How does the way that you approach the insurance sales process impact the health of your book? At Client Focus, we believe in cultivating meaningful relationships over traditional hard and fast sales, because we believe that this is the best way to be of service to your clients and attract potential new clients to your agency.
The 3 Most Crucial Elements of the Insurance Sales Process
One: Build an Insurance Pipeline
There are certain periods of life in which someone is a better candidate for certain insurance---but that doesn’t mean that you can’t build a pipeline that will compound and give you the opportunity to do more business with these clients in the future. You can build an insurance pipeline by serving your clients in the most genuine fashion possible - by valuing every meeting that you have, and using these as opportunities to get to know their needs.
After each meeting, take notes on where your client is in your pipeline. Have they made a purchase, or have you promised to follow up in the next few weeks? The more that you can do to anticipate their needs, the more that they are likely to invest in you and to want to come to you when it’s time to consider big purchasing decisions.
Two: Establish genuine relationships with your clientele
To do your job effectively, you need to worry about both closing the deal and about meeting your client’s needs --and the former should always outweigh the latter. This means that, as an agent, you must establish a foundation of trust so that they feel comfortable divulging deeply personal information and making expensive investments with you. You should work to schedule regular review meetings with all of your clients in order to deepen these relationships and improve client retention. Be consistent about your review process, and make sure that you are making an attempt to schedule time with every client at least once per year.
Three: Follow through on solutions and provide great service
The insurance sales process begins the minute you meet someone new. Long before anyone picks up the phone to schedule a meeting with you, they are asking their friends for recommendations and potentially vetting your reputation as an agent. If your reputation as a compassionate and trustworthy agent is lacking, then the phone calls may never come. Remember, your clients are in need of insurance for a reason - and trusting someone to help them with some of the most important assets (and people) in their life is a big undertaking. It's crucial that you truly take care of them and provide them with solutions and excellent customer service.
Once you have closed a sale, it’s important to keep up your promises to your clients. Nothing is more frustrating, or more damaging to your reputation, than not following through on finding solutions for their needs. Your customers expect you to take care of them, answer their questions, and be someone they can count on. One of the best customer service practices you can implement is to be readily available for questions, and other needs that may arise.