6 Tips for Successful Truck Insurance Prospecting

6 Tips for Successful Truck Insurance Prospecting

According to AVP of Carrier Software, Kyle Lack, there are around 390,000 long-haul, interstate trucking companies in the U.S. today. As an agent, where and HOW should you begin to sort through that many prospects and figure out where you can find the most success and save you the most time?

Advice from a Veteran Truck Insurance Specialist and NATMI-certified Safety Director Buddy “Roy” Walls “Nobody is born to be a truck insurance agent, you have to do your homework.”

Here are 6 things you can do today to get more ROI out of your prospecting. 

#1 Do your homework.

Before you ever pick up the phone, research the company you are working with, Pull a Snap VU Report, review the detailed information on their MCS 150, ISS Score, radius of operation, type of commodities hauled, type of trucks and cargo, understand their CSA Scores to better communicate with a prospect. Evaluate what this carrier looks like to see if they have a market that will be interested in that type of carrier. There is no sense in wasting their time if you don’t have market interested in insuring that type of carrier. Use that research to prospect companies that your available markets are aggressively wanting to underwrite. You want to go after opportunities that you think you have an 80% chance of closing with your underwriter.

#2 Start early.

A relationship doesn’t develop overnight. It takes time. At least 6 months prior to renewal, pull a SNAP-VU report and a detailed Insure-VU Underwriting Report, and actually understand the safety condition of a company. When you start the relationship early, it gives you an upper hand in positioning yourself against other brokers that are wanting to quote them as well. If there are issues with safety that need to be addressed prior to renewal, you will then have 6 months to help put them in a better position to get quoted with your market. Ultimately, this saves them money and builds trust with you.

#3 Bring solutions to the table.

According to Accenture, “The use of customer data to generate relevant, real-time usage- and behavior-based offers that help customers mitigate, manage, and recover from loss can help insurers build trust with customers. That’s the value advanced data analytics can deliver both to the insurance customer and to the insurer.”

Have SOMETHING in hand that you can provide for them that makes their life easier. Make sure that you understand the data you are reviewing so well that you can spot a violation that should be Data Q’d. Example, “I noticed that your MCS-150 filing is out of date.” “I noticed that you have 3 Basics in Alert Status, and here are your problem areas.” “I noticed you have a MUST Inspect ISS Score.” Provide information of value to the company, it gives you a lot of credibility. Have your Snap-VU report in hand; you may teach them something about their company they didn’t even know.

#4 Be realistic.

Let the potential client know up front what markets you are available to quote, and list them in order of preference. Don’t try to quote on a market that won’t be successful. If you have done your homework, you should know what markets will want your prospect. If possible, try to get the trucking company to send a letter to your underwriter assigning you as the broker of record for that specific market.

#5 Find a mentor

Have someone that you can ask a lot of questions, and someone that can lead by example. Learn from what the coach is teaching you. Success breeds success. Make sure your mentor is someone that is successful. Ask other producers “How much premium do you book?” “What size accounts do you target” “What type of accounts do you target that your insurance company underwriter has an appetite for?” Have your mentor introduce you to the underwriter. The underwriter obviously trusts the mentor, and that will go a long way in establishing a level of trust with your underwriter.

#6 Find a focus.

You can only feed so many sharks. Find a few, good aggressive markets. Use market analysis reports to determine who is writing business in certain geographic regions.

Most of our clients who implemented these procedures experienced higher return on investment and increase on premiums earned in just a few short months. Carrier Software offers a suite of prospecting, truck insurance marketing, and underwriting analysis tools. Visit our products page here.

$120,000 in New Truck Insurance Premium in Less Than 2 Months

$120,000 in New Truck Insurance Premium in Less Than 2 Months

Company Profile

Waypoint Agency, LLC is an independent truck insurance agency located in Gulfport, MS whose “Client-First philosophy is the foundation for everything [they] do.” They strongly believe insurance professionals need to genuinely understand the industries they serve and have invested time learning about the challenges trucking companies face every day – and invested the resources necessary to solve them.

Why did they need Carrier Software’s help?

They wanted to efficiently expand their business and gain more clients. They had previously subscribed to a different, but well known, source of truck insurance leads and were optimistic that the leads would provide a positive ROI. But at the time, the competitive leads were not helping them write more truck insurance policies. Being solely dependent on selling insurance for a livelihood, they were anxious to find a source for truck insurance leads that would generate more revenue.

Carrier Software Products Employed

As a small agency, saving time prospecting was a high priority. During a live personalized demonstration, the Carrier Software sales rep discussed their needs and showed them how DOT Leads could provide them with fresh and accurate leads, updated daily, using the FMCSA Database. There is no middleman to delay clients from receiving the most current lead information available anywhere! In just a few seconds, the user-friendly search filters enabled them to find the specific truck companies they wanted to write. In contrast to the competitive leads they were using, Carrier Software’s DOT Leads program includes an integrated CRM program, online Call Notes with Reminders and Email marketing. All information is easily tailored to download and import into directly into their existing agency management system.

Outcome

The DOT Leads proved to be a huge time saver. The automatic reminders enabled them to keep track of each prospect with whom they spoke and alerted them when a follow-up was due. The activity status tracking allowed them to quickly find leads that were hot prospects, interested in a quote or with whom they closed the deal. After just a month and a half, they were excited to report that since signing up for Carrier Software’s DOT Leads for just a couple hundred per month, they had already written $120,000 in new truck insurance premium. The return on investment was over 1,000%.

