How Leads Work At Duford Insurance Group!

In this article, we’ll discuss the different lead options Duford Insurance Group provides its agents, specifically for:

• Our Lead Philosophy
• Final Expense
• Medicare
• ACA
• Annuities

Let’s Begin!

Our Lead Philosophy

Let’s talk about how Duford Insurance Group’s lead systems work.

Whether you’re selling face-to-face or over the phone, you have to have leads, and what I want to do today in today’s video is to talk about the different options while also talking about what makes our lead programs different from many of the other organizations out there.

First and foremost, I think it’s very important to understand that Duford Insurance Group does NOT make money off of selling its agents’ leads. 

Most of the big name organizations that are recruiting everybody and their mother sell leads at a profit. Because they sell so many leads to so many agents, it is a very profitable source of income for these insurance MLMs.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with making money, but the problem is that it incentivizes the agency to profit over something that may not necessarily lead you, the agent, to profit.

I believe an agency should profit ONLY when the agent profits.

How would that work?

Well, an agency profits when you make a sale, right? Therefore, the profit motive is based around, “How can I get agents to get into the field, get trained, buy the right leads to give the best advantages or options for success?”

When an insurance agency/IMO profits in ANY other way, at best it muddies the water.

That’s why Duford Insurance Group refuses to profit on lead sales. I make no money recommending any of the vendors that are available to our agents.

In other words, I want to give my agents the best options! Options that have been vetted by other agents and have proven to be successful.

This is going to give me the best opportunity to profit myself because…

If you win, I win. 

Final Expense Face-To-Face Leads

#1 Direct Mail Leads

We have direct mail lead vendors with competitively-priced options on a fixed price or per thousand basis.

On a weekly basis, you’ll need between $700 to $1000 a week for optimized results on a full-time basis.

#2 Facebook Leads

If your budget is tighter, another great choice are our high-quality Facebook lead vendors.

Most of those leads are between $25 and $30 a lead. And you’ll need $500 to $800 a week in order to do those effectively on a full-time basis. Part-time, closer to $500 weekly.

#3 Seminar Marketing

The last option that we have for our final expense face-to-face agents are seminar marketing leads.

We’ll teach you how to find speaking opportunities in places where seniors congregate. Hosting these events is nearly cost-free, and no, we don’t charge you to teach you this =).

In short, seminar marketing is a great way to start with little to no budget.

Final Expense: Telesales Lead Options

If you opt to go the final expense telesales route, there’s really two different types of leads we recommend: outbound and inbound leads.

What are outbound leads?

• Outbound leads are leads already generated that you make calls to.

And what are inbound leads?

• Inbound leads are leads that call you, either from a TV commercial or transfer from a call center.

For outbound leads, we have several digital Facebook lead vendors reasonably priced and of good quality. Expect to invest $700 to $1000 weekly on a full-time basis, and between $500 to $700 weekly if you’re selling part-time.

For inbound leads, we have either TV lead options or warm call center transfers. Expect weekly investment somewhere in the $900 to $1200 week range, as warm transfers are usually more expensive

What If The Leads Are Too Expensive?

If you can afford to invest properly in leads, my recommendation is to:

• Get a part-time job and save up money for 3-6 months
• Start final expense part-time to require less weekly spend
• Borrow money from loved ones or finance with debt (I did this when I started, but it is not for everyone)
• Start with seminar marketing and selling to friends and family (we have trainings on how to sell to friends and family, but do not require agents to do it whatsoever), or,
• Work for a no-cost lead agency and accept a lower commission

If you’ve liked what you’ve read about how Duford Insurance Group approaches leads, please read more about how working with DIG is like here.

Medicare Leads With DIG

Duford Insurance Group provides high-quality leads to its Medicare agents.

In some cases, these leads can cost you NOTHING!

And I’m not talking about garbage leads that are recycled a million times like the other guys do. What we’re talking about are fresh and exclusive direct mail leads, which are the cornerstone really to how Medicare is optimally sold.

Continue reading to learn more…

Primary Medicare Lead: Direct Mail

First of all, our primary lead we recommend for either Medicare face-to-face or telesales is direct mail.

Direct mail works wonderfully in Medicare sales, and we have agents successfully selling in-person and over the phone with direct mail leads.

Weekly costs for full-time agents beginning ranges between $500 and $700 weekly. Part-time agents can expect to invest around $500 weekly.

Lead Subsidy Program

All Medicare agents who join Duford Insurance Group have the option to take advantage of our exciting lead subsidy program for selling Medicare Advantage policies.

Here’s how it works:

1. You set up a lead order with your preferred vendor
2. Every Medicare Advantage sale you make, you’re paid a $75 lead subsidy. You can apply those subsidies towards any lead vendor of your choice!

Keep in mind this is a performance-based subsidy. We just don’t give you money for no work! So you have to go out there and actually sell Medicare Advantage in order to get the subsidy and earn the right to those subsidies.

Additionally, you have to sign a 5-year commitment to get access to this optional lead subsidy program, as we’re losing money for several years before breaking even, and need an agent committed long-term for the program to make sense for us.

NOTE: If you do NOT want to do the commitment and rather pass on the lead subsidy, that is totally fine. This program is optional.

Also, the good news is that Medicare Advantage carriers are stepping up lead subsidies as of late, so if you’re producing consistently, it’s likely your Medicare Advantage carriers will want to help subsidize your marketing budget.

Some other points on the lead subsidy program:

1. We don’t reduce your commissions.
2. You completely, 100% own your book of business
3. You can always start the lead subsidy program later. Just remember the program is subject to change, so the opportunity for subsidies may be different in the future.
4. We don’t frown on agents who don’t participate in the lead subsidy program. It’s really your choice!

More On Medicare Advantage Carrier Subsidies

A cool thing that’s happened over the past year or so is that carriers are funneling more money to agents to help support their marketing efforts to acquire clients. Ultimately, agents do a better job than call centers on acquiring and retaining their clients.

This stands in contrast to what we’ve seen over the past couple of years where carriers have made an active effort to investing resources into call centers because the belief over time was that call centers did a better job of acquiring, thus will do a better job of retention.

Here’s a few examples of DIG agents cashing in on carrier-sponsored lead subsidies:

1. A Midwest agent was earmarked $30,000 in 2022 to cover his lead cost during that time of year. What’s crazy is that he only puts a fourth of his total business with this sponsoring carrier. There are other carriers that are also providing co-op money, lead support, et cetera, in order to keep this agent busy and productive and his cost of doing business that much lower.

2. An agent in the South received $2500 from one of his several carriers in the 1st quarter of 2022. Even better, the carrier offered to pay any and all of his lead costs as time progressed! Also, another carrier is giving him a thousand dollars stipend monthly, as long as he writes eight policies a month.

Summary On Medicare Leads & Subsidies

Bottom line, many of our most productive agents simply don’t pay anything for leads because they have shown through their efforts of taking action that they know how to write business. The carriers love agents who do that because they all know that the agents do a much better job of retention, thus increasing profitability.

Personally, I think this is “Golden Era” of Medicare Advantage sales! You should probably seriously consider investing your time and energy into the business over the next 5 to 10 years as there’s potentially a LOT of money to be made!