Summary of Success
Business of Insurance Podcast
Episode 72 - If you’ve been listening to the last few episodes, we’ve been breaking down the steps you need to consider before starting a business. The concepts shared in these episodes are the foundation of building a successful business, no matter what kind. Bottom line in business is You Don’t Know What You Don’t Know You see, too many people jump into starting a business without doing any planning. Then they wonder why they aren’t finding success, as if business should just fall from the sky! For some people even if they don’t plan, they might get lucky but the majority of...
info_outline
Business Pre Planning Part 2
Business of Insurance Podcast
EP -71 If you haven't listened to episodes 65-71, they set the stage for this final episode on things to think about when starting your own insurance business. Regardless if you are starting an agency, an insurance company or a related business to the insurance industry like technology, claims or risk management, the concepts of starting a business are the same. These are discussed in these episodes and can help with your thought processes and planning. Pre-planning, part 2 provides ideas to implement 6-12 months before you are ready to open your doors. If you don't have a year to plan...
info_outline
Business Pre Planning Part 1
Business of Insurance Podcast
EP - 70 This episode provides additional insight into starting your own business in the insurance industry. We'll cover ideas to help you map out the process over the course of several months so you don’t have to do everything at one time. We'll talk about tasks that can be broken down over 12 months or done in 30 days if you don't have much time. Month 1 -2 Define your ideas - what area are you going into? Agency, carrier, claims, Life, health, will you just do something like work comp, airlines or medicare? Maybe you are thinking technology in the form of a CRM for insurance, maybe...
info_outline
Who Should Be On Your Team
Business of Insurance Podcast
EP 69 - We get training for being an insurance agent but we don’t get training for being a business owner. They are two completely different hats. If you want to succeed in Business you need to have a team. I was recently listening to another podcast with an angel investor and she said the first thing she looks for is who is on the team and what is their experience. You need a team. It’s nice to think you can do everything yourself, but something will be lacking if you don’t bring on help. So here’s what your team should look like. Accountant Consult with an accountant for...
info_outline
Understanding The Business Owner Mindset
Business of Insurance Podcast
Today’s episode is one of several episodes about how to get started in the insurance business. I’m not talking about becoming an agent, I’m talking to those of you that are thinking about starting an agency, an insurance company, or an an insuretech business. There’s a lot more to hanging a shingle that says you are open. As part of the planning process for starting a business there are some concepts to consider, these are about yourself. As exciting as it is to start a business, there’s a lot to consider. It’s not all glamor and glory! Most business owners would agree it’s a lot...
info_outline
How To Start A Business Without Failing
Business of Insurance Podcast
WHY DO BUSINESSES FAIL? EP 66 - In this episode, we are talking about the top 10 reaosns businesses fail and what you can do to keep your business from failing. This episode is one of several episodes about how to get started in the insurance business. I’m not talking about becoming an agent, I’m talking to those of you that are thinking about starting an agency, an insurance company, or an an insuretech business. These are real issues to consider. It’s geared for those of you who are thinking about getting started or those that have started and are looking for ideas to build a better...
info_outline
Don't Be Fooled By Entity Structures
Business of Insurance Podcast
SET UP YOUR BUSINESS PROPERLY EP 65 - Today’s episode is one of several episodes about how to get started in business. Some of you might be working for someone now and thinking about going off on your own and some of you might just be entering the industry and doing so as an independent. If you are in either of these two categories or if you are someone that works with agents that are working independently, this episode is for you. I started in this industry on the property and casualty side and quickly moved into commercial insurance when I started. Working with my dad, his personal...
info_outline
Risk Management Basics
Business of Insurance Podcast
SMALL THINGS MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE EP 64 - Todays episode was inspired by a recent CE class on Ethics. There were many great ideas shared, in a boring ethics class, but the tips I'm sharing today were from the discussion. There was actually a list of 50 risk management tips and I've taken 10 of them and offered my thoughts on them from my own experience in the industry. States didn't always require ethics, it's only been a requirement for about 20 years. When I first entered the busines we didn’t have to take ethics. It’s a good refresher but it can also be boring! I’ve...
