We calculated that 11% of Agents are proficient in Insurance Products, Customer Service, and Life Insurance. They’re also known for soft skills such as Detail oriented, Math skills, and Analytical skills.
We break down the percentage of Agents that have these skills listed on their resume here:
- Insurance Products, 11%
Provide a variety of insurance products for various individuals/businesses utilizing independent insurance agents throughout Texas with two in-house Independent Agents.
- Customer Service, 10%
Oversee operations for full-service agency to include sales, customer service, marketing/business development, underwriting, claims and financial operations.
- Life Insurance, 8%
Researched and provided financial services ranging from health/disability/life insurance to financial packages such as mutual funds and stock options.
- HR, 6%
Scheduled tours for sales reps. City of Fort Walton Beach Human Resources: -Maintained employee files and the HR filing system.
- Inbound Calls, 6%
Receive inbound calls on a retention contract while maintaining a positive/happy disposition in a very melancholy office.
- Financial Services, 6%
Developed and grew agency through both property casualty lines, and financial services products in increasingly competitive and highly regulated marketplace.
Some of the skills we found on agent resumes included "insurance products," "customer service," and "life insurance." We have detailed the most important agent responsibilities below.
Analytical skills is also an important skill for agents to have. This example of how agents use this skill comes from a agent resume, "insurance sales agents must evaluate the needs of each client to determine the appropriate insurance policy." Read this excerpt from a resume to understand how vital it is to their everyday roles and responsibilities, "analyze the client's financial situation and provided financial services and solutions by cross selling products from multiple lending institutions. " An agent responsibilities sometimes require "initiative." The responsibilities that rely on this skills are shown by this resume excerpt: "insurance sales agents need to actively seek out new customers in order to maintain a flow of commissions." This resume example shows how this skill is used by agents: "researched historical documentation, prepared reports and made recommendations on initiatives to improve customer support and service. " As part of the agent description, you might find that one of the skills that might be helpful to the job is "self-confidence." A agent resume included this snippet: "insurance sales agents should be confident when making “cold” calls (calls to prospective customers whom they have not contacted before)" This skill could be useful in this scenario: "provided confidential customer care in person and by phone activities and leadership" Lastly, this career requires you to be skillful in "communication skills." According to agent resumes, "insurance sales agents must be able to communicate effectively with customers by listening to their requests and suggesting suitable policies." This resume example highlights how agent responsibilities rely on this skill: "support customers across telecommunication, financial services, healthcare, technology vertical. " See the full list of agent skills.
After discovering the most helpful skills, we moved onto what kind of education might be helpful in becoming an agent. We found that 44.3% of agents have graduated with a bachelor's degree and 4.8% of people in this position have earned their master's degrees. While some agents have a college degree, you may find it's also true that generally it's possible to be successful in this career with only a high school degree. In fact, our research shows that one out of every five agents were not college graduates.
Those agents who do attend college, typically earn either business degrees or criminal justice degrees. Less commonly earned degrees for agents include general studies degrees or psychology degrees.
Once you're ready to become an agent, you should explore the companies that typically hire agents. According to agent resumes that we searched through, agents are hired the most by Lincoln Heritage, Best Buy, and Sonder. Currently, Lincoln Heritage has 168 agent job openings, while there are 119 at Best Buy and 56 at Sonder.
If you're interested in companies where agents make the most money, you'll want to apply for positions at Latham & Watkins, Barclays, and Southern California Edison. We found that at Latham & Watkins, the average agent salary is $203,605. Whereas at Barclays, agents earn roughly $105,524. And at Southern California Edison, they make an average salary of $103,584.
View more details on agent salaries across the United States.
If you earned a degree from the top 100 educational institutions in the United States, you might want to take a look at New York Life Insurance, Aflac, and State Farm. These three companies have hired a significant number of agents from these institutions.
