Internet Health Insurance Leads 2009 Ratings...

CHUMPS FROM OXFORD · 12-22-2008, 12:28 PM

Are coming....

This year, I am asking for additional help. Normally, I base ratings on personal observation, Forum comments and first-hand experience from many other brokers...most that do NOT participate on this Board.

If you wouldn't mind...if you have used Internet leads for health insurance this year, please send me a short PM, EM or GM with your opinions and observations. Pick out your best and worst choices and explain why.

Your comments will be held in the strictest confidence.

Since this is actually an announcement, please do NOT post comments about lead companies on this thread.

Ratings will be publishd in a few weeks.

Thanks.

djs · 12-22-2008, 09:41 PM

I'm waiting with my $$$$. Ooops, just got back from putting gas in the car, make that cents..... (and no, I don't mean sense).

Dan

moonlightandmargaritas · 12-22-2008, 09:44 PM

Wow, gas is cheap here in Florida Dan. Paid $1.579 today...

djs · 12-23-2008, 03:11 AM

Yeah, but driving to Florida from California so I could fill up cost me a lot of $$$$

Besides, my Jaguar uses premium.

Dan

somarco · 12-23-2008, 09:37 AM

Do they still make a 12 cylinder Jag?

djs · 12-23-2008, 12:23 PM

Don't think so, but the XF has 420 horsepower...
Only one problem with this.... I don't have an XF.

True story....
When I first got my Jag, realizing that I live in Silicon Valley where driving the posted speed limit is hard to do, to much traffic, usually driving much slower.... I had to take a short trip on a Sunday, figured great, I'd have a chance to actually get the car up to a little speed. Well, there was a lot more traffic than I had thought there would be (happens here more than I care to admit), so I was working my way through traffic at around 50 miles an hour, cursing that I was blowing my one chance to get up to at least 70.....

Then I looked at my speedometer, I was a bit in excess of 90 MPH (won't admit how much in excess).... oops, don't trust how the car feels for speed!!!! I have learned that at over 110 MPH, there is a very faint shimmy in the steering, which tells me to slow down. I have also learned that on a good road, this doesn't happen, but not to worry, good roads aren't a big concern here.

I now use cruise control a lot when I'm on the more open roads, keeps my speed to something reasonable.

Dan

JRoot · 12-23-2008, 01:44 PM

Anyone here willing to do this for life insurance leads?

TXINSURANCE · 12-24-2008, 12:46 AM

Ed I have found a source of leads where I close 98% of all leads, it is unbelievable you have never seen anything like this before.

I will PM you since you told me not to post specifics in the thread.

Happy Hanukkah and Merry Christmas to all...

CHUMPS FROM OXFORD · 12-24-2008, 12:53 AM

Thanks Joe. I anxiously await your email. Of course, as you know, in Ohio...you need a 99% close ratio just to break even.

retread · 12-24-2008, 01:00 AM

Originally Posted by CHUMPS FROM OXFORD

Thanks Joe. I anxiously await your email. Of course, as you know, in Ohio...you need a 99% close ratio just to break even.

I'm out here in Kansas where we need 150% close ratio to break even. Got anything better?

MikeLevy · 12-24-2008, 03:37 AM

Originally Posted by CHUMPS FROM OXFORD

are coming....

This year, I am asking for additional help. Normally, I base ratings on personal observation, Forum comments and first-hand experience from many other brokers...most that do NOT participate on this Board.

If you wouldn't mind...if you have used Internet leads for health insurance this year, please send me a short PM, EM or GM with your opinions and observations. Pick out your best and worst choices and explain why.

Your comments will be held in the strictest confidence.

Since this is actually an announcement, please do NOT post comments about lead companies on this thread.

Ratings will be publishd in a few weeks.

Thanks.

Chumps-

I'm was a xxxxx.com customer over the past year. Let me just tell you, they really suck. I didn't close a single lead. Please, make sure to put in your guide not to buy leads from them, especially within a 30 mile radius of zip code 30342 and for self-employed, preferred, and general health. Oh, and group health to. That sucks even more, especially in Alpharetta. Other places, I don't care, ummm I mean know, about but Alpharetta is really terrible. Make sure to tell everyone not to buy leads there either. Thank you very much and I really appreciate you passing this information along because I really care about all the other insurance agents I compete against.

