What You Need To Know About Commission Cuts

• Mining the Gold Within – Rounding & Win Back Programs. Run reports on your clients or review your manual files. Tier those that have one policy, two and so on… Each presents an opportunity for you for to gain both revenue and increase retention. Thrive for three policies per client. Some client attrition is normal; advertising messages to consumers about insurance is plentiful and confusing nowadays. If clients stray, have a formal program to invite them to return and win them back. Consider invitations to existing and former clients to an open house or a community function. Connect with them on social media, , or make an old-fashioned phone call to invite them back.   
• Staff Development. Mining the gold within also applies to your staff. You are asking them to raise their game. Invest in them to give them the sharpest tools necessary for them to mine the gold. When was the last time you did an annual review to discuss their core competencies and how to improve? There are plenty of inexpensive programs  that insurance carriers, your local Big I/Trusted Choice, and others have and are worth considering for employee and producer development.  
• Embrace Technology and Consumer Behavior Changes and Adjust. Speaking of analytics, how are you using your website? How is client outreach done – the way you prefer, or the way the client prefers?    
• Referrals. Referrals are many agencies number one source of business. However, most agencies do it passively, as many CSR’s prefer the service role to the sales role. A proactive approach to referrals works wonders. Simply ask at the point of sale for two of their friend’s names, addresses, phone numbers, and emails. Try this with a ready-made sheet with a gift card “thank you”, and you are guaranteed to get at least one referral. You ask for two but you’ll settle for one, right? The beauty of this is there is a strong likelihood the person who is referred to you will have similar value and risk profile characteristics as the person who just became your new client.   
• Radius and Target Marketing. These programs help because they focus your dollars on buying leads in areas where you already have business. Many of your preferred carries have discounted programs. Expand both your penetration and the net you cast. If these clients liked your value proposition, it is likely their neighbors will as well. 

Other means to drive business and revenue include new affinity lead sources and commercial lines, where the value you bring to the table is deeply appreciated. With commercial lines, a two-pronged approach- to be a generalist for the business within your radius and then a specialist, focusing on limited commercial niches by producer – can work very well. It enables your producer to be the go-to person for specific classes of business, and then eventually add more.  

For more information beyond this overview, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me at RexH@PGIAgents.co. Premier Group Insurance has been in business for nearly twenty years and is one of the fastest growing and largest insurance agency entities in the country, most recently ranking #70 in the Insurance Journal’s P&C study out of nearly 38,500 agency entities. For the last eight years, it’s been my privilege to lead Premier and serve our membership of more than four hundred agents all across the country. Prior to that, I spent twenty-five years with two Fortune 100 insurers in a number of technical, managerial, and leadership roles.  For agencies that can adapt to the changes, grow, and grow profitably with their carriers, there’s a pot of gold to be made. However, the cruel reality is some agencies, captive and independent, and some carriers won’t make it. Their spoils will go to those that do, and not necessarily through acquisition. Their business will be absorbed by those who know how to do it via superior execution.  Happy to share further ideas on how to thrive!

To your success! 

Rex