We were lucky to catch up with Lorena Tomasini recently and have shared our conversation below.

Lorena, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you talk to us about a risk you’ve taken – walk us through the story?

My mom and I work together and we had worked from 2006 to 2013 by visiting our clients in their homes or offices. In 2014 our business had expanded so much that we decided to open an office for our clients to visit us for their life insurance and health insurance needs. That was a big risk as it was going to increase our overhead and also have to hire employees for the front office. All new things for us but we decided to jump in and do it! Our clients enjoyed it and we also saw that we were capable of taking such a risk. A few years later we decided to take an even bigger risk.

While having the office was convenient for both us and the consumer we also realized that much of what we do could be solved over the phone. We made another decision. We decided to transform our business from the traditional face to face insurance environment to a totally teleservices environment. This was an even bigger risk because in our industry it is all about trust and much harder when they are not seeing our faces. Well, turns out that was a misconception and what some would call a limiting belief.

We transitioned our office to working from home and helping our clients and their referrals all over the phone. At first it was an adjustment but with practice and adjustments things got better. A few years forward and there’s no way we would ever go back to doing things face to face. Our clients love it because they can be in the comfort of their home or office while we’re taking care of important things such as their financial protection.

None of this would have happened, if we hadn’t taken those risks of opening an office and also being open to change. Seems like we were prepared for the pandemic while everyone else was now trying to figure how to work virtually with their clients.

Lorena, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Hey there! I work together with my mom for the past 16 years. Many are often curious as to how that happened. While I was studying finance in college, my mom needed an appointment setter one day and she asked me if I could help her. I decided to do it since I had experience working on the phones, then I went with her to see in more detail what my mom did and I thought oh this is not so hard, you talk to people and fill out paperwork. My mom has been in the insurance industry since before I was born but seeing up close what she did was very different.

We own an agency called MALM Life and Health Insurance Agency where we help individuals, families and business owners with their life and health insurance needs all done virtually over the phone. We help people solve very important matters in their lives from which health insurance plan to get, how to continue a business after someone’s passing, how to have cash on hand in case of a critical illness such as cancer or a heart attack. In essence we provide peace of mind when families and businesses need it most. What sets us apart is that we make this often hard and difficult subjects easy and fun to understand with our 3D process which is where 1. We Define What Your Needs Are 2. We Discover Solutions To Your Needs 3. You Decide Which Option To Do

We work out of Miami, FL but help people as well in Texas and Nebraska. One of the things that we take pride in is that we pick up the phone or return text messages in a normal time frame. This is one of the reasons we get so many referrals not only from our clients but also from other professionals such as CPAs, Financial Advisors and Disability Attorneys.

At our agency we also strive to have a presence in social media and help many that speak Spanish.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

Being consistent is what has helped build my reputation. When I say that I will call you Tuesday at 10am I will do that. Being consistent is not only when speaking to prospects or clients but also when building a social media strategy, referral partnership and marketing.

If you just have one meeting with someone they are not going to remember you so you need to be consistent in keeping in front of them.

Any fun sales or marketing stories?

Last year, I decided to join a networking group! That is definitely outside my comfort zone as I’m not one to like to go to happy hours and just pass out business cards. What I liked about this group is that it was being held over zoom…at 7am…that is early! I see this as a marketing risk because what if I joined this group, got up once a week a 7am and didn’t even break even with the cost for membership.

As it turns out, leaving my comfort zone behind and joining a networking group was a great marketing risk to take. After getting to know many of the members, I started to see referrals coming in. Turns out these would be high quality referrals that were eager for my help with their health insurance needs from ACA (“Obamacare”) to people retiring and needing help figuring out the confusing world of Medicare.

Joining an online networking group has been a fantastic marketing risk that has paid for itself a few times over.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.malmins.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/malmins22
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/malmins22
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenatomasini
• Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/malmins22

Image Credits
MALM Life and Health Insurance Agency