One of the best ways to keep your customers informed and up to date on insurance practices is to keep constant contact with your customers.  The problem with this is that your customers probably don’t want to be constantly pelted with calls from you – and most insurance agents don’t have the time to sit around and call all of their clients, anyhow.

This is where a newsletter comes in handy.  Newsletters are a great way to touch base with your clients in a non-imposing way.  Even better, with the advent of e-mail, sending out a newsletter can be entirely free.

Newsletters are also good for informing your clients about changes in provisions and also news in the insurance world in general.  If you’d like to bolster your reputation as a person who knows what they’re talking about in the world of insurance and can be used as a resource and not just as a salesperson, a newsletter is an excellent step in that direction.

In order to make a newsletter actually be effective, though, it needs to be newsworthy.  Don’t just send out a daily blog about your own personal thoughts.  Once a week is probably the most frequent you should send out a newsletter relating to insurance, and even that might be too often.  Clients are more likely to actually sit down and read your newsletters if they come at a frequency that they find convenient but not overbearing.  Once a month or once every two months is probably best.

If you feel as though you are nobody to be sitting down and writing articles, don’t despair.  Most of the time people are better at writing than they give themselves credit for – just sit down and give it a shot.  If you’re really sure that you’re nobody to be putting pen to paper or don’t have time to sit and write articles, you can still have a newsletter.  Simply do a search for pertinent information on the Internet and have your newsletter be a compilation of links with descriptions below each story rather than writing your own.

A word of advice, though: make sure that any article you send out is written with the layperson in mind.  The entire point of sending out the newsletters is to educate your clientele about insurance, not to overwhelm them with terminology they may not be familiar with.  Be sure to keep your articles direct, informative, and pertinent.  If your clients can’t understand your articles easily, they won’t be read.

If you start up a newsletter, be sure to make your clients aware of it and explain how it can help them save money and time on insurance as well as understand the inner workings of the business better.  Sending them constant and reliable information really helps bolster you in your clients’ minds – and this can also bolster your bottom line.

The following insurance sales tips will show you how to talk to people using Facebook to get them interested and to generate leads. Facebook is a great tool both because it connects so many people and because people will be more likely to talk about tough subjects online than they will in real life.

1. Find Groups For Similar Topics
There are groups for everything on Facebook. You do not have to find groups specifically for life insurance, but you should find related groups. This may include groups that talk about all of the other things that have to be done at the end of a life — making a will, distributing property, paying off debt, and all the rest. These groups will contain people who are interested in life insurance, so you can contact them and create leads.

2. Target The Right Age Group
One thing that you can do is to keep your efforts aimed at people who are getting on in age. While it is true that all people should have life insurance just in case something happens, it is also true that older people are more likely to acknowledge the need. They are more likely to be thinking about it. If you target them when you are making contacts, you will have better success.

3. Target People Who Are At Risk
You should also look to people who have dangerous lives, people who may want life insurance because their profession puts them at risk every day. This could include police officers, firefighters, soldiers, and the like. These people often have groups relating to their profession where you can talk to a large number of people at once. Even if you cannot find a corresponding group, you can probably find out what they do from the information that is listed in their profile.

4. Be Active
You want to become an active member of the Facebook community. Start a Fan Page where people can check out the basics of your company. Talk on the discussion boards of all of the groups that you join about the benefits of life insurance. Start conversations on the wall of your own page. Go out and add people to your contacts list instead of waiting for them to find you. Anything that you can do to make it so that people see you can generate insurance leads.

Aged mortgage leads can easily become your most productive and profitable marketing segment. Remember each of these mortgage leads had some intention when they submitted their contact information.

Your mission is to find that intent and re-ignite it!

There are 5 proven strategies to nurture aged leads back into real-time opportunities:

1. Data cleansing and appending – Most aged mortgage leads end up in the trash because of bad data. Whether it is accidental or intentional, customers enter bad emails and phone numbers all the time. The good news is that the fix is often cheap and easy to fix–quickly bringing dead leads to life.

2. Email drip campaigns – Not everyone is cut-out to pound the phones trying to get unresponsive leads to take action. This is where a diligent email drip campaign can squeeze more out of your lead buy or monetize aged lead data you buy on the cheap. Simply build a progressive mortgage or refinance email campaign that builds up demand for the current low mortgage rates or special federal mortgage programs.

3. Telemarketing and phone screening – Much like the email marketing strategy a simple campaign by phone can reawaken a Web lead/prospect to their original intent. What’s even better about this strategy is that it can be very affordable and done in large volume–personally or outsourced.

4. Direct mail campaign – Believe it or not direct mail can be a very powerful strategy for Web leads, especially aged leads. Often times Web consumers are easily confused by all the information and clutter on the Web. They submit a request for information or help and then they forget or aren’t sure where they were. Then the call comes and confuses them even more–making them non-responsive. This is where mail helps. A traditional, well done piece of mail can build the traditional comfort and trust to bring that prospect back to life.

