contact info and going around to doctors offices and seeing if you can just leave a few in the waiting rooms for people to read. After a while I'm sure you could halve your folds in at least enough offices to generate a consistent lead bases. Its like direct mail with no postage and no list.

Centers of influence are better. Finding independent fee based advisers that don't sell products.

 

[Guest]

Centers of influence are better. Finding independent fee based advisers that don't sell products.

Your probably right it was just a half ass idea to show how simple it is to beat the roi on internet leads.

Can anyone provide an example of when internet leads were your top form of marketing?

 

[Josh]

Your probably right it was just a half ass idea to show how simple it is to beat the roi on internet leads.

Can anyone provide an example of when internet leads were your top form of marketing?

Again, there are guys and gals throwing down $5k-$10k/month NET working internet leads, so it's unclear to me why you're dogging on them so hard. If you dont like them then you don't like them, but I think it's interesting that you're attacking the idea of buying leads when there are many folks doing extremely well with them (as well as other aspects of marketing).

What about the guys that spend time building relationships and never get referrals? Is that a good ROI? An agent knows they can spend $X and have a list of Y prospects to talk to without having to look for them. Internet lead agents also don't have to worry about what happens when google changes it's algorithm, they just buy leads from the guys that are on the top now.

I get why you think you have a better mouse trap, but I think it's curious why you would take to questioning why other agents are doing things that are clearly making them a healthy income. What if every agent in California tried to generate a site for cheap car insurance? There are only 10 spots on page one of google, so what happens then?

If you're in business you shouldn't be relying on one source of leads because as soon as that gets a big enough bump you have a problem. New (and old) agents should have multiple ways of generating leads (like Larry pointed out). Heck, even if you're doing your own SEO you should have multiple websites rolling vs just one.

 

[Bob Klee]

+1 on what Josh said.

I guess some professional agents have more time than I did when I was an agent. But I know from personal experience, having built 2 agencies in the top 10-15% with Allstate, that running my agency was a full time job....finding time to build HTQ above my garage back in 2004....thankfully I had excellent support staff as I was working 80-100+ hours/week in those days.

How many leads can an agent generate from 1 website a month? 10-20 perhaps? Is that enough to grow an agency with? Can an agent stay on top of the trends & what works + run an agency? Maybe a few can....

I'm not saying it cannot be done....but if any agent has time to build a BOB with annual commissions of $200k++ [1998-2006] and has time to do build their own website, SEO/PPC on the side to drive 100+ leads/month to their own agency.....WOW! You are a super star in my book! Keep it up