Have You Heard?
June 29th, 2007 by Megan Mahan
I dug through my feed reader this morning for something to tell you all, but this is the jist of today’s news:

Happy weekend, all!
June 29th, 2007 by Megan Mahan
I dug through my feed reader this morning for something to tell you all, but this is the jist of today’s news:

Happy weekend, all!
June 28th, 2007 by Jeb Foster
File this story under: ‘Doh!’
Word has it that a few years ago the COO of Verizon turned down an offer from Steve Jobs to partner on the iPhone.
Seth Godin thinks most of us in his position would have done the same, because the default answer in most organizations is no–particularly when it comes to taking risks that may change the status quo. The higher one climbs on the corporate ladder, the less likely one is to take risks.
Is Godin right?
Keep in mind this question is predicated on ignoring what you know now. Of course you’d jump on the iPhone bandwagon now. But would you have done it when the iPhone was just a collection of loose sketches?
The underlying question for you, blog reader, is this: Are you receptive to innovation? Is no your default answer?
June 27th, 2007 by Megan Mahan
Even if it’s not good news, it’s good news to know. That’s the jist of Google’s slogan for its infamous analytics application. I couldn’t agree more, especially when it comes to the quality and findability of your web site.
Yesterday I stumbled upon WebSiteGrader.com and with some trepidation, entered our main site URL (InsureMe.com), a handful of keywords related to our site (insurance quotes, health insurance, car insurance, etc.) the site URL of one of our competitors, and my email address.

Within seconds, I had a [free!] fairly meaty analysis of InsureMe.com, including:
June 26th, 2007 by Jeb Foster
Consumer Reports‘ web site has a cool feature wherein you can select a car make, model and year, and see video of its frontal offset crash- and side-impact crash tests.
With somewhat morbid curiosity, I watched footage of my own ride smashing into an offset barrier at 40 mph and getting t-boned by a SUV going 40 mph.
The good news was that the crash-test dummy fared rather well. My car got ‘good’ ratings (the highest) during both the frontal offset crash, which shows overall structural integrity, and the side impact crash, which shows how it fares when struck in the side by an SUV or pickup. (Thanks, Subaru, for making a safe car!)
Another takeaway: the Scion XB (that boxy mini-minivan) is the last car you’d want to be in during a side-impact crash.
June 25th, 2007 by Megan Mahan
The annual National Association of Health Underwriters (NAHU) is holding its annual conference here in Denver this week, and this morning Maribeth and I had the opportunity to chat with various conference attendees in the exhibit hall. (Yes, we’ve still got the infamous stress balls left–stop by tomorrow if you haven’t yet gotten one!)
While we keep up with industry happenings each day, it really doesn’t compare to getting out and talking with all of you guys and gals. It was specifically eye-opening for me to see the private health insurance industry react to Michael Moore’s upcoming movie, Sicko (which examines the problems with U.S. health care), as well as the government’s role in it.
In fact, NAHU President David Fear used his farewell address last night to sound off on Moore and the government’s role in health care, vehemently declaring that the government need not intervene to provide health insurance to all Americans.
June 22nd, 2007 by Megan Mahan

If you have a big outfit, you may have thought about doing a little outsourcing where your customer service is concerned. Which is funny when you consider that nearly all of us have had to jump through hoops when dealing with an outsourced call center. Yet, as much as we complain about it, companies keep outsourcing their customer service.
This week, my boyfriend’s cable box seemingly broke for no apparent reason. When he called the service number, it was evident that the outfit was somewhere overseas. On two separate occasions the service center couldn’t even pinpoint Boyfriend’s location.
Here’s the written [and comical] description I received of last night’s debacle:
June 21st, 2007 by Jeb Foster
Sick of cramping on long bike rides, I recently went online and ordered some electrolyte pills.
(My girlfriend helpfully pointed out that my cramping probably stemed more from lack of fitness than a lack of electrolytes. But I digress.)
I bought the pills from a Whitefish, Montana-based outfit called Hammer Nutrition. In short order they won my loyalty and inspired this blog post.
Here’s what they did:
June 20th, 2007 by Megan Mahan
Today Seth shared a great trade show tactic, which actually reminded me of the insane popularity of the InsureMe stress balls at AMS this past March.
I won’t bore you with a synopsis; read the full post here–and learn how to take over your next trade show.
[via]
[Previously]:
Lessons from AMS: How to Ensure Trade Show Success
June 19th, 2007 by Jeb Foster

Leaving an effective voicemail message isn’t hard, but there are a few important things to keep in mind. Here are a few tips that may increase your callback rate.
June 18th, 2007 by Megan Mahan
The Future of Online Advertising (FOOA) took place in New York City last week, and Markus over at AU Interactive recently shared his takeaways from the conference.
My favorite notation was one that I think applies to insurance agents using the web to reign in sales leads:
Ryan Carson [founder of Carson Systems, which put on FOOA] gave a great real world presentation on how he advertised the Future of Online Advertising conference and what worked (and didn’t work) for them across many different channels. Cross-promotion with other sites and bloggers worked far better than advertising on high-traffic advertising industry sites. This sort of solidified the point that leveraging personal relationships with people you know and cross-promotion are far better strategies than throwing money at mass advertising channels.
Leveraging personal relationships is something James and I will touch on at HIGH TECC next month, so be sure to tune in. In the meantime, catch Markus’ full FOOA recap here.