How to make Income Protection a great retention tool
Craig Bryce talks about how income protection can be integrated to be part of an adviser’s overall client retention process
One of the best parts of my role at Mortgage Intelligence is spreading the protection word and sharing best practices. One of the best platforms for doing this are protection workshops, which give people the chance to have detailed conversations and ultimately inspire each other to do more for clients.
I recently hosted three protection workshops, which gave me the chance to sit down with advisers and discuss reasons why they might not be selling as much income protection as they could. One of the main reasons for not writing more income protection, was concern that they may be potentially over-insuring the client, should their circumstances change. An example being that the client may potentially earn less during the time of the plan and therefore will be paying a higher premium than necessary.
This got me thinking. Could income protection therefore be used as a retention tool? This would also help ensure that the client’s circumstances best match their income protection plan.
So how might an adviser help ensure this works? An idea might be to set a diary reminder from the time the plan started, so that every anniversary the adviser could contact the client either over the phone, email or by post, to remind them of all the added benefits and services their policy delivers.
Simply booking a time with the client to discuss income protection and their current circumstances, can deliver plenty of benefits such as staying relevant and fresh in the client’s mind and letting them know you are always looking after their best interests. This will also create a barrier between your client and someone else looking to upsell to them.
As with many other best practices, setting up review systems, spreadsheets and processes takes work. But I have seen this pay off on the long term for firms, with increased retention and repeat business.
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