3 Tips For New Insurance Agents

Beginning a new career, whether it’s your first time out, or your second or even third endeavor in life, is an exciting, electrifying time. Beginning a new career as an insurance agent is no different, however it can also be a bit overwhelming, too, as you adjust to the demands of the industry and the uniqueness that being an insurance agent brings with it. With that in mind, here are 3 tips for budding agents, to help you through those difficult early years.

#1: Your Beginner’s Period Lasts a Long Time

New Insurance Agents

The “learner’s permit” for an insurance agent lasts between 90 days and 2 years. You’ll spend the first 90 days forming the effective habits that will carry you through your entire career. As an insurance agent, the most beneficial habits you’ll need to establish are those of both an employee and an employer. As a self-employed insurance agent or broker, you’ll be both your own boss and your own employee. Setting a good daily plan of action – balancing both administrative and subordinate duties equally well – will go a long way to establishing good, effective, beneficial habits to last your entire career. In fact, your first 90 days, that’s all you’re going to worry about – establishing effective habits.

Your first year as an insurance agent is spent learning to sell. That’s it. Learning to use the qualities you possess, and developing skills and qualities that you’ll need, will consume your time. Expect a lot of “No”s in those first weeks and months. Expect to work much more than you get paid for, too. In the long run, those unpaid efforts will pay for themselves in the long-term clients you acquire in those early goings. Your second year, you’ll find yourself refining those skills ad qualities, and turning those habits into an efficient system of operating your business.

#2: Your First 100 Clients Will Set Your Career

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It may take all of those first two years, but when you acquire your 100th client, you’ll have a career that’s pretty well set for success. Not that you want to stop at 100 by any means, just that 100 is a magical number In the insurance industry. Here’s why:

Each of those 100 clients are going to have on-going needs for your products and services. There are milestones in every life, and 100 lives full of milestones are a lot of opportunities for future business. Consider 100 lives filled with

  • Simple Family plans for the newly married couple
  • Mortgage insurance policies for their first home
  • Additional plans for each new baby that comes along
  • Additional coverage for increasing lifestyle – additional vehicles, recreational vehicles and homes, travel insurance, pet insurance, etc.
  • Additional policies for mom and dad to cover their “additions”
  • College planning
  • Retirement planning

Can you see how 100 families can keep you busy for a very long time? Now, double that, or triple it, and you can see how a core group of clients and their families can really CREATE your business. Typically, those first 100 finally give you enough breathing room to relax a bit and concentrate on specializing –  honing your skills and learning just which areas of your industry you excel so you can capitalize on that.

#3 – Insurance is NOT an 8 to 5 Job

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First of all, you are in a BUSINESS, not a job. You are both boss and employee. You’ve got to handle both administrative and subordinate duties. You’ll have to learn how to manage time, money, and yourself. You can’t go into business with an employee mindset. It’s ALL on you. That can be both good and bad, both an opportunity to shine and a rude awakening as you discover your weaknesses. Learn from your mistakes, build on your strengths and you’ll soon figure out your own way of operating your business.

Secondly, you’ll have to go out and meet with potential clients. That means you’ll have to meet with them on THEIR time, not necessarily yours. Expect to put in evening and weekend hours. A LOT of evening and weekend hours. Divide your day into administrative duties in the morning or afternoon, and then go out for your client calls after 6pm. As you progress through your first few years, your need for evening calls will greatly lessen, but never entirely go away, unless you stop meeting with potential clients. As time goes on and your business builds, more and more of what you do will be in your office, during the day. But in those crucial first years, expect to have very little free time between the hours of 6pm and 11pm. It’s just the nature of the business. Think of it as your rite of passage, the dues you hae to pay, to have a thriving insurance business.

You’re Insurance Business and You

Now that you’ve seen a bit of what it takes, early on, to become an insurance agent, perhaps you’ll be one of the stalwart young agents who actually make something of themselves in what can be a very lucrative and rewarding field. Few have what it takes, but armed with a bit of the reality, perhaps you’ll be the one who does.

5 Qualities That Make Successful Insurance Agents

A good goalie can almost sense where the puck will come from and stop it. A good auto mechanic can tell by the sound of the engine where the problem might lie. And a good cop knows when a suspect is lying in the interrogation room. These qualities make them good at their respective jobs. All pursuits require certain qualities, and being an insurance agent is no different. While many good qualities are required to be an insurance agent, there are 5 that no agent can be without. Let’s look at them to see if you have what it takes to make it as a “good” insurance agent.

