If you’re considering buying leads to help boost your business, be aware that not all leads are created equal—and neither are the companies they come from.
To help you gain a full picture of the landscape, this article tackles lead-buying from two angles: One, what are the most popular insurance lead companies out there? And two, what questions should you ask them to ferret out whether a particular lead generation company will actually help you acquire new customers—or waste your time and money?
Below are six well-known insurance lead companies that agents commonly use. To learn more about each of them, ask a company representative the questions that follow this rundown. Getting good leads is a crucial part of your business, so dig deep!
EverQuote is America's leading online insurance marketplace.
EverQuote differs from other lead vendors in that it operates an end-to-end insurance marketplace connecting shoppers with agents and serves as a trusted, all-in-one growth partner for insurance agents. It offers real-time auto, home, and life insurance leads along with calls, lead outreach, and marketing services for both captive and independent insurance agents.
Its Lead Connection Service (LCS) program gives agents the option to let EverQuote’s professional lead outreach teams work their leads for them. In practice, this means agents can receive call transfers from interested customers in real-time, which eliminates the most time-consuming—and frustrating—part of the sales process: outbound calling and prospecting.
EverQuote also offers concierge-level customer service with dedicated Business Consultants who help agents review their results with EverQuote’s products. Agents, in partnership with their consultants, can use these results to optimize their accounts, fine-tune their sales processes, and learn to grow their businesses more effectively.
Founded by two MIT alumni in 2011 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, EverQuote now has over 500 employees and is listed on NASDAQ as EVER.
SmartFinancial is run by a team of “insurance and technology experts” that touts its advanced technology platform as giving agents a competitive edge. It delivers leads generated through its own consumer-facing marketplace as well as leads acquired from partners.
SmartFinancial’s prices may be higher than other vendors on this list—for example, they offer “high-risk leads” for $10–$12 per lead if you buy in bulk—but they do offer good customer service and verified live transfers.
SmartFinancial was founded in 2012 by a former insurance agent and is headquartered in the greater Los Angeles area.
Datalot was founded in 2009 by a communications software developer with the goal of simplifying online lead generation. The company provides agents with live transfers, but it doesn’t offer traditional data leads.
Datalot’s platform automates the web-to-phone sales process and delivers agents live prospects on demand. It offers lead types that aren’t typically available through most lead companies, including renters insurance, health insurance, and Medicare in addition to the more standard home and auto.
Datalot is well-known in the industry for its live call service, which is a good thing but can also be seen as a drawback. Many agents—especially newer agents who don’t yet have a large budget or many leads to work—find it challenging to build a solid lead pipeline with only live transfer calls. This makes it more difficult for new agents to get off the ground. Additionally, calls tend to be far more expensive than data leads, which means Datalot is a bit pricier than some of the other options on this list.
QuoteWizard is best described as an online marketplace for comparing insurance options. It provides real-time and aggregated leads for auto, home, health, renters, and Medicare insurance, along with warm transfer calls.
The company offers leads at a wide range of price points which vary by how the lead was sourced, the lead’s age, and other criteria. It also provides discount packages for agents—it claims that shared data leads are delivered to a maximum of four agents—and also offers exclusive leads.
QuoteWizard was founded in 2006 in Seattle, Washington, and was acquired by LendingTree (NASDAQ: TREE) in 2018.
Hometown Quotes provides auto, home, life, and renters insurance leads. As might be expected by the name, it strives to offer a more personal touch in its agent communications. Their prices are competitive; however, they don’t focus on volume. If you’re looking to buy in bulk, they may not be able to deliver.
Hometown Quotes primarily provides auto and home data leads, but it also offers life and health leads. However, it does not offer a calls product; agents can only receive contact information for potential customers.
Hometown Quotes has a reputation for offering good customer service — something that’s not typically available from other vendors. However, many agents report receiving a mix of aged and real-time leads, which can diminish the usefulness of purchased leads.
The company was founded in 2003 and is located in the greater Denver, Colorado area. Today, according to the company’s online profile, it has fewer than 50 employees, making it one of the smaller companies on this list.
Like a number of other vendors we’ve mentioned here, ZipQuote operates an online insurance marketplace that connects consumers shopping for insurance with agents looking for business. ZipQuote offers agents leads in the auto, home, health, and life insurance categories, and also provides live transfer calls.
ZipQuote is another comparatively smaller company with fewer than 50 employees. It was founded in 2008 in San Diego and was subsequently acquired by Digital Media Solutions in 2015.
As you compare insurance lead vendors, the following questions will reveal important information about the leads and the companies that provide them—both of which will play a significant role in your growth as an agency.
This is the most important question to ask. You’ll save yourself a great deal of time and money simply by knowing what kind of company you’ll be working with when you buy insurance leads. What’s the difference between a lead generator vs. a lead aggregator? In a nutshell: Lead aggregators purchase leads from other aggregators or from generators; lead generators source all or most of their own leads (this is what we do at EverQuote) .
