5 Strategies to Sell More ACA Products

You’ve got advantageous sales goals during this year’s Open Enrollment Period. These five sales strategies could help you close more sales.

Incorporate these marketing and customer relations suggestions into your business plan for the opportunity to make more ACA sales all year long.

1. Understand Your Clients’ Needs

When working with clients to find the right ACA coverage, it’s important to have a comprehensive understanding of their current and their potential future needs. Having a complete understanding of your clients’ health insurance priorities will allow you and your clients to make an informed decision about which plan will be the best fit for them.

Consider your clients’:

• Current health status
• Average number of visits in a year
• Medications
• Budget
• Preferred hospital network or providers

Having a complete understanding of your clients’ health insurance priorities will allow you and your clients to make an informed decision about which plan will be the best fit for them.

Make sure you consider all elements of a plan in order to place your client in a plan that will meet their needs. When in a client meeting or phone call, ask how often they visit the doctor or emergency room, or if they have chronic health conditions that could require additional care.

2. Be a Source of Knowledge

The insurance industry is constantly changing; that’s why it’s important to stay on top of new plans and carriers in your area, as well as compliance and regulation changes. As things change in the industry, make sure that your clients can trust you and easily approach you with questions about their insurance plans. We recommend becoming knowledgeable about the types of insurance you plan to sell.

There are several educational resources available to agents looking to gain a better understanding of marketplace insurance. We recommend HealthCare.gov’s blog for help with tricky situations or other questions you may have. And at Ritter, we’re committed to keeping agents informed about noteworthy and significant updates.

We’ve compiled helpful blog posts, resources, and more for marketplace agents on our Surviving OEP page. This page rotates content before OEP, during OEP, and after the OEP to display timely information!

Ritter also has resources available for agents looking to grow their ACA knowledge or brush up on facts, like our eBook, The Complete Guide to Selling Affordable Care Act Insurance Plans. This guide covers the basics, gives marketing tips to reach more clients, and provides resources such as a cold call script, customizable letter, and helpful metal tiers comparison chart for clients.

If your clients can sense you’re a knowledgeable agent, they’ll likely feel comfortable coming to you with questions and referring you to their family, friends, coworkers, and more! Your clients should be able to trust you with something as important as their health insurance. They should always feel as if you’re in their corner.

3. Reduce the Number of Options

There isn’t a shortage of options when it comes to health insurance. However, finding just the right plan for your client can be overwhelming for them. One reason that we recommend knowing your clients’ needs well is so that you can eliminate plans that will be less beneficial to them.

While having options and being able to choose your own plan can be empowering, too many choices can create decision fatigue. You’ll also save time by being able to present your clients with a shorter list of plans to choose from. While navigators cannot recommend one plan over another, but you can eliminate options that won’t be beneficial.

While having options and being able to choose your own plan can be empowering, too many choices can create decision fatigue.

Use search filters to eliminate some of the options available. On HealthSherpa and most state-based exchange platforms, you can filter plan options by monthly premium amount, maximum deductible amount, and more to consider options that align with your client’s budget.

HealthSherpa is a direct enrollment tool that can be used to shop and compare plans with your client and make finding an individual health plan even easier. As a Ritter agent, you can join us on HealthSherpa by using code FB05 to gain access to sales support and lead-sharing opportunities.

Note: Currently, HealthSherpa is available in all federal exchange states and Georgia.

Additionally, you can compare up to five plans at once on HealthSherpa and send the comparison to your client through the platform. If your client qualifies for Advanced Premium Tax Credit subsidies, but not cost-sharing reductions (CSRs), consider quoting a few of the lowest-cost bronze, silver, and gold plan options.

If your client does qualify for a CSR, concentrate your efforts on silver plans. These plans are the only options available to use with a CSR.

4. Build Relationships

As an agent selling ACA health insurance plans, your target clients are under 65 years old, and guess what? Almost all of them use the internet. We recommend you stay up to date in your lead-generation methods and determine your social media strategy.

Social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn make it easy to connect with others at any time, building relationships outside of business hours.

Cultivating client retention is one of the most important things you can do for your business. At minimum, we recommend responding to emails within two days, responding to calls within 24 hours, and being on time for business meetings.

Learn new customer retention strategies and transform your business. Read our recommendations in The Complete Guide to Client Loyalty and Retention.

5. Understand the Impact

Periodically, set aside time to analyze the work you’ve done in the last few months. Were there channels that were more effective than others? Were there campaigns that generated several leads for your business? Understanding the impact of your work is crucial and an important step to improving your sales strategy year over year.

Of course, there are more statistics that matter than just new business. Making sales is important, as it’s what keeps your business running, but check in with your current clients and make sure they’re happy with the services you provide. Some agents choose to send surveys to clients to gauge responses and adapt their strategies.

When your current clients are happy, they’ll come back, and maybe, they’ll refer friends or family to you as well.

No matter what combination of ACA sales strategies you choose to implement, Ritter is here to back you up while you strive to achieve your goals. If you’d like recommendations from our knowledgeable Sales team, contact us today!