A Good Agent Cares About His Clients

A good insurance agent has to put the needs of his clients first. Good insurance agents could care less about their commissions. All they want is to help people have a better future, a more secure financial situation, and a more stable plan for dealing with those disastrous moments when life goes all wrong. Good agents listen to what their clients have to say, and deliver just the products the client needs, rather than the size of the commissions attached. A good agent also knows when a client may need more than they are asking for, or more than they are willing to realize. Compassion and emotional intelligence – caring for and about people – are essential to being a good insurance agent.

A Good Agent Cares For His Clients

Customer service – good customer service, anyway – is sometimes difficult to find in today’s business world. Customers who receive quality customer service are contented and happy and stick with the companies that give them the best customer service they can offer. A good insurance agent is always available to his clients. He returns calls and messages in a very timely manner. He answers questions, or finds the answers if he doesn’t know them, until the client is satisfied. He cares for his clients’ needs and concerns as if they were his own. Good customer service is another hallmark quality of a good insurance agent.

A Good Agent Has a Winning Personality

The children’s character Eeyore is the only one around who is appealing and loveable when droopy and depressed. No one likes to do business with someone who is negative or unpredictable. A good insurance agent should be human, sure, with real emotions and reactions, but he should also be genuinely positive and upbeat as much as possible. People naturally are drawn toward others who are enthusiastic, energetic, excited, and exciting. Insurance agents with that sort of “peppy” personality will make a lot of clients, and a lot of sales.

A Good Agent Has Business Sense

It takes smarts to make it in any field, but insurance agents need certain types of smarts, and they need to be good at using them. They have to understand financial and legal aspects of their products, as well as the financial aspects of their clients’ situations. Insurance agents must also keep up with the changes in both his industry and in the economic issues that may affect his clients and his business. Not to mention, every aspect of business these days requires technology and team work. Good agents know how to keep up with the changes in the way today’s business world does business, and in how to choose, and work, with the best people.

A Good Agent Has Tenacity and Integrity

It takes a strong person to face rejection day after day and not give up or succumb to a defeatist attitude. It also takes a strong person to remain honest in the face of every incentive not to. Clients trust and respect agents who tell them the truth up front, and will quickly leave one agent for another if that integrity and honesty isn’t present. Good agents know that stubbornness and a strong sense of morals are necessary to long-term success in the business.

Good Agents Have a Host of Good Qualities

We’ve listed 5 qualities that are essential to a successful career in the insurance industry. There, are however, a whole host of other qualities that make a good insurance agent. Insurance agents come in all shapes and sizes, from all walks of life. Any one of them has the potential to be a “good” agent, especially if they have the 5 essential qualities that all their fellow “good” agents have in common.

Which Learning Environment Is Right for You? Online Learning vs. the Traditional Classroom

When it comes to taking your insurance certification or continuing education classes, today’s high tech world gives you two choices. You can participate in a traditional classroom with fellow students, or go it on your own with an online option. There are benefits to both, and which one is right for you will depend on your needs, your learning style, and your goals. Let’s have a look at how online learning and traditional classroom learning stack up.

Benefits of Learning in a Classroom

#1 – Interaction

One thing that online learning can’t really offer you is the interaction with others. Sure, many online learning platforms offer forums and email communications to “interact” with your instructor and fellow students, but it’s not in real time. A question may go unanswered or unclarified for hours, or even a day or more. Group dynamics and cooperative learning are nearly impossible when you are basically alone with your keyboard at 1am. Some instructors attempt interaction by requiring so many responses to your fellow classmates’ postings, but when you are doing it because you HAVE to, and not because the conversation is engaging or interesting to you, it loses something in the translation. Interacting with your peers and insurance instructors can be an important part of your learning process, too, as it can help you synthesize and analyze the information you are being presented.

#2 – Networking

Not all of the face-to-face interaction you have with your fellow students will, of course be limited to JUST classroom discussion. You’ll find yourself chatting before and after class, and on breaks. You’ll discover that these face-to-face conversations can be valuable in terms of networking – getting to know others who can be beneficial to you professionally. While networking may not help you much in class, in terms of studying or learning, it’s what happens outside of class that makes networking so valuable.

