Brokers, drop your acquisition costs ...

Our attention is under siege. Global online advertising spending is expected to reach $645 billion by 2024. Every minute, more than 350,000 tweets are sent and over 500 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube. 

We are constantly being hunted for attention, saturated with solicitations. A Microsoft study even estimated that our online attention span had fallen below that of a goldfish, to 8 seconds.

How do you capture your customers' attention in this mayhem? At what cost? What levers can insurance brokers use to stand out from the crowd? How can you grow more profitably? 

Here are our 3 recommendations. 

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Step 1: Sharpen your focus  

The "off the shelf" era is over. Each target has its own guarantees, specific features and acquisition channels. To discover them, you need to answer 3 questions: 

• Who ? | Who are you targeting? How big is the market? What are the expectations?
  
  
• How ? | How do they consume information? How is your target organized? How do you talk to them? What is their lexical field? What tools do they use?
  
  
• What ? | Which pains would you be addressing? What services and guarantees does your target expect? Have you tested your hypotheses on a screen? Have you tried AB-Testing to gauge the relevance of certain messages in relation to others?
  
  

Spending time on planning and targeting is the only way to guarantee a more profitable program. Rather than building an offer for “independent contractors”, try and specify which sub-segments you’d like to address? What ecosystem of services can you put forth?

Finally, remember that beyond the product itself, success lies in the details of your distribution strategy. You can drive a Tesla all you want, but if you take only winding roads to get to your destination, you'll always finish last. 

Take Slack and Microsoft Teams, for example. While the former is largely recognized for its superior quality of service, with over 2,000 connected applications (vs. 700 for Teams), the battle was eventually sealed on the Go-To-Market. In 2024, Slack has 35 million users. Microsoft Teams: 320 million - even though the latter launched 4 years later. The key: native integration for all Microsoft 365 users.

What is the key takeaway for the insurance industry? An effective acquisition is will require a relevant product, but above all an unbeatable distribution strategy.

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Step 2: Optimize your sales processes

Optimized sales require: i) the right division of labor, ii) the right tools, iii) the right flow of information. 

It's crucial to develop a writing culture within your teams. It's the only way to keep your CRM up to date. It's important because it will centralize all the customer knowledge you need to deliver a high quality service and follow-up.

Define a common structure to your meeting notes using Text Blaze, a snippet generation tool. Save time on report writing with tools like praiz.io. It's all these details that will ultimately free up your teams' headspace and time to boost sales efficiency.

Because responsiveness is key. A Salesforce study showed that calling up an opportunity within 2 minutes multiplied the conversion rate by 4. But in truth, reaching this goal is often quite a feat. Not to mention the follow-up. PR Newswire estimates that 70% of B2B leads go unprocessed. A shame, given that lead acquisition tends to account for an average of 65% of marketing budgets.

To avoid missing out on opportunities, you need the right technology. Policy management solutions allow you to centralize and automate all the time-consuming tasks that stand between you and the sale.

Finally, you need to prioritize. And to prioritize, you need to give your opportunities a score. The score will depend on the business potential and the probability of realization. Effective selling means selling to the right person at the right time. If it's not the right time, maintain the relationship but de-prioritize the opportunity. 

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Step 3: Improve retention

The golden rule for lowering acquisition costs: avoid acquisition. 

To do this, focus on retention and cross-selling. In fact, a study by strategic consultancy firm Bain showed that it is 7 times cheaper to cross-sell a customer than to acquire a new one.

To do this, anticipate requests and expectations. Systematize the surprise effect with an impromptu call to nurture the relationship, or by sending your customers a little extra attention. 

In the early 1920s, Marcel Mauss theorized the social contract that is forged through giving. Indeed, the philosopher and scientist demonstrated that every gift, by its very nature, calls for a counter-gift, committing the recipient to a relationship. (Source: Essay on Giving, 1923-1924)

Some companies have even made this their business, like Gytfti, which lets you plan small-scale intentions for your customers. 

It's also worth noting that pampering your customers will also increase the likelihood of recommendation and organic growth. 92% of those surveyed are more likely to follow recommendations from a loved one than from traditional advertising. No wonder word-of-mouth generates 5 times more sales than paid media.

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As marketing guru Gary Vaynerchuck once said: "We're in an attention economy. If you don't give your customers attention, someone else will."

Cultivating an obsession with customer satisfaction

In conclusion, by definition, there will never be more profitable growth than organic growth. Instill in your teams a culture of feedback and customer satisfaction to ensure you maintain the relationship. To conduct your own satisfaction surveys, we recommend you take a look at the PMF Survey tool, which offers a range of approaches and sample surveys you can adapt to your offers and services.

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