Insurance Companies Listings and Ratings Guide For Insurance Agents & Brokers

Here is the newest, revised version of the best insurance companies listings. These are compiled in a top 100 ratings guide format. The listings are in alphabetical order helping insurance agents & brokers locate an insurer. Find out how your opinion compares. How can you possibly rate an insurance company? I will mention briefly the various ways, show you the method I is used for this article, and why.

BY NUMBER OF AGENTS

This ratings guide listing method evaluates the insurer by the sheer number of insurance agents & brokers currently licensed and under contract. with carrier. I feel this evaluation to be worthless for a multitude of reasons. First of all there are a number of career health and life insurance agencies that have thousands of representatives. However, of these,up to 80% of the total agents are relatively new in attempting to establish credibility in the industry. Four years down the line only 6% of many an insurance company agency force will maintain enough production to stay career representatives.

Moreover, my findings uncover inaccuracy of this method due to licensing renewal process state insurance departments impose on the insurer. Most state departments of insurance send the renewal report forms on a yearly basis. There is a fee to be paid by each ins agent renewed. What makes it difficult is the variation of different paperwork procedures by individual states for removing non-active ins reps. The paperwork consists of costly, time consuming forms and procedures for the insurance company to make any changes. Renewing all the sales representatives is often cheaper, and thus the route the insurer frequently takes. This also gives the insurance company bragging rights to how many sales people write for them.

Personally I was shown in state insurance department records as licensed for 11 years after I wrote my last case.

INSURANCE CO FINANCIAL RANKING LISTINGS

There are four or five top independent firms that employ this insurer rating of a company based on a multitude of financial factors. A lot has to do with projecting the financial stability of the insurer. This is accomplished by closely dissecting past and present financial history. It covers how the insurer investments perform, and the rate of return. An insurance evaluation also takes in consideration the amount of cash on hand, and how much exists in reserves to pay present and future claims.

There is a consensus among life insurance association members into believing that the highest rated insurers are the best of the bunch. Yet association members make up less than 12% of the total producer base. The other insurance agents and brokers, (the majority), do not agree that these are always the best ones to use for their client's needs. Logic tells you that a newer quality insurer does not have past history to start out top ranked. In my situation, clients bought what I presented them. Nearly half the time it was NOT the highest rated company by the rating firms. I however sold the client what their emotional needs demanded. Many past insurance companies with rankings in the best 100 later financially failed, and still frequently do in today's world.

BY RANKING OF PREMIUMS COLLECTED

This is a very common type of insurance company listing & ranking to produce. Insurance companies are rated by total number of premiums they collected that year. It seems rather unfair to mix annuity premiums in with all dollars collected. Producers know it is easier to sell a $20,000 annuity than a $20,000 premium term insurance policy. The other fault I find with using total premiums collected is with who actually contributed a chunk of the premiums collected. With some companies an enormous amount of these premiums were not collected by the average sales person. A lot of institutional buyers directly bought hundreds of thousands of dollars of annuity premiums.

BY RATINGS IMPORTANT TO HEALTH & LIFE SELLERS

This is my way. As fair and balanced from an sales representative perspective as feasible. Premiums are collected from the 1,500,000 agents, trying to make a living by selling insurance policies in this industry. Often these sales are done one by one. Plus, of this 450,00 independent brokers, semi-independent agents and some career reps write, depending on which company, 50% to 100% of that insurance co business.

This rankings method is imposed because I find the insurance companies listing is intended to be a beneficial directory. One that independent brokers, semi-independent representatives, along with some career reps can turn to. This is a guide directory to other insurers that you may consider writing production for.

The insurance companies listing and ratings guide to the top 100 is purposely placed in alphabetical order instead of by premium or financial data. You may not agree completely with the listing, because we have left in some companies with a strong percentage of business sold in annuities, and investment products.

In the eyes of a typical health and life broker, this guide is of health and life insurance companies is about as accurate as possible.