Often, aggregators share lead information within the same insurance carrier, so you can end up competing against people who offer the same rates as you. Leads who come through lead aggregators might have been looking for insurance days, weeks, or even months ago. They’re likely tired of talking to agents (they’ve already been solicited by dozens of them). Leads from aggregators may have already signed on with a company or decided not to change the insurance products they already have, which means you may potentially waste your money and time pursuing people with whom there is no prospect of binding a policy.
Ask a sales rep to show you exactly where every lead comes from. If they can't give you a straight answer, it's a good sign you've found an aggregator.
Lead generators, on the other hand, pass on prospects who are actively seeking quotes (“warm” leads)—their current insurance may be up for renewal, or they need a new product. Their intent is to buy insurance, and they want to be contacted by insurance agents. EverQuote sources the vast majority of our own leads, so we can show you exactly where a lead originated (i.e., Google, Facebook, etc.), as well as when they filled out a form and all the details of the dozens of questions they answered.
Do you want to talk to a lead who has been contacted by a bunch of other agents already? Nope.
What about someone who was looking for coverage a month ago? Nope.
But if you buy leads from a company that recycles lead information, that’s exactly what will happen. To reveal whether or not the vendor does this, ask them the following questions:
Most companies that recycle leads couldn't give you legitimate answers to even half of these questions. This means the leads you buy can’t be sourced, aren’t delivered to you in real time, and may not have an intent to purchase insurance—they may not have even realized the purpose of the form they were filling out.
When I talk to agents who are shopping around for insurance lead generation companies, I never discourage them from talking to other companies. The truth is, companies that can’t honestly answer the questions above just don’t compare to companies that can.
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If I sent you this form, do you think you’d fill it out because you wanted to go to Aruba for free—or because you wanted to buy insurance? Exactly.
Companies that incentivize lead information with free giveaways or trips (or anything else) are less likely to get “leads” who are looking for insurance, which means they’re collecting lead info using methods that are disingenuous to their purpose.
As you may have guessed, insurance agents who buy leads from companies that incentivize leads do not see good results. These leads aren’t intentful, because they aren’t actively seeking coverage. Once again, purchasing a list with these incentivized leads can be a waste of your money and your time.
Customer service is one of the pillars of a good insurance lead company. Make sure you’re familiar with the customer service experience offered by each of the companies you’re considering.
At EverQuote, our industry-leading Customer Success teams partner with thousands of agents, leveraging data analysis and industry expertise to help optimize your account and drive results. We also invest heavily in creating agent-focused content – from weekly webinars featuring some of the Country’s most successful insurance agents and industry thought leaders, to eBooks and videos on best practices and strategies for success.
The number of leads you purchase when you sign on shouldn’t be the number of leads you’re locked into forever. Find out whether the company you’re considering partnering with will allow you to revisit the number of leads purchased as you become more successful—or if for some reason you need to scale back.
The best insurance lead companies not only allow you to adjust the number of leads you need, but will also help you identify what steps you need to take to make the most of every single lead you buy. (That’s what our team does at EverQuote!)
Not every agent needs the same type of service; it depends on your particular needs. Hopefully, the vendor you work with recognizes this fact and offers a variety of service packages (with varying price points) for you to choose from. To give yourself maximum flexibility, look for a company with three or more service packages.
EverQuote has the following packages for agents:
For any entry-level program, the short answer should be yes. However, higher-level service offerings will likely have a minimum commitment period, so be sure to ask what it is and make sure you feel comfortable with it.
Also, for any entry-level program, the ability to pause (and resume) your account at your own convenience is crucial for addressing staffing shortages, days off, holidays, etc. For vendors that don’t allow this functionality (at least for entry-level tier accounts), you may end up paying for leads that you receive when your office is closed or when no one is available to work the leads.
Lots of agents ask the typical questions about prices, contracts, support, etc. But the biggest question of all—and the one few agents ask—is: What can I expect to gain from this partnership?
The best insurance lead companies understand that you’re investing a fair amount of money into lead generation, and you should have a concrete idea as to how far their program will take you. After signing up, what might your agency be doing in 60 days? 90 days?
At EverQuote, we try to paint the long-term picture for prospective agents:
Based on our average close rates, this is where you should be with this much spend, if you’re doing A, B, and C.
If the vendor you talk to can’t tell you that with any certainty, you might be in for some surprises down the road.
Growing your company isn’t about the work you can do in one month. To be successful, you want to make sure you’re finding quality prospects who will increase your book of business on all items across the board. Researching different vendors and asking them each of the above questions as you compare insurance lead generation companies is your first step.
If you’re wondering how to find quality leads that are 100% originally sourced—EverQuote experts can help. We’d love to answer your questions, talk to you about how we source our leads, and help build a game plan that sets you up to win. Contact us today, and let’s get started.