August

​We are now in our sixth month of the COVID-19 Era, with little hope for an early end. Social distancing and masks will continue to be parts of our lives for now. The changes that seemed shocking to insurance agencies in March have now become Just The Way Things Are.  

But people are still buying homes (there were almost 22,000 closed and pending sales in New York in June,) cars (auto sales were at an annual pace of 14.5 million units in July,) and businesses are hiring back some workers, though not as quickly as they shed them in the spring. Commerce is continuing as much as it can during a time when so many normal activities are unsafe. Is your agency taking advantage? 

The New York State government designated insurance as an essential business last March. That means agencies weren’t required to have all employees offsite like others. Many agencies never sent their staffs off to work from home. Regardless of where your employees worked from (home or office), they continued to serve their customers, answer their questions, work out their new premium payment schedules, reduce their estimated auditable exposures, and help them through the anxiety.   The reality is most agencies seamlessly continued providing trusted guidance and care to their customers.

Many types of businesses were closed, but insurance agencies were there. Insurance agencies are still there.  And you are a local business. Are you broadcasting that to the world? You should remind your communities that you have always and will always be there. Now is the time to dust off your promotions, invest in your brand, spruce up your expertise, and experiment with scheduling. 

Here are three things your agency can get started on right now to position itself for success as the country muddles through this crisis and crawls toward the finish line. 

1. Revisit the COVID messages on your phone system and website. 

Do those messages still say something like, “Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, our office hours are reduced to …” If that is still true, why? Can you ramp operations back up? If it’s not, get those messages off of there. You want to project reliability.

Sure, in April when literally everything was in flux and you were being ordered to send notices to all of your clients, those messages were a good idea, maybe even a necessary one. But now it’s August. We’re not shell-shocked anymore, the notice requirement is happily well back in the rearview mirror, and we can operate a bit more normally, even if most or all of your staff is still working from their kitchens. So jettison any messages implying that you aren’t. 

2. Your customers need flexibility just as much as your staff does. 

While a lot of people were idled or working remotely early in the crisis (and many still are,) some people and businesses are busier than they’ve ever been. They have insurance needs that they don’t have two seconds to think about until the dinner hour or later. Too bad your office closes at five. But does it have to? 

A lot of you have employees who need flexible schedules so that they can perform their newly-discovered jobs of home school teaching, daycare providing or adult caregiving. What if Jane, who is teaching math and spelling in the morning to her eight and ten year-olds, is able (and possibly desperate) to converse with adults about business between noon and 8:00 pm while her significant other assumes the tasks of instruction and peacemaking? Now your agency can serve customers well into the evening, which is when a lot of them need it. You get to take care of customers when your competitors aren’t, making them happy, and you help solve a valued employee’s problems, making him or her happy. Oh, and you make money. Think about it. 

3. Invest in staff education. 

The insurance business never stops changing, which means you and your staff should never stop learning. 

Last August, had you ever heard of pandemic insurance? Did you know that some specialty carriers are writing active shooter insurance? Less exotic, how often is your agency selling Ordinance or Law Coverage with commercial property and homeowners insurance? What do you know about Mechanical Breakdown Coverage? If you had to explain Personal Injury Protection Coverage to a client whose child was just in a car accident, could you do it? Do you know what types of property National Flood Insurance Program policies cover and what they don’t? Expertise matters. 

Every insurance shopper is looking for a lower price; that’s a given. But many (not all, but many) really are interested in protection, even if they don’t initially realize it. So build up your agency’s technical expertise. If you specialize in certain industry or market niches, learn more about those niches. If your business is changing, chances are they are, too. And COVID has likely impacted them differently than it did insurance. So commit to learning. It’s good for your customers, it’s good for your future E&O insurance premiums, and it’s good for your bottom line. 

These are simple things to make your agency look good. More importantly, they are things to make your agency be good. So get started now. Be the business that your customers know they can rely on.