1. Aetna 2. AIG Life Insurance Company** 3. Allianz Life Insurance Company of North America 4. American Family Life Assurance Co of Columbus 5. American Fidelity Assurance Company 6. American General Life and Accident INS Co** 7. American General Life Insurance Co** 8. American Income 9. American Memorial 10. American National Life 11. Americo Financial Life And Annuity 12. Anthem Blue Cross 13 Aurora National Assurance 14 Aviva Life and Annuity Company 15. AXA Equitable 16.Bankers Life and Casualty Company 17. Banner 18. Beneficial Life 19. C.M. Life Ins 20. Colonial Life & Accident 21. Columbus Life 22. Conseco Life 23. Farmers New World 24. First-Penn Pacific 25.Forethought 26. General American 27. Genworth 28. Gerber 29. Great American 30. Great-West Life & Annuity 31. Guardian 32. Hartford Life and Accident Ins Company 33. Hartford 34. Homesteaders 35. Indianapolis Life 36. ING 37. Jackson National 38. John Hancock 39. John Hancock Life Insurance Company USA 40.. Kansas City Life 41.. Lafayette 42.. Liberty Life Assurance Co of Boston 43.. Liberty National 44.. Life Ins Company of North America 45. Life Ins Company of the Southwest 46. Life Investors Ins Co of America 47. Lincoln Benefit 48. Lincoln Heritage 49. Lincoln National 50. Massachusetts Mutual 51. Metropolitan 52. Midland National 53. Minnesota Life 54. Monumental Life 55. MONY - America 56. MONY - New York 57. National Guardian 58. National Life 59. New England Life 60. New York Life Ins and Annuity Corporation 61. New York Life 62. North American Co for Life & Health Ins. 63. Northwestern Mutual 64. Ohio National Life 65. OM Financial 66. Pacific Life 67. Penn Mutual 68. Phoenix Life Ins 69. Primerica 70. Principal 71. Protective 72. Provident Life and Accident 73. Pruco 74. Prudential - America 75. Reassure America 76. Reliance Standard 77. ReliaStar 78. Riversource 79. Security Life of Denver y 80. Standard 81. Stonebridge 82. Sun Life and Health 83. Sunset 84. Surety 85. Symetra 86. Transamerica 87. Transamerica Occidental 88. Trustmark 89. U.S. Financial 90. Union Central 91. Union Security 92. United Healthcare 93. United Ins Company of America 94. United Investors 95. United of Omaha 96. United States Life 97. Unum 98. West Coast 99. Western and Southern Life 100. Western Reserve Life Assurance Co of Ohio Note: Sagicor Life, Foresters, and Illinois Mutual should appear on the bottom 3 listings, replacing the companies listed above as #6, 2, and 7.

**AIG Life Insurance Company, American General Life, American General Life and Casualty Comments

This group of companies USED to be one the highest premium generating, and highest ranked insurance companies in the United States. Still, after two massive Federal Bailouts, the future is uncertain. Therefore, AIG Life is no longer deserving of being on this top 100 list guide.

GUIDE TO QUESTIONABLE LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY LISTINGS

The following insurance companies listings often could be included in different types of some top 100 Life ins company rankings IF you were evaluating premiums written. Sometimes the premiums consist of considerable amounts of annuity premiums. Also counted in would be insurers where a large portion of sales do not come from representatives and sales people. Instead it is written by security stock brokerage firms, and independent broker-dealers of variable investment contracts not governed by insurance departments. In other cases, products may be directly strictly toward teachers, the military, or credit unions. In a couple cases, there are companies with pending litigation. A representation of this mix of insurers is listed below:

1. Cuna Mutual 2. Genworth Life and Annuity 3. Harford Life and Annuity y 4. John Hancock Variable Life 5. Mayflower National 6. Metlife - Connecticut 7. Metlife Investors USA 8. MML Bay State 9. Nationwide 10. Nationwide Life & Annuity 11. NYLife of AZ 12. PHL Variable 13. Sun Life Assurance Co of Canada 14. Teachers Ins and Annuity Assoc of America 15. USAA 16. Shenandoah -- financial difficulties

There is a grand total of over 600 Licensed Life/Health Companies "active" in every state of the United States. However, some are not currently writing new business. In addition, there are many active in only one or a few states, so you will find them missing from the top insurance company listings. Most states have a true actual listing count of 220 to 330 life and health home offices currently accepting new cases from licensed agents & brokers.

Advisor's predition. If I choose from the provider listings above, Foresters would be my top pick as the next rising star. Its innovative niche products are starting to create a high demand. Also watch Genworth, its stock value has zoomed and the company is very adaptive to market opportunities.

Well published author, Don Yerke likes to concentrate on what you don't know or what no one else dares to print. Therefore, he enjoys telling it like it is.

Watch for his new paperback book debuting on Amazon early this summer. It is loaded with great insurance marketing. brokerage, and recruiting information.

Come and get your FREE "Think and Grow Rich" Ebook by Napoleon Hill instantly. The website address is [http://www.agentsinsurancemarketing.com]

Who's Who - Company Insurance Brokerage & Independent Insurance Brokerage Listings

Agents can choose to place business with either a company insurance brokerage office or an independent insurance brokerage firm. Here are insurance brokerage listings for many of the various tiles used within the business. Find out the difference among insurance brokerage titles, and how to distinguish who's who.

Health and life agents can earn over 90 insurance designations. Fortunately, the numbers of titles for firms obtaining brokerage business are fewer.A listing is provided of many different title names used, and any actual differences that separate one's firm title from another. The potential producers that might write insurance cases for you should also know these differences.

Before this, it is critical because of some many misconceptions to define the terms broker and brokerage as they refer to life and health insurance. You would be surprised at how few of the general public understands what your firm title or function means. Likewise, hundreds of thousands of agents do not understand these terms. The mix up occurs primary with stock brokers and stock brokerage firms. That is what the majority of the public thinks of when hearing these terms.

Insurance brokerage firms of all different titles, obtain a written annuity, life, or health insurance case from a broker. All their producers should be called brokers and their cases called brokerage business. When an agent writes a case outside their primary career company, they are called a broker and their business is brokerage. There are many agents that are "agent brokers". They have a primary insurance company as an agent and submit business to a brokerage firm as a broker. There are also independent life and health insurance agents that should rightfully be called independent brokers, with the before mentioned group better referred to as semi-independent agents.