Now, just put that in the guide 1000 times varying the location all over the United States and that would be what every one of the agents who buy from any particular lead company, many who have been buying from that company for years and will continue to do so, will say. It is in their best interest to do so. For an agent, recommending a good lead source is just creating competiton for yourself. Unfortunately, no one has a unbiased opinion in this industry. You have to be the one that personally does the investigation. Granted, I think you know that. :-)

Wouldn't it make sense for you to personally work 30 leads from each lead company in a controlled environment and then give your own opinion? I bet you could get the lead companies, each one of them, to give you 30 free leads a year to be included in your ratings guide. I have a feeling some of this goes on now (I caught the inference made in that post a little while ago. Do you really need 100?) but if the lead companies know it is you they will just send you the cherries. It's better to have them send you the money to buy them and then you find someone to buy them under their name or some way you buy them under a pseudo name. That might be a little tricky with the credit card unless you have multiple identities (Well, more multiple identies than you currently have.) I wouldn't mind participating in this type of program. I would gladly pay the cost of the leads provided you really made it a controlled experiment with all the lead companies. That would truly be valuable.

Just a thought. Probably not an original one, but a thought.

Signature omitted!

indmedins · 12-24-2008, 10:59 AM

Originally Posted by MikeLevy

...but if the lead companies know it is you they will just send you the cherries. It's better to have them send you the money to buy them and then you find someone to buy them under their name or some way you buy them under a pseudo name. That might be a little tricky with the credit card unless you have multiple identities (Well, more multiple identies than you currently have.) I wouldn't mind participating in this type of program.

Would mostchoice send the cherries? Would chumps have to pay $500 to get a sample of your leads?

TXINSURANCE · 12-24-2008, 11:04 AM

Wouldn't it make sense for you to personally work 30 leads from each lead company in a controlled environment and then give your own opinion? I bet you could get the lead companies, each one of them, to give you 30 free leads a year to be included in your ratings guide. I have a feeling some of this goes on now (I caught the inference made in that post a little while ago. Do you really need 100?) but if the lead companies know it is you they will just send you the cherries. It's better to have them send you the money to buy them and then you find someone to buy them under their name or some way you buy them under a pseudo name. That might be a little tricky with the credit card unless you have multiple identities (Well, more multiple identies than you currently have.) I wouldn't mind participating in this type of program. I would gladly pay the cost of the leads provided you really made it a controlled experiment with all the lead companies. That would truly be valuable.

Right.

Hard to pull off for reasons you mentioned, and you know my opinion about any sample under 100 leads and 90 days to me is insufficient to test.

There are so many variables - not to mention that have you seen Chumps' operation? It is in a barn outside of Lebanon, it is hard to make calls with the bombs in the background, very unique setup.

The truth is most agents couldn't measure stats or ROI if it hit them side their head. Most have erratic no formulated dialing and work habits, no stats, and no real ability to report results other than subjective opinions.

Give me 100 leads from each vendor I can print a report of how many times the lead was dialed, when it was dialed, how many emails were sent, postal mail if applicable, what was quoted, why it was quoted, who quoted it and where each lead is in pipeline.

Obviously I spent a ton of money and time to get to that point but most agents could do a mini hybrid on the cheap if they took a 10,000 foot view instead of focusing on each individual lead. I could truly care less about each individual lead disposition I am looking at the big picture, or trying to at least.

MikeLevy · 12-24-2008, 12:31 PM

Originally Posted by indmedins

Would mostchoice send the cherries? Would chumps have to pay $500 to get a sample of your leads?

It's basic game theory. If any one of the players has the ability to game the system, all the players must game the system to maintain a level playing field. However, I think Chumps could get every lead service to send him the cherries for free!

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Originally Posted by TXINSURANCE

The truth is most agents couldn't measure stats or ROI if it hit them side their head. Most have erratic no formulated dialing and work habits, no stats, and no real ability to report results other than subjective opinions.

