Insurance companies employ personnel to help them sell health, vehicle, property, life, and other types of insurance that clients may need. While all these insurance policies have a ready market, you’re more likely to have a successful career selling life insurance.
Statistics indicate that there are over half a million insurance agents in the U.S., and about 104,985 of them sell life insurance. Life insurance is predominantly male-dominated. Men make up 53.7% of the workforce, while women account for 46.3%.
To answer the question, ‘can I make money selling life insurance?’ Yes, you can make money selling life insurance. However, it’s not going to be easy. Research shows that most life insurance agents report burnout within the first year on the job. Here are a few pros and cons of a career as a life insurance agent.
Pros
Renewal Commissions
A great answer to the question, can I make money selling life insurance, is renewal commissions. Insurance agents make money when selling insurance packages. If, for example, you sell life insurance to a customer and they renew the cover after the first one expires, you still get to earn a commission from the renewal. Your commission won’t be as much as it was initially, but you are guaranteed of earning some amount as long as the policyholder submits their contributions.
Great Job Prospects
A career selling life insurance requires minimal to no educational qualifications, provided you’ve graduated from high school. However, some insurance companies require one to take and pass a test to get a license. The good news is that the tests are simple, and hardly anyone fails.
Lucrative Salary
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics, an insurance agent can earn up to $125000 annually. As mentioned earlier, you earn a commission whenever a policyholder renews their policy.
Cons
The Process of Selling
When thinking about whether can I make money selling life insurance, be warned that life insurance isn’t an easy sell. You have to first convince your prospects that they’re going to die someday, a subject many consider too morbid even to contemplate. It makes it seem more real than they want it to be. You’ll rarely have an easy sale. Equip yourself with skills that’ll help you strike a balance between creating a sense of urgency for the prospective client to sign up and convincing them death isn’t something to be scared about.
Getting Customers Can Be Hard
Generating insurance leads isn’t easy. Marketing your product online may help you reach a wider market, but you’ll still need to knock on several doors to secure leads. If your employer passes a lead to you, they’ll likely reduce the commission they give you.
3.The Pay is Commission Based
Most insurance agents don’t earn a basic salary or receive any benefits, meaning they have to rely solely on the commission they make. You may work so hard throughout the week but fail to make any sales. This means you won’t earn a cent despite the work you put in.
To answer the question, can I make money selling life insurance? Below is a list of people who need life insurance the most.
1. Families With a Single Source of Income
Life insurance can provide a safety net for families where only one of the spouses is working. Just like children, the other spouse depends on the income of the working spouse. If the working spouse dies, the family will struggle to meet their basic needs. This is why life insurance companies target their policies toward families with a single source of income.
Some employers offer life insurance to their employees. However, once the employment contract is terminated, the policy is also terminated. You can use this argument to convince them that they need separate family life insurance.
There are two types of family life insurance you can sell to prospects; permanent life insurance and term life insurance. Permanent life insurance stays active as long as they keep paying the premiums. Term life insurance is the most common type of family life insurance. When the policyholder dies, the family is covered for a specific time. This could be up to 10 years.
2. Parents Who Want Their Children to Afford a Home Someday
As of 2020, you had to part with a whopping $260,000 to become a homeowner in the U.S., and this has since gone up. While buying a home can be very expensive, having a life insurance policy can help ease the burden of buying a new house, especially for the children of the prospect. As you look for leads, target parents who have the desire to secure a home for their children in the future. This is a great motivation for the question, ‘can I make money selling life insurance?’
From life insurance cover, children can get funds to help them make payments for a house. In case they don’t know how to go about the whole process, they can use the services of a public insurance adjuster to ensure they get the best deal possible. Let your prospects know that to take out any sort of loan or claim on life insurance, they need a permanent policy.
3. People Who Want to Avoid Unnecessary Fees
When a policyholder dies, many expenses follow. It may be a hospital bill that needs to be settled or the cost of the burial itself. Statistics going back to 2021 indicate that, on average, a burial costs $7,484. This amount can be too high, especially if the deceased was the only breadwinner for the family. In such cases, having life insurance helps cater to pending bills and burial costs.
If the family of the deceased contracts a florist to deliver flowers for the burial ceremony, but due to an unforeseen event, they’re forced to postpone the ceremony and consequently cancel the order, having an event cancellation insurance will ensure that the florist doesn’t incur any loss. This is another potential prospect you can explore.
4. People Looking to Turn Their Life Around After Legal Trouble
According to Rutgers University, over 70% of all Americans have been on the wrong side of the law, with most of them ending up in jail. North Carolina, for example, records 128,000 people who are thrown in jail annually. The jail cells serve as detention centers where the culprits are held as they await trial. This is another group to which you can target life insurance packages.
