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How to increase your protection business

04/04/2024

By Carl Heard, National Account Manager, LV=

Often when you reflect on those clients that decided they didn’t want to take out protection after being offered your professional advice, it can start to feel a little personal. 

Almost like a relationship that perhaps isn’t quite working out…where you start to think ‘is it you or me’?

Not wishing to start a new line in marriage counselling, perhaps however we can start to think about how to at least ‘freshen up’ that relationship with clients and recreate that protection ‘spark’.

Freshening up

One element that Consumer Duty brought us in 2023 was a prompt for you to check in on the relationship you hold with your clients. To not only act in good faith, but to think more about how you interact with them; how you support them; and that they understand the situation you are discussing. 

When Consumer Duty talks about the ‘design of products and services’ as one of the four outcomes, it is easy to think that relates to the creation of products (the manufacturer / insurance provider). However, even as ‘the distributor’ this outcome also relates to you and your business. You create the advice service that you offer your clients and how you manage that client relationship is within your control.


When was the last time you reviewed how you interact with your clients? Where does the positioning of the protection need sit within your processes and marketing of your business? With so many challenges and disruption within the mortgage market, does that positioning of protection need a refresh? 


If we think first about the ‘shop window’ of your business. This could be your website, your social media presence or that first meeting you have with a client. How does the client know that part of your qualified advice will be to discuss their protection needs? 

33% chance of being unable to work for two months or more

The first date

Within the latest Viewpoint research from the Association of Mortgage Intermediaries, 77% of advisers said they raised protection either at the introduction or fact find stage of the client relationship¹. So as a first step towards this new refreshed relationship, consider when does a client appreciate the support you can offer them in respect of protection advice. Is it on your website? Do you talk about it in your social media posts? Are you introducing it early into the relationship with your client? 

One tool that stands out as being a clear way to put protection on the radar for clients is the use of a risk calculator. 

LV’s risk reality calculator is uniquely a client facing tool that can be accessed directly by your clients. By highlighting the tool, your clients can start to appreciate the life risks that drive the need for protection. With no links to a product solution (and a clear recommendation to consult you as the adviser), the risks illustrated by the tool can be used within that initial ‘shop window’ of your client interactions. Already ensuring that your client is appreciating the importance of the protection conversation that will be taking place.

The average UK worker is supporting 3 people with their income
 

The conversation starter

As part of that new (or renewed) relationship with your client, you want that conversation to be engaging. Crucially you also want to understand as much about their lives as you can to ensure you can offer them the protection advice they need. 

When did you last review the questions you ask your clients? Are they generating the responses that ensure your clients are engaged when you discuss protection?

In the recent Reaching Resilience research carried out by LV=, the average UK worker is supporting 3 people from their income2. When your client considers their outgoings from their income, are they considering the loved ones that it supports or do their minds relate it to those financial transactions on their bank statements. Within our research we asked who else relies on that person’s income, which had the responses you would expect such as partner or younger children. However, that question also opened up a much wider response, such as older children; parents; and other family members. Your clients have a wide variety of loved ones that depend on their income and are not just financial transactions.

If we again refer to Consumer Duty, one of the three cross-cutting rules is that ‘firms must enable and support retail customers to pursue their financial objectives’. It’s easy to assume that paying a mortgage and keeping a roof over a family’s head is a ‘financial objective’, however consider for a moment what your own ‘financial objectives’ would be. Perhaps it would be pension provision; to financially support your children through university; that memory making family holiday each year; or just being able to support your family members financially should the need arise. Asking a client what their own ‘financial objectives’ are can create that wide response and personal attachment to how important their income is to support those objectives. 

Taking that relationship to the next step

Now it’s time to take your relationship into the next stage as you’re both ready to commit… time for you to recommend the protection products that will be there to support your clients in their time of need. 


At LV=, we’re committed to helping you ensure your clients can become financially resilient, and our range of income protection products are there to support your clients should they be unable to work due to injury or illness.


We also understand how important it is to keep those relationships ‘current’ and our range of member benefits such as access to a private GP and support services such as physiotherapy will enable your client to remain engaged with their LV= policy and their relationship with you.

Whilst our account managers may not be able to offer that marriage counselling, they can support you as you broaden those protection conversations, increasing the number of clients undertaking that next step of your relationship.

 

¹AMI Protection Viewpoint 2023 – The Perception Gap: Research carried out by Opinium Research, 12th – 19th July 2023. 3,000 UK adults, 436 Independent Financial Advisers / Mortgage Advisers and 15 adults in the community group.

² LV= Reaching Resilience report: the data used in this report comes from a survey of 2,720 nationally representative UK workers conducted for LV= by Opinium between 15 – 25 October 2024.