Why CP Manager Is The Best Agency Management Option Today. Plus, Our Users Favorite Features...
Summary Of Why CP Manager Is The Best Choice For Your Agency:
Back in 1989 when I first started helping agencies with their agency automation and helped them review systems to determine which one was best for their agency there was less than 10 systems to look at and of these only 5 of them were even a consideration. The rest sold strictly based upon price since that was the only thing really going for them.
Thirty years later, today we have over 40 systems to choose from. This has simply made it more confusing to agencies on which is the best option for their agency.
When I chose to take on designing CP Manager, the one thing I absolutely did not want to do is create "just another management system" since there are enough of them already on the market. It was my objective to create an extremely easy to use system (#1 request of agencies) which is very single-entry and which would massively increase your productivity (#2 request of agencies) and profits.
When we look at all of the systems on the market and really analyze them you see common patterns...
- There are still high-end expensive systems with lots of features, but pretty consistently most agencies really only use 15-20% of the system
- There are still low-end inexpensive systems
- Most systems are still just personal lines driven and really miss the mark at supporting the commercial lines agency
- Most systems are based upon policies that are downloaded and are weak at manually processing policy tasks for policies that aren't downloaded.
- The #1 request of an agency when reviewing management systems is still "easy to use" and for good reason. Because this is still the #1 request it leaves us to believe the systems on the market still aren't easy to use.
- Accounting and being able to support agency bill business continues to separate systems
- It's well established management systems are not created equal with each system allowing a different level of productivity. When analyzed we can see that the more single-entry a system is, the better flow with how you process policy tasks along with how many steps/windows you have to go through to process your work being the core factors to establishing just how productive you'll be with a specific system even though they all tend to have the same "core" features.
- All of the systems are still "feature driven" putting the emphasis on adding the features needed to do your job where a productivity driven system also includes the features needed to do your job but they're built into the system from a productivity foundation to allow you to do your job more efficiently.
- There still isn't a productivity, workflow driven system (until now).
So why CP Manager? How does CP Manager stand out and separate itself from the other systems?
This is what I'm going to discuss with you here starting with this...
We're Really Good At Moving Agencies To CP Manager... 30 Years Of Experience!
There's a time-tested and proven process to transition from one system to another in a painless and efficient way which dramatically minimizes interruptions in the agency. This is something Mr. Chesnut has perfected over the past 30 years. As is, he's already helped hundreds of agencies move to a new system over the years.
Where it becomes "key" to having a proven process and knowing the "key" strategies to transition from one system to another is when there's a data conversion involved. Not every agency wants to do a data conversion for a few key reasons. But most who are currently on a system do want to have their data converted.
When there's a data conversion involved it's important to pay special attention to the process to properly coordinate each of the key steps. For example, when the "final" conversion is scheduled to take place we want to start the training process so the agency staff is ready to start servicing clients at the completion of the final conversion. This is just one of a few key things that must be done once we start the "final" conversion.
The key here is we're very much aware of how to effectively transition an agency over to a new system.
On top of all of this you'll also find that the easier the system is to learn and use the easier the transition will be. If the new system takes a lot of training and time to learn the transition to the new system will be much more stressful and difficult. Thankfully, by design, CP Manager is an extremely easy system to learn and use!
Let me just say, "you're in really good hands with AAT" with Mr. Chesnut's extensive experience in this process of switching to a better system. The big advantage today is Mr. Chesnut is the President of AAT so he's able to make sure the vendor --AAT-- is doing their part efficiently and correctly. You can learn more about all of this by clicking on the following button...
Things To Consider When Comparing Management Systems...
Here are some key factors to keep in mind when reviewing systems:
- You process your work from your management system. Therefore it's very obvious that your management system controls your workflows to processing a task. You need to know what it takes to process key transactions system by system... to process and manage endorsements, renewals, claims, etc. What are the steps to each of these? How easily is to stay on top of these items?
- Most agencies have never been through a formalized "workflow" training course. Vendors don't teach workflows. Is the management system flexible enough to support different workflows? For example, how you process a policy task when the policy transactions are downloaded compared to how you process a policy task with policies that aren't downloaded is different. Can your system efficiently handle policy tasks you need to do manually when it's not downloaded? (FYI, of the over 2,000 carriers only a little over 400 offer downloading, and of the carriers who do download they don't download all of the LOB's they offer.)
- Proper workflows is the key to increased productivity and protecting the agency from E&O exposures.
- The "Core features" of the management system is Notes, Follow Ups, Correspondence and Attachments. Every system has these features. However, each of these core features are distinctly different system by system to include, 1) How data flows to them, 2) What you can do with each of these core feature, and 3) Where you can access these core features... These three things are what you want to compare when reviewing the core features!
