New to Business, Recommendations?

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Permalink Reply by Dave Williams on December 9, 2008 at 1:26pm

New born baby parents now have a reason to buy life insurance and are perfect starter prospects who will grow with you. Check local birth announcements and start calling. and when you come across someone who needs a boat insured please call me. Dave 954-761-8500

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Permalink Reply by Raymond A. DiDia on December 10, 2008 at 9:41am

You may want to investigate to determine if your employer offers any "payroll deducted" products.

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Permalink Reply by Janet K. Holstine on December 12, 2008 at 10:20am

Scott,
I'd suggest you start making a list of people you know who already have some form of relationship with you. In all economic markets, but especially today, people want to do business with people they know and trust. Another means of generating leads is to do seminar marketing or informational presentations. I'd think your church might welcome an informational program. While in the PC business, I offered such a program and generated 65 policies off an hour program. This makes you an instant 'expert' and since you are new, it is possible your manager or other person from NYL would be there as well. Good luck, Janet

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Permalink Reply by Christina Cusumano on December 16, 2008 at 12:08pm

Congratulations and welcome, Scott!

My first recommendation is to join NAHU - the National Association of Health Underwriters. My partner and I were encouraged to do so about six years ago, when we were newbies, and got lots of support from this professional insurance community. Their online forum is a great resource and has provided valuable support for us along the way.

Best wishes as you begin this new phase of your work life!

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Permalink Reply by Duaine Owings on December 19, 2008 at 3:20am

Hello Pastor:

Well, as any successful person will tell you do what you love and what you know. As your first love is God's ministry I would work in the church market and expand out from there.

I also had stated with a "captive" company back in 1989 and worked there as a debit agent until I found out that as an independent agent you can double you commissions and be your own boss. As a pastor you must already be a self-starter.

I work the Life and Health markets from my home-office and get my clients by either purchasing internet leads, receive leads from companies I work with or from referrals. I also work the church market for groups traveling overseas, missionaries and mission sending organizations. ( www.missionary-services.com )

If you'd like to email or call me sometime please do as I have a heart for pastors and have all of my home-church pastors and several other pastors as clients.

I'm licensed in (12) states and have clients all over the U.S. and worldwide. You can do that also and not have to make a list of 300 of your friends or enemies to try to sell to.
Best regards,

Duaine Owiings
mailto:duaineowings@gmail.com

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• DuainePTW.gif, 15 KB

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Permalink Reply by Bill Bateman on December 19, 2008 at 8:40pm

NAIFA - the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors (formerly know as Life Underwriters) sponsors LUTC (Life Underwriters Training Council) classes in most Metropolitan areas. You do not have to be a member of NAIFA to join (although you will be encourage to join). www.naifa.org gets you to their site. These are great classes designed to teach you the basics and the advanced. They are sales oriented. They meet weekly and 20 years ago they kept me in the business when I had few mentors and no clues.

Feel free to communicate with me further
Bill Bateman - Albuquerque, NM

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Permalink Reply by Matt Milne on January 12, 2009 at 4:17pm

How do you find the birth announcements?

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Permalink Reply by Seth Rosenberg on February 16, 2009 at 11:56am

It really depends on what products you are focusing on. NYL is a captive structure which can be both beneficial and not at the same time. I have had the chance to work with several Local NYL regional offices. In many cases the regional offices have marketing support programs or marketing support dollars for you to develop your own program.

While I still maintain my licenses, I focus now on marketing support for agents and agencies as part of my Direct Mail Company. Remember that the average person will by life insurance 7 times in there life --- you need to develop a program of contact with you current customers and acquisition of new customers to maximize your return.

In this thread people of mentioned Births already; I would add Marriages, New moves, major life stages; NYL of course has a robust wealth management offering of products so I would also target High wealth individuals.

We offer a verity of very cost competitive Direct Mail Campaigns, we are not a lead service, we are a mailing company with expertise in marketing. While we have customers that regularly achieve 3~7% return rates we tell all of our customers to budget based on 1%. We offer 1000 customer targeted letters, printed mailed, including postage for only $450. Call 410-336-6118 or email me Seth@precisionpostal.com to discuss how to develop a campaign that meets your needs.

