Agents can generate leads through their website or social media, through compliant mailers or telemarketing, or through sales events. Whether you use a third party vendor is up to you; your job is to capture the leads once they’re expressed interest and given explicit permission to be contacted.
Inbound Marketing
Let your potential Medicare clients come to you by positioning yourself and your business as a resource. Inbound lead generation involves capturing leads who are already looking for your services.
Start with your website and social media. The way you get traffic to your website is to show the search engine that your business is relevant to “Medicare plans in City, State,” for example. You do that by consistently producing quality content that your potential clients are looking for. A mix of educational and entertaining content will show clients you have personality and expertise, and make them feel like they’re getting to know you before the first conversation. If you have engagement on your social media channels, you can send that traffic over to your website through links in the posts themselves or up in your bio or profile.
Once these potential clients land on your website, you want to capture their contact information. Per CMS regulations, the agent should only be reaching out once the client gives permission to be contacted about insurance plans; when they enter their information giving explicit permission, you can count them as a lead.
Outbound Marketing
One straightforward way to garner interest is to send direct mailers. These can be pamphlets or information, with business reply cards or your business contact included. You can use a third-party vendor to purchase a mailing list of people who fit the demographic of Medicare clients and hope for the best. Third-party vendors may also be able to handle the mailers for you, with fewer man-hours for your team. Telemarketing is another option. You could hire a call center and provide a script that complies with CMS regulations. Mailing back a business reply card or granting permission to be contacted makes these respondents official leads.
A combination of inbound and outbound marketing works best, depending on the business’ budget. Another method is to gain visibility in the community by presenting at marketing events or educational events, although an agent’s role will differ because of the regulations for those two types of events.
Filtering Leads
Once you have permission to contact people, speak with them! Set meetings and start to develop the client relationship using your people skills. After you’ve earned their trust and engaged with empathy to their unique personal situation, you will gain loyal clients.