Most of these culprits, however, don’t stay in the cells for long. A consultation with a bail bond agency could be all they need to get released as they await trial. If an individual doesn’t have the full amount to foot bail, they can use the money saved in their life insurance policy (as long as they have a permanent policy) before contacting one of the many bondsman agents.
5. People Prone to Injury or Disease
The risks you face when all you do at your workplace is sit behind your desk and peruse through heaps of files are minor compared to a person who’s always out in the field or operating heavy machinery. If you cycle a lot, especially professionally, you may at one time or another need a bicycle accident attorney. Common types of work-related injuries include broken bones, neck and back pains, paralysis, lacerations, and repetitive stress injuries, among others. Each employer must ensure that their employees are working in a safe environment. However, unforeseen events may still occur, resulting in injuries. In such a case, you can use this angle to convince them that they need life insurance, or in the best-case scenario, a workplace injury lawyer.
6. Anyone Nervous About Their Life or Safety
Most people go through life without a shred of worry or doubt. However, some people pursue career paths that leave them constantly concerned about their safety. Take, for example, an auctioneer. Those working in this field may rub the people they evict from the auctioned properties the wrong way. As they forcefully remove these people from, say, a house that has been home for the evictees all their lives, they may find themselves on the receiving end of insults and threats.
These threats may be so grave that the auctioneer feels that their safety is compromised. As a life insurance agent, you can use this to convince them to get a life insurance policy. Let them know that life insurance will guarantee that their family is taken care of after they’re gone. However, implore them to take precautions to ensure that nothing happens to them in the first place. This may include getting in touch with a home security company.
7. People Looking to Invest Money for the Future
Life insurance is primarily intended to secure the financial future of the policyholder’s beneficiaries. However, due to the tax benefits that the policyholder enjoys, life insurance can be taken as an investment. However, not all life insurance policies have investment options. One would need to take up a policy that has cash value for it to be classified as an investment.
Typically, all permanent insurance covers have a cash value. There are four main types of permanent life insurance policies: universal, whole life, variable universal, and indexed universal. If, for example, a policyholder wants to buy a house and the initial down payment exceeds their current financial abilities, they can use whole life insurance to apply for jumbo loans, which allow them to make a down payment for a home.
How Can You Get Started?
Unlike other insurance policies, there is a plethora of life insurance policies. Picking the ‘right’ one can be a confusing task for anyone. Previously, not many people were keen to take up life insurance. However, since the global pandemic hit, more people are open to learning about and buying life insurance. In America, for example, a study carried out by Insurance Barometer indicates that one in every three Americans is open to buying life insurance after the COVID-19 pandemic. What this means is that a career as a life insurance agent has great dividends.
Characteristics of A Great Agent
Before asking yourself the question, can I make money selling life insurance? You first need to know what it takes to be a great agent. To be a great insurance agent, you need to possess a certain set of characteristics and skills. These include:
- People Skills: An agent who’s only interested in answering the question, can I make money selling life insurance without considering the interests of the customer won’t last in this business. The hardest part of an agent or broker’s work is earning the trust of their customers or potential clients; therefore, listening intently to what they have to say is key to a successful career. An agent willing to recommend a policy that pays a lower commission because it’s a better fit for the client’s needs is more likely to retain a loyal clientele.
- Excellent Customer Service: An agent who is easy to reach is more likely to retain customers as it gives them a sense of reassurance. This involves timely response to phone calls, e-mails, or any other form of correspondence. You also need to do what you say you’ll do, and when you say you’ll do it, or at the very least, have a solid reason why you can’t.
- Emotional Intelligence: This entails the capacity to hear clients out and empathize with them to discern their true needs and wants. Even when a client is adamantly opposed to it, a smart agent understands how to make them see the financial realities.
- High Energy Level: Being enthusiastic and happy at all times is one of the most important qualities of a successful insurance agent. Customers will immediately notice an agent with a worn-down disposition, reducing the chances of making a sale.
- Persistence: This is perhaps the most important trait of a competent insurance agent. You need to have the fortitude to accept rejection with a smile throughout your career. Good insurance agents know that each ‘no’ brings them closer to a ‘yes.’
So, here’s the final answer to the question: can I make money selling life insurance? It’s a resounding yes. You can make money from selling life insurance; all you need is to polish up your sales skills, be resilient, stay positive and smile. You’ll also need to know when to work with other service providers, such as certified public insurance adjusters. If you have other questions, don’t hesitate to reach out to us.