The times are difficult. All of us should have taken action yesterday to improve our businesses’ position. We are now past this point so what can we do to make our businesses better? There are not many short-term solutions. In this article, I will list five low-hanging fruit tips. These are tips you can act upon immediately, costing you nothing less than $20 and you should see results in a short time.
1 Don’t Reduce Advertising Expenses
Would you cut off your arm to stop your finger bleed? The answer, I think, is “no”. Advertising and marketing are often the first thing to cut when there is a tight budget at work. Instead of trying to solve the problem (the bleeding fingers), you are actually treating a symptom. We need to be smarter about advertising and marketing. Instead of blindly spraying money at advertising campaigns, you should create methods to track the response to your advertisements. You cannot make informed decisions about how much money you spend on advertising without data. This starts with a simple question that you should ask every Agent and CSR in your office: “How did they hear about us?” This question is so easy, but it can reveal so many things. What does it mean if you spend the same amount in radio, newspaper and telephone directory, but call-ins say they heard about your company on the radio? This means that 33.33% of your advertising dollars are not generating revenue. You might as well throw 66.66% of that budget into the fireplace to achieve the same result. Redirecting 100% of your advertising dollars to radio will statistically triple your revenue without any additional costs. It all starts with a simple question.
2: Existing Business
Many Insurance Agents have a goldmine of business that is just waiting to be discovered. It never becomes premiums. This business can be captured with less than $10 at your local office supply shop. Implementing a Suspension File System is the solution. It works as follows: Agents and CSRs both have access to the same filing cabinet. Each month is represented by a folder in the cabinet. It covers a period of two years starting from this month. When your staff receives quote requests that they can’t sell at this time (e.g., the prospect’s auto policy won’t expire for four more months), the staff member places a piece of paper with client information, files and the name of the staff member in the folder. This represents four months. You only need to have your staff look over the prospects in the suspension folder every week. Then you won’t have any prospect slip through the cracks due to a forgotten note on someone’s desk. Managers, agents, and CSRs can all see potential business.
3) Maximize Website Exposure
Websites are often neglected as a marketing tool. Agency owners often forget about their web sites after they have been built. You must realize that your web site is not only a brochure, but a search engine crawler who views it constantly and actively every day. There’s a good chance you’ll appear when someone searches for “car insurance Orlando florida” on a search engine. This marketing is known as “organic search” and it is 100% free. Your only expense is to ensure your website is current, error-free, and has all the right tweaks so search engine crawlers find it so delicious and full of information that they devour every word on your pages. You should not only optimize your website for search engine crawlers but also market and brand your site in all advertising that is associated with your Agency. It is a rule of thumb that if your phone number is printed on the paper, you must also print your website on it.
4) Use existing technology
You might be interested in the most recent evolutions of their products if you’re currently using a Multi-Rater, or an advanced Client Management Software. Many vendors have developed or launched online versions of their products that you can embed into your own website. What will this do for you? This will enable prospects to automatically enter themselves 24 hours a days into your system. It will also allow your website to offer online quotes. This route will allow you to advertise your 24-hour quoting capability in all your advertising. This means that you are not restricted to working during regular office hours and that your staff did not have to be increased. What if your Multi-Rater and Client Management Systems are not available? Non-profit associations like The Professional Insurance Agents of America have some initiatives to offer Independent agents affordable access to this technology. These incentives are supported by cooperative advertising.
5) Search for an inexpensive alternative marketing
Amazing marketing opportunities have opened up for Insurance Agents through the internet. You can find advertising opportunities that are either free or very affordable if you do a little research. Online directory listings should not be charged outrageous fees. This listing must eventually translate into revenue, so the lower our outgoings, the higher our Return on Investment. The first thing to do is get your agency in online directories. These sites are not visited by potential visitors but they are frequently searched by search engine crawlers. The more sites that link back, the higher your listing in search engine listings. While you may be willing to spend more to get a higher quality listing, how much should it cost? Although I don’t know what your maximum limit should be, I do know of a web site that falls within the lower end of the dollar range. This is a new website and concept that sells car insurance. It offers exclusive zip code listings for $2.50 per annum! You can promote your Agency for as little as a cup of coffee! It only allows 10 agencies per zipcode. You can check them out to see if they are worth your time.