Automated Daily Portal Monitoring  = Low CSA Scores

Automated Daily Portal Monitoring = Low CSA Scores

Company Profile

Based in Columbus, Nebraska, Puntney Trucking has 39 power units and 35 drivers. They first teamed up with Carrier Software in 2020.

Why did they need Carrier Software’s help?

Puntney Trucking was having a common issue among trucking companies, driver’s not reporting citations and inspections in a timely manner (or at all). Unless the driver self-reports, a company does not know when issues on the road are occurring and cannot correct the deficiencies. Using Daily Portal Monitoring Notifications, Puntney was easily able to view inspections in real-time and come up with corrective action plans to correct inspection issues before they happened again.

If you wait until the SMS Data updates monthly to look for new problem areas or inspections, you have a wide time frame for the driver or vehicle to be stopped for the same violations over and over and that can really drive up your scores quickly, resulting in high BASIC Scores. In addition to that, if the driver received a citation and doesn’t notify the company and then the driver doesn’t pay it, the carrier will be liable to pay the citation, potentially on a driver that’s already left the company.

Carrier Software Products Employed

Puntney enlisted in Carrier Software’s CSA Safety Improvement Program. This includes daily portal monitoring emails, telematics/ELD Tracking, BASIC Score trending analyses, driver performance tracking, and so much more. Daily e-mails include violations, crashes, citations, and clean inspections, if any.

Outcome

Now, Puntney receives all the news straight to their inbox in real time, with no effort or search at all. This has allowed them to be proactive by limiting driver behavior, fixing defective equipment, and protecting themselves from items that before were driving up their basic scores.

“Carrier Software’s daily reporting helped us be more aware of our fleet’s on-road behavior. Our CSA Scores needed a lot of improvement and Carrier Software team members were there every step of the way.”

56% Reduction  in ISS Score in  Less Than 7 Months

56% Reduction in ISS Score in Less Than 7 Months

Company Profile

Based in Laredo, TX, FREIGHTSOL LLC has been a prominent participant in the transportation of goods between the United States and Mexico since 2014. Initially starting out with a fleet of only 12 tractors and 50 trailers in 2014, as of 2021, FREIGHTSOL now operates 206 trucks and 295 drivers.

Why did they need Carrier Software’s help?

FREIGHTSOL’s insurance broker, Wess Peterson of Triumph Insurance out of Dallas, TX, referred FREIGHTSOL to Carrier Software in September of 2021. At that time, they had three BASIC Score alerts in Hours of Service, Driver Fitness, and Crash Indicator. Their ISS Score was 96%, which falls into DOT’s “must inspect” category.

Essentially, Freightsol knew which way they were trending and sought help to figure out where they had opportunities to strengthen their policies to be more proactive in helping keep our safety scores down. In the fast-paced world of trucking, it isn’t always easy to figure out where the breakdown of efforts is occurring, especially if you don’t have the right tools.

Carrier Software Products Employed

In order to get the TOOLS necessary to help them provide a full-circle safety approach and improve the overall safety culture, FREIGHTSOL enlisted in our CSA SAFETY Improvement Program. This includes the daily inspection emails, BASIC trending analyses, driver performance tracking.

Using the analytical tools available in the program, they were able to see the Root-Cause-Analysis and implemented a corrective action plan that quickly helped them turn their path around. The main points of their corrective action plan included strengthening their disciplinary policies and implementing proactive measures and bonus programs to encourage clean DOT Inspections.

Outcome

By November of 2021, after two months of using Carrier Software’s services, 3 Alerts dropped to 1 Alert. In April of 2022, just 7 months after teaming up with Carrier Software, their ISS Score was down to 40%, which is a pass. That’s a 56% reduction in ISS Score. Not only will this save their driver’s time by not getting pulled in for inspection as much, it also has HUGE implications on how many insurance markets they will be available to be quoted by at renewal.

“The CSA Safety Improvement Program helped us figure out why our BASIC and ISS scores were high and what we could do change it. The overall safety culture of our company has improved since getting involved with Carrier Software.”

May 2022 Commercial Trucking Insurance Market Analysis: New Primary Liability Filings

May 2022 Commercial Trucking Insurance Market Analysis: New Primary Liability Filings

The Carrier Software Market Analysis provides retail agents and insurance companies a ranked list of the highest performing trucking insurance underwriters by various attributes, including total policies, BASIC measures, power unit groups, and more.

May 2022 Market Analysis Preview

Insurer

May 2022 Liability Filings

30 Day Change

1
UNITED FINANCIAL CASUALTY COMPANY
(PROGRESSIVE)
2182
-3%
2
PROGRESSIVE COUNTY MUTUAL
(PROGRESSIVE)
1654
+11%
3
ARTISAN & TRUCKERS CASUALTY COMPANY
(PROGRESSIVE)
1029
0%
4
PROGRESSIVE SOUTHEASTERN INSURANCE COMPANY
(PROGRESSIVE)
867
+7%
5
CANAL INSURANCE CO.
(CANAL)
809
+13%
6
GREAT WEST CASUALTY CO.
(GREAT WEST)
809
-9%
7
PROGRESSIVE CASUALTY INSURANCE COMPANY
(PROGRESSIVE)
806
+3%
8
PROGRESSIVE MOUNTAIN INSURANCE COMPANY OF OHI
(PROGRESSIVE)
789
+11%
9
PROGRESSIVE NORTHERN INSURANCE COMPANY
(PROGRESSIVE)
780
+1%
10
NORTHLAND INSURANCE COMPANY
(TRAVELERS)
619
+5%
… 327 More Insurers