One thing I’ve learned over the years of marketing for life insurance online is you can’t do it yourself. You have to leverage the knowledge and resources of others. That’s how I’ve built my entire business.
Every single agent I work with that generates their own leads and places over $100k in premium online and over the phone relies on experts to either teach them…or do it for them.
But how do you find a good resource?
I’ve done it by networking with others online.
When I say “networking”, this is obviously a different kind of networking. You’re not networking to make life insurance sales…you’re networking to make contacts to build your business.
Lets say someone wants to charge you $2500/mo for SEO. How do you know they’re any good?
That’s where networking comes in. I only work with those in my network or those that come recommended to me through my network. I’ve been burned too many times and I’m writing this to save some of you from being burned.
DON’T be sold from flashy websites or sales pitches from people you don’t know. There’s a lot of internet marketers that are great at sales, but horrible at execution. I’ve been a victim of a few. Instead, develop relationships online and get referred.
You want to look for someone who is more talented than the rest in their field.
Quick Networking Example
I spent this last week in Bangkok, Thailand meeting up with my “location independent” entrepreneur group. These businesses range from pre-revenue start-ups to businesses being sold for over $100M. Anyone ever heard of HARO (Help A Reporter Out)? If not, you should. I’ve received some great PR from their free service.
To the right is a picture of me and Peter Shankman at the airport (he’s a member of our group). He founded and sold HARO to Vocus for a ridiculous amount and is one of the nicest guys I have ever met…he also dropped a ton of knowledge on me.
The main reason I traveled 20+ hours on a plane to Thailand was to network with influencers like Peter and learn some new skills/ideas to grow my business. It’s the exact same reason Peter came out to Thailand. Even the ultra-successful are still networking.
When you’re constantly networking, serendipitous opportunities will present themselves.
At this event, I found an SEO expert that I wanted to work with, but I already have an expert who is knocking it out of the park for me. I was upfront and told him this. So instead of hiring him, we partnered on a new website where I’ll generate the content and he’ll SEO the whole site (free of charge) and all I do is pay him $8 per lead generated. $8 for an organic life insurance lead…hell yeah! How awesome is that!?
That’s a serendipitous opportunity that fell in my lap just because I put myself out there.
I made about a half dozen other contacts I’ll be working with shortly as well.
Bottom Line
If you’re building an online life insurance agency, you should be networking.
One great relationship can make your business.
