by Agent C » Fri Jun 08, 2007 02:57 pm
HI ALL,
WHAT MARKETING STRATIGIES WORK THE BEST FOR YOU AND YOUR COMPANIES?
MAIL DROPS :cry: ? COLD CALL ON THE PHONE :cry: ? COLD CALL FACE TO FACE :? ? TV :) ? RADIO :) ? VEHICLE WRAPS :D ?
THANKS!
AGENT CLINT
:wink:
WHAT MARKETING STRATIGIES WORK THE BEST FOR YOU AND YOUR COMPANIES?
MAIL DROPS :cry: ? COLD CALL ON THE PHONE :cry: ? COLD CALL FACE TO FACE :? ? TV :) ? RADIO :) ? VEHICLE WRAPS :D ?
THANKS!
AGENT CLINT
:wink:
Posted: Thu May 08, 2008 08:46 pm Post Subject:
She was converting approximately 30 leads for every 500 she purchased. So the average resulting cost per customer was around $200. Not so great when you consider that the average yearly premium revenue is between $200 and $300.
Are you telling us that this agent called 470 so called "leads" with no positive results and continued to do business with the lead company?
On a two minute phone call, this would mean 940 minutes or almost 16 hours of wasted time and at a minimum value of $80 per hour, that's
$1,280.00 down the drain. This is where most agents make a mistake, they don't count their time. So the cost per customer was much more than $200.
I don't quite understand how you arrived at the "average yearly premium revenue" of $200-$300. Are you referring to P & C insurance?
One can have the above "fantastic" results for a marketing program but if the cost of acquiring a new customer is not reasonable in relation to the revenue from that client then there's no point in performing the marketing activities. So....what's a reasonable Cost Per Sale?
If an agent or agency is spending more than 10-15% of commission income in obtaining a new customer, he/she is probably having trouble paying the rent.
The commissions on life and health insurance are greater than those of P&C insurance, so we could spend a little more on "quality" life and/or health leads.
The problem is that there are so many "sign up", "survey", "give us your opinion" forms on the internet, the quality of these leads, to me, is very poor.
If more lead companies would just be up-front and honest about the situation - "Have You Reviewed Your Life Insurance Program Within The Past Two Years? If not, it's probably out of date. If you would like to take advantage of a free, no obligation insurance review by a licensed, professional insurance agent in your hometown, please complete the following short form and we will have an agent call you at your convenience."
This would be a lead.
Maze
Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 05:51 pm Post Subject: @Insurance Maze
Are you telling us that this agent called 470 so called "leads" with no positive results and continued to do business with the lead company?
Yes. That's exactly what I'm saying. What's more they spent around $4,000 for those leads to convert just 30 of them. Awful, awful, awful! And that doesn't even account for their time as you suggested. Understandably they are much more pleased with the results they're getting from us but that's not that resounding of an endorsement given what their previous experience was.On a two minute phone call, this would mean 940 minutes or almost 16 hours of wasted time and at a minimum value of $80 per hour, that's
$1,280.00 down the drain. This is where most agents make a mistake, they don't count their time. So the cost per customer was much more than $200.
I don't quite understand how you arrived at the "average yearly premium revenue" of $200-$300. Are you referring to P & C insurance?
No. These are Health leads. The agent may not be giving us a clear picture of the real revenue. It only matters to us from the aspect of helping to make sure that the agent is getting a decent ROI for their advertising dollars. It could be more.The problem is that there are so many "sign up", "survey", "give us your opinion" forms on the internet, the quality of these leads, to me, is very poor.
If more lead companies would just be up-front and honest about the situation - "Have You Reviewed Your Life Insurance Program Within The Past Two Years? If not, it's probably out of date. If you would like to take advantage of a free, no obligation insurance review by a licensed, professional insurance agent in your hometown, please complete the following short form and we will have an agent call you at your convenience."That's great insight. I agree with you that there needs to be differentiation and this is a great way to do. If one is saying what everyone else is then the results are going to be subpar at best.
We promote all sorts of stuff on the internet ethically and effectively. Our modus operandi is to make sure that there is an immediate, response accountable (meaning that there is a measurable positive response for every marketing action), positive ROI for what we do.
We have found that the quality of the opportunity generated is significantly higher when the provider (agent in this case) is controlling their traffic to their own branded page and making sure that the messaging (sales pitch) is aligned with their values and service to their clients.
Thanks for the insight on the percentages for acquiring new clients. Please, anyone else please sound off. I'd like to hear more!
Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 06:22 pm Post Subject:
That's great insight. I agree with you that there needs to be differentiation and this is a great way to do. If one is saying what everyone else is then the results are going to be subpar at best.
