Financial advisors play an important role in the overall success of businesses and individuals. Advisors help us manage our money as efficiently as possible, make recommendations for growing funds, and put a plan in place if the unexpected should occur.
As an advisor, your goal is to understand the needs of your clients so you can help them achieve financial success. You have so many areas of expertise and experience, ranging from investment vehicles to retirement planning and business planning.
Clients are looking for advisors who offer comprehensive solutions for their financial lives. Insurance is just one tool that serves an important purpose in protecting and growing wealth. Including insurance options and solutions – from life insurance to long-term care – is part of meeting those needs.
Yet it can be difficult to be an expert in every single financial product on the market. Life insurance is one resource your clients can benefit from, but it can be difficult to navigate the many options you have at your disposal to present the best solutions to your clients.
Why Life Insurance?
Part of being financially secure is being prepared for the unexpected. Discussing what-if scenarios can be an uncomfortable topic, but these conversations are a necessary part of the comprehensive financial planning process.
Think of life insurance as a back-up plan. If someone gets injured, becomes sick, or even loses their life, this can have a negative impact on their financial well-being and their ability to take care of their families. Life insurance is the policy to plan for an unexpected event and minimize any financial loss.
A Quick Look at the Life Insurance Market
There are five main types of life insurance to choose from:
- Term Life Insurance
- Whole Life Insurance
- Universal Life Insurance
- Variable Life Insurance
- Burial Insurance
Each type of life insurance has unique qualities and different price points depending on coverage length, if they build cash value and the kind of benefits that are delivered upon death.
Your clients need life insurance, but many don’t understand the value or have misconceptions about how much it may cost. Only about 52% of Americans have life insurance, and 44% of American households would encounter significant financial difficulties within half a year if they lost the primary wage earner in the family, and 28% would reach this point in only a month.
In addition to many different kinds of life insurance policies, things get even more complicated in the life insurance market. There are more than 700 life insurers in the United States, representing the largest sector of the trillion-dollar insurance industry. Navigating the different offers, understanding how carriers view different risk levels, and shopping for the right insurance at the right rate for your clients can be one daunting task.
Understandably, many advisors turn to the Internet for fast quotes. However, life insurance rates are based on the lifestyle and health of your clients, and automatic online insurance quotes are often substantially inaccurate. Misrepresenting life insurance policies can do irreparable harm to the client/advisor relationship.
The Dangers of Online Life Insurance Quotes
Your clients want to know what kind of life insurance they need and how much a life insurance policy is going to cost. Life insurance is all about assessing risk through the process of medical underwriting.
Medical underwriting involves asking your clients questions regarding their individual health and lifestyle. Many times clients will not disclose private or personal aspects of their health. This can pose a problem when submitting the application for life insurance and estimating premiums.
In a situation like this, an inaccurate quote can present a delicate situation where after presenting a solution, the individual client is rejected from an insurance company or the price is dramatically different from what you originally presented.
Think of it like this: online quoting engines are equivalent to us in our world to what Robo advisor tried to do in your world. There is no comparison for the level of education, experience, and service you provide.
Another Way: Partner with an Insurance Expert like Advanced Benefit Solutions
Partnering with an insurance brokerage to walk you through the life insurance underwriting process can add tremendous value to your relationships with your clients. We will utilize the same system as the online life insurance quote systems, but you’ll have a team of experts guiding you. The fees are the same!
We know the details of the medical underwriting process and how individual carriers view different medical conditions. This insight can make a dramatic difference when positioning yourself as an advocate and expert to your clients. Remember, there are hundreds of life insurance companies!
Advanced Benefit Solutions has been providing life insurance for decades. We know how to assess client risks and match them with the best carrier for their individual situation. It is vitally important to ask the specific questions – about both the client’s lifestyle AND their health history – to determine which carrier would be suitable.
We’ll work with you to review health history, discuss any health concerns, and ask the right questions. Some carriers even look at things like driving records as part of the application process!
Putting in the effort at the outset streamlines the process for you and your clients and delivers accurate information. We are all trying to do the best we can for our clients especially as it relates to being efficient, however, the unintended consequence is a lot more pain on the back end if things are not done correctly and efficiently.
Any undisclosed information can disrupt the process and there is simply nothing more frustrating than finding out about issues once the application is already in the underwriting stages.
Let Us Advocate for You & Your Clients
Let us serve as an advocate for you and your clients throughout the life insurance process. We have been forming relationships with financial advisors for the last 15 years to help provide life insurance solutions for clients.
If you’re an advisor and looking for a life insurance partner for your clients, get in touch with the Advanced Benefit Solutions team today.
