Using insurance carrier data to acquire solid leads

To help insurance agents better qualify leads, carriers should provide access to the data and business intelligence that they have available. (Photo: iStock)

 Insurance carriers and their agency partners struggle more than ever to attract and retain the right policyholders because customers have more choices than ever before. It’s not unusual for policyholders to switch carriers several times — a behavior that fatigues agents and erodes profitability. It’s much more profitable to retain and defend existing clients than acquire new ones.

Some carriers rely on their agents to prioritize and determine a lead’s potential value. Others try to address this challenge by doing rudimentary lead vetting for agents through call center staff. Both approaches tend to yield leads that are arbitrary, ad hoc or based on intuition. Agents and call center staff don’t have the time or resources to make fully informed decisions.