This column, written by a BN Sunrise Rotarian, features “five things you should know” about that Rotarian’s area of expertise. It helps our members showcase their skills and share useful information.
(Click HERE for a list of previous posts)
Your Rotarian
Kris Andrews
Vice President, Marketing
Bliss McKnight, Inc.
Five things you should know about being an Insurance Marketing Executive:
- Insurance isn’t just cocktail conversation, insurance fits into almost every niche of business possible. Insurance is about risk transfer providing a financial component. Insurance is about people – protecting reputations and lives. Insurance is about physical assets – assuring that homes and businesses continue after a loss. Insurance is about communication – helping individuals and businesses express their long-term needs and sharing how your product or service meets those needs. Insurance is about diversity, providing protection to people in different economic strata, in different ethnic groups and in different geographic parts of the world. Insurance is cool!
- Insurance marketing requires creativity and objectivity. In order to cause people to engage in the subject of insurance, visuals are needed to depict an event. Think of pictures of a teenager getting a first car before college. Think of images of a couple on their wedding day, through the birth of their children and holding hands at retirement. Insurance marketing creativity also comes with verbal cues. Insurance marketing executives use words such as protection, value, competitive pricing, service, payment options, and assurance. The objective side of insurance marketing comes from making sure that you have facts are correct, that the customer is not misled through imagery or select words, providing assurance that the product or service performs at time of need. Coming up through the ranks of direct sales to insurance executive has given me this important blend of creativity and objectivity.
- I give back to my community. When a sales professional makes a living selling products or services in their community or their industry, they need to give back. Giving back means giving time (volunteering) to local organizations. Giving back means helping raise funds or contributing money to local organizations. I entered the field of professional insurance sales over 25 years ago and through those years, I have been on numerous boards, participated in committees, helped raise funds for a non profit, packed food at the food bank, taken a child bowling as a Big Sister, mentored youth through Girls Scouts, the YWCA, my local church and other venues where a child had a need. I have done my best to “Pay it forward!”
- Ever wondered what all those initials after a name on a business card mean? After my name on my business card, you will see CIC AAI CSE. These are professional designations I have earned in my career that demonstrate I have stayed current in my profession. It goes like this: CSE stands for Certified Sales Executive. I earned the designation through Syracuse University. CIC means Certified Insurance consultant. I earned and maintain the designation by qualifying for five (5) specific insurance subjects and keeping my skills updated every year in a formal classroom setting. AAI equals Accredited Advisor in Insurance which means I took coursework on the technical and management components of my business. I finished college after I was married and the mother of two children. Education has been and will always continue to be an important part of my personal and professional credentials.
- I am a closet writer. I have two books on sales and sales management that have been published. I have also authored numerous articles on business, sales and sales management that have appeared in the US and Canada. I am presently writing a book for pre-teen girls. I write every day in my job as Vice President of Marketing. I may write the tag line for an ad or I may write an article for our internal employee newsletter. I may write an article for an industry publication or for one of our affinity partners. I often write letters to our board of directors. I write direct marketing campaign material for our niche markets. Now, insurance policies can be fairly heavy stuff, but out of respect, I honor the good folks who wrote these documents as well. Words are my friends. The use of the computer has been a God-send in that spell check saves the day, but the computer also has nearly ruined my nearly (formerly) impeccable penmanship. Well, you can’t have everything your way can you?
Your Rotarian
Julie Dobski
Owner: Little Jewels Learning Center
A growing number of families need supplementary child care – that is, care provided by someone other than a parent. The reasons are well known: 51% of mothers with children under one year of age, and 63% of mothers with the children age 3-4 work part or full-time. Single parent families headed by fathers add yet another dimension. These youngsters need reliable, nurturing, affectionate child care to thrive.
The value of good child care is well documented. Early learning experiences that help build resilience, social skills, and the ability to keep learning have social and economic benefits for everyone – children, parents, employers and society as a whole – both now and in the future.
On the other hand, indifferent child care leads to poor outcomes for children. Intellectual and social development is likely to be stunted. Poor quality care can hamper what and how well children learn. Low standards of hygiene and safety in poor quality settings lead to injury and illness for children.
Inadequate care affects parents and employers as well, resulting in absenteeism, tardiness, and low productivity. 14 % of employees simply quit their jobs. The cost to retrain a single employee is estimated to be one and one-half times the employees annual salary.
Quality child care is what Little Jewels is all about. Come check us out.
(Author Credit: Catherine M. Pruissen)
Your Rotarian
Steve Schroeder
Development Director – Salvation Army
The lessons I’ve learned from my position, from which you might also learn (or at least find interesting), are as follows:
1. CONNECTIONS: There are many things that are needed to keep the Safe Harbor Shelter operating. All of them cost money and that is the one item most lacking so you have to be creative. When I was touring the Shelter I noticed the towels being offered were below “car washing” quality. My Hotel background reminded me that Hotels cycle out their undesirable towels. I contacted the hotels in town and we were blessed with their cycled out towels and a few cases of brand new. It’s who you know!
