After you have secured clients, your Insurance Canada company can begin relying on premium renews to bring in the revenue. How does an insurance agent start to get clients? These are our top tips.
Independent insurance agents often describe their early years as long hours and hard work while building their business. Finding new clients for independent agents can be difficult, even for experienced professionals. According to 49% of agents, finding new business opportunities for their agency is their top challenge.
Find your niche
Insurance agents want to be everything to everyone. However, niche marketing might be a better strategy for increasing your sales. Focusing your marketing efforts on a single business type can be a great way to increase sales.
Develop a deep understanding of the industry’s risks. Sometimes, the dangers are not obvious. However, as you gain more experience in a particular profession, your ability and skill to assess risks increases.
You will be able to gain an edge over your competitors. Expertise in your industry is more appealing to clients.
Raise your standing. It is possible to build a reputation for being the best agent in the industry by getting clients the right insurance policy at an affordable price.
Refer others. Your reputation will grow and you may get more leads.
Start by looking into the type of businesses in your area to find a specialty. You might consider joining trade associations and reading industry magazines to keep up to date on current issues. Then, focus your networking efforts towards people in this industry.
Get to know your neighbors
Networking is crucial for new clients. You may end up meeting the same people every time you go to the same events. To meet potential customers outside the insurance industry, you should try:
- Meetup groups
- Shows for trade
- Fairs in your area
- School board meetings
- Charity events
- Seminars for business
Volunteering with local nonprofits is also possible. Volunteering is a great way to meet people, but it also has the potential to:
Engage employees
Your reputation should be strengthened
Attract new agents
Your business is the best choice for insurance when people mention it in their community. The activity will also bring together your employees and give them a boost.
Every day, Prospect
You probably spent a lot of time as a new agent generating business. Your sense of urgency might have diminished once your residual income began to roll in.
Nobody expects that you will spend half of your day searching for new business. Prospecting is essential to the growth of your agency. You should set aside one hour per day to:
Read local news outlets. Be sure to pay attention to the business section. Also, take a look at engagement announcements. Both could offer sales opportunities.
Generate leads. Your website should have features that allow you to request email addresses.
Cold calling business owners. It’s not impossible to cold call, but it isn’t dead. For tips, see the post “4 surefire methods to increase insurance cold calling results”.
Send out additional business cards. Give business cards to potential clients.
You can generate your own leads. Your friends, family, clients, and potential clients should be aware of the insurance products you offer and the advice that you provide.
Work with other professionals
Reach out to professionals interested in the same clientele. You might want to establish a lead-sharing relationship, for example with:
- Real estate agents
- Mortgage brokers
- Financial planners
- Accountants
Your clients will be grateful that you are able to refer them to experts in their field if you build relationships with professionals in the same niche. The other professional can refer new clients and customers to your business, which is a win-win situation.
Nurture your leads
Although it would be wonderful if every pitch resulted in a sale, the reality is that insurance rarely works this way. It is equally important to generate leads as it is to nurture them. You can set up a system to keep your agency in the forefront of their minds while also promoting your business’ value. You might want to:
- Blogs that highlight your expertise in topics such as life insurance, annuities and health insurance are a great way to show off your knowledge.
- Make short videos to explain different policies.
- Provide webinars to show them how insurance can help their concerns.
- Regular emails will be sent with risk management strategies and information.
Use social media to connect with your clients and share useful content. This will help you increase your customer base, as well as make people more aware of your insurance company.
