1st Year as a Producer Stories

[sacman]

Dude,

My advice is to ALWAYS put the needs of the customer first.
Forget about your paycheck, commissions,and GWP or any other quota while
presenting to a potential client. Concern yourself with giving them the honest advice
that you would hope to receive.
It is tempting to cut corners as a new agent just to put some food on the table.
However, that is the quickest way to flame out in this industry.
Honesty, integrity, ethics and good old plain advice is how you build a long term, profitable
client base.
The P&C market is one where it is difficult to earn a decent living in a short time, but can be very
rewarding over time. Small commissions up front turn into comfortable renewal commissions.
I pay more per month now in income taxes than my entire annual earnings of my first year in the business.

Whether you earn a designation or not isn't as important as whether you learn the industry and become
knowledgeable in the products you are offering. How you gain the knowledge is immaterial, but you MUST gain it if
you want to set yourself apart from all the 800# & internet offerings available.

Be patient, do what's right for the client, work hard and success will follow in time.

Best of luck
SAC

[californiadude]

Right on Sac thank you.

The "Trusted Advisor" is what I am seeking to be.

[gregcw]

I do agree with lonestar, the people that pay attention to the designations are not the general public.

jtownagent is also correct you do HAVE to like this business. On getting the designation it's not the designation it's the KNOWLEDGE that makes you the money. The CIC would not be a good first step because it is based on already having more than a basic understanding of insurance. The CISR or ACSR programs would be better building blocks. If you were to take any of the CIC Institutes the one I'd recommend is the Agency Management institute. It would give you a good base to build your business on wihout getting technical in insurance which could overload you at this point.

I've been doing this for thirty years this month. I started out as captive with Farmers and went I/A after seven years. The first CIC instute I took was the Agency Management Institute because I wanted to learn how the I/A side of the business operated.

[lnguyen]

Hi California dude - I posted your question to IJ's LinkedIn group and got a slew of great responses. I hope they help!

http://www.linkedin.com/groupItem?view= ... mp_2044159

[independent guy]

I have obtained several designations and highly recommend them to new agents. There is nothing wrong with experience alone, but I feel that to obtain book knowledge first and then stack experience on top of that is a better way to go. The agency owner used to poke fun at my taking designation courses, probably feeling insecure that he didn't have any. Five years later he routinely comes to me with questions that his 35 years of experience did not teach him. He has since dropped the "CPCU = Can't Produce, Can't Underwrite" jokes.

I did not have any mentors around me when I was first starting out, let alone any others with designations, so I did things backwards by getting the CPCU designation first. I would highly recommend working on other designations first, and working your way up to the CPCU. Why do I say this? I feel that the CPCU is more of a "macro-view" of the industry. It should be your capstone designation. But starting out, you need practical information that is relevant to your specific line of work. I also obtained the API (Associate in Personal Insurance) and AIS (Associate in Insurance Services) designations as those are fantastic if personal lines is your focus. But they don't really teach you how to sell. API gives you technical knowledge of personal lines products, and AIS teaches you how to give great service. I am also working on the LUTCF and AAI designations, and the SM certificate. I would recommend the LUTCF as your first designation if you work with life insurance products, because you can apply the sales course information to any type of insurance or other product that you are selling. I've only taken the AAI course on agency management and it was pretty fantastic for that purpose. I feel the SM (Supervisory Management) certificate is geared more towards home office people, but if you have anyone under you in the office then it is very worthwhile as well.

One other word of advice. Don't take on too much all at once.

[Rainmaker]

1) the best thing you can be is a dedicated student of the profession, and, later the industry;
2) designations become more important to buyers as you move upmarket - ie past personal lines and mainstreet into B2B commercial or EBEN - whichever path you decide to take;
3) any designation is contributory to a developmental producer (ie someone in their first 3 years) because it helps mitigate the suspicion a buyer may have that because you are new you are not able to credibly and reliably transact
4) focus on increasing in the number of people 'who know who you are...and know what you do..." for your first couple of years....build your base of contacts, X-dates, etc.
5) do exactly what you are doing - reaching out, asking questions, learning, gaining perspectives
6) keep the faith!

-D

[californiadude]

Rainmaker, thank you for the advice. I am 9 months in so far and excited to hit year 2 soon. For me, the hardest part of being a new producer is policy knowledge and carrier appetites. I will be starting either my CIC or AAI after I get married in August.

I've kept track of what is working, here is where the business is coming from...

- Cold Calls (Phone) - 1%
- Cold Calls (Drop In) - 7%
- Networking & Community Groups - 21%
- Referrals from Existing Clients - 14%
- Previous Network (Family, Friends from HS & College) - 16%
- Phone In's - 15%
- Existing Client Cross Selling - 25%

Hopefully this is the hardest year! Cheers.

[92builder]

Glad to hear you're going strong! Instead of another response from all these other guys telling you what to do, here's what you asked for in the first place (a story!):

I was out knocking doors in OK selling crop insurance door to door. Yes, I really was knocking on doors. Anyway, I drive up into the home place and the shop is open, but nobody around. I head to the house, and ring the doorbell. While the wife is coming to the door, a basset hound comes around the corner of the house with one ear all bleeding and chewed up. He's clearly stressed out. I exchange small talk with the wife and make plans to talk to the farmer when he gets back, and the convo turns to the dog. While we're talking about this area stray dog who comes by daily to chew on said basset hound, the mean dog appears around the other corner of the house. She says she doesn't know how to get rid of him, and I reply, "have ya taken a shot at him yet?" She turns right around back into the house, and I'm thinking I've upset her and she has no use for me with my flip comments. She returns five seconds later with a .357 magnum and a 12 gage shotgun! Looks at me, and says, "which one do you want?" I don't care for pistols, so I fired the shotgun close enough to the dog, it looked like I was just a bad shot and missed. Dog ran off, I got the appointment, and the rest they say, is history. Enjoy your career.

[californiadude]

Ha ha that is great! Thank you for sharing.

[manny79]

Thats good thanks for sharing

[ABMCalifornia]

Haha love the experience. It amazes me what some insurance agents go through...