How to Grow Your General Liability Insurance Business

Commercial insurance agents who sell general liability policies can grow their businesses in many ways. From going deeper with existing customers — such as having clients renew with more expensive, comprehensive policies — to finding new clients, such as through networking, there are plenty of paths to follow. 

Because general liability policies can cover several different risks, insurance agents can also go in many different directions in trying to grow their general liability books. Some agents may find success by broadly targeting small business owners who want to mitigate risk, whereas other agents might find success by, say, identifying that retailers want to limit the risk of a customer getting hurt in their stores.

Identifying the best approach for yourself may take some trial and error, but there are certain steps you can take along the way to try to run a successful test. As we’ll explore in this guide, growing your general liability business often depends on identifying customer challenges, whether you’re pitching a wide or narrow audience. It also can help to build a bigger marketing presence for yourself to reach more of your intended prospects and customers.

Want an easy way to provide general liability quotes? We can help. Click the button below to learn more. 

Identify Customer Pain Points

While the opportunity to sell general liability insurance is vast, not every business owner knows why they should consider these policies. Even if they do have a sense of the benefits of general liability insurance, they may still be early in the buying process and not know where to turn to meet this need.

That’s why it’s important for insurance agents to identify customer pain points that they can help solve. If you try to pitch policies based on offering a great deal, but the prospect doesn’t think they need insurance, then your pricing won’t make much of a difference. But if you can make them feel like you understand their challenges and can provide a solution, you can grow your general liability insurance business.

See how you can connect with customers’ pain points such as:

Budget Constraints

Acknowledging business owners’ budget constraints doesn’t preclude them from purchasing general liability insurance through you. Instead, it can help business owners feel like you understand what they’re going through and can make them more receptive to your explanations of how insurance protects against unforeseen events completely blowing up budgets.

Hiring Challenges

Discussing hiring challenges and sharing resources, such as articles on hiring your first employees, can also be a good way to get your foot in the door. General liability insurance may protect business owners from some of their employees’ actions that they can’t directly control. So, if you can connect with business owners over the struggle to find quality employees and the difficulty of giving up some of their oversight, they may be more open to considering using general liability insurance as part of managing risk.

Finding the Right Commercial Real Estate

Since general liability insurance often covers risks like a customer getting hurt while visiting a business, you may be able to find a connection by discussing commercial real estate challenges. For example, a business owner may be struggling to find the right location for their store. If you can help in that regard, such as by making an introduction to a commercial real estate broker, you may be able to have more success when you eventually shift the conversation toward managing some of the risks that come from operating a physical storefront. 

Expand Your Marketing Presence

As you identify customer pain points, you likely want to be able to share them beyond just your existing network. If you can position yourself as a resource to a broader audience, you can potentially draw in more general liability customers. 

If you want to expand your marketing presence so more business owners come to see you as a valuable resource and you grow your general liability insurance business, consider trying to:

Develop Content

Creating content such as blog posts, whitepapers, and landing pages can help you connect more with business owners searching for helpful information. Approximately two-thirds of B2B buyers said they relied more on content in 2020 than in the previous year in order to guide purchasing decisions, according to research from Demand Gen Report, a B2B marketing publication.

Leverage Reviews and Referrals:

Over half of B2B buyers conduct their own research by looking at industry or peer reviews, finds Showpad, a sales and marketing platform. As such, it’s important to ask existing clients for reviews and referrals. You can also claim your profiles on sites such as Yelp to provide accurate information about your business to prospects.

While you might be hesitant to ask clients for these favors, if you provide value to clients, you’d be surprised how often people are willing to be helpful in return. And if they do need more of a nudge, you could try approaches like establishing an insurance referral program.

Create Ads

Sometimes you’re unable to find much reach beyond your current contacts. If you need a boost, or if you’re trying to reach a client segment that you don’t have any connections to, you might find that certain types of advertising help you break that barrier.

You don’t have to spend a ton of money either. You can test out ads for just a few dollars through search engines (e.g. Google Ads) or social media (e.g. Facebook Ads).

If you’re able to put a little more budget behind your advertising efforts, you also might find success by advertising within specialty publications or at events that appeal to your target audience. For example, you could sponsor a webinar within the industry you’re trying to reach, which might provide you with a speaking slot, allowing you to introduce yourself to quality prospects. 

Create an Easy Sales Process

Drawing in prospects and proving your value to existing customers can go a long way toward expanding your general liability book. However, you want to make sure that once you piqued someone’s interest that they can complete the sales process before they get distracted by a competitor or another unforeseen issue pops up to derail the sale. This can occur both with new leads as well as with existing customers who you’re trying to get to renew. 

So, to grow your general liability insurance business and create an easy sales process, aim to:

Sell policies digitally: 

Many business owners don’t want to waste time waiting for quotes over the phone or having to set up an in-person meeting to discuss policy options. Being able to buy a policy online can streamline the process and provide a good experience, as customers can complete their purchases from anywhere. Learn how.

Keep client information organized: 

If a prospect starts the sales process, such as by generating a quote, you want to be able to save that information and keep it organized. That way, when they come back to complete the purchase, you have their quote ready to go, rather than making them start all over again.

Automate renewals:

The less friction you can create for renewals the better. Ideally, customers can set up their policies for automatic renewals so that they don’t have to spend time generating a new quote and entering their payment information again. Insurance agents can also send out automatic renewal reminders leveraging a tool like Wheelhouse to provide a quote so clients are clearly informed about when their policies expire and what the new policy will cost. That way, if they do want to make changes, they have plenty of notice. 

By implementing these processes and strategies, insurance agents can sell more general liability policies. Doing so doesn’t have to be overly complex. Simply aim to connect with prospects, provide value, put yourself out there, and when it comes time to close deals, have the resources in place to easily complete sales.