Thanks
Seth Rosenberg

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Permalink Reply by stuart kirsner on April 14, 2009 at 5:41pm

Seth-we market to the wealthy. Does your $450 price include the cost of the list of the wealthy, and does it include the cost of a reply card? Stu Kirsner, Stuart Estate Planning 954 938-3590

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Permalink Reply by Ron Shane on March 5, 2009 at 12:17am

I was also in your shoes for some time. I pastored and tried to sell insurance at the same time. I now do ministry strictly from a lay person's perspective and am working very hard at helping others with their insurance careers. I don't know if you want to spend all the time driving to appointments, having people stand you up, going back, etc. or if you are looking for something less time consuming. I am working with Mutual of Omaha and we have an exclusive system for doing the applications over the phone and the internet using a voice signature method so no "wet signatures" are ever needed. The electronic system goes directly to the underwriter. We have lead companies we use and can give you evaluations of other agents who have used the different companies. I provide training and support. Because you don't have to go see the person, you are not as limited to the areas you can get leads from.
My biggest pointer would be DON'T CHASE RABBITS I have been independent for some time now, and have been guilty of chasing after this new system and that new system. I spent over nine months finally getting my business model in place and being focused on it. I am convinced that we are just on the verge of seeing more and more insurance being sold completely electronically with voice signatures for compliance or for digitally signed email applicatinos for compliance. I know some people are still into the belly to belly method, but whichever method you choose, just stay focused.

If you ever want to contact me
Ronfoundit@comcast.net
www.ShaneFinancialServices.com or
www.fastterminsurance.com

Sorry this is at the end, but the most important thing you can do is pray.
I personally don't like to mix ministry and insurance. I think it turns people off on what your real motives will be if you ever try to get together with them. Is he coming as a minister or wanting to sell me insurance?
Also, you don't want to see someone attend church and be thinking about your next insurance appointment with them while trying to minister. That again is why I am so sold on the over the phone/over the internet system. I can work and leave it. And I don't ever have to worry about chasing down my friends or family trying to sell them something. If they ever want to buy, great, but I don't ever bother them with it because I want to be their friend, their minister, and the person who tries to sell them eternity insurance.

God bless you

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Permalink Reply by Gary D Marcum on June 2, 2009 at 12:21pm

I think this is enviable. However a thought. My Dad was also a Pastor. Mom and Dad had several insurance professionals that attended our church. Also my mom's 2 brothers were life insurance salemen.
They didn't want to bother my parents or sell to friends or family.
End result if it hadn't been for a Combined salesman my mom would have passed with no life ins. at all.
I say ask your friends. I wish my parents friends would have.
Thanks for sharing.
Sincerely,
Gary Marcum

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Permalink Reply by Padra S. Ramtin on April 1, 2009 at 4:58am

Scott welcome to the club, wow your at a new turning point in your life, I found myself there to when I decided to make insurance a career as well, When I first joined I was the sales manager for a life and health agency, we sold insurance policy’s nationwide over the internet and in person we were the first agency to have online signatures; we were the top 30 producers for the state of California for individual health and life and my most recent company West Coast Auto Insurance 50 offices in Cali was sold to form the largest Auto brokerage firm in California. No one ever taught me in this industry I had to learn from all my own mistakes. So here is what I teach all my employees to give a running start = what you need is someone you can bounce some ideas off of, remember every market is similar and quite different too. You need to find a buddy (to work with like a workout partner to push each other) and a mentor (for guidance, don’t make the same mistake we made avoid them and give yourself a head start). If not look at the top sales person in your group and see what he is doing right, then duplicate it and work it into your own words so it becomes second nature more natural for you. Also learn the three step process of selling insurance, Quoting – Selling – Closing; remember FACTS TELL and STORIES SELL (I live by this), use a story when selling to explain, a lot of couples do not want to talk about death but make it more of a reality since you see it everyday. You don’t need to learn leadership skills you have that already, work on your weak points to make them stronger and make your strong characteristics shine more. Internet leads have a 15% to 3% Closing ratio and most of them have already been sold to 8 agents in your area it’s a waist of money in my area California. Besides looking at selling personal life insurance try selling Group Life, Imagine you land a company that has 300 employees and they option to buy life insurance from you, now you are receiving a commission check on 300 policies on one large sale. Oh by the way try to see if you have any contacts in TAX preparers/ accountants for referrals on this tax season, as the customer gets their refunds they can put that money towards a life policy, plus the preparers can prescreen their income level too.

Good luck and keep me posted.

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