Click on the Dotted Line!

Click on the Dotted Line!

So tell me if this has ever happened to you in your office: you get a telephone call from a prospect, or perhaps it was an email lead that you obtained via your “Get an auto or homeowners quote” button on your agency website or Facebook fan page, and immediately either you and/or a member of your agency staff spring into action!

You begin the usual ritual of fact finding, the conducting of a complete financial and asset protection needs analysis, complete discussion of coverage and insurance carriers available, pricing of coverage, and most importantly, what is appropriate for this particular and unique situation.

Once this phase of the conversation has been completed, and you come to an agreement on what is the proper amount of coverage and at what price, your prospect then proclaims to you the words that you so love to hear, “Yes, that is precisely what my family and I need, so what is the next step?”

Armed with the knowledge that their current policy doesn’t expire until ten days from now, you ask your prospect to come into your office at their convenience to sign the application and make a deposit payment. Well, unfortunately the insured is at work every day, which is not in proximity to your office, so that won’t work. Maybe their spouse is available to process the necessary paperwork? Nope, that’s not an option either, as they also work in a town that is not close to your office, and immediately after work every day they have to pick up the kids when they get off the school bus and take one to dance class and the other to karate lessons. No worries, you tell your prospect that you will mail them the application, they can sign it at their leisure, and mail it back to you with a check. After all, you do have ten days to work with, so you and your prospect agree that this is the way you will secure the coverage for them.

So that afternoon you prepare the ACORD forms that are appropriate for the coverage requested, attach the little yellow “sign here” sticky notes, write a nice cover letter with explicit instructions on precisely what is expected of them, ask them to enclose a check made payable to the carrier, enclose a self-addressed stamped envelope, and you drop it into the outgoing mail.

Well, assuming that your agency conducts business similar to most agencies around the country, your business (whether it was you, another producer, or a CSR) spent 20 minutes completing the necessary ACORD applications for the auto, home, and umbrella policy, another five minutes typing up and printing the cover letter, a minute or so more to self-address and stamp the return envelope, another five minutes assembling the package to be delivered, a minute or so to weigh it and affix the correct amount of postage, and then drop it in outgoing mail. Not to mention the “water cooler” time that was spent when whomever facilitated all of the above walked over to the postage machine, and stopped to chat with co-workers along the way. In dollars and cents, how much did that time just cost your business? Oh, and let’s not forget the time that was spent on the phone speaking with the prospect to even get to the point where you were able to do the manual leg work to get the application out. Add in the cost of obtaining the lead, however you received it, and what has this cost you so far? Fifty dollars? A hundred? Maybe more?…and you haven’t even made the sale yet!

Back to our story: so after three days, you call your prospect to follow up to see why you have not yet received the check and signed application, and they don’t return your calls, or emails, or texts. You continue to try and reach them, and finally after two more days pass and many more calls, you get an email back stating that on the same day that you originally spoke with them, your prospect decided to contact one more agency that was located even further from him than you are. But there was one difference:

While speaking with the other agency (who represents the exact same carriers as your business), the prospect was told that while he remained on the phone this agency would have him set up immediately! How was it done and all while the prospect remained on the telephone? Easy! …and here’s how: the agency went into his real time comparative rating system, and generated the ACORD forms necessary for the package policy. From there, using an electronic signature program that was inherent to the system, he packaged up the applications, along with a cover letter, and directly from the system he emailed it out to the insured. Immediately, the management system portion of the program notated an activity, and time and date stamped it for errors and omissions protection.

Still while conversing on the telephone, the insured received the email and opened the attachment. He reviewed the application on his computer screen (he could have also used his mobile tablet or smart phone), “clicked” on the electronic signature portion of the attachment, and instantly the now “signed” application was returned directly back to the agent…again while they are still on the telephone!

The management system portion of the agency system received the signed application, again documenting that it has been received (time and date stamped) and deposits the application in a folder in the client’s file on the management system.

Your competitor now has in his possession a signed application and simply asks the insured for his checking account routing number and account number, or debit/credit card number. He electronically passes the application up to the underwriter of the carrier from his management system, and binds the policy from his rating system. The whole process took a fraction of the time, effort, and cost of doing business the “old fashioned” way. Reminds me of the Honeymooners episode where Ralph and Ed use a “new implement” versus an old apple coring utensil…also good for spear fishing!

Sounds incredible? Well, it is. If your real time rating system and management system do not provide these types of tools for conducting business in the most effective and efficient manner, please give me a call and I will let you know where you can find a system that does.

So the holidays have come and gone once again, and it is my hope and prayer that all of you have had a safe, healthy and blessed year with your families and friends. Although some of us may have lost a loved one, I say that we are so much more fortunate to have the memories and tears from someone who touched our lives in such a loving way, than to not have had them in our lives at all. As they say, “It is better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all.”

Happy New Year…and Ciao for now!