Broker and agent alliances

As an independent sales agent, you strive to build your own individual utopian business model, right? You learn from success and failure stories and do your best to integrate the lucrative and eliminate the destructive.

One lesson that you have likely learned throughout your career is that building business alliances can be a winning formula for creating a thriving sales operation. And successful business alliances no doubt can also help provide quality customer service for your clients.

When it comes to customer service, make it a point never to be just a voice on the phone. Get to know your client face-to-face and develop a sincere relationship. That way, if you run into problems, it doesn't get adversarial. You establish a trust bank and the ability to work things as a result of regular communication.

Communication is also the key to establishing great business alliances. While this principle may seem obvious, it's often overlooked -- especially in challenging economic times when everyone feels pressured to focus on numbers. It is important to build alliances with insurance brokers; do whatever you can to make sure they know how your products and your team can help them create great, memorable experiences for their own customers.

Brokers work with agents and their insurance companies because they want to bring great benefits packages and satisfaction to business owners and their employees. Adopt this as a personal mantra: Everyone wins when there's trust between the agent and the broker.

That brand of trust is particularly important in today's economy because business owners and their employees are feeling very anxious. Understandably, workers are worried about safeguarding their income -- particularly against unexpected health events. Likewise, employers are seeking cost-efficient ways to bolster their benefits packages.

Create a synergy

Brokers help businesses put together benefits packages for their employees, and they play an increasingly important role for businesses. As the benefits market becomes more complex, more employers are turning to brokers to help them sort through the options and develop plans that suit the needs of their business and their employees. Not only do the brokers put the plans together, but they also help their client companies manage the benefits enrollment process and the payroll deductions.

Insurance agents and brokers who create synergy of their products, services and core values are an infallible powerhouse. They can provide information, tools and products to help ease the fears of employers and employees alike. You are uniquely equipped to educate customers and clients about exactly how your products and services can help them when they need it the most.

In today's environment, insurance agents and brokers who provide business solutions that address economic anxiety are adding value to their clientele -- they don't exacerbate the countless problems that customers face today; they're part of the solution! And that's really a breakthrough customer experience.

Follow the "rules"

As you read through the "3 key principles" listed at the end of this article, remember that none of them really work if they don't rest on a foundation of solid communication and strong alliances. Building strong alliances between agents and brokers requires agents to practice consistent communication, solid service and fast response times.

When looking at how to communicate with brokers, try to operate according to the "no surprises" rule. It's your job to keep brokers first -- and then their customers -- fully informed about all aspects of the insurance programs provided to them. If there's anything coming from your end that will affect employee participation in a program, how billing is handled or how claims get paid, make sure that the broker hears about it first -- and in detail.

When looking at how to serve brokers, try to operate according to the "make it easy" rule. Don't forget the realities of how employee benefits work in the real world. When an employee files a claim or applies for a policy, that person's employer or human resources department will never hear about it if everything goes easily. However, if something goes wrong, the employer or human resources department will surely hear about it. So when you're working with brokers to put enrollment, billing and claims service systems in place, ensure that those systems are easy to use and not prone to breakdowns.

When looking at what to do when brokers have questions or problems, try to operate according to the "respond immediately" rule. That's a commitment we take very seriously. A few years ago, our company, Aflac, published a book for its employees to lay out all the commitments we're expected to make to our customers and to each other. The second commitment reads like this:

"Respond immediately. Every day, people come to us with their problems. A policyholder who's gotten sick or hurt might come to us to file a claim. A co-worker might come to us with an issue they need our help to solve. We need to make and keep a commitment to all these people that we will respond to their needs immediately. It's true that sometimes there will be more requests than we can handle at one time, but we still need to let people know we've heard their requests and tell them how we plan to respond."

In our dealings with brokers, we make it our business to live up to that commitment every day. Of course, we don't think it's any accident that the first commitment in our little "Aflac Way" book is "Communicate Regularly."

Regular, open communication is the foundation of good relationships between agents and brokers. It's the foundation of the strong business alliances that ultimately produce breakthrough experiences for your customers.


3 key principles to building strong relationships

Principle 1: Provide a single, consistent point of contact.

Brokers have a variety of questions about sales and service issues every day, and they need answers quickly. But they don't want to deal with just any "voice on the phone." For instance, to work effectively with brokers, Aflac has a dedicated broker relations team whose job is to develop and nurture relationships with brokers -- and they make it their business to build one-on-one relationships of trust. The team is designed to meet their needs as a one-stop shop for sales to brokers. Yes, it's important for insurance companies to have all the modern tools that brokers need -- Web sites, dedicated toll-free hotlines and support staffs -- but at the end of the day, a broker depends on his or her relationship with the person he or she knows best inside an insurance company. That's why it's imperative to make sure every broker you deal with has a single, consistent point of contact.

Principle 2: Provide hassle-free services to brokers and their customers.

No broker wants to deal with a dissatisfied customer -- no matter whether that customer is a business owner, human resources professional or an average employee. That's why agents and the companies they represent need to make sure that all their systems make life easy on the broker and the broker's customers. That means easy billing, and fast claims response and payment. It also means having easy-to-use systems to handle enrollments and the ongoing administration of flexible spending accounts, COBRA and other items that affect the overall customer experience. When putting those systems together, the key goal is always the same: no hassles.

Principle 3: Provide relevant products.

Every broker wants to bring his customers packages of insurance products that meet their current needs. In other words, products need to be relevant to what's going on at the moment. Today, that means offering products designed to help ease the anxiety brought on by the tough economic conditions. We believe that voluntary products are very relevant today. The economy has created a heightened awareness of the need for security. People want to protect their businesses, finances and loved ones. So it's a great opportunity for brokers and agents to collaborate and ensure that voluntary benefits are included in their portfolios to help relieve some of this overwhelming anxiety. Not only can voluntary insurance products help brokers diversify product offerings and generate new revenue sources, but they can also provide a great service to clients by addressing specific financial needs during a time when employees and employers need it most.

-- Ron Agypt and Ed Ryska


Ron Agypt is vice president, broker sales, for Aflac, and Ed Ryska is an Aflac broker development coordinator working in California. Both have decades of experience working to build strong relationships between insurance agents and insurance brokers.