info_outline
Making An Impact
Business of Insurance Podcast
THERE IS MORE TO THIS INDUSTRY THAN MAKING MONEY EP 63 - Like teachers, social workers and doctors and nurses, you have the power to make a difference. This episode provides three examples of how people have benefited from having a solid insurance policy and an agent that will works for them. It also talks about a few situations where agents need to do a little more to protect the people they serve. CHECK OUT OUR SPONSOR: This is a mailing service I’ve been using for over a year now and I love them. I send all of my birthday cards, thank you cards and marketing post cards from this...
info_outline
Continuing Education Thoughts
Business of Insurance Podcast
STAYING FOCUSED ON A MONITOR FOR 8 HOURS EP 62 - This episode is about getting CE credits As a CIC, we are required to do annual updates and the classes are usually a deep dive into a topic that you won’t find elsewhere. I’ve done updates every year since 1992. In 2012 I did an update and received a certificate that I had been a CIC for 20 years. To my surprise that meant that I only had to do my CIC update every other year now, instead of every year. This created CE issues for me because I need 24 hours of CE’s a year in my state and since the CIC updates are only 16 hours, I’ve...
info_outlineEP 49 - Marketing is about Measuring.
When it comes to email marketing, there are several metrics you can measure to determine how well your campaign did.
It’s important to set goals for these metrics which will help you track the progress of your campaigns as well.
If you are someone that has sent email campaigns in the past, this is something you want to look at for prior campaigns and future campaigns and for those of you that haven’t sent anything yet, this is information for when you do.
Inside of your ESP, there should be a place for you to see different metrics from each campaign. You should be able to see how many people unsubscribed, how many emails bounced, how many email in- boxes were full, how many emails were opened, not opened and how many people clicked on the different links you put inside the email campaign.
TODAY WE ARE FOCUSING ON
- Bounces,
- Unsubscribes and
- Full email boxes.
At the end of this episode I’m going to share one very valuable tip for email marketing.
One of the key indicators of how you're doing with your email marketing is to track and review your unsubscribes. Many people will say it’s how many opens you have, but if people are reading it and unsubscribing, it’s a bigger problem.
If people are unsubscribing, it is usually an indicator of 3 things:
- You aren’t sending valuable content
- You are sending too much content
- Your audience isn’t interested in what you have to offer any longer
It’s that simple.
The content you send is important. I spoke about this in episode 47 when I gave the example of an agent in NYC sending emails about drainage problems when most of the people on the list were renters or condo owners. If this agent were to send a lot of email campaigns that weren’t relevant to renters and condo owners, then they’ll lose a lot of subscribers and that is an issue in the long run because your prospect list begins to dwindle, for the wrong reasons.
It’s essential that you send relevant, valuable content and while it might take extra work, it’s also important to tailor it to the audience rather than being too generic.
Another reason why people unsubscribe is that you are sending too much content. You are in their inbox too much and because they really aren’t seeing the value or they aren’t interested any more, they don’t want to see you.
Look at your own email inbox. How many people send you emails every day or every week?
How many of those do you keep and read or just delete? How many do you completely unsubscribe from? What’s your reason for unsubscribing?
Most likely that’s the reason many of the people you send email campaigns to also unsubscribe. I’m a believer that if you evaluate your own behavior, most likely, it’s similar to others as well. That will help you manage your email campaigns.
The last reason people unsubscribe is that they aren’t interested in what you have to offer any longer. This can be tricky. A realtor friend of mine was talking about her email list yesterday and said she gets people that don’t want to see information she is sending out about upcoming listings, but they do want to know about the happy hours or events that she is hosting. (and she and her team have done some very elaborate outings in the past)
One of the ways you can manage this is to put a questionnaire at the unsubscribe box asking questions about why people are unsubscribing and if they still want to get emails related to certain content.
By asking this information and giving people options, it could help to salvage a few unsubscribes.
This also ties to list segmenting which I discussed in episode 47 as well.
If you have an email list that you haven't sent any emails out in awhile, you’ll need to send an introductory email or two and let the reader know what you are doing.
Give them the option to unsubscribe as part of the content that you send.
Doing this helps you to set a baseline for unsubscribes.
Pay attention to your clients unsubscribing as well. If you have clients that unsubscribe and then you send an informational type of email campaign (like Covid-19 specific information) they might not get it because they unsubscribed to your list.
If people do unsubscribe, you need to look at why, but then let them go. Don’t worry about the ones that unsubscribe, just keep working to create better content and reduce the number of unsubscribes.
Let’s talk about bounced emails.
