Top 10 Best Books for Insurance Agents

Top 10 Best Books For Insurance Agents

Insurance agent reading one of the best books for insurance agents

NOTE: If you’re a new financial advisor, make sure you check out Your First Year As A Financial Advisor, where I reveal several things every new financial advisor ought to know.

What are some of the best books for insurance agents?

I try to read at least one book every few days (at least one per week) and the vast majority of my reading revolves around business, self-improvement, sales, and marketing.

Insurance agents always ask me what books I recommend for them, and sometimes it’s hard for me to choose. With that being said, I’ve tried my best to put my favorites in this list. Some are insurance-specific, while others deal with sales and motivation. These are, in no particular order, the best books for insurance agents, along with affiliate links. If you end up getting the books, thank you. 😎

1. The Psychology of Selling by Brian Tracy

I really enjoy Brian Tracy’s material. He’s given a lot to the self-improvement industry, but this book is one of his masterpieces. Insurance is a sales job, and in order to sell insurance, you need to know the psychology of selling. What are your prospects thinking? How can you lead them to a sale? Brian Tracy will help you understand how you can go from prospect to close.

This book is only ten bucks on Kindle, and you can pick up a used paperback version for around five bucks. You can’t go wrong with this one. Get it here.

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2. Talking to Strangers: The Adventures of a Life Insurance Salesman by Peter Rosengard

This is more like a memoir and it’s a great read. Rosengard has a lot of interesting stories, from turning an unknown band into a chart-topping sensation to selling the world’s biggest life insurance policy in history.

Every chapter of the book starts off with “How to…” Some of the chapters include:

How to sell the world’s largest life insurance policy
How to spend a day with the Doors
How to sell life insurance to an African chief
How to create the world’s largest charity in a day
How to spend a night on the town with a Mafia boss
How to take up smoking at 50
How to discover you’re a life insurance sex symbol

If those chapter titles intrigue you, you can get the book on Amazon here.

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The book, "Talking to Strangers", has a crazy story about the Mafia...

3. Think And Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill

This isn’t a sales or insurance-specific book, but it’s considered the go-to book in all of self-improvement. It’s personally my favorite book of all time. In a nutshell, Napoleon Hill was commissioned by Andrew Carnegie to interview hundreds of the world’s most successful people and write a book on their “secrets”. As a result of this endeavor, Hill wrote The Law of Success In 16 Lessons.

While The Law of Success is a great book, Think and Grow Rich is considered Hill’s magnum opus. If you end up reading the book, get in touch with me and we can talk about “the secret”. I want to know what you think it is, and if you want, I can show you some more resources to help you.

Note: Make sure you get the original version – do not get an abridged or edition version. I have read several different versions, and you will miss some important stuff if you get the edited versions. Some very important words were cut out, which can hinder your overall understanding.

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4. The Magic of Thinking Big by David Schwartz

While Think and Grow Rich is my favorite book, I have several friends who tell me The Magic of Thinking Big is their favorite book. I’ve also noticed that a lot of ultra-successful insurance agents have this book somewhere in their office. I read it and enjoyed it, but it wasn’t really life-changing for me. That’s just my personal opinion, so take it with a grain of salt. Maybe it was because by the time I read this book, I had already read hundreds of self-improvement books. I guess if you had to read just a few, I would include this on my list.

I recently went to a Barnes and Noble and this book was right out front, which tells me that even though it was written decades ago, it’s still selling well. This book can help you sell more, manage better, earn more, quit making excuses, overcome your fears, and think like a leader.

“The size of your success is determined by the size of your belief. Think little goals and expect little achievements. Think big goals and win big success. Remember this, too! Big ideas and big plans are often easier – certainly no more difficult – than small ideas and small plans.” – David Schwartz

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5. Power Position Your Agency: Building a Successful P&C Agency by Troy Korsgaden

Even if you only sell life and health, you can benefit from reading this book. It’s well written and it gives several key insights on positioning your agency within a competitive marketplace. I didn’t expect this book to even be on Kindle, but it is. It came out in the late 90s, and it is slightly dated, but you can still learn a ton.