Writing brokerage business is a true form of independence of the agent's part. Rarely will this occur to any extent until the agent has surpassed a full three years of insurance dependence on career orientated companies. The three main reasons an agent writes insurance brokerage are independence, client needs, and higher commissions.

COMPANY INSURANCE BROKERAGE

What truly baffles insurance agents is the fact that some of the insurance companies training new insurance career agents often operate and highly promote through large advertisements their brokerage operations. They preach to the agents that they should only do business with the career company you are licensed with. Moreover, agents are firmly reminded they have all the products they need, and the company is supporting them 100%. Meanwhile the company insurance brokerage operation is trying to pilfer away as much business as possible from the career agents of fellow insurance companies. Less confusing of course, are the expanding number of insurance companies that only accept brokerage business and have no agency force of their own.

Starting with one insurance company brokerage operations, you have many different variations and titles among the people that distribute the products. A main difference would be those that are directly employed by the insurance company as a salaried or salaried plus bonus individual. Others have an independent contractor style contract, with fringe benefits like health insurance missing. They are paid through a combination of commissions and overrides along with possible production bonuses.

Director of marketing, national director of recruiting, director of product development and sales, Northwest marketing director, divisional director of disability sales, are just a taste of titles usually reserved for higher up home office employees. Many of these have never sold or brokered an insurance policy! Among them are fortune telling number crunchers with little reality of what it takes to be a successful brokerage manager. In turn, rarely do they do the actual recruiting of agents. The sad part is that they frequently set the company recruiting, marketing, and budgeting policies that others must follow.

The common one company insurance brokerage devoted titles include General Agent, Brokerage General Agent, Regional General Agent, State Manager, Managing General Agent, District Manager, Director of Brokerage, Wholesaler, and Regional Manager. If an insurance company is brokering three main products, they for example, may be LTC Brokerage Manager, Annuity Brokerage Manager, and Advanced Life Brokerage Manager. The inter combinations of titles are virtually countless. A high percentage of these one insurance company brokerage operations maintain the name of the company in their firm name.

Here is one conflict of interest. As some insurance companies want to sell as many insurance brokerage cases, as possible they often contract with independent marketing organizations and national brokerage firms. There is frequently true competition among them, going after agents and brokers to acquire insurance brokerage. It should be mentioned what the danger factor is. When you rely on just one insurance company what happens when your prime product is suddenly dropped, your territory is cut, your position is eliminated, or when another insurer buys out the company?

INDEPENDENT INSURANCE BROKERAGE LISTINGS

Non-existent just 25 years ago, independent insurance brokerage firms have erupted on the market scene. Here are some reasons why. First brokers like to find a company that can give them the best product for their client, or the highest commission when they make a sale. With some independent insurance marketing firms representing over 50 companies, they can sometimes do both. Some national firms are so powerful that they can dictate that an insurance policy develop a product only they can distribute. Insurance companies know that they can keep adding new policy features or constantly introduce a rehashed, but now called new policy. Insurance marketers love promoting a familiar product that has new features, a new name, or new commission structure. As insurance marketers like to make money, unfairly some of those where the highest override exists, are the products most heavily promoted . A 35% override sure beats 20% on a similar product in the mind of numerous marketers.

Titles that independent insurance brokerage marketers have on their contract include product distributor, national wholesaler, and exclusive product marketer, along with all independent contractor titles mentioned under one-company marketers. They often distinguish themselves by keeping their personal name out of the firm's official name. Others insert the word independent or national to separate them. Usually they promote a variety of company insignia trademarks or names in their advertising materials.

It is essential to describe briefly independent insurance marketing organizations. Over 250 independent insurance brokerage firms are associated with to at least one of the top 20 independent insurance marketing organizations. While 250 out of 15,000 to 20,000 separate brokerage titled operations does not seem significant, it really is. The smaller firms combine contracting and some advertising to form the larger independent insurance brokerage marketing organization. The organization thereby is able to obtain a higher compensation level contract with more insurance brokerage companies. Although sometimes members only operate in one state, others cross-territories, even on a national basis. The longevity of profitability for these firms is amazing, especially when compared with brokerage firms overall. The dues and advertising cost sharing is well offset by the extra training tips, bonding, shared marketing tricks, and higher overrides they could receive on their own.

Who's Who in major league, big-time insurance brokerage is constantly changing. Some are 3-generation family owned firms, and others mightily spring up and disappear just about as quickly. One of the key factors never mentioned above is of great magnitude. That factor is service. What can you do to make sure your broker stays your broker? Regardless of what title you or your firm has, all is irrelevant if the broker writes one case and moves on elsewhere.

Well published author, Don Yerke likes to concentrate on what you don't know or what no one else dares to print. Tell it like it is.

Watch for his new paperback book debuting on Amazon early this summer. It is loaded with great insurance marketing and recruiting information.

Come and get your FREE "Think and Grow Rich" Ebook by Napoleon Hill instantly. The website address is [http://www.agentsinsurancemarketing.com]