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Your Agency Path & Plan

 

Don’t be the last to know! Now all that stuff Kevin and Lucas have been bugging you to do is in one easy to use location! You can now get the highest local search ranking by just completing a series of steps and set up your mobile site. 
First go to your website and log in. 
Second go to the “Tool” drop down located at the top right of your website edit bar. 
Third scroll down and select “Agency Path & Plan”
Start at the top and do some of the easy stuff like name, address, and phone. As you tackle each task a handy completion bar lets you know how much more you have to complete. Now you can setup your Google Places and Launch your Mobile Site all in one place! 
That is what I said LAUNCH your NEW MOBILE SITE! Everything is on your phone nowadays so why not your website! Get started with this handy new tool and then next time Kevin asked how many people in the room have completed their SEO for Local Search and have Implemented their Mobile Launch you can Proudly raise your hand. 
As always if you are swamped with work and can’t even start to think about doing this simple and effective new tool from Agency RevolutionI can do it for you. Just shoot me an email or call. I am here to make your Agency Revolution/ Fire Fly software work for you. 
Let me know if you have Launched your Mobile Site for a Shout out Facebook! 

Pinterest + Insruance = Leads

Think Pinterest and insurance don’t go together? Think again! 
For those of you who do not know about Pinterest it is an image driving social networking site. All of the images are links. The idea is that if you like an image or want to remember the idea/site you pin it to your digital cork board. Others can follow your pins and share with their friends through their digital cork board and a network of sharing is created. Pinterest is mostly used by women some of its most popular pins tend to be recipes, fashion, and arts and crafts. So how can you use this site to promote your insurance agency? Try running a Pinterest Campaign
  1.  Car insurance example: British insurance company runs a Pinterest campaign highlighting the danger of driving in ridiculously high heels. http://pinterest.com/confuseddotcom/driving-in-heels-competition/ The idea is if you want to win a pair of free butterfly twists high heels from confused.com then you post a picture of the highest pair of high heels you have worn while driving. Now to do this you do have to give some information to the insurance agent so they are collecting prospects. 
  2. Car insurance. Every person who gives your company basic information and uploads a picture of their car gets $10 free gas card. 
  3.  Home insurance. Every person who gives your company basic info (name, email, zip code) uploads a picture of a dream remodel for one room in the home. And one winner gets $500 towards home improvements.  
  4.  B2B insurance. Every company that gives you basic info (name, email, and phone) and uploads a picture of their store front is entered to win a lunch for the entire staff on you.
I think you get the idea. Remember you want to collect info you can use but also have a visual eye catching images that will be shared and liked by everyone that sees it. Other ideas are just posting beautiful pictures related to your insurance niche and have it link back to a landing page featuring that image and of course a form to fill out, to collect more information. 
Think outside the box. What are some of your ideas on how to mix visual based Pinterest and insurance?

Taking Action! The Insurance Agent Speaks

The Insurance Agent speaks; “After attending one of Michael Jans Conferences I always feel a surge of inspiration. I have the best intentions to do everything I have taken notes on.  I always come away with some great ideas too. Then I get back to the office and I realize I am way behind. So the note pad and book of great ideas is set aside as I put out the office fires. I don’t pick them up again until the next conference.” 
If this sounds like you then you are not alone. No one said taking action is easy. Some things have to be done to keep your business working and keep your customers happy. You do not always have time to spend marketing your business. If you know the story told above all too well, you might want to try hiring a freelance insurance marketing professional. 
A freelance insurance marketing professional can take your book of great ideas and make them a reality. Hiring freelancers also has some financial benefits. You are not taking the time to hire a new employee; you’re not paying any additional money for health insurance or employee benefits. Just think of all the potential commission that could be brought into your agency if you took action on half of your marketing ideas.  
If you are interested in turning that marketing to-do list in to leads please contact Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions at 401-400-2467. They will do the job for you and start turning good ideas in to commission sales.

8 Modifications To Know About The NEW Smart Form Builder 2.0

Many of you got the email about the new Form Builder 2.0 in your inbox this week. I don’t know about you, but as soon as I got word of the update I logged in to my account and started playing around. I think this new Form Builder 2.0 has some great new features and maybe some downfalls. If you have not checked it out here is a video curtsy of Send pepper on the ins and outs of the new Form Builder 2.0. 
I started by spending a good hour just playing with all the new tools. So let me share with you my personal review of the new Smart Form Builder 2.0.
  1.  Visually this is a much easier way to build Smart Forms. I can see the form while I build and add to it or take away from it as I see fit.
  2.  It is now easier to add existing fields and to create new fields on the spot.
  3. For a quick Smart Form with no hassle using the pre-made Templates is a must. They look great the one problem is there are only 7 templates to choose from. Yes, you can change the colors and backgrounds, but I still wish there was more variety.The other option is to build one from scratch.
  4. Customizable to the extreme! The forms now can be customized down to the pixel spacing, box size and shape, font, field style (selected and unselected), input text, background, border size and color. The list goes on and on. Is it a good thing? Yes. On the bad side there are almost too many choices and I could see 90% of users not utilizing these tools.
  5. Conditions are a new feature, similar to rules in campaigns, if this than that statements. I could see this being great for anyone who wants to direct specific traffic to a part of their website or to a specific thank you landing page. I think this new feature will become an indispensable tool.   
  6. The new Preview button is a great way to see the finished product before adding it to the web or landing page. I used this a lot when I spent time playing with the new setup.
  7. Send Pepper has also added a new Publishing Form feature with options like, I will install my form, Send to my Webmaster, and Have OfficeAutoPilot Host my Form. 
  8. Settings Tab is now the place where you assign tags and sequences. This is also where you change opt-in settings and thank you pages.
Over all I think this new format will be easier to use. It is more user friendly, but might have too many nit-picky options. The old builder is gone for good so better get used to this one. If you need help with the new Smart Form Builder 2.0 do not be afraid to email or call me at 401-400-2467 with questions. Or if you don’t want to bother with it at all I can just build it for you.  

