Do you remember…..when we actually got the true news of the day between 7:00 and 7:30 PM? When TV on a phone was a fairy tale? When cell phones came in a battery pack case with a phone larger than our heads? When a PC had all of its storage space residing solely on external floppy discs?
Do you remember George Jetson and his flying car? OK, we haven’t gotten there yet but I’m sure you get the point. Besides, driving around in New Jersey, I’m scared of that one. Drivers are bad enough on the ground, couldn’t imagine flying cars out there.
It’s all about Technology. Technology has certainly changed our lives and will continue to do so for years to come. We are bombarded with information daily. We used to get our news once a day, now it comes in as it happens on our Smartphones. Every aspect of our lives has changed. In fact, every business, including our own has undergone a tech change.
When I first started in the business, we sat with clients and quoted life insurance premiums, guaranteed cash values, projected cash values, term rates, etc. with a special tool called a RATEBOOK. Yes, a RATEBOOK. NO sales illustrations. If you had a yellow pad, you were on your way. We also had to make sure we kept an ample supply of applications in the trunks of our cars so we could take an app at any time. We would then go back to our offices, make photocopies, submit the app and store everything in file cabinets that took up an entire storage room.
Through technology, that entire process has changed. Even the actual sale is different today. Here’s a real life sale that took place several months ago. An advisor that I deal with was on the golf course and starts a conversation (as only an insurance agent can do), and proceeds to tell what he does for a living. The client he is talking to tells him that he was just looking into buying $5,000,000 of term life insurance. The advisor asked him some questions (age, health, etc.), takes out his iPhone, utilizes the quote engine on our ASG Mobile App, comes up with the premium within seconds and winds up selling a policy on the golf course. After finishing their round, they had lunch at the clubhouse. The advisor downloads the application for the carrier they selected, our HIPPAA form, has it printed out at the golf club and has a signed app, an exam order and a new client all by utilizing the technology to his advantage.
That’s a lot different than how it used to be done. It’s possible that the conversation could have led to a future meeting between the two and resulted in an “old- fashioned” sale but the client was HOT to buy and got it done that day, on the spot! That’s a great story but a testament to how things have changed through technology. As we point out, our mobile app is truly “A Virtual Office in the Palm of Your Hand.” This just proves it.
There are so many other ways to improve your practice using technology. Social Media such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are great ways to reach and stay connected to your current clients. By utilizing this media, you can increase your touches by informing your clients of important information that affects them. You may not have been able to do that by individual one-on-one contact since there is only so much time in a day. In the world we live in, the culture has changed to an “I need it now” mentality. Social Media affords you the ability to get information to your client “NOW.”
There are great apps/programs that will even allow you to send documents such as applications, service forms and delivery requirements that they can sign on their Tablets and iPads and instantly send back to you. That’s efficiency at its finest. Not to mention the countless savings on overnight packages associated with obtaining signatures the old-fashioned way. There is also an intuitive underwriting tool that allows you to accurately quote impairments within minutes. This can surely differentiate you from your competition by allowing you to pinpoint ratings and more efficiently manage your client’s expectations.
The average person will check their Smartphone 150 TIMES A DAY (That’s one look every 9.6 Minutes or 6 times an hour). Whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Alert Messages, e-Mails, Blog Posts, Articles, etc., these are the things that people are looking at during those 150 looks. Why would you want to miss out on using this technology?
Through technology, we have gone paperless. All of client data is stored electronically either on local drives or somewhere in the cloud, where we can access the information virtually anywhere. Information is available for any of our clients as fast as we can type their names on a keyboard. This is so much more cost effective and lowers our overhead, which increases profitability.
1. Why change anything? I have always been successful doing what I have been doing?
2. My sales & marketing methods work just fine.
3. This stuff is too complicated to learn.
As you’re reading this, one of the three “excuses” may have popped into your head. The fact is that there is proof in numbers. You don’t have to accept it , but you will feel the negative effects of it if you ignore it.
Technology has changed everything around us. The Life Insurance business included. In a recent meeting I attended, there was a speaker talking about technology. He used a phrase called “Humology,” which he explained as the joining of humans with technology. If you don’t embrace it, you will not survive long in the business world. The Life Insurance Industry is no exception. It has definitely improved the way we conduct business and can be responsible for more sales down the road. The trick is to fully embrace it. If the average person looks at their Smartphone 150/day, wouldn’t we want that look to be meaningful and get OUR message across. We have their attention, let’s make it pay off.