Whatever your primary business is, let's just say, for the purpose of example, that it's selling life insurance... So you sell a life insurance policy to your client to protect their estate, their retirement, their loved ones; and you don't talk to them about disability insurance to protect their income. Then your client becomes disabled. Instead of their first phone call being to you to help them set the wheels in motion to tap into their disability policy, maybe their first phone call will be to their lawyer because you didn't offer them disability insurance as a means to protect their income. Suddenly the burden has fallen right into your lap.
If you have clients that work for a living, not only should you be selling the idea of financial protection, your most serious advice to them should be about protecting their paycheck. 95% of disabling accidents and illnesses are not work related, so Worker's Compensation doesn't cover them and only 1/3 of workers have access to a disability insurance plan at work.
If you sell disability insurance, you must also practice what you preach, and buy a disability policy on yourself. When you purchase a disability insurance policy on yourself, you benefit in many ways:
- You experience firsthand the application and underwriting process, giving you valuable insight into what your clients will experience
- You address your own income protection needs
- You earn first-year commissions and ongoing renewals that help offset a portion of your premium each year
According to Life Happens, approximately every 7 seconds, a working-age American suffers a disabling injury or illness that will last for at least one month. 50% of them wouldn't be able to meet their expenses after one month without a paycheck and some won't last even that long.
Selling disability insurance is also a huge market opportunity because there aren't many agents selling it. 51% of consumers are concerned about supporting themselves if they were injured or became ill and couldn't work, but only 29% actually own disability insurance.
The disability insurance sale is a more difficult one, but if you put forth the effort, it pays well and it might help you sleep better at night. We challenge you to find ways to make the need for disability insurance relate-able to your clients. There are many tools and calculators available to help you draw connections between the coverage and your clients’ everyday lives.
*All references to statistics can be found at lifehappens.org.
