Marc Eagan: Most of our recruitment has been through associations that we have developed with parents of the young people. These new recruits are above-average individuals who have a great ability to associate with people. After all, insurance sales is about who gets on with whom.

The new producers are mentored by some of our more seasoned pros within the office. This mentoring process is vital to setting the stage for these young recruits to get on and stay on the right path. It accelerates the learning curve.

Read on for the agents' take on areas of growth and technology use.

What services or lines of business are you focusing on for growth in 2012?

McPoyle: We never want to be labeled as a professional firm capable of only one or two areas of expertise. We will continue to provide broad support to our clients in all P&C coverages. As always, we will leverage the success stories we have created within our existing client base and will seek out companies in the similar industries with the goal of repeating the same results. In 2012 we will invest more time in educating our clients and prospects on the fast and changing exposure to cyber/information risk. If you have a computer hooked to the outside world, you have a potential exposure. As larger amounts of data can be stored on smaller pieces of equipment, the risk of the data falling into the wrong hands grows as well.

Eagan: We are concentrating on a few niches, in particular cyber liability. These lines of coverage require a lot of research in order to offer them properly. It is not just the policy language but the federal and state laws that may come into play.

Cohen: We are expecting to grow in all lines in 2012. Even in tough economic times there are certain companies and organizations that are growing and it is our goal to find those companies and convince them to become IMA clients.

How has technology helped your agency become more efficient, productive and valuable to clients and carriers?

McPoyle: Our Xchange product, which allows for greater communication and sharing of information between us and our clients, has proven to be a significant tactical advantage. The collaborative workflows we’ve created from that platform have enabled us to increase our productivity without increasing headcount. That’s efficiency defined! We are able to perform “deep dives” into a prospect’s risk management and insurance programs in days when at other places the same process would take weeks. We can do more and at a higher quality level than most other firms because our platform and workflows allow us to do so.

Eagan: We all feel it was well worth the investment to beef up our IT department. Social media is here to stay, so we hired an individual to specifically handle this area. We are trying to focus on how technology in its ever-changing form can be best used by our agency when dealing with our clients, comparing partners and in dealing with the public in general.

Cohen: IMA’s sound technology infrastructure allows our brokerage to function efficiently and productively. We utilize several cutting-edge technology-based products and services that add significant value for clients and carriers, such as a proprietary application for aggregating details about healthcare vendors, or custom solutions like risk control mobile e-forms that allow our consultants to perform site inspections and capture reportable data in real-time using iPads and cell phones.

We also manage our internal client servicing activities based on proprietary technology and workflow developed by IMA. Those services are measured based on our own custom reporting methodology accessible by business units throughout the enterprise. This allows our organization to support the diversity of our client’s needs based upon our consultants’ expertise, regardless of geographic location.

Next - the agents speak on 2011 challenges and building relationships with clients.

What was your biggest challenge in 2011? How did you overcome it?

Eagan: South Louisiana has experienced some rough going over the past 5 years due to Hurricane Katrina (and Hurricanes Rita and Gustav) and the unprecedented problems caused by the BP oil spill. As a major agency in the New Orleans area, we realized the importance of understanding these risks. We have successfully overcome this challenge by:

1. Seeking out new insurance companies willing to write business in our state
2. Working with the Louisiana Dept. of Insurance to assist in identifying new regional carriers to listen to our story
3. Showing insurance companies the millions that have been spent on restoring and improving the regional infrastructure and our levees
4. Identifying the legislation that has been passed upgrading building codes ordinances, etc.
5. Convincing the standard admitted carriers that currently write casualty lines to jump start the property marketplace and change perception that insurance and reinsurance executives have had.

Cohen: Finding ways to grow was difficult to achieve in a market that has both soft pricing and a tough economy. We overcame this by doing comprehensive strategic planning and identifying those areas where we could grow and then working the plan.

McPoyle: Our biggest challenge in 2011 was to replicate our new business volume and success of 2010. While the effort was in place, the prospect focus was not in many cases. The soft market did not further any sense of urgency among many C-level executives to consider change and more effective support. We see our new business momentum shifting, however, as we become more well known in the market as “last year’s best-kept secret.”

How do you build a trusting relationship with clients?

