The growth of a successful insurance agency depends on the efforts of high-quality, productive insurance agents that have the ability to win over new customers while still supporting your existing customers. But how do you find and hire insurance agents for your agency? Should you rely on insurance recruiting agencies or take on the challenge yourself? When you find potential agents, how do you know which ones are going to be able to take your business to the next level?
Why recruit insurance agents?
Recruiting insurance agents is the key to building a successful agency. Every quality insurance agent you recruit helps to boost your agency’s selling capacity. As a top producer, you are limited to how many people you can actually meet with and close a deal with on a daily basis. By recruiting high-quality and productive insurance agents and adding them to your team, you can increase your selling capacity exponentially, growing your agency much quicker.
What to look for in an insurance agent?
As you begin your insurance agent recruitment process, you must understand what your agency needs in terms of an agent and what skill sets agents will need to meet those goals. Here we take a look at some of the top insurance qualities and skill sets you may want to consider.
Sales skills
The insurance industry is all about sales and closing the deal, so it is essential that any insurance agency recruits have a strong history of sales and business experience. While a history of selling insurance may be beneficial, it is much easier to teach the ins and outs of the insurance industry to someone that already has a proven track record in sales.
Honesty
The insurance industry is all about selling trust and building relationships with your clients. Success in this industry relies on an honest character and being open with clients to help establish long-lasting relationships that, in the end, will create the backbone of your business.
Able to handle rejection
In the insurance industry, every agent is going to hear the word “no” regularly. Good agents will have the ability to handle this rejection with a positive attitude and move on to the next lead without skipping a beat.
Growth mindset
When looking for a top agent, you want to find someone that isn’t willing to settle for the bare minimum but rather a go-getter that works hard to meet goals, both personal and agency-specific.
Communication skills
Insurance can be confusing and complicated for the average person to understand. With industry jargon and often confusing terms, you need to look for agents that can translate this jargon into simple terms that potential leads will understand.
Team player
An agency sees the greatest success when its agents work together as a team. You want to find agents that are willing to collaborate and work with other agents to meet the goals of your agency.
Relationship builders
In the insurance industry, the ability to nurture and grow client relationships is essential for success. Finding new agents that can build strong relationships with new leads helps to ensure that you are not just gaining customers but retaining them for years to come.
Where to find potential hires
Once you know the type of agents you are looking for, the next step is determining where to look for these ideal agents.
College campuses and insurance licensing schools
Connecting with local colleges, universities, or licensing school resource centers is a great way to identify potential agents that match your needs. These centers work with graduates to find employment. They know these graduates and their skills and will be able to find potential matches for the skill sets you are looking for.
Social media
Successful agents understand the importance of social media when it comes to selling themselves and their abilities, and most will have active social media profiles. When looking to recruit new agents, sites like LinkedIn allow you to explore agents’ profiles, see what experience they have, how they approach their sales, and what their work history may be. This allows you a window into who they are and whether or not they may fit with your agency before you ever approach them with a recruitment message.
Online job sites
Online job sites, such as Monster.com, offer the ability to post job listings and recruitment postings. Here you can highlight the skill sets you are looking for, what you are offering, and what you expect from your new insurance agents.
Referrals
Oftentimes, your current insurance agents have connections with other agents that they worked with previously or regularly network with. As top producers, they know what you expect and can often recommend other agents that they feel would be a good addition to the team.
Recruiting agencies
If you are looking to hire agents quickly or just want to avoid the recruitment process, hiring a recruitment agency that specializes in finding insurance agents may be the choice for you. These firms specialize in finding ideal candidates that meet or exceed your requirements and will help your team meet its goals.
Tips for retaining agents
Once you hire your new team members, it is important that you do everything in your power to help them succeed and want to stay with your agency long-term. Retaining quality insurance agents help you avoid the need to recruit down the road, as well as helps you establish a solid, happy team that brings in the sales necessary to meet your agency goals.
1. Recognize top employees
Employees who know they are valued are often more motivated to perform for their company, as well as less likely to look for other employment opportunities. Recognizing top performers, whether through awards, promotions, or pay raises, shows them how important they are to your business.
2. Fair compensation and incentives
Offering new agents average or above average wages from the start and awarding them with raises when they are merited is an important factor when it comes to retaining top agents. If their efforts are above and beyond what you expected, rewarding them with a raise, without them asking for it, will go a long way. In addition, offering occasional incentives can help to motivate agents to increase productivity and reach specific sales goals.
3. Supply agents with quality leads
Successful agents know how to turn leads into sales. Providing your agents with a steady stream of quality leads will help ensure they have prospects that are ready and willing to talk about insurance.
4. Offer flexible work schedule
Not everyone is looking for the traditional 9 to 5 workday anymore. Offering a flexible work schedule allows new agents to work around their individual needs and situations while still meeting the goals of your agency. In fact, having agents working flexible hours allow you to better target those clients that have 9 to 5 jobs and can only discuss insurance after work hours.
5. Have an open-door policy
As the head of the insurance agency, you want your agents to know that your door is always open to them and that you welcome questions, concerns, and suggestions for improvements. When other agents feel they are truly part of a team, they will work as a team and help the agency achieve the desired goals.
Build your business with the right agents
Insurance agent recruitment can seem like a challenge, and you may not hit the mark the first time out. Chances are you may hire the wrong agents in the beginning, but as you grow and learn, you will quickly be able to determine which agents will truly fit your team and agency.
As you grow your agency and add more and more agents, adding a quality customer relationship management (CRM) platform can help you better manage your leads and customers, while also making team collaboration easier. Our tools fit the insurance industry because former insurance agents designed them. To learn how we can help, schedule a call with us today!