How Much Revenue Are You Losing By neglecting Your AR or Firefly System?

I have a lot of my leads take one look at my prices and frown. They look at the price and fail to see how it fits into the big picture. Today I want to do a little math to put investing in your investment in perspective.
You have already made the smart decision to buy Firefly (FF) or Agency Revolution (AR) from Michael Jans. Your website is looking great and you are starting to get web leads. This is all good, but the real strength in this system is not the pretty website but the unattractive back end. Yeah you know where I am talking about the AR or FF Engine where campaigns, tasks, rules, and landing pages can make or break you. This part of FF and AR takes more time to really see the benefits. I feel that if the time is spent on this part of your FF or AR you will see your business flourish. But if you don’t believe me talk to the multiple agents who have embraced the back end and have reaped the profits.  
Enough about why you should use your FF or AR to its full potential let’s get down to why it financially makes sense. 
Firefly costs- $6,000.00
Agency Revolution cost- $80,000-$100,000
So why would you want to spend more money on Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions services to use the back end of your already expensive system?

Let’s do a case study:

How much additional commission will you make if you run one X/Sell campaign in your back end of your AR or FF? 
                       
The average agency has between 1.5-1.65 PIF (policies in force) per customer. For this case study we say an agency with 1500 personal lines clients approximately 35% of them are mono line customers.  Making the math simple we’ll say that for every mono line policy you are missing out on getting an additional $100 in commission per customer.  Let’s say you get a 5% response from the X/Sell campaign . 
             525 mono line policies
            *5% percentage of customers the X/Sell campaign will convert from 1 policy to 2
             26   people purchased the second policy
           
                  26 people purchased the second policy
            *$100 additional income per policy
            $2,600 dollars made from running one X/Sell campaign
Now let’s look at how much it will cost to have Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions to set up an X/Sell campaign for you. For Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions to set up 5 marketing campaigns for you it cost $2,330 dollars. So how many policies would you have to sell to make your money back?
           
            $2,330 Cost of Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions
              /      5 Campaigns (the number of campaigns offered in the first package)
               $466 dollars for the cost of setting up and implementing one campaign
              $466 dollars for the cost of setting up and implementing one campaign
            / $100 dollars you gain from selling one additional policy
               4.66 policies’ to sell per campaign to get your ROI
 Now for those of you I lost in the second math section let me make this clear. For Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions to set up, write the copy, and implement one campaign it will cost you $466 dollars. For you to get your ROI on this investment you will have to sell 5 additional policies. Now it’s not looking like a bad deal. Especially if you see the $2,600 additional revenue you could have made from implementing one campaign.

Summary

Q: How much additional commission will you make if you run one X/Sell campaign in your back end of your AR or FF?
A: $2,600 dollars.
Q: So how many policies would you have to sell to make your ROI on purchasing Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions services?
A: 5 policies per campaign ran.
Q: So why would you want to spend more money on Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions services to use the back end of you already expensive system? 
A: Because you are essentially losing the opportunity to make more money. By not investing in a tool you have already put a lot of money in. By not using it you are losing potential earnings.
So What are the benefits of hiring Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions?
●      Implement campaigns quickly and efficiently.
●      None of your time or staffs time is wasted on learning a new system.
●      Faster ROI.
●      Maximizing utilization of your AR and FF system.
Isn’t math fun!

Gadgets and Wingding’s

I have just started using this great gadget on my Google home page. Anyone with a SendPepper web site needs to get this gadget! You will love it. 
As you can see in this screen shot it gives you the name of the person who visited your site, the amount of times they visited your site, the amount of pages and the times spent on your site. You can select the name and get information like company, email, office phone, cell phone, home phone and visit details. You can also click on the pages to view which pages where visited by that person to get a good idea of what they were looking for on your site. 
Now that you are excited and want to get this gadget ASAP Go Here to get you own SendPepper Gadget on you Google home page. 
Another Gadget to go for is a Google Analytic gadget. Some other gadgets I have on my iGoogle are NPR, Google Calendar, Weather and News gadgets that give me a overall snap shot for the each day. 
What Google Gadgets do you have on your iGoogle Page?

