Kevin Crosby started a career in insurance 36 years ago, back in the days when Allstate was owned by Sears. Prior, he was the manager of Wendy’s and wasn’t making much money. There was an Allstate agency next door to where he worked, and the guys who always saw him running around at the restaurant came to him one day and said if he worked just as hard selling insurance, he’d be a successful agent. Soon afterwards, Crosby brought his resume to their agency, and they gave him a job!
Almost immediately, Crosby began using insurance leads. “At first, I was working with Allstate Lead Advantage, lead vendors approved by Allstate,” he said. “It was inconsistent, so I switched to SmartFinancial.”
When he first began working with SmartFinancial, Crosby was buying live transfers for himself, another agent and a full-time customer service representative. “It was hard for us to juggle the calls at random,” Crosby said. “You don’t know exactly when a call is coming in.”
His account manager suggested that he try data leads, and after the switch, Crosby sold a few policies right away! “I’m happier now with the leads we get from SmartFinancial,” he says. “With data leads, you don't have to stop what you’re doing each time a call comes in, and there’s no chance of missing a call.”
When asked what he does to have such success with leads, Crosby says:“An early start is the best way to approach a lead, because you’ll have the best shot of closing the sale if you’re the first to call.” But that’s not where Crosby stops: If he can’t make contact he tries that prospect two more times that first day. If there’s still no contact, he tries three times the next day and twice the third day. “I then call once a week for a few weeks,” he says. “I then ex date that prospect for a quote close to their renewal date or when an accident falls off their record.”
Crosby notes that it’s important to build rapport in a short amount of time when speaking with a new prospec to relax them before going into selling mode. “We don’t sell on price,” he explains, “We sell on coverage. If a prospect calls asking us to beat $100 a month in premiums, we say let’s look at your coverage to see you’re properly covered first. We don’t want clients to have to pay for damages or a lawsuit out of pocket.”
Another wise thing that Crosby and his team do is that they always try to get the lead to bundle home and auto, to save them the most amount of money. “The filter on our SmartFinancial data leads is set for homeowners so we can bundle policies,” Crosby explains. “I sell auto, home, home and life insurance as well as financial services. The filters help bring in clients that need the whole circle of protection while saving for retirement.”
When asked how long it takes him to close a sale, Crosby says usually after seven or eight attempts. “Main obstacle is that people are tough to get in touch with, so we approach each lead with the mindset that if we don’t make the sale now, we’ll make it later.”
Most of the objections Crosby gets from leads is that they have no time to sit on the phone. “We explain that we understand they’re busy but that it will only take a few minutes. We then start shooting over questions based on the answers on the SmartFinancial form to give an accurate quote. If they are not open to talking just then, we ask if we can call back.”
4 Golden Insurance Sales Tips From Kevin Crosby
- In order to make a sale, you have to know your talk path during the first couple of minutes with data or live transfers. If you get past that, you have to know how to sell based on coverage, not price.
- Be organized. Use a lead management system to organize leads and ex date them based on the best opportunity to call back. Look to ex date that client when their accident falls off, not just when it’s time to renew.
- Don’t overbuy leads. Buy only what you can manage. Stick to a budget for what you can afford to buy.
- You need patience. You will not sell every lead. Selling less than 5% of the leads you buy is a good close ratio.
- Call a prospect every year. Unsuccessful leads will come around a second or third time for you to make a sale. Ask for permission to call back in a few months or next year. The more ex dates in your pipeline, the better off you’ll be.