- When reviewing management systems you should always focus on the results you need to achieve with the agency automation in your agency, not on the features of an agency management system. You focus on the "result" and then make sure the features to support this result are available in the system.
- You want to prioritize your automation needs because no one system will likely meet all of your needs. Are the most important needs which will make the biggest impact in your agency able to be met system by system? What are the factors to each your automation priorities?
- You should compare your business model (or the business you'd like to put in place) with the management system to make sure the management system will support that business model.
- When reviewing prices, the upfront amount is the small part. It's the monthly support fees that establish the true long term cost of a system when the only focus is on price.
- When looking at the "true long term cost of a system", how productive your staff will be is the #1 factor to establishing the true cost and what your ROI on a system will be. Just a 10% increase in productivity will create a significant long term savings and benefit to the agency.
- How intuitive and easy to use is the system? This right here will dictate how easy or hard it will be to train your staff on a system to include both CSRs and Producers along with new people you will hire as you grow or as staff quit. If you're cringing at the idea of having to hire new people because of how difficult your current system is, you need to seriously look at other systems. If on the other hand the system you're using is very easy and intuitive you'll be excited about growing and bringing on new producers and CSRs.
Mr. Chesnut has been helping agencies for 30 years to properly review and make a good decision on an agency management system. This list should be very helpful in helping you to make a good decision for your agency.
Agency AutomationTEAM Brings 30 Years Of Industry Experience...
There's Advantages To Working With A Company With A President With 30 Years Of Experience And Who's An Expert In Productivity Strategies, Workflows, Agency Automation, Agency Growth Strategies...
Mr. Chesnut has experienced a lot and played an important role in helping hundreds of agencies develop a profitable and growing agency. He's was also the master mind, the secret weapon, behind two other vendors going from Startup to becoming wildly successful. Then they both secretly sold out, the first vendor in 1993 and the second one in 2005.
You should know, he was furious with the two vendors for selling out and promises to never sell out Agency AutomationTEAM (AAT)!
He is constantly stating how AAT is being built for agencies to give them a home, a family, where they know they'll be with a forward thinking company committed to excellence in agency automation, who puts their clients first and who will do everything they can to keep costs down. He clearly understands the process to switching systems, especially when you get forced into switching systems because your vendor sold out to another vendor. It really puts the agencies in a bad spot!
Over the past 30 years he's always been on the agencies side. With the other two vendors he worked with he was creating a family of agencies who he was working closely with, but when the vendor sold out that all came to an end.
You have to remember, your management system is the foundation to how you service your clients and run your agency. Your agency management system plays a bigger role in how you conduct business to include your Business Model than just about anything else you could do which makes choosing a management system pretty darn important!
You never have to worry about AAT selling out (just talk to Mr. Chesnut about how upset he was when the other two vendors sold out and you'll agree), we'll bring the best features to the market place, will continue to stay focused on helping you do your day to day work in the most productive way possible and much more. You'll feel important and we'll show you how important you are to us in the decisions we make and how we conduct business by putting our clients first.
We take meeting your agency automation very seriously... we're on your side!
Excitedly, agency automation isn't our only expertise which means we'll be bringing other important skills to help you with your agency.
We'll Be Offering Advanced Training Programs To Help You "Build" Your Agency and To Help You "Grow" Your Agency
As an insurance automation consultant, Mr. Chesnut has been training agencies for years. Not just basic training, but advanced training such as:
- How to read reports to make important decisions in your agency, and how these decisions play an important role in the agency
- Productivity strategies... Using your management system even more efficiently and strategies that have nothing to do with automation.
- Taking a brand new user to being very proficient in doing their job
- Business Models for small agencies, mid-sized agencies and large agencies to help your agency prosper and grow. Business models are initially based upon where you're at now, your niche market, your resources available, the goals for your agency. Business models are key to the success of an agency! Even small tweaks in your business model can result in huge results.
- Numerous marketing courses:
- The two key parts to marketing... the marketing strategy and the marketing piece
- Understanding "demographics" and the important role this plays in marketing
- Breaking down the different marketing strategies and understanding their effectiveness between PL and CL marketing... they can be very different.
- Understanding "marketing assets" and the very important role they play in your marketing
- The correct order and proper implementation of marketing strategies supported by marketing assets
- We'll also offer "Done-For-You" marketing where the marketing company we work with will handle your marketing for you
This is just some of what we'll be offering in advanced training courses.
A High Level Of Customer Satisfaction
With every vendor he's worked with Mr. Chesnut maintained the highest level of customer satisfaction. Support loved working with his clients because they were happy clients and some of the best trained clients of the vendors.
Now that Mr. Chesnut is the President of a vendor he gets to make sure that all clients receive a high level of service and gets to put in place the services which matter the most to clients.
Working With Our Clients In A