#3 – Real People

Your fellow students and your instructor are real people, just like you, just like your prospective clients and customers and colleagues. Classroom learning offers you the opportunity to communicate with real people, perhaps culturally or racially different from you. It allows you to practice communication skills, leadership skills, cooperative skills and other “people” skills that online learning can’t. Sure, your fellow students and teachers online are real people, too, but you may never know what they look like, what they sound like, or what color their hair is. You’ll never have the opportunity to speak with them face-to-face, and while written communications are important, you’ll do more speaking with your real world clients and colleagues.

Benefits of Learning Online

#1 – Flexibility

We don’t all lead the kind of lifestyle that allows us free time whenever we need it. Family demands, work demands, travel – all can make it difficult to be anywhere on a given day at a given time. So for those with demanding lives, the flexibility of online learning is definitely a plus. Being able to log on and complete your classwork from anywhere, at any time, may be the only way you can manage classes and the rest of your busy schedule.

#2 – Comfort and Convenience

While taking your classes in your PJs may be the first image that pops into your head with the mention of comfort and convenience, it’s not the only comfortable thing about online classes. There’s no need to brave cold, wet, rainy or snowy weather. There’s no need to deal with the hassles of commuting to class. There’s no need to worry about paying for food, gas, parking, or other costs traveling back and forth to class may require. Those with limited mobility need not be concerned with accessible buildings or adequate parking.  You don’t have to leave work early, or give up your Saturdays with the family. Online learning can keep you safe, warm, dry, and allow you the freedom to choose just which slippers go best with each assignment.

Both online learning and classroom learning settings offer benefits, and ultimately, the same education. The choice you make in pursuing your necessary insurance classes should be the right one for you, your lifestyle, and your goals.

Which type of learning do you prefer? Let us know in the comments below.

Top 5 Reasons to Consider a Career in the Insurance Industry

The insurance industry sometimes gets a bad rap. Customers don’t like the high costs of premiums, or they don’t like the restrictions and limitations of their policies. And then there are those who wouldn’t dare dream of a career in the insurance industry because it’s “all about the selling”. You surely HAVE to have the blood of a snake oil salesman in your veins to WANT to be involved in the insurance industry, right? Wrong. And here are 5 very excellent reasons to prove that thinking wrong.

Reason #1: You get to genuinely help people.

Most customers in today’s world don’t like to be sold on anything. Therefore, you aren’t a salesperson, but rather a source of information. You lead the customer to the information they need so that they can make the best, most informed decision regarding their insurance needs. You help them wade through all that information to find the most relevant bits so that they completely and fully understand. Along the way, you have to help them face fears they may not want to consider, decide on how much risk is too much, and ultimately, help them take control of their lives. You and your products can make a real difference in your customers’ lives.

Reason #2: You can brand yourself by being yourself.

Authenticity goes a long way when you are dealing with people face-to-face. When you are in their homes, or in their offices, up close and personal, you can’t help but show bits of yourself. And the insurance industry offers that kind of personal communication and interaction with your customers and clients. Integrity, honesty and personality go a long way toward being a successful agent, and make the industry perfect for those who can’t stand the thought of hiding behind a half-truth or a make-believe “professional” façade.

Reason #3: You can serve the community you wish to serve.

Many markets – women, minorities, small business – are greatly underserved. You can offer your expertise and services to those who need it most, to those you are most comfortable with. You are in the position to target your chosen market audience better than many other professionals, because they are in desperate need of your help, and waiting for someone like you to come along.

Reason #4: You can take your business online.

For the tech-savvy agent, there’s a world of opportunity in the insurance industry just waiting online. You can build a community, an informative and relevant website, and you can become somewhat of an authority in your field, with the right amount of effort, skill, and perseverance. You don’t have to be the stuffy guy in the stuffy suit. You can join the online market and thrive.

Reason #5: You can be a leader.

Imagine, you can have your own agency. You can stand out from the crowd. Even if you don’t take it that far, you can still be a leader to your customers, a coach to your clients. You can serve them, and your community, in ways you never dreamed possible. Remember, the insurance agency is all about changing lives, securing futures. No one can do that for so many people like an insurance agent can.

The insurance industry is all about serving others, and it takes someone with a serving, empathetic attitude to do that well. There’s a lot more to being successful in the insurance industry than just selling policies. And see? Not a drop of snake oil in sight.