The scarier truth is that some agents can't even remember who they bought from. We have agent's calling customer service from time to time wondering why we didn't accept a credit. We have to tell them: We can't credit xyz.com's lead, you need to call them!
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Originally Posted by TXINSURANCE

There are so many variables - not to mention that have you seen Chumps' operation? It is in a barn outside of Lebanon, it is hard to make calls with the bombs in the background, very unique setup.

It's a step up from the last place he had. I hear the phone rates in Lebanon are better than in Columbia.

indmedins · 12-24-2008, 12:42 PM

Point taken. Of course all lead vendors participating would send the cherries to put them in the best light possible.

The only cherries to me are leads with a high level of interest. I don't really know how you can measure that attribute. Perhaps you measure level of interest by PPC and organic generated as opposed to affiliate generated junk.
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And, I am curious...How would a lead vendor sort leads that are considered "cherries" vs. "the pits"?

MikeLevy · 12-24-2008, 01:21 PM

Originally Posted by indmedins

And, I am curious...How would a lead vendor sort leads that are considered "cherries" vs. "the pits"?

For lead companies that use a mixture of affiliate programs and search, they simply exclude the affiliate program leads or any source they think is bad. Most lead companies use a mix and whenever you have a mix you can sort out the bad.

You can also age/type/location cherry pick. For example, only sending leads in a certain age range or who own homes for life or family leads for health or getting the demographics for a certain location and sending the affluent or less affluent depending on type of lead. These are things you can filter as well and just pay a little more for so some of this can be cherry-picked by the customer for the right price. For some type of leads, filters come free of charge like disability and commercial P&C, but I can't really go into any great detail on that in this thread. I will just say that in all fairness that is true for any lead service.

We only use search generated, so the first category of cherry picking won't work for me. I am sure there are other ways to cherry pick. I haven't thought of them all right now, but I guarantee you that if you put me on an un-level playing field I will figure out some way to level it out! Every lead service will do the same. Every business will do the same in any given industry.

healthagent · 12-24-2008, 01:32 PM

Lead companies are hard to measure for newbies - but extremely easy to for seasoned agents.

I can have lead source A and B. Source A has consistently been returning 1:6 and source B is returning 1:7.

Now I pick up new source C and it's 1:3 - bad source. It's not me when I call 20 leads, only 2 answer and one of them isn't interested and other other chews me out.

I've had lead companies to all kinds of justification. There's no justification when I receive 50 leads and struggle to close 2 deals when with other sources I can close 6 out of 50.

This isn't a Mostchoice post - just pointing out that it's relatively easy for me to know which lead companies are good and which ones are bad.

I do a very good job when I get prospects on the phone of finding out some good info:

1) Which site did you use to submit for your quote
2) How did you find the site? Did you do a search on the net, see an ad, get an email

This is how I separate the truth from the typical lies I get from lead vendors.

indmedins · 12-24-2008, 01:37 PM

True, but you can't measure lead quality on filtering for families or age. I suppose a true measure of one lead source vs. another has to be on closing %. If one lead source gives me all families between ages 35-59, my AV will be much higher than a lead sample of a mix of families and singles of all age groups from another source in the evaluation.

To truly evaluate all lead sources, all filters have to be turned off, which most likely won't happen.

healthagent · 12-24-2008, 01:41 PM

There are things only lead vendors can explain however explanations don't mean anything to me - deals hitting the books do.

Go figure why one lead source gives me a great mix - some young, some middle aged and some older while another source give me 90% under 30 - almost all singles - rarely a family.

Again, I've heard all the explanations which doesn't matter to me.

There are other factors involved. I can imagine if you want leads in Miami you're going to get Spanish - if I want Baltimore city leads well....

I like sources where I can choose zip codes or counties.

CHUMPS FROM OXFORD · 12-24-2008, 01:57 PM

For more than five years, I have made a point of asking prospects what phrase they googled and how long ago they clicked the "submit" button.

The information garnered has been substantial.

But there are always situations that can not be explained. On Monday I received a lead from Company A. Four hours later, I received the same lead from Company B. The prospect SWORE they only went to one site. I believe them.

I questioned lead company B about it. They SWEAR the lead was organic from their own website.

It was a family of four with all of the info identical (ht, weight etc...) Still a mystery and probably always will be.