5. Integrated lead management strategy – Any of these will give you (guaranteed) good results and a positive ROI on any aged mortgage lead buy. However, if you really want to pump up your business work on an integrated plan–probably using a lead management system–to blend the marketing approaches.

Take a look into your “dead pool.” Are there aged or discarded leads that might still have mortgage needs? Maybe their financial situation has changed and they have new refinance or mortgage needs? They might even be a great source for referrals and cross-sells.

You don’t have aged leads of your own or real-time mortgage leads don’t fit your budget? Contact Next Wave Marketing Strategies and try these strategies on a batch of our Aged Mortgage Leads.

We have certainly discussed this before, but I want to take a little different angle on the topic this time. I recently received a marketing email from a lead management software vendor talking about the number of leads that go ignored in sales people’s pipelines. The number was enormous-they said 90%–I have seen objective research that puts it closer to 40-60%.

Regardless, this presents an incredible opportunity for you and your aged leads marketing strategy.  Assuming either of these big numbers is accurate it is no wonder customers are still willing to listen to you 30, 90, even 120 days after their initial inquiry. No one is talking to them.

Here are 5 simple steps to seizing this opportunity:

1. Create an aged lead script. It is worth putting some time into learning to introduce yourself to someone that has been dropped on the floor or whose needs have changed. I like to suggest an ear catching statistic-preferably one related to a change in the market or lending environment. This prevents the quick hangup while you are trying to spit out your name, which they won’t remember anyway, and it immediately explains your call.

2. Don’t lose track of them again. For heaven sakes manage your leads so you don’t drop them again. If you are going to work aged leads you should invest some of the savings from aged leads  into a good lead management system. If you lose them you will never get them back.

3. Reassure them along the way. You are certainly climbing a mountain in gaining these clients trust. However, if you keep them informed and reassure them of what the process is when you get that trust it will be locked. Coming through for a customer that has previously been disappointed can be a huge win for your sales pipeline.

4. Be hyper-responsive. Much like your strategy to reassure a customer of the process, your follow through is a trust builder. Try to be as responsive as possible. Immediately return calls and emails, even if you don’t have the answer yet.

5. Ask them for a referral. Don’t be shy. If you did a good job ask for that referral. They will want to repay you and are going to be interested in sending people they care about straight to you so those people can avoid getting put in the meat grinder they probably went through before you helped them.

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Constantly Enhance and Adapt

The market and your customers are always changing. Markets go up and down. Customers go hot and cold. It is not always clear as to why they change or why a marketing campaign degrades, but look for trends and shifts in your metrics.

Your market process should have testing and measurement processes that constantly look for and adapt to these subtle changes.

Differentiate

One of marketing biggest goals is to make your products and services stand out from the crowd. Take a quick review of your marketing materials today. Are you saying something different? Are you making it clear what is different about you? Are you communicating that you are the market leader?

Following the leader always makes you #2!

Marketing Strategy Fits Product

This is a mistake that I constantly see in marketing–marketing doesn’t match what you are selling. Products (especially in debt and mortgage) are constantly changing and shifting. Are you marketing yesterday’s program or rate environment?

Make sure that all of your marketing messages tie closely to your products and sales process. Marketing should not only tell consumers what they can get from you, but also what to expect during the sales process.

Distribution is Critical

Consumers will never see your award winning marketing if it sits in some sales person’s desk drawer. Make sure you have a plan for distribution for every piece of marketing collateral.

Make sure that you message fits the medium. Your yellow pages ads should be different from a website banner, different from a blog post, different from a direct mail piece.

Diversify

You never can be sure what will work. It is important that you are always trying different things and different mediums. Get a plan and then test it. If you haven’t tried online marketing, Twitter, Facebook, or think that newspapers are dead; don’t be hasty in discounting any marketing method–test it.

Is this a necessary consumer protection or a frivolous political ban on an efficient marketing technique?

This is what DoublePositive had to say:

I remember when we started DoublePositive, Fax Blasting was very popular. I was competing against so called marketing companies that were selling Fax Blasted (Junk Fax) Leads. Once the government started to take action and send out fines with cease and desist orders that all changed pretty quickly. The so called competitors that were selling leads via junk fax had to go into a different form of shady marketing or just shut down completely. Then all of a sudden this voice broadcasting thing starting growing and growing and growing. You get the point.

Look…. its dirt cheap, easy to host and companies have made tons of money doing it. But it’s wrong! It’s not a true expression of interest and finally the government has put their foot down once again.

DoublePositive is turning this into an opportunity for hot transfer business. It might be a good option, especially for your aged leads. You should sign-up and see:

No more Voice Broadcasting, Are you compliant?
Wednesday, May 20th @ 2PM EST.

No more cold calling, no more fax blasting, no more voice broadcasting…… What’s left? Find out during the webinar!

In sales and marketing we often talk about treating customers like gold. They are “always right,” we are “customer-centric,” our “responsiveness” to customer inquiries is unparalleled in the market.

