Although it hasn’t affected any of us on this side of the country as of yet, the recent GOOGLE movement into selling online auto insurance caught everyone’s attention in the insurance industry. Sure, there have been some others that still attempt to sell insurance online with at best, meager success. But to have the giant GOOGLE enter that market space got some attention. Personally, (and please forget that I do this for a living), person to person sales for big ticket items such as insurance still needs a person to handle it. Sure, we ALL get educated in some way online by seeing what is available, price shopping, price comparing etc. That’s one of the conveniences of having online availability. But to take that final step to give my money to a computer for something as big as insurance, I along with obviously many others, just can’t do it. We never know what the future holds in this arena but this GOOGLE development of pulling out of the online auto insurance sales market is an example of true selling/buying reality.

Take for example – purchasing a car. I bought a car last year and did much shopping over 6 to 8 months prior to purchase. I went to dealerships, shopped online, reviewed Kelly Blue Book online and Consumer Reports. After all of that, I felt like I was educated to make the right deal for the right car that worked for us. But when I wrote the check, I put it in the hands of a person – not a computer. I have people like that who buy insurance from us. They read, compare, get more education and when they come to us, they know better what they want. Then they find that we can truly SHOP for their coverage with a number of companies in our portfolio and find the best coverage for the best pricing here. That’s been our goal over these many years. With the continued year over year growth we have enjoyed, we’re still a welcomed place to purchase insurance vs. the available alternatives.

So GOOGLE tried and they decided it’s not working and excuse me (along with many others) if I/we think it is because of the lack of personal contact and service available from the independent agent. We can walk customers through the complete process and custom make the insurance program that works best for their age, income and insurance history. One stop and you’re insured with us. And unlike the ONE COMPANY outlets with the gecko and so many others, we’re in the community, live and buy in that community and know the area where your insurance will be used. THAT makes a difference and I promise, we do our best to use all of that to YOUR advantage.

So let me close by saying … we’re here and always ready – not to be GIVEN your insurance business but we want to EARN it! You can reach us at info@BentonWhite.com or call any of our staff at 615.377.1212.

I’m a fan of GOOGLE! I use them almost everyday and am glad they’ve decided to stick with their core competencies that has made them a leader in the internet space. They don’t need to worry about insurance sales! We’ve got this! 🙂