Page 138 - The UnCaptive Agent

TOOLS YOU’LL NEED AND WHEN YOU’LL NEED THEM 111

The other, more dominant system is sold by SalesForce™.
Another option for CRM is Hubspot™, if you decide to
build your website using their software. The advantage of
Hubspot™ in this regard is that data about prospects and
customers will be integrated into your website rather than
a separate data silo. You should look at all three of these
systems (and potentially others) and, if at all possible, begin
your agency with a CRM system in place.

Website Considerations

Every legitimate business now has a website. If you
don’t have a website, you are not in business. In fact, all
the studies of consumer insurance shopping behavior
indicate that consumers, once they learn of your exis-
tence, will go to your website and do a little research on
you before they willingly engage with you. So, before
you open your doors, you must have a website ready
to launch. There are several things that are critically
important to provide in your new agency website. The
first and most important of those is that it must be
adapted for mobile devices. Nearly seventy-five percent
of Internet search (as of 2020) is now conducted on
mobile devices, and if your website is not adapted for
these devices, consumers will click off almost immedi-
ately. Soon, having a non-mobile optimized website will
be almost as bad as not having a website at all.
Your website should also feature client self-service
capability through integration with your agency man-
agement system. Your website provider or developer
should include functionality that allows you to easily
update it. Use of WordPress™ as the backbone for the
website make this easily possible (although, in my expe-
rience, it doesn’t offer the data analysis and manipulation
capability that Hubspot™ does).