Sales or Marketing...Make a Decision

Sales and Marketing are equally important in driving revenue. In the insurance space, most agents are both the salesperson and the marketer; especially when they are just starting out or run as a boutique agency. The most successful insurance agents I’ve met are the ones who made the decision that they were either focused on sales or marketing, not both. 

In most cases, the broker is the one getting out in front of the decision maker of the group establishing rapport, asking pointed questions and developing a fruitful relationship. In order to be excellent at this, they must devote all their time honing this skill and repeating it every day. Unfortunately, a lot of brokers split their time trying to brand themselves and sell at the same time. It’s almost impossible to dominate any space this way.  

Let’s look at the difference between Sales and Marketing:

Sales is about asking questions: gather data and make recommendations.

Marketing is about telling a story: "My name is Tommy and I am a benefits advisor. I recently worked with an agency that was spending upwards of $5,000.00 per month with a full-service marketing company. As good as the company was, they specialized B2C and didn’t have the experience needed to navigate the complex health insurance space correctly. Our copywriters, designers and strategist were able to optimize their website performance, provide competitor analysis, branding, design and on-going consulting with tailor-made solutions…” 

Sales is about numbers, logic and analysis: “In SaaS, the rule of 72 is used like this: assuming no churn and one new customer per month (added on average mid-month) produces 72 months of revenue in a year. So, if your monthly ARPU is $100 and a rep adds 10 accounts a month, each rep produces $72,000 of revenue in a year."

Marketing is about creation: “Today I had a meeting with an advisor and his response to me asking him for leads was amazing. He said, “I’m not here to feed you for a day, I’m here to teach you how to feed yourself as much as you desire.” He then showed me how simple it was to get creative on LinkedIn Sales Navigator and generate my own leads. It was a pretty cool experience! With marketing, you get to experience something creative worth remembering. Both sales and marketing work, but you don’t experience a story with logic and numbers.

Sales always moves linear: It’s important to make sales today, this week, this month, this quarter and a salesman is busy thinking and moving this way.

Marketing expands and ascends: Someone with a marketing mindset is thinking about how they are going grow 18 months to 24 months from now and what that will look like.

Leads: Sales is all about converting leads. The salesperson goes where the lead takes them and hopes to get a referral after the sale. Marketing is all about generating constant leads through creative marketing campaigns. The leads are coming to them instead of the opposite. Think of the strength of a rope. Is it stronger when you push or pull on it?

The Salesperson: all about selling themselves. “Hi, I’m Tommy and I’ve been in the business forever, everyone loves me, I’m always winning the Round Table and I’m going to treat you like royalty.”

Marketing: All about the story behind the product. “One Size Does Not Fit All – We Customize. You operate in a unique space and see success with specific carrier partnerships, product, and services. LISI will address your needs and build a marketing recommendations list that's tailored to your business goals and targets your audience. Achieve more with LISI marketing services.”

So, who is your ideal customer? Are you focused on being an attraction to your ideal customer, or are you trying to appeal to everybody?

In the insurance space successful agencies specialize in certain lines of coverage, specific industries, company size (2-500 employees), etc. What ever decision they make, they stick to it and compete to be the best in that space.

Jeff Grocky, Marketing Director at LISI concurs:

"Marketing has become a highly technical field. It's no longer postcards and handshakes; it requires programming, data management, statistical analysis, search optimization, and social platform expertise. The rapid evolution of digital advertising & marketing has created major gaps between agencies that understand the pace and those that do not."

More brokers are realizing that in order dominate the space they are in, they must focus on the one thing they do best, and leave the rest to the best. Coming to the conclusion that marketing is something they need help with is just the first step. The next step will not cost the big dollars you hear most people are spending on full service agencies. If you are a licensed health insurance broker in San Diego then click here LISI Marketing Consultation and request a web meeting with my team.

So, where's the sales nuggets?...Stay tuned for my next article...