LTCI: Regarding referrals

Upson also benefits from his close relationships with CPAs, many of whom are encountering the need for LTCI in their personal lives and with aging clients. Those relationships stem from Upson’s work as a financial advisor, part of which involves the review of clients’ tax returns in a search for tax savings. Upson is not an accountant, so with clients’ permission he would retain local CPAs to review the clients’ returns with him. The alliances he developed with those CPAs are an important source of referrals for him. “As a consequence of doing that, I have become much more conversant with tax returns,” he says. “I have also developed very close relationships with CPAs, who now send me business because they understand what I do and how I cut taxes for clients. Those kinds of relationships are very deep and very rich because they will refer me to businesses, individuals, charities, and groups of people. And as a consequence, I wind up doing group benefits for the CPAs themselves, so I am in their office and seeing them on a frequent basis.”

Nancy Morith, CLU, CASL, LTCP and president of NP Morith Inc. in Princeton, N.J., has also developed a reputation as a LTCI expert. In addition to 20 years of working with LTCI clients–roughly 80 percent of whom are referred by other professionals–she also serves as an adjunct faculty member at The American College in Bryn Mawr, Penn. To generate referrals from existing clients, Morith sends them a newsletter with updates on developments in the long term care market, policy enhancements, and legislation that might affect their coverage. Each issue also offers a policy review and reminds clients that Morith welcomes referrals to clients’ friends and associates.

Morith’s approach to developing professional referrals recognizes that potential referral sources are often being approached by multiple LTCI salespeople. In order to stand out from the crowd, Morith takes the approach of asking what she can do to help the referral source. “So for me that meant doing pro bono work in the beginning to establish the fact that I knew what I was talking about, had great depth of knowledge, and that I wasn’t one of the herd,” she says. “That may perhaps be seeking an opportunity to talk to the local section of the bar association, and if possible, doing programs of educational matter for them.”

It’s important to consider a wider audience for educational programs, Morith believes. She has hosted roundtable discussions at local hospitals and invited senior management, care managers and discharge staff, among others. Although those professionals might not be in the market for LTCI, they can influence patients and patients’ families’ decisions. “If you have created a positive image amongst the care managers, guess whose name will be on their lips when they talk about how the family members in the next generation down should prepare for this themselves with insurance,” she says. “So there is an enormous net that can be spread to the related professionals.”

Client referrals
Existing LTCI clients are another valuable source of referrals. But even your most satisfied clients probably need periodic reminders that you welcome their referrals and are actively seeking them. Charlie Reed, Ph.D., CLTC, and owner of Long-Term Care Insurance Connection, Inc. in Asheville, N.C., has sold LTCI since 1998. She’s developed an innovative method for identifying prospective referrals from clients. After a client starts working with Reed, one of Reed’s staff members conducts an online search to identify boards the client serves on, where they live, etc. Reed uses that information to develop a list of possible prospects that the client knows. She then shows the list to the client, explains that she would like to contact the people listed and asks permission to use the client’s name during the initial contact. Most clients are comfortable with her approach, she’s found. “It’s very rare that clients mind,” she says. “Sometimes they’ll look through the list and say, ‘I don’t think you want to contact that person,’ or ‘I don’t think that person would be interested,’ but typically what they’ll say is ‘Sure, I have no problem with that.’”

Mickey Batsell, CLU, CASL, is the vice president, sales for Individual Commercial Brokerage in Leander, Texas. Batsell, a board member of the Society of Financial Services Professionals, has been selling LTCI exclusively for eight years. He tells clients from the beginning of their work together that the primary way he builds his
business is through referrals from clients. “There are two things I ask of them,” he says. “If the subject of long term care comes up with some of their friends, I say, remember our relationship. The other thing I ask is don’t keep me a secret. I need them to help spread the word and they do.”

Some clients balk at this approach, and in those cases Batsell reminds them that he will be sending them a quarterly newsletter. That helps keep his name in front of clients, and he asks them again to mention his name if the subject of LTCI comes up in their conversations. “I want them to remember me and say, ‘You know what, I know somebody that you can talk to that that I feel comfortable with and I know you’d feel comfortable with him too.’”