Listening and Learning over Lunch
March 10th, 2009 by Jeb Foster
We recently invited three local insurance agents to the office for lunch. We wanted to get their thoughts on our service, the lead industry in general and whatever else they felt like discussing.
While we’ve been discouraged by some of our agents’ antics, these three agents, it was clear, were of the highest caliber, and the discussion was worth ten-times the amount we spent on sandwiches from Udi’s deli. (Next time we’ll be sure to splurge on Maggiano’s.)
One of the attendees, a health agent named Jerry, inspired us with his approach to working leads. He said he treats every lead as an asset—even the ones that don’t convert. If you treat the ones you don’t sell with gratitude and understanding, he said, you’ll have earned their respect, and that in itself can generate a referral, turning a “worthless” lead into a lead generator.
In a sense, Jerry acknowledges that every lead is a potential advocate. Treat them as such, and you’ll soon have a legion of advocates doing your marketing for you. Makes sense to me.
Throughout the hour-long meeting we received welcome praise and equally welcome criticism. On the praise side, the agents agreed that we offered great lead volume and quality, excellent service, and useful tools (notably, the Agent Connection lead management application). On the criticism side, they said it’s tough to sell a lead that’s matched to more than four agents, and all three agreed that our filters are awesome but too expensive.
After the lunch was over, it was agreed that we ought to host such ‘lunch and learns’ regularly. Although we talk to our agents on the phone every day and survey them on a regular basis, there’s just no substitute for face-to-face interaction.