2. TIME MANAGEMENT: My least qualified talent. There is a lot going on at once and I like it all done *now.* That leads to stress, gray hair and weight gain (that’s my excuse anyway). So I’ve learned to slow down, take it one task at a time in the proper order.
3. COMMUNITY KNOWLEDGE: Our community has a great many resources to help you if you are in need of any kind of assistance. Knowing who the offices and agencies are is vital to this position. If you don’t know all of the agencies, you need to know who to ask to find the agencies. It makes “All of the Difference” to someone that is in need. Finding information to help someone might be just one task in your day but it may be THE pivotal point to someones complete success or failure.
4. GRANT WRITING and FUNDING: It’s not fun but it is necessary.
5. CARE FOR WHAT YOU ARE DOING: I love what I am doing. I realized that I spent all of my free time after work volunteering for groups that helped others. Now I get paid for it. It just makes sense. I get a lot out of it too. When ever I am having a bad day I look around and see how good I actually have it. That’s a great benefit as well.
Your Rotarian
Jamie Mathy
Chief Technology Officer, Mavidea
1. Windows 8 will be out in 2012.
Rumors have it that Windows 8 will be ready for back-to-school shopping in August, but I’m betting on Christmas shopping season in October. Microsoft is designing a whole new user interface that is going to be finger and mouse friendly. Touchscreens everywhere! This also means we will see the first true Windows tablets this year. Yes you heard it right folks – tablets that your business applications will actually run on!
There will be very little business impact for at least the first 6 months. Microsoft is saying that any application that runs on Windows 7 will run on Windows 8 just fine. It is safe to ignore Windows 8 for a while, but next year it will start getting harder and harder to buy Windows 7 machines. And you know a new version of Windows means a new version of Office can’t be far behind…… Do not upgrade without checking that business critical applications work correctly.
2. Cloud Computing is NOT for everyone.
The hype machine is still rolling, but the truth is that cloud computing may save some businesses money, but it won’t save money for every business in every circumstance. Some applications get very unhappy in the wrong environment. For other businesses the cloud will cost more money, but it may come with significant benefits like security, easy remote/mobility access, better backup / disaster recovery options, etc. Additionally, moving to the cloud normally does not incur the significant up-front Capital Expense that an onsite server would. Check with your trusted IT guy to see if it will work before jumping in.
3. Data encryption on laptops is essential.
Laptops outsold desktops in 2011 by about 55% – 45%. As more and more business data moves to laptops, it becomes imperative to take steps to protect it. Last year over 10,000 laptops were left in cabs in New York City alone. If I got my hands on your laptop, it would take me less than 3 minutes to access any piece of information stored (or cached in temporary files) on your computer if the drive isn’t encrypted.
Windows 7 and Windows 8 have drive encryption technology called Bit Locker built in (you may have to upgrade to the Enterprise edition) that is invisible to the end user if set up correctly, but will protect customer info in files, emails, and presentations on employee laptops.
4. You must protect yourself with a firewall and antivirus software.
The Internet is getting more dangerous, not less. If you are traveling with a laptop and connecting to Wi-Fi in hotels or coffee shops, make sure you have firewall software installed. Windows Firewall is built into Windows 7 and works great – when you connect to a wireless network, Windows 7 will ask where you are. Make sure you choose PUBLIC (unless you are actually at home or work). Choosing PUBLIC will turn on the Windows Firewall and raise all of the defenses.
Everyone should know by now that antivirus is not an option. Your business should have a good spam-filtering system that will stop 99%+ email-borne viruses, but most attacks now come via tricking users to click on the wrong thing online. AV installed on every machine is a must (this includes Macs!)
5. Your business must have a website and a Google Places set up.
Every year ISU asks me to come in and speak with their freshman. For the past 3 years, not a single one of them had a phone book. Only 1 knew where to FIND a phone book. Everyone younger than 35 is using the Internet to look up information, and if you are not out there, your competition is. Make sure your website has your phone number and address easily accessible on the front page. Google Places is now Google’s default way to provide localized content to searchers and if your business is not set up correctly there, it will hurt customers’ ability to find you.
Also, if your email address is from Gmail, Yahoo!, Hotmail, or AOL, you need to change it now. You will not be taken as a serious business by the younger generations if you aren’t using a real business email address.
Jan 2012 – Jamie Mathy
Feb 2012 – Steve Schroeder
Mar 2012 – Julie Dobski
April 2012 – Kris Andrews
May 2012 – Lynn DeCair
