Practice and client management

Iwould rather be poked in the eye with a sharp stick than sit through a humdrum and aimless sales presentation that goes nowhere. What needless pain that is. There is something to say for sales momentum and pursuing a goal in everything you say and do.

For the benefit professional who hates making cold calls or following up on direct mail, networking can be the next best alternative. But, like any marketing strategy - and yes, marketing is necessary - networking requires consistency of action over a period of time. Too many benefit professionals join a local Chamber of Commerce, go to one or two events and fail to generate even one appointment and then never return, believing that networking is a waste of time and energy.

Experience with the health insurance exchanges in Massachusetts and Utah suggest these reform mechanisms will retain a strong need for brokers to provide buyers with market education and guidance.

Despite concerns about the impact of rising health care costs on their businesses and employees, only one in six employers (16%) say they favor a federally funded universal health care system, according to the 2011 UBA Benefits Opinion Survey from United Benefit Advisors.

Although benefits comprise 30% to 40% of an employee’s total compensation, they’re largely hidden from view, which can serve to undermine benefits appreciation.

The economy and health reform may have prompted the youngest workers at U.S. companies to take a deeper interest in workplace benefits, according to online research conducted by Harris Interactive on behalf of Unum.

One year into the brave new world of health care reform, there’s good news and there’s bad news, says industry insider Eric Johnson.

This is a time of significant change for the employee benefits industry, but rather than respond with panic, consultant Alan Katz urges brokers and advisers to prepare for whatever lays ahead by learning from the habits of successful producers.

In this month's installment in our sales training series - which follows February's and March's columns on buyer motivation ("If you want to sell, do this ..." pgs. 56 and 68, respectively), we'll look at the art of painting mental pictures for your buyer - an art that can result in an AOR.

There are numerous reasons to move the sale of ancillary products to the forefront of your sales strategy, not the least of which is a significant increase in your revenue.

Unanswered questions and unknown repercussions abound as regulators continue to flesh out the provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act framework. For employers, it is a frustrating time of uncertainty and confusion.

Faced with the current challenges brought on by the financial crisis, company priorities have been forced to shift, and employees are left often with a lack of understanding and insufficient guidance on their benefits choices at work.

A National Association of Insurance Commissioners task force is seeking comments from brokers, agents and advisers on the impact of PPACA’s medical loss ratio rules. The comments will be the basis of a meeting of the task force scheduled for later this month.

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.

Employers struggling to stay afloat in the flood of guidance on implementing the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will find themselves looking both forward and backward this year. Their challenge: to gauge how the PPACA rules issued so far are affecting their plans while at the same time anticipating the changes that lie ahead in 2012, 2014, and even 2018.

Several members of Congress from both political parties expressed support last week for the role of the agent and broker post-health care reform. The legislators addressed a crowd of more than 700 at the National Association of Health Underwriters’ annual Capitol Conference in Washington, D.C. — including calls for the medical loss ratio provision of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to be altered.

Despite efforts to defund PPACA in the Republican-controlled House, and prospects of a Supreme Court test for the federal health reform law, employers are forging ahead as best they can with short-term compliance issues and long-term strategic decisions.

The economy and health reform may have prompted the youngest workers at U.S. companies to take a deeper interest in workplace benefits, according to online research conducted by Harris Interactive on behalf of Unum.

State health insurance exchanges mandated in the health care reform law — assuming they survive court challenges to the law — are getting federal funds to launch but must be self-sustaining afterward.