Laughing At Yourself

I have recently become the one woman jack of all trades. At one point I found myself with four part time jobs and none of them paying me all that much. I will say one job I am working on to make my career and it is growing. Another is purely because I love it. The last two jobs I am just doing to put some extra cash in my pocket. I digress. 
One of my part time jobs was selling vacuums door to door. I am not too bad at this and people like me enough to let me into their homes where I vacuum and shampoo one room in their house. Then I sway them that my $2,500 vacuum is better than their $80 Hoover. This was easy to do by the way. You would be surprised at the dirt I would get out of peoples seemingly clean carpets.
When I was just getting tired of this knocking and cleaning to go on I proceeded to one of my last appointments. He was a nice guy and was interested in purchasing the vacuum. After doing half of my pitch I started to vacuum his floor in preparation for the shampooing. I was just about done when the make shift bag I made to hold and show all of the dirt collected exploded in to the air (it had gotten too full, oops). As I turned off the vacuum and watched the home owner brush off the dust from his once black shirt I started to laugh. He did not think it was as funny as I did. Let’s just say there was no sale that day. Don’t worry his living room was clean when I was done. 
Not only is this a great story for any sales person but it is a reminder that sometimes your dirt bag explodes and instead of freaking out its OK to laugh. At one point or another we all fall victim to the unforeseen mistakes in selling. Just remind yourself that you are only human and continue to knock on the next door. 
Do you have a selling blunder of your own? What is your story?  

The Paradox of Letting Go

In college I took a few leadership classes for my minor. One of the classes assigned this amazing book called the The Tao of Leadership by John Heider. I really enjoyed reading the book and looking at how I could apply the ideals to my own life. I remember reading this passage at a time when I needed it the most and as I pulled the book from my book shelf today I thought it was worth sharing. I hope you can learn from it as I did and put the principles in your pocket for use in the future. 
The Paradox of Letting Go
When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be. When I let go of what I have, I receive what I need.
These are feminine or Yin paradoxes:
  • By yielding, I endure.
  • The empty space is filled.
  • When I give of myself, I become more.
  • When I feel most destroyed, I am about to grow.
  • When I desire nothing, a great deal comes to me.
Have you ever struggled to get work or love and finally given up and found both love and work were suddenly there?
Do you want to be free and independent? Conform to God’s law; that is how everything happens anyway.
When I give up trying to impress the group, I become very impressive. But when I am just trying to make myself look good, the group knows that and does not like it.
My best work is done when I forget my own point of view; the less I make of myself, the more I am.
When I yield to the wishes of the person working, I encounter no resistance.
This is the wisdom of the feminine: let go in order to achieve. The wise leader demonstrates this.
~ The Tao of Leadership by John Heider
My personal point of letting go was when I was in my final trimester of college. I would have to move out of my apartment in 2 months, and would be without a place to live, without a job, and no real direction. I was frantically applying to entry level positions all over the US trying to get the dream marketing job. I was having professionals look over my resume and taking interview classes. Finally after receiving dozens of no thank you letters I decided to move home and just work for whatever job would take me. That’s when the job of a life time came up. Now all I can do is push forward and work hard but remember to keep things in balance and try not to use too much force. It is funny how things just tend to work out.
Have you had an experience when you let go of a want and it almost materialized over night? 
How could you use this idea or form of leadership in your business or everyday life?

Is Your Business Social?

Everyone is trying to get their business into social media. Engaging your customers in the cyber world can be difficult.  In recent years a new job has been created just to tackle the massive giant that is Social Media: the Community Manager. 
For some businesses the Community Manager is a full time job. For others, it can be a task handled by an employee, or even you. Now if you are the community manager it may be time to ask yourself do I really have the time for this? 
I have a lot of people ask me about social media and how they can manage it. What tends to happen is they get a Facebook account and set it up with pictures and links to their website and then they never look at it again. This is not going to get people on to your business Facebook. You have to be using it constantly and directing your content to your customers. An example;
Save on your car insurance today!
Should be
 Our new deal with progressive insurance can save you up to $100 on your car insurance a year. 
Focus on meeting your reader’s needs, solving a problem for them, providing information, or maybe just entertaining them with a cute commercial while using a conversational language and avoiding insurance terminology. If you’re like a lot of business CEO’s you might be thinking I don’t have time for this stuff. Then you might be right!
 Now you do not have to go and hire someone to by your Community Manager. You probably have one right in your office. Ask yourself these questions to pin point your community manger in your current staff. 
  •  Who works with your customers and the general public on a daily basis?
  • Who answers the phone or emails?
  • Who handles complaints from customers?
  • To whom in your business do customers ask to speak? 

Now who is your Community Manager? Is it more than one person?

Great you have a few people who might be good at this Community Manager thing. The next thing to do is make sure your new Community Manager understands their roll in Social Media with your business. They should  
  •  Understand how social media works
  • Enjoy social media
  • Understand your business
  •  Know the kind of material that is appropriate for your business to share
Only thing in your way now is you! Trust your employees to manage your business in the social media world. You should check in to make sure things are going smoothly, but let go of having to do everything yourself. You Trust your employees to work with your customers on a daily basis so they must be doing something right. Let them take that contact into the social media world and start connecting with your customers in a new way. 
So who is your Community Manager?