In this post, I want to talk about one of the most effective and yet overlooked marketing tools you have at your disposal: namely you!

You may have never thought about this way, but as an insurance agent, the greatest marketing asset you possess is yourself.

What do I mean by that?

There is currently a trend in this country away from “corporatism.” People are sick and tired of dealing with big corporations who serve their shareholders first and have little concern for their customers… as people.

The fact is, people don’t want to deal with “corporations,” they want to deal with people. Think about your own relationships; who would you rather do business with… someone you know and trust, or a complete stranger?

Following then, is what you can do to engender trust with your prospects and turn prospects into trust relationships.

1. Forget About Your Company Name

People don’t really care what your company name is. People will ask who you work for and you should tell them… “You, I work for you! I am an independent agent and I represent all of the big insurance companies, but in reality, I work for you.”

2. Brand Yourself in a Professional, Yet Personal Way

The best way to do this is to establish a personal, yet professional website. The first thing you should do is go over to Godaddy.com and buy a domain name that is about you, i.e. JohnSmith.com If that is not available, be creative and try different variations, such as “JohnSmithOmaha.com” or whatever. The key is to get a domain that is about you, not about insurance, not about your company name, about you.

Next, you should set up a professional website. Unless you are a graphic designer, forget about setting up your own site. I used to be cheap and I tried to do everything myself, until I realized that doing it myself was only costing me money. People would land on my websites and bounce right off because they looked cheap and cheesy. Who wants to do business with someone who looks cheap and cheesy? I don’t. Do you? Invest a little money in yourself and your business and you will not be sorry.

3. Use Your Website To Generate and Follow Up on Leads

Most insurance agents don’t write thank you cards and monthly send out cards, because frankly, it is a LOT of work and hassle. The great thing about a website is that it can put your lead generation on auto-pilot.

Once you get a prospect to come to your website, you can get them to sign up for a free newsletter. Using an auto-responder, you can easily keep yourself in front of them, automatically and effortlessly.

So there you have it. In three easy steps you can build a new powerful brand (YOU) to sell Medicare Supplement insurance.

I think of lead companies a little bit like pushers. If they can get you hooked and give you just enough information to make a few sales, you will make the sales, get your commission and keep coming back for more.

The fact is however that a large percentage of leads you buy will NEVER answer their phone or email. They fill out a form (or more likely, several forms) online and within minutes, their phone is ringing like crazy and their email is jammed with sales messages from hungry sales people. Our numbers indicate that about 60% of the leads we buy will collect just enough information and then go straight to the company of their choice.

I am going to reveal 3 little secrets that allowed us to capture about 30% of the leads that were falling in to the lead black hole. You should be warned, if you are looking for a “quick fix,” this is not it. Many of these leads take a year or more to convert to sales, but if you can convert these leads, your return on your investment will skyrocket.

1. You MUST Build Trust With Your Prospect Before They Will Ever Buy from You

Most of our prospects for Medicare Supplement insurance are going online because they want to buy their insurance without the hassle of having to talk to some insurance agent. The ironic thing is however, they don’t trust the internet. The web is fine for information, and it is OK to buy a crock pot from a big trusted store like Amazon, but other than that, people know that the web is full of scammers. If you call them from the web, they don’t trust you. Period.

So, how do you build their trust? The first thing to do is show them that you are a true human being. The first thing we do after we get a lead that doesn’t respond, we send them a hand-written thank you card with a picture of our staff. If you don’t have a staff, then send them a picture of your family.

Why? You need to let them see that you are the real deal, not some “internet shadow” hiding behind the building, waiting to rip em off.

After we send em a real card, we send em an e-card in about two weeks, from a legitimate e-card company. There are several good ones. We like Blue Mountain, because they are cheap and easy to use.

The next thing we do is send them an e-card about once a month. But here is the trick. Don’t EVER mention insurance. Send them a “funny” card, or holiday card. Again, the idea is to let them see that you are a real human.

By about the second or third month, you will be amazed at how many people are still in their open enrollment, who begin to call you and say, “Thanks for all the cards. I’ve been meaning to call you…”

2. You MUST Be Persistent. Persistence Pays

Most agents lose most of their sales for lack of one thing… persistence. I don’t mean pesky, in your face, high pressure sales kind of persistence (those days are gone forever, get over it). I simply mean, staying in front of someone long enough for them to get to know and trust you.

Every lead we get, we “assume the sale.” Not necessarily in the first week, or even the first couple of months. But, we never throw away a lead until essentially, that person says, “go away, you are bothering me.” Even when someone says that, we don’t give up. We send them a final, paper card that says, “I am sorry I bothered you, if you ever need my services in the future, I am here for you.”

3. You MUST Use Technology and Forget About the Kitchen Table

Unless you already know them, baby boomers don’t want you coming to their house. There are a couple of ways around this.

A. Rent a cheap office. Did you know you can get a very nice, executive (even penthouse) office for about $30 per month. Companies like Regus allow you to buy what is called a “mail account” which gives you access to two things. 1) A real mailing address and 2) Access to rent an executive suite by the hour or day (for very reasonable rates). If you can get clients to come to your office, it makes you look professional and you become a “trusted advisor” rather than some schmuck salesman.

B. Get a website. Forget about building a big website and driving thousands of visitors to your site. Unless you are willing to invest about $50,000 in time and education to learn how to effectively do this, you might as well forget it. Insurance is one of the most competitive niches on the web. There are big companies with big dollars invested on the web. You will not compete with them.

