Selling Individual Programs in Traditional Group-Oriented Markets: An Interview with a Pioneer: Part 2

Drew Reardon and Innovative Benefits Consulting are blazing new trails with individual health insurance in the Southeast, using technology, a commitment to educating consumers and a belief in the future of individual policies.

In part 2 of this interview, Drew discusses the sales tactics and automation tools that let him convert health insurance leads into closed and submitted apps.

Interviewer: What's your approach to calling leads?

Drew Reardon: I give people a call as soon as I get the lead. Within the first week, I call a few times but not every day. I've found being here in the South, it's the preferred way. Some people see it as rude for people to call a million times. They start feeling "Hey, look, I got your voicemail, I got your email. I'm busy. I'll get to you when I can."

But, obviously, things go on and people forget, which is why our team has autoresponders to stay with people.

I've had people who didn't look at a single one of my emails until they got to the seventh one. Then they'll call and say "I saw it. You're right, I was looking a couple months ago, and it went really well. Now I'm ready, and you're the only one that has kept up with me. I really appreciate your good business. Now let's go and take a look at this program."

Interviewer: How has the LeadMiner autoresponder worked for you?

Drew Reardon: I like most of all the pre-done content. I like that I can go in there and add a couple of other things just because it's a product that I personally would offer that maybe other agents probably wouldn't, just to add some other personalized things into it.

But I think it's fantastic.

I had one lady that I talked to, and I actually sold her a policy about a year and a half ago. She kept it for a couple months and dropped it; but I was concerned about her and kept her in the distribution list.

Well, I heard from her yesterday for the first time in about a year, and she's like, "Yeah, you know, I got your email, and we're finally ready. We'd like to look at something new." So being able to have that, where you know it's automatically going out and you don't have to worry about it, is great.

When I first got the autoresponder set up, I had a stack of about 500 leads that I had gathered over the previous half a year. I used to call people, and you know what that means. You're trying to see people, you're trying to talk to people, but you don't have time to go through that many calls - especially during the day, when most people are at work. You also don't have enough time between 5:00 and 7:30 or 8:00 to call 500 people.

So what I did was just take two days and entered everybody into the auto-responder and sent it off.

I soon got a couple of people who would never return a phone call, answer the phone or respond to mailers. But they would respond to that auto-responder and at least look at it and read the proposal, so I know that it's getting to people and that they're looking at it.

Interviewer: Do you use the Norvax Quote Engine?

Drew Reardon: Yes, all the time.

Interviewer: What have you liked about it?

Drew Reardon: When you first set it up, it's a lot of information. I mean, when I first had mine set up, there were 357 plans in my proposals.

That's a whole lot for somebody to have to go through. They call up, and they say, "Well, what's the difference? I don't get it. I don't understand." So we go through and check that their filter's up and let them decide, "I just want the one with those features."

I normally don't worry about the 50 percent plan because most people don't get those. If someone really needs to save an extra 20 bucks, then I would suggest that option. But it's not likely to be popular so I usually leave that out. I usually go in and highlight the most popular plans, the 80 percent plans, the 100 percent plans, with reasonable co-pay. That's what the majority of people are looking for.

That makes it a lot easier, and I think it's a great part of the Quote Engine program that they're able to go through and say, "Well, look, let me just see 80 percent plans," or "Let me just see plans that have a co-pay," or "Let me just see plans that are under $400.00 a month."

Interviewer: How has the Quote Engine improved your quoting time and process?

Drew Reardon: I don't think there'd be any way I could go back to not using the Quote Engine.

When you've got four different carriers, for example, that you're looking at, if you have to go to each one of those carriers and get quotes - and they're just giving you one particular plan design at a time - it takes forever.

But with the Quote Engine you can just sit down, and literally, in 25 to 35 seconds, you've got all four carriers, and you've got every conceivable plan design. Our client will see all their choices, and then we'll help them narrow it down, figure it out and find the most advantageous program for them.

Interviewer: What's your outlook for the future?

Drew Reardon: It's my own personal belief that within the next ten years, we probably won't have any group plans anymore. I think it's all going to move to individual programs or something similar.

I think defined contribution programs give the employer a way to say, "Look, we just can't keep up with just paying more for benefits, but nobody cares how much it costs, and they just spend our money as quickly as they can."

Well, if we re-empower these people to say, "You make the decision; make a better one. Whatever you have leftover of this money you get to keep," we get consumerism back into the healthcare system. That is what will solve the crisis we are currently experiencing.

It's a much better way to take care of the healthcare practice here in America, to get people to reintroduce the free market into healthcare and health insurance. It's the only thing that's going work.