Can you say that about how you treat your sales force? What would happen if you treated your sales staff like customers? Would they produce for us like customers do?

Needs Assessment

The first step in any customer process is understanding their needs. If we are trying to offer solutions and create value for our customers we need to understand their challenges. We must explore their needs.

Now, lets turn the table and reflect internally–what are the needs of our sales? We know what we need them to do, but what do they “need” to be successful?

Here are a few ideas:

• Compelling products and services
• Knowledge of what they are selling (as well as what competitors are selling)
• Source of fresh prospects or leads
• System to manage and follow-up on prospects
• Ability to negotiate and make deal decisions

Adapt these to your mortgage or debt business, but make sure you take the time. Look at trends and performance data. What helps get a deal done? What happened to those that didn’t get done?

Learn The Selling Cycle

Most of us have analyzed the customer buying cycle to a fine science. We know all of the scenarios that drive customers to us. We know what will make them hesitate, wait, or buy. We know how to accelerate that buying cycle with influence and persuasion.

Unfortunately, we don’t apply the same analysis to our selling process. The data is all there. Leads and prospects enter into our system. They are contacted and engaged. Then what happened?

Master this data and you can see delays, choke points, and fall out risks in your sales process. Tracking your selling cycle(s) can help you:

• Build better sales processes
• Improve knowledge-building and training
• Design more compelling marketing collateral
• Learn exactly when and how to follow-up
• Give sales people the tools to reinforce best practices

Mastering the sales cycle can help you equip your sales force for success–even automate much of that success formula.

Remove the Barriers to Sales

The first two steps have given you a pretty good picture of the sales cycle. Within that picture you should also begin to see the barriers that frustrate the effectiveness of this cycle.

Here are a few barriers that I often see in sales organizations:

• Total reliance on “hunting” philosophy for leads. New mortgage or debt leads motivate and increase productivity.
• Lack of attempt and contact accountability. Whether you are using a dialer or CRM, sales needs focused discipline on touching lots of customers.
• No system to manage follow-up. This is where some form of lead management is critical. Consistently touching customers is as important as making first contact.

Tools are critical to helping your sales department to not only be efficient, but also to show them that they are the center of the organization.

Go the Extra Mile

Nothing lands a customer faster and builds a deeper sense of loyalty than “going the extra mile.” This makes them feel special and reinforces that you care. The same applies in managing your sales department. Show them you are willing to support and motivate them.

Some ideas you may consider:

• Running sales competitions are always a hit
• Make sure they have quality equipment (computers, dialers, crm)
• Put sales support (marketing) at their finger tips
• Have them participate in sales and marketing strategy
• Put them at the center of new technology or software decisions

Simple incentives and motivation can produce far bigger results than simple salary and bonuses. Get creative. You will be amazed that an exotic trip for top performers to the Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas can cost less and bring more revenue than a higher deal split.

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As the market continues to deal us tough challenges it is time to look deeply at your sales and marketing strategies. Take a few moments away from trying to grind out sales and think about the big picture. Where are you headed in 2009?

1. Write Down Your Mission: It is amazing how powerful simply writing down an idea can be to it’s execution. Think about what you are trying to accomplish. Make that concept simple, but big. Then write it down.

2. List Your Strengths and Weaknesses: Take inventory of what you have to work with in making that mission a reality. Every organization and/or individual has strengths and weaknesses–list them. Now understand how you can leverage the strengths while minimizing or improving the weaknesses.

3. Review External Threats: Who are your competitors? What technologies, processes, or approaches are beating you in the market? These are your threats. Review them for opportunities to pivot or beat them head-on. Don’t hope they will go away–deal with them.

4. Look for Growth Opportunities: You will be amazed at how likely you are to find these growth opportunities in analyzing your threats. Regardless of where you get your inspiration, itemize your potential opportunities and use them as a foundation to your plan.

5. What are Your Options: Roll together your strengths and weakness inventory, your threat analysis, and growth opportunities. Now look at that data and assess your options. This is going to help you build all of the facets of your strategy.

6. Create Long-term Goals Vision: The foundation of your strategy needs to have a vision. This is supported by long-term (specific) goals. Get as concrete and measurable as possible. Again, write it down!

7. Develop Short-term Benchmarks: Break that big goal into little bite-size chucks. These smaller goals should be easily actionable and tied directly to measurements. These benchmarks are going to be your roadmap to success.

8. Implement Business Plan: Planning time is over. Now it is time to get to work. You now have a new business plan. Start executing. The hardest part is the first step–do it!

9. Evaluate Decisions, Adjust: No plan executes flawlessly. Your benchmarks and metrics are going to help you quickly identify what is working and what isn’t. Don’t ignore these indicators. Adapt and reposition your plan. Every decision gives you an opportunity to build a new success, make sure you are evaluating each carefully.

Don’t put your head in the sand in these tough times–look at it as an opportunity to grow and build marketshare.

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