For most independent insurance agencies, superior customer service is their bread and butter. Beyond serving your local community and providing a quality service to those in need, good customer service is also tied to better business. One survey recently found over 80% of respondents would pay more for a better customer service experience. There is value in bettering your customers’ experience, and you already have the means in your agency workflows.
These five steps can help you gain insight into customer needs and put them into practice.
Step 1: Identify Interaction Points
Take a look at the where you interact with customers: online, over the phone, in person – all of these are opportunities to gain information on what your customers want and care about. Once you know what matters to them, you can start putting them into practice in these existing interactions.
Once you know where you’re interacting with customers, come up with a method to document each encounter. The more in-depth info you collect, the better. Management system mobile apps come in handy here as they allow agents to immediately document meetings and their details. Email and texting integration are also beneficial as each instantly captures an entire exchange and syncs to the customer’s record.
Step 3: Determine Where Interaction Documentation Lives
Once you have a way to record information on customer interactions, you need to have a place to put that information. Too often, agents and CSRs are keeping customer interaction data in siloed spaces. You need to find a spot to bring it all together. Ideally, your agency management system is built to address the needs of your service and sales teams.
Step 4: Establish Process to Follow Up on Interactions
Tracking customer interactions is only a piece of what you’re trying to accomplish. To truly improve these interactions, you need to follow up on conversations. In most cases, follow up comes from a CSR providing service to conclude a suspense, but not all conversations have such defined follow-up needs. Some interactions need a simple check-in to see how things are going and to get a feel of whether a customer was satisfied with the service they received. This can be via automated or manual methods or a combination of both.
Step 5: Ensure You Have the Right Tools to Get the Job Done
For any customer interaction to happen, you need to provide ways for customers to connect with your agency. The essential customer connection tools are 1) an easy to use and understand website, 2) customer-facing mobile app, and 3) branded client portal. Each of these tools face out to the customer and give them an opportunity to connect with you.
We’ve brought all three together in our latest Partner Platform addition, Partner Connect. Partner Connect is a multi-faced customer experience for users to enhance customer communication with agency-branded tools. With multiple offer levels to fit your agency, Partner Connect provides all the tools you need at the right price.
Find out more about Partner Connect and the Partner Platform agency management system – contact us at [email protected] or 800.747.7005, Option 6.
We’re on to part three of our look at insurance agency marketing to the generations with an analysis of the oft-stereotyped Baby Boomers. Born between the mid-1940s and mid-1960s, Boomers number an estimated 75.4 million in the U.S. Many are looking forward to retirement and have big plans for an active future.
A recent study showed over 65 percent of Baby Boomers went for one-on-one meetings when seeking insurance. Boomer’s preference for personal interaction doesn’t stop there: the same study showed Boomers preferred any “live communication” during the purchasing process. Live communication includes over the phone and online chat – any method that gets them in touch with a real person in real-time.
Treat Them Well
It’s critical to provide great service to all customers regardless of age, but it’s especially important to Baby Boomers. They are the most likely to write off a company due to bad service. And, they’re loyal to good service. One study showed 54 percent were “very or somewhat likely” to stick with a business if their patronage was valued. Only 33 percent of Millennials agreed.
Half of those 60 to 69 and almost 75 percent of people in the 50 to 59 age range own a smartphone. Yet, Boomers still face a persistent stereotype that they’re not tech savvy. Don’t be fooled. Boomers also own 1/3rd of all tablets purchased in the U.S. Suffice to say Boomers expect websites to be mobile accessible.
Contrary to most marketing trends, Baby Boomers are reading what you write. They’re more likely to look at print and read whole articles than Millennials or Generation Z, so give them something to take in. When it comes to writing, Boomers look for straight talk and facts. They’ve been marketed to for years, growing up during the advertising boom, and are almost immune to gimmicky and salesy language. Be clear and honest, and avoid spelling and grammar mistakes as many Boomers take note of these small errors.
Avoid the Age Gap
Don’t call Boomers “old.” Just don’t.
Marketing to the Generations
If you’ve read the other posts in our series, you’ll know each generation is different and responds better to sometimes contrasting marketing methods. Such duplicity means you need varied marketing tactics, segmented to target each group individually.
The Partner Platform Marketing Automation Manager (MAM) is designed to tackle just this issue. With over 50 sample campaigns and 100 pre-built customizable outreach templates, Partner Platform’s MAM makes it easier to craft and send your agency messaging to a variety of audiences.
Every minute counts when it comes to your agency operations. There’s no time to waste in an industry with such tight margins. The difference between gaining and losing a customer can come down to which agency reached out first, so quick action is valued. But, speed isn’t the only factor – quality counts, too. How can you speed up your agency operations without sacrificing your personalized service?
When you think of “this generation” what comes to mind? Smartphones? Social media? Start-ups and freelancing?
What about insurance agency marketing?
If you’re not thinking about how to market to “this generation” – Generation Z – it’s time to start. These more than 72 million people born between 1995 and 2010 are coming of age soon, making them an important group to put on your agency’s marketing radar.
Managing Technology Costs for Your Independent Insurance Agency Demos Guides Blog Carriers FAQs Events From mobile websites to efficient document signature software, technological advances can help an agency grow in leaps and bounds. But, just because something is new...
You know data is valuable. It’s what we use daily to make decisions, and it’s what we use to measure our successes. But are you using data effectively in your agency?
A wealth of insurance tech is available to capture and manage data, and the coronavirus pandemic accelerated data use in the insurance industry. According to a survey from Insurity, over 80% of agencies plan to “invest more heavily in data and analytics” following the 2020 pandemic outbreak. And with good reason – Willis Towers Watson found that over 66% of agencies say data analytics helped them reduce expenses, and 60% say it helped increase sales.
There are many ways to improve your insurance agency management, but one of the most impactful is hiring the right people. When you have the right people for the right job, you start from an optimal point.
But how do you know who to hire? We’ve got your answers in our latest eGuide, Who You Hire Matters: The How and Why of Hiring Great Producers and Leaders.
“We all need somebody to lean on,” as Bill Withers said in his famous song Lean on Me. Yet, it can be challenging to know when and how to ask for help. Working in an independent agency, you likely need more help than you know. With a small team, everyone is usually tackling more than one job at a time, making it easy for something to fall through the cracks.
Though you may intend to put effort and thought into something, invariably other time-sensative matters comes up. For many agencies, that something is insurance agency marketing. Whether it’s a customer request, an uptick in claims, or another important measure, marketing gets put on the back burner again.
So how do you know when it’s been too long since you paid attention to your insurance marketing? There are a few signs that it’s time to get help.