The good news is, you don’t need to compete with them. Did you know that studies have shown that in online marketing, small websites actually “convert” better than big fancy websites. Why? I don’t know. I suppose it goes back to the trust factor. If people think you are just another one of those “internet shadows,” they will probably avoid you. This is not to say, you should get a cheesy, ugly website. To learn more about this, read my article on medicare lead generation and branding you!

So there you have it, three little secrets the drug, er, the lead companies don’t want you to know. Go forth, be patient, be persistent, build your business and stop supporting those pushers.

Following are two things you really need to grasp if you intend to use web leads.

1. Most Leads are Shared Leads

Do shared leads work? Yes they work. We have bought and worked and closed many, many shared leads. But know this for certain, if you expect to work shared leads with a casual approach, you will not close many sales. Notice, I didn’t say “any” sales. As a good friend of mine says, “Even a blind hog finds an acorn in the forest once in a while!”

Here is the way that shared leads work. Lets say that there are 3 agents subscribing to get a lead in your zip code or state. The second that lead is generated, it is emailed to all 3 agents. If one of those 3 agents is at the coffee shop reading the paper, and another of those agents is golfing, too bad for them. If you missed a lead, read my post, “Three Little Secrets the Lead Companies Don’t Want you to Know.”

The fact is, if you want to be successful with internet leads, you really need to be by the phone during the hours the leads are coming in. The best thing to do is to dial the phone the very second the lead comes into your box. In many cases, if you wait 5 seconds, you will be too late.

2. Don’t Give Up Too Quickly

In fact, never give up. We have closed many sales by calling the lead a few days after the lead comes in. Remember this, people are busy. They are running out the door, or getting ready for company, or whatever. Sometimes, people are simply frustrated that they get what seems to them “so many calls” (even if it may only be a few), they won’t answer their phone and they delete their emails (if they get them at all).

After a few days, most agents just give up and the dust settles. If you call them back, you might just find that you are the one they talk to and you are the one who gets the sale.

I have one word of caution about internet-generated Medicare Supplement leads.

There are a few lead companies that generate leads using a process called “incentive’s.”

At one point or another, I am sure you have landed on one of those sites where you are promised some product or service and all you have to do is complete 3 free trial offers. Sometimes, one of those offers might include getting a free quote for health insurance (in our case, a free quote for Medicare Supplement insurance).

If you have done this, then you know that you really aren’t interested in those other offers, you just want to get the prize that drew you in initially.

The point is, these leads suck air. In our opinion, incentivized leads are of the lowest quality and not worth our time.

So why would companies generate these types of leads? Greed. Pure and simple greed.

What companies sell these kinds of leads? I’m not going to name names, but I will tell you that some of the biggest, well-known, industry leaders generate some of their leads using this method.

What we have found is that the smaller lead generation companies don’t generate leads in this way. None of the companies that we recommend use this method. But do keep this in mind, even big lead companies buy leads from the biggest lead companies, so every now and then, a few of these garbage leads filter through.

So what. It does happen, but we don’t whine about it. This game is a game of numbers. When we get a bad lead, we use one word and one word only. NEXT!

So there you have it. By following the example I have outlined here, you are armed and dangerous. You are ready to buy leads and jump in. Don’t be afraid, the water is great!

It is no secret that finding quality leads to build your business has changed drastically over the past few years. Methods that used to work, such as:

• Cold Calling
• Post Cards
• Appointment Services
• Auto Dialers
• Yellow Pages

All of these methods are outdated and almost completely ineffective.

Nearly everyone (including almost every Baby Boomer) looking for help with their Medicare Supplements is now going to the internet. But for you as an agent, this presents two problems:

1) Generating your own leads on the internet is nearly impossible

The competition on the internet today is fierce. Natural search results are nearly impossible to attain and pay per click advertising will set you back $6 per click or more if you don’t know what you are doing.

2) Buying Medicare Supplement leads is also very competitive

Most internet-generated leads are sold to 3 or more agents. The good news is that most agents are lazy. If you follow what we teach you on this site, you can buy these leads for a fair price and close 30% for a tremendous return on your investment.

The key is, you really do need to follow a system. If you are not willing to follow the system we recommend, you are probably throwing your money in the trash, and you might want to consider doing something else.

Click the banner below to get high quality, screened leads now…

Over the years, we have tried one insurance lead program after the other. What we have found is that there is one factor that is more important than nearly any other factor in getting the best quality leads and that is the technology behind the program.

Lead generation companies use different platforms to both capture and scrub their leads. Some people say that “a lead, is a lead, is a lead.” In one respect, that is true, but it isn’t the whole truth.

Consider the following two scenarios:

1) A life insurance prospect lands on a page and he is told that if he completes three offers, he will get a new ipad. One of the offers is a free life insurance quote. He is not really interested in a life insurance quote, but he is willing to endure the hassle because he really wants that free ipad.

2) A man turns 40 and begins to think about updating his life insurance. He goes online to find competitive quotes and he states that he wants help from an agent.

Which of these leads is a better lead? Obviously, number two is a much better lead. Some lead companies use advanced technology to make sure that you never get a lead from scenario #1. Many lead companies do not have this capability.

One of the best lead programs we have found is from Insurance Agents. We have found their insurance lead program to be of the highest quality and most importantly, they never, every sell you incentivized leads (where someone is just filling out a form to get a freebie). In other words, you will always get leads from people who are actually looking for help with their insurance.

The other thing we like about this program is that there are no commitments. We actually wouldn’t care if we had to make a commitment because we just like the quality of their leads. We do understand however that many agents have been burned a lot of times and you may just want to test waters before you jump in. Click on the banner below and check them out. I think you will be as happy as we have been with them.