A variety of factors contribute to the success of an insurance company. Product knowledge is required, as is an aggressive sales strategy. You’ll also need proper financing to get your business off the ground. However, don’t overlook potentially the most important aspect of your company’s success: hiring and retaining your insurance workers!
Your agents are the public’s first impression of your company. You want to remain confident that you hire insurance workers who are properly representing your interests. Here are some ideas on how to achieve that.
Determine Whether You Need a Freelancer or a Full-Time Insurance Agent
Before writing an insurance agent job description or interviewing candidates, determine whether a full-time or freelance agent is best for your company:
Full-Time Insurance Agents
A full-time insurance agent works as part of a team within your organization. They may have their own office space or work remotely from home, but they are still part of your team. You can expect them to attend meetings regularly and be available when their clients need them.
Full-time insurance agents typically have clients they service directly and tend to be more focused on them than an independent contractor.
Freelance Insurance Agents
Freelance insurance agents typically have a set number of clients they work with one-on-one to service their insurance needs. They also have the flexibility to take on new clients as needed.
This arrangement is best for smaller businesses that need help managing their current client base and helping them meet their goals. They sell insurance products for a variety of companies as independent agents. They typically earn higher commissions but are also in charge of representing their company, adapting plans to customers, and providing quotes.
Regardless of your choice, ensure you get top-quality agents with good communication skills and ambition.
Create an Eye-Catching Job Posting
It’s no secret that interesting job postings get more views. When writing a job ad, you want it to be descriptive enough to attract the right candidates.
Make sure your post is easy for people to read and understand. It should be short, concise, and easy on the eyes. Make sure it’s written in plain English—no jargon or technical terms here!
Summarize what exactly you want from applicants in one sentence or two. Ensure this is followed by specific qualifications that will help employers determine if they can hire someone based on those qualifications alone.
Where to Place your Job Posting
In the last few years, many employers have turned to platforms like LinkedIn and Facebook to post their open positions to attract the right applicants. However, there are several other places where employers can post job openings that may not be as well-known but can still help them find their ideal person.
Here are some places you can post your job openings:
- The local paper
- Local news website, TV, or radio station
- Your community college/university’s career center website
- The Chamber of Commerce website (if available)
- Job advertising platforms
Get Employee Referrals
Your employees might know someone they worked with who has a similar background or skillset as you need. For example, if you are looking for an insurance specialist, ask a peer who has worked in that role recently if they know anyone who could help. If they don’t know anyone, ask if they have contacts within the industry. If they do, ask them to make some introductions.
Remember that you don’t want to make it sound like you’re only hiring people with no experience or education because this will scare them off. Instead, let their experience show by asking about their previous positions and how long they were there. Be sure to get some background information about why they left these jobs and the skills needed for success at each one of them.
Use Staffing Agencies
Hiring the services of a professional recruiting agency, which many insurance companies do when they need to hire insurance workers, is a time- and energy-saving strategy. It is important to note that the staffing agency will be able to provide you with a complete list of insurance companies that are hiring for your area. They can also help you find the best fit for your company’s needs.
The staffing agency will also work with you to schedule interviews, which means less time spent on this step in the process. The recruiting agency can also help streamline the hiring process by providing you with templates and other resources that employers commonly use.
The trick is to create an ideal candidate profile with all the necessary experience, skills, and licenses. It would also help to provide information about compensation, benefits, and advancement opportunities. Your staffing agency will then shortlist candidates for you based on this information. This approach can provide a pool of qualified candidates who meet your preferred criteria while saving you time and money.
Hire Temp-Workers
Temporary workers are often not as expensive as full-time employees because they have no benefits or retirement plans. Because they’re temporary, they may not be eligible for benefits like vacation time or health insurance coverage, which makes them more affordable than full-time employees.
However, perhaps the most significant benefit of hiring temp workers is getting a chance to assess their skill set. You can give temps different responsibilities to see what benefits the company the most. You can also determine whether the temp has what it takes to be a full-time employee.
Also, temporary workers make up the majority of employees in the industry, so they are very familiar with the work environment and know how to handle certain situations. They also have experience working with other employees so that they can provide valuable insight during training sessions.
Qualities to Look for in Potential Agents
While trying to ascertain how to recruit the best workers, consider what makes your existing employees exceptional. Please list your best agents, describe what distinguishes them from their peers, and consider the characteristics you want to look for when hiring insurance agents.
Here are ideas on what to look for:
Ambition and Drive
You are hiring people for sales, so finding good agents means getting ambitious and competitive individuals. These are some of the qualities that make an insurance worker successful:
- They want to be successful in their job and will put in more elbow grease to achieve them.
- Good agents are self-motivated, love what they do, and want to excel at their jobs.
- They’re organized and like knowing what needs to happen each day so they can focus on the task instead of worrying about details or getting overwhelmed by numbers.
- Excellent insurance agents need to be able to anticipate problems and come up with solutions when things go wrong. They should be able to work with clients from all walks of life and understand that every client has different needs.
Sale Skills
Because an insurance agent’s primary goal is to sell insurance policies, an individual with strong sales skills has a better chance of success as an agent. A skilled salesperson possesses charisma, empathy, tenacity, and communication.
Growth Mindset
You are looking for someone with the confidence and self-esteem to work at a challenging job in an unpredictable industry. Don’t be afraid of the volatility of the insurance business; instead, embrace it. Insurance sales agents are vulnerable to layoffs but also have opportunities to earn bonuses and commissions whenever they meet their quotas.
Excellent Communication Skills
Good communicators can clearly explain complex issues to their clients. Insurance agents need strong communication skills. Often, they deal with people who don’t understand what’s happening behind the scenes or how much renewing or replacing those policies will cost them.
The ability to build relationships is also an important trait. It will help insurance agents cultivate relationships so customers become loyal clients, returning to renew their policies or take out new ones.
Key Takeaways
When you need to hire insurance workers, it can be challenging to find the right candidate, but going through the rigorous process of finding one is well worth the effort. After all, good insurance agents are the key to the success of your business.
There are about 50,400 job openings for insurance agents every year. The majority of these openings are due to the need to replace agents who retire or change careers. Others are due to open positions in new insurance companies, which means there’s quite a lot of competition for good insurance workers. So use these tips to stay on your game and find excellent candidates.