There’s a heated discussion about a cold subject going on at the AA&B LinkedIn readers’ network.

It all started when a reader posted a link to a blog entry by sales consultant Steve Kloyda about his unpleasant experience with a salesperson who cold called him, then lied that he’d already spoken to him — when Kloyda knew he hadn’t.

It sound innocuous enough, but the posting started a debate among several readers about the ethics — and efficiency — of the practice of cold calling, and the right and wrong way to do it. The debate essentially boiled down to what exactly is acceptable in cold calling, and morphed into  a discussion of more controversial cold calling practices, such as dropping in on prospects unannounced, or following a script on a phone cold call that’s clearly fake. Even AA&B columnist Chris Amrhein got in on the controversy, defending the practice of the drop-in while reviling the fakery of an aggressive canned pitch, a la the “boiler room” denizens in David Mamet’s masterful play (and movie) on the sales mentality, “Glengarry Glen Ross.”

Agents and brokers understandably pride themselves on being professionals, on acting as “trusted advisors” to their customers. Producers practicing overly aggressive cold calling run the risk of compromising that perception and casting the profession back into the image of the hand-gripping, fast-talking used car salesman.

Everyone agrees cold calling is a part of any sales job. But my question to you is, how cold is your cold calling? A sale is a sale, and these are tough times. Would you go as far as the salesman who called Steve Kloyda and lie in your pitch? Do you consider “drop-in” visits to prospects acceptable or anathema? Have you ever crossed the fine line between cold call and telemarketer?

In short, what’s OK in this area and what isn’t?

To paraphrase the late, great Rodney Dangerfield, independent insurance agents don’t get no respect.

It’s bad enough that a recent career survey ranked your profession below janitors, bookbinders and even editors (see my related blog, ”At least you’re not a roustaboust“). Now, the latest Forrester Research consumer survey reveals that your customers don’t even find you fun.

The survey, conducted over the Internet last October, gave independent agents an overall score of “okay” from 4,600 consumers who had interacted with a variety of companies. Forrester asked consumers to rate insurance companies on three areas: “meets needs,” “easy to work with” and “enjoyable.” Several insurers, including USAA, Liberty Mutual, Progressive and The Hartford, were ranked “good” by respondents. But when it came to being “enjoyable,” consumers rated independent agents “poor,” while giving them “good” ratings for “meets needs” and “easy to work with.”

What does this mean? Evidently it’s not an ease-of-use issue; respondents ranked agents “good” on meeting customer needs and being easy to work with. And it’s not just a carrier issue, either. Savvy carriers know, and slower carriers are discovering, that it’s not enough to simply provide ease of use through technology and real-time services — in fact, that’s just the starting point (see this related article on Deep Customer Connections’ recent survey on agents telling carriers they need more ease of use).  

From just looking at the numbers, the problem seems to be with the agency system itself, as several carriers got high marks from consumers as being enjoyable to work with. Granted, the results may be skewed because of the focus on personal lines insurance purchasers, but this dissing of insurance agents shouldn’t be the case. It all boils down to the perception of insurance agent as unnecessary middleman, useful perhaps, but more likely just another roadblock between the customer and the underwriter.

The irony is, agents are in a much better position to deliver real customer satisfaction — and yes, even “fun” – than any insurer ever could. In our monthly agency success stories, we speak with agency owners, especially those in small towns or rural areas, who don’t think twice about emergency customer visits, of knowing the names and ages of teenaged drivers about to be added to a family’s auto policy, of engaging customers in intimate conversations to discover their plans for the future and how insurance coverage can help protect those plans. These agencies and their employees are also connecting to their communities through charitable work, recruitment at area schools, and other ways to create engagement with customers and prospects. It’s a testament to the level of service that every independent agent should be providing to valued customers, especially at a time when every customer counts.

And inevitably in today’s world, part of that customer outreach is through intelligently developed and executed social media planning. Maybe that’s where the smart carriers have an edge on agencies — they have the financial wherewithal and staffing to plunge right in. (Luckily, you don’t need these resources to make good use of this new tool: check out ACT’s recommendations for creating a social media policy for your independent agency). 

With more insurers, including traditional direct writers, using multiple distribution methods, the stakes are higher than ever for agents to prove themselves invaluable to their customers — not just by meeting their insurance needs in a smart and timely way, but by engaging with them on multiple levels.

What’s your agency doing to build your brand perception with your customers?

If you watched President Obama’s State of the Union speech last night, you’ll know that although priorities may have shifted, he still supports both healthcare and financial services reform — the most recent permutation of which includes the elimination of insurers’ antitrust exemption. Unfortunately, to politicians and people in general, ”insurance,” “health insurance” and “financial services” are three dirty words that mean the same thing: bilking the public.

You might say that ever since the 1999 Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act,  banks seem to have gotten the better end of the association with insurance.  And a study released this week suggests that banks are banking on insurance — specifically, agents and brokers — more than ever. A recent report by Michael White Associates LLC shows that insurance brokerage fee income for more than 7,000 savings banks and bank holding companies hit $3.05 billion in third-quarter 2009, a 11.7% increase over last year and the highest level in the last five quarters.  These fees include commissions and other fees earned from selling insurance products, as well as referrals for credit, life, health, property-casualty and title insurance.

The top 3 gainers for brokerage fees in the first three quarters of 2009 were:

1. Wells Fargo & Co., $1.38 billion, up 5.34% from the first nine months of 2008
2. Citigroup Inc., $771 million, down 19.27% from the year-ago period
3. BB&T Corp., $699.9 million, 11.8% gain from the year-ago period.

“Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” to paraphrase Seinfeld. We’ve interviewed many agents whose businesses are affiliated with banks, and most seem very happy with the arrangement. But in the course of the last year or so, as “financial services” has become synonymous with shaft, trickery and deceit, maybe it isn’t such a good thing to be lumped into that category.

Just this week, PCI CEO David Sampson warned attendees at the group’s annual executive roundtable that property-casualty insurance could very well get caught up in the “wave of political populism” that’s crashing down on banks, health insurers and other financial services institutions. So far, agents’ enviable position as trusted advisors to their customers has helped them dodge that wave. Let’s hope it’s a position we can retain through the rough times ahead.