There’s a few reasons why emails bounce. One is a great marketing opportunity the others are just numbers and there’s not much you can do.
When an email bounces and it’s because the email address is no longer good, it’s a indication that your prospect or client has a new email account. Hence, the marketing opportunity for you because maybe they have a new job or they started their own business or maybe they retired. In some cases it’s going from one email provider like yahoo to another like gmail. Regardless, it’s your opportunity to reach out to them and get the new email address. It’s your opportunity to talk to them and see what changes are taking place in their life. Maybe create a business opportunity for yourself or one of your strategic referral partners.
Other reasons why emails bounce include their inbox is full or they are out of office.
One other reason why they bounce is that the email service provider you are using has been blocked by the company you are sending to. For example, in my CEO roundtables, one of my members is a banker with PNC bank.
When I send emails to his PNC account they always bounce because I use Constant Contact and PNC blocks Constant Contact. If I send the emails to his personal email address, then there isn’t an issue of him receiving them.
Some companies will let their employees white list emails, but not all will allow that, so it’s important to keep an eye on this type of bounce metric as well. It will tell you when you need to get personal emails and not business emails!
HERE’S YOUR VALUABLE EMAIL MARKETING TIP:
NEVER, NEVER, NEVER BUY AN EMAIL LIST.
It’s the easiest way to get reported as spam and if you get reported as spam too many times your email account will be shut down and it is a very expensive proposition to get it back online.
If you haven’t heard of this before, you are probably thinking I’m crazy. Well, hopefully not because I’ve seen this first hand. In the early 2000’s I was involved with an international networking organization. They did monthly events and with each event, there were 3 events. Initially, we were encouraged to build our lists as much as possible.
Personally, I knew better because of my knowledge on email marketing, but not everyone knew the rules. A lot of people just added names without permission and therefore, they were reporting spam.
Well, this international organization was shut down. Everything email was shut down. It took them almost 3 weeks to get back up and running. As a result they implemented strict protocols regarding email addresses, but the damage had been done. Imagine not being able to communicate with clients for 3 weeks because of no email.
Buying an email list is basically buying a list of email addresses that hasn’t given you permission to email them.
Some platforms like Mail Chimp require a double opt in, so that email list you bought and uploaded will have to give permission to have you add them to mail chimp.
Constant Contact flags you if you try to upload too many emails at one time and will contact you to discuss the emails you have before it lets you send to them. If you aren’t truthful about where the names came from and get a lot of spams, you’ll get shut down by them.
It’s not something you want to go through.
While the intent of the CAN SPAM act is to have an opt out feature, it’s also better if you don’t get reported for spam.
And here’s a little side note….did you know that most CGL’s today do not provide coverage for the CAN SPAM act? Initially they did, but that’s been added as an exclusion now! I learned that a few years ago in a CIC update I took! - ok, done with the sidebar, if you aren’t sure, read your carrier’s CGL’s and see what they say about the CAN SPAM act. And if you aren't familiar with the CAN SPAM act, then I’d encourage you to google it and read about it!
WRAPPING UP
If you like what you’ve heard, please go to iTunes and leave a review. If you know someone that should hear this content, please share the episode with them.
If you want to learn more about marketing, join the FB group called the Business of Insurance. I’ll link to it in the show notes and I look forward to meeting you there!
If you want to connect with Debbie on LinkedIn, mention you heard the podcast in your request. It helps me identify the spammers from the listeners!
Until next time, keep creating opportunities..
SHOW THE LOVE
If you haven’t done so already, please like or subscribe to this podcast on your favorite podcast player. We are on all of the platforms including spotify, IheartRadio and Apple podcasts.
If you are listening to this podcast online and don’t know how to listen to podcasts on your phone, reach out to our host, Debbie DeChambeau and she'll help you.
CONNECT WITH THE PODCAST ON SOCIAL
ABOUT THE HOST
This episode of the Business of Insurance podcast is produced and hosted by Debbie DeChambeau, CIC, AAI, CPIA - an entrepreneurer, business advisor, insurance professional and content creator. Her goal is to inspire you to think differently and explore ideas that disrupt the status quo.
Debbie has an extensive business and marketing background with a focus of helping insurance professionals be more successful.
She is the co-author of Renewable Referrals and produces three other podcasts, Business In Real Life and Divorce Exposed and Seniors We Love.