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Most insurance agents can write auto and home policies in their sleep, and many understand commercial insurance like the back of their hands. But sometimes, clients throw us curve balls.

Smart Choice and CalSurance Associates welcome you to the Smart Choice E&O Prevention Newsletter, your resource for loss prevention education.

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As the excitement of New Year’s fades, and the boredom of late winter settles in, the feeling of a new beginning often fades as quickly as it began. But now is the time to dig in and do something different to grow your agency.

The goal of any independent insurance agency is to grow and build long-term wealth. To get to a place where an agency can fund growth initiatives and make money, owners often obtain capital via specialty loans, use of liquid investments, seller finance, or funding from friends, family, and other supporters.

Sure, there are plenty of infomercials that use over-exaggeration and half-truths to peddle cheap wares (though I’d say that’s closer to the definition of sales, not marketing) – but at its heart, that’s NOT what marketing is.

Selling in the insurance industry is not the same as sales in many other industries. Unlike most commodities being sold and advertised, insurance isn’t a choice in most cases, it’s a necessity.

As an insurance agent, your business lives or dies on the amount of new and renewing policies you sign with your carriers. Years ago, how you got paid was fairly straightforward: you got paid a percentage of the premiums you signed. But carriers have changed the way they compensate their agents.

Gone are the days when insurance agents had to invest in expensive hardware and software to quote, issue, and place policies. Updating software was tiresome and time-consuming. And when a computer went down, your production ground to a halt.

As an independent agent, it’s easy to get so caught up in your business that you forget to work on your business. But, if we fail to continuously develop and close leads, eventually, our agencies will suffer.

In my recent article, “The Art of the Close,” I discussed how I coach insurance agents to close on value versus cost. I don’t leave my close until the end of my meeting with a prospect. The entire meeting is the close.

In insurance, as in any sales business, there comes a time when the presentation is over and it’s time to close. Or, to put it another way, time to get paid for your investment of time and hard work in looking for the best coverage options for your clients.