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Health care reform has been good for business - true or false? These days, it still depends on whom you ask. Ask a producer who sells critical care insurance, though, and the answer you'll probably get is "true."

Voluntary benefits is often referred to as "worksite marketing." Many carriers, in fact, refer to their voluntary products as "worksite voluntary benefits." Recent developments in enrollment technology, however, are rapidly making the term "worksite" obsolete and no longer relevant to the voluntary benefits process. The term "worksite" derives from how these benefits have had to be enrolled. As products that are voluntarily purchased by employees, the only consistently effective means of presenting (and selling) them have been one-on-one employee meetings with licensed benefit counselors (enrollers) at the workplace during the workday.

The social business software market is evolving rapidly, and so are the language and features of the category.

To begin, we learned about the Death of worksite voluntary benefits. Well, not so much the death of them, but more of a re-working. We need to keep in touch and keep tabs on the market place. It's important to keep up with the terms being used - "core" and "voluntary" might have new meanings to your prospective clients. You've got to stay in touch with carriers offering worksite plans and be up to speed on how they integrate with the entire benefit package - or some other adviser will be telling your former clients about it!

In last month's column we detailed the three psychological states that benefits buyers find themselves in, especially the one you want to lead a buyer to - "satisfied." If you missed my last column, you may want to pick up a copy of the February issue of EBA or read the digital edition on the EBA website, eba.benefitnews.com.

Unless you've been living under a rock, you are already aware that at least one major carrier has announced that premiums for groups of 51 employees or more will no longer include commissions. The agent can specify the commission level desired and it will be billed by the carrier, but it will be a line item visible to the client.

The notion that you can do well by doing good is alive and well in the 401(k) and qualified plan marketplace. Advisers, however, are walking a tightrope. With a big push by the government for more disclosure and stricter fiduciary standards, broker-dealers are struggling to allow their advisers to act as fiduciaries without opening themselves to unwanted liability. Meanwhile, plan sponsors are looking for advisers who can help their participants be more successful in retirement yet limit their costs, liability and work.

As the economy starts to stabilize, retirement plan experts say plan sponsors need to emphasize certain elements of their retirement education and advice programs to get workers back on track and saving for retirement.

While some media outlets have focused on the unscrupulous acts of life insurers and agents marketing unsuitable products to military families, Mike Nordquist and his agency, Consolidated Financial Group, have worked diligently over the past 35 years to protect the financial interests of U.S. soldiers and their families.

Advisers looking for innovative ways to help their clients attack health care costs now have a new arrow in their quiver: the nascent field of surgery benefit management. SBM combines the use of medical centers of excellence and medical tourism with data mining, predictive modeling, health coaching and case management.