It’s a short book, but that’s because Korsgaden gets straight to the point. He shows you how to get a grip on your time, make prospects come to you, market more effectively, and get more appointments. He spent his first ten years in business getting only 1,500 Policies in Force. He became frustrated with his progress and developed systems that would make his agency more productive. Over the next four years, he added nearly 4,000 policies. In this book, he gives you a sneak peek of how he did it.

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6. Questions and Answers on Life Insurance: The Life Insurance Toolbook by Anthony Steuer

Many life insurance agents are hesitant to read this book because they think it’s too elementary for them. After all, they probably already know a lot of the stuff in this book, so why read it? I tell life insurance agents to read this book because it gives them a deeper understanding of their prospects. It sheds light on the uncertainties they have and the questions they’re asking.

While this book was written for consumers and not agents, it’s an incredible book to have because by understanding what your prospects are thinking, you can improve your sales and customer service skills. For example, there’s a section in the book called “Hire a Trusted Agent”, and it will show you what consumers are looking for. It’s over 400 pages long, but it is well worth your time. Check it out here.

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7. The New Life Insurance Investment Advisor by Ben Baldwin

This book is a little enamored with variable UL, but it’s still a good read. I recommend this for the same reason I recommend the previous book – to help you understand your consumer and how they’re wading through all the different choices available to them.

To a lot of your prospects, life insurance is complex and intimidating. Baldwin breaks everything down in a clear and logical way. He explains the pros and cons of Internet purchases, how to use capital within a policy, and insurance needs for different stages of life. If you can explain the concepts to your prospects like Baldwin explains them to you, you will become a better life insurance agent. It’s that simple.

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8. Secrets of Successful Insurance Sales by Jack Kinder and Garry Kinder

This book contains a Napoleon Hill book called “The Science of Successful Insurance Selling”, which Hill never published. The authors basically took Napoleon Hill’s work and his principles and packaged them together into a book for life insurance agents.

If you are already familiar with Hill’s work and enjoy it, you will love this book. There aren’t any super-specific sales strategies; it deals more along the lines of persistence, self-improvement, and having a positive mental attitude.

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9. The Wedge: How to Stop Selling and Start Winning by Randy Schwantz

Okay, so this is the most expensive book on this list. At the time of this writing, it is $37.99 for the Kindle version, but it is some powerful stuff. I don’t want to give too much away, but it will help you close more sales by giving you a way to ask your prospects for help. It will also help you differentiate yourself from the competition.

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10. Go For No! Yes Is The Destination, No Is How You Get There by Richard Fenton

This book changed my life. I used to get so hung up on rejection and it would destroy my chances of making sales. This book changed all that by shifting my mindset. Instead of making my goal to get a “yes”, I made my goal to get as many “no’s” as possible, knowing that the “yes” would eventually come.

I have both the book and the audio version. It’s only 80 pages long but it’s life-changing. I recommend this book in The Ultimate Financial Advisor’s Guide to Getting More Clients and financial advisors write me all the time telling me how helpful it is. This is, hands-down, one of the best books for life insurance agents. Get it here.

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BONUS: The Slight Edge: Turning Simple Disciplines Into Massive Success And Happiness by Jeff Olson

The concept in this book has been beaten to death over the last few years, but this is the best one I’ve read on the concept of a “slight edge”. Essentially it’s the accumulation effect; the idea that little things add up. If you eat one donut today, it won’t be a big deal, but if you eat a donut every single day for years on end, the negative effects will accumulate. The same goes for success. It all comes down to the choices you make every day.

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So there you have it – the best books for life insurance agents. If you have any recommendations or comments, reach out to me! If you know people who need to add some of these books to their reading lists, feel free to share this post.

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