McPoyle: Integrity, transparency and having our clients know their interests, in all cases, at all times, supersedes any interest we might have. We back those fundamental touchstones with smart people who are client facing and always considering how to best support the goals and outcomes sought by our client. An attitude such as that, repeated consistently over time and circumstance, builds tremendous trust.

Cohen: Trust is earned the old-fashioned way and there are no shortcuts. You build relationships with clients one day at a time. Trust is earned over time by doing lots of little things really, really well.

IMA is a valued advisor to our clients. They entrust us with their greatest assets, confident that IMA will perform in their best interest. We become part of our clients’ team, an ally assisting with the identification and management of risk. Business owners trust IMA because we think like business owners—and, as employee owners of IMA, we are.

IMA is privately held, which makes a difference to our clients in that we have an independent, entrepreneurial and non-bureaucratic approach to assist our clients in meeting their objectives. Being independent and employee-owned means that we can re-invest in the company and hold ourselves accountable; we aren’t beholden to quarterly performance reports.

Eagan: One step at a time. Over the years, we made sure to deliver a consistent level of world-class service. Clients have become accustomed to this level of responsiveness and we know we must continue to deliver the very best that we can. We can’t have any broken windows.

Read the agents' opions on legislative issues, direct writers and the soft market.

What legislative issues are you interested in?

Cohen: We are interested in healthcare reform and surplus lines reform. State issues we follow include broker compensation, countersignature litigation and producer licensing.

Eagan: Naturally, two large issues on the federal level stand out for us—the healthcare issue and the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). We will continue to watch both of these as they will have a huge impact on how we manage going forward.

McPoyle: We are concerned about the viability of NFIP and the impact losing that support might have on the property market and on the decisions made by clients with that need. It's never been perfect as a tool. But it certainly is better than the client retaining all the risk. We also watch the changing nature of privacy laws and -tort reform how they relate to liability for our clients.

How do you differentiate your agency and products from the competition of direct writers?

McPoyle: We differentiate from others with our higher level of product knowledge, greater access to alternative carriers and markets and our orientation on providing the client what is best for them to achieve their goals regardless of carrier. Direct writers, representing just one carrier don't have the access or the luxury to provide the same market breadth an independent agent can. As a leader in customer service and support, we have the ability to go well beyond the normal service expectations and actually invest with our time and talents with our clients in reducing their cost of risk. We find direct writers primarily price oriented. If we do our job selecting the right prospect, one who appreciates and understands the value of a well-structured program, we limit the times we "bump" into direct writers.

Cohen: By providing value added services. At tough times such as this, these services truly mean something to our clients.

Eagan: Providing options to our clients is something that our direct writer competition cannot do. People like to see what’s available in the marketplace. In addition to options when placing business to get the best value, businesses and individuals look to receive a certain level of service, some more than others. We as an independent agent can deliver on that.

How is your agency adapting to the continued soft market?

Eagan: Actually, here in South Louisiana, we are really not seeing a soft market like most of the rest of the country. Ever since 2005 and Hurricane Katrina, we have seen a hard property market, both on the commercial as well as in the personal lines areas. When you look at rates on line, the cost of a typical homeowner’s policy may startle you.

Cohen: We believe that we are currently moving out of the soft market as we’re seeing pricing stabilizing; but with that said, our goal as a company is to grow and enhance our profitability regardless of market conditions.

Growth has been a problem for many brokers during this recession and soft market. In order to grow you must be willing to invest, even in tough economic times. Because we have no debt, we’re able to invest in new offices and expand in new markets while our industry peers may be contracting. In addition, we have been investing more money back into new programs and services for clients; these in addition create other growth opportunities.

IMA is well equipped to manage through a recession because we specialize in multiple industry segments. For example, even though the construction practice is down due to the economy, the energy practice and technology practice are performing at high levels. We have purposely avoided concentration risk in our business model, and thus we are diversified enough to maintain strong performance across a variety of industry practice areas.

McPoyle: We started this business in a soft market so for us it's been a consistent philosophy of lean operations and management. We also position ourselves on the same level as our client's accountants and attorneys from both a partnership and compensation standpoint. We were never shy about educating our clients how we are compensated because it gives us the opportunity to explain what they are paying for.

In 2011, we developed the "One Minute from Normal" concept to help clients and prospects understand that insurance programs cheaply built and poorly serviced often cost more in the end. We're helping to refocus those who we come in contact with about why they have insurance and what it is designed to do in support of them following a claim.