You will have to excuse me, but you gave me a political response.
Does this mean that your company will be the first company to offer insurance agents quality leads from people who have responded in some way to the need for or desire to review their insurance programs?
Maze
Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 08:59 pm Post Subject:
I'm interested to find out how what Lead Equity had written is not an advertisement. You may not have meant for it to be, but it came out as such to me.
I prefer sponsorship events. We sponsor at least one event every month that includes our name in the event. Along with the event comes extras that are given out to the participants or attendees to the events. With this we get more eyes seeing our name which will increase the calls. We keep our name out as well with radio campaigns and small newspaper ads. We make calls to as many leads as we can to increase our hit count. I am also hitting the road as much as possible to cold/warm call as many commercial accounts as possible. This is all in a P&C world. I came from the advertising industry and you must spend money to make money. The trick is spending it wisely. In our area referrals are huge and there is no downside to asking everytime you talk to a client which we do.
Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 09:03 pm Post Subject:
I'm interested to find out how what Lead Equity had written is not an advertisement. You may not have meant for it to be, but it came out as such to me.
Of course, it's an advertisement. I have ordered many leads over the internet, but basically they are all the same.
Lead generators gather, sell and share the same information.
I'm with you, asking for referrals is the best source of insurance leads and I have seen none better.
Maze
Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 10:35 pm Post Subject:
I agree that referrals are the best source for insurance leads.
I am a P&C agent and we are big on referrals.
we have participated in a few different lead sources via the internet and have not had much success
Posted: Sat May 10, 2008 01:14 am Post Subject:
@Insurance Maze
You will have to excuse me, but you gave me a political response.
Does this mean that your company will be the first company to offer insurance agents quality leads from people who have responded in some way to the need for or desire to review their insurance programs?
I'm sorry. I just talk too much for my own good. Let me try to give you a real response.
I guess I just agreed with your assessment that the generic sales pitch that lead generators give to visitors/searchers doesn't create a high-quality lead for agents. That's all. I thought the more honest approach you recommended would be different and perhaps lead to a better experience for both the prospect and the agent.
We aren't really doing lead programs like a normal lead company. We're actually creating landing pages for our client that have their specific sales pitch (value proposition). That allows them to be more authentic. I think that's a big part of their experience being better.
I'm interested to find out how what Lead Equity had written is not an advertisement. You may not have meant for it to be, but it came out as such to me.
Sorry about that. I can see that. It does sound like I'm really patting myself on the back. We're not a insurance lead company and we're actually not able to take on new customers right now anyways. Once we get down to brass tacks with our current insurance customer and can determine the cost of new customer acquisition is reasonable then we're are considering approaching a few more agencies. I don't think we can do that yet.
I could have made my post a whole lot shorter by asking: We are helping an agent market their business. What is an acceptable cost of sale ration/percentage as a general rule?
Posted: Mon Jun 09, 2008 12:49 pm Post Subject:
Hi Lead Equity,
We aren't really doing lead programs like a normal lead company.
I would really like to know more about your description of a 'normal lead Co.'
Awaiting your reply..
Plasmahectic
Posted: Mon Jun 09, 2008 04:03 pm Post Subject: Normal lead company
I would really like to know more about your description of a 'normal lead Co.'
What I mean by that is: We are not a company that generates leads from affiliates, generic lead generation sites, or by purchasing any leads wholesale and then reselling to individual agents and brokerages.
Currently we're working on a flat fee for our insurance customer. We create landing pages for PPC (and email) that are branded with our customer's logo, images, value-proposition, and contact info. We then drive traffic directly that client owned page.
So the differences between what we're doing and what a company like insureme.com does is that we are working for a flat fee and driving traffic directly to the client owned and branded conversion/landing page. (in short)
What's an ongoing challenge, though, is making sure that the cost of a new lead converts to a customer acquisition cost that is acceptable. What's the point of paying any amount for a quality lead if it doesn't convert to a customer that you can make money on. That's what I'm trying to find a benchmark for. (i.e. If a lead costs $12 to generate and you convert 1 out of every ten leads then your customer acquisition cost is $120. That seems high to me.)
Posted: Tue Jun 10, 2008 05:22 am Post Subject: Do you know about the affiliate system?
Dear friend..
Its good to know about your way of working at it...also would like to know if you have anything to share about the affiliate system. Please tell me who are these affiliates..n how this entire system works! Have once heard that the affiliates are getting paid to generate leads..but didn't quite understand how this process works & who all are involved in it..
Awaiting reply,
Plasmahectic
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