After two months of sheltering in place, most brokers have figured out how to work from home. You’ve probably set up a workspace if you didn’t have one already, downloaded and mastered some type of virtual meeting software, and learned how to service your clients without going into the office. But have you actually been selling new business over the past few weeks? If not, perhaps you need to polish your phone sales skills.

These days, more and more insurance is being sold online or over the phone. This is certainly a more efficient way to do business. It allows agents to sell business without ever talking to the client. Quoting and enrollment tools like Quotit can help brokers put their business on auto-pilot; brokers can make sales even when they’re not at work.

Insurance agents get leads from a variety of sources.

The world is changing. More and more people are working from home, doing side jobs, and trying desperately not to spend their lives “working for the man.” How much is the freelance workforce growing? A lot. According to a recent report by Fiverr, an online marketplace for freelance services, there are “approximately 57.3 million freelancers in the US currently contributing $1.4 trillion to the economy,” and “it is anticipated that freelancers and independent workers will make up the majority of the workforce in the US within 10 years.”

In May, The Hill reported that “A crowd broke out into chants of ‘PowerPoint, PowerPoint, PowerPoint,’ at Democratic presidential hopeful and entrepreneur Andrew Yang’s” rally in Seattle after the candidate announced that he would use PowerPoint in his State of the Union address if he wins the election. Yang has admitted that his is “the nerdiest presidential campaign in history,” but clearly his idea has resonated with some voters.

Most agents who sell group health coverage, and some that sell individual as well, create a spreadsheet in order to present the plans in an “apples to apples” format so their clients can quickly narrow down their options. While the spreadsheet can be a useful tool when comparing dissimilar plans by helping the client focus on the most important benefits, one big disadvantage of a quote spreadsheet is that it minimizes the characteristics of a health plan that differentiate it from the other options.

Do you know what your close ratio is? What percentage of your prospects actually turn into clients? If you don’t know, it might be a good idea to start keeping track of this information. It will help you determine what sales techniques work and help identify areas of improvement.

There’s been a trend in the insurance industry over the past few years. Brokers across the country have invested in technology that allows them to quickly and easily provide quotes to clients in an “apples to apples” format so that the client can make a buying decision, often without any additional input from the agent. Many agents even have quote engines on their website that allow clients to run the quotes and apply for coverage on their own without ever talking with the broker. With today’s tools, brokers can literally sell insurance in their sleep.

One thing we learned from the 2019 open enrollment period is that the government’s outreach efforts are coming up short. Marketplace enrollment was down this year, and that corresponds with a huge 90 percent reduction in the marketing budget for Healthcare.gov.

Every agent likes getting referrals. They’re easier to sell—and certainly less expensive—than leads you buy online, and talking to someone who actually wants to talk to you is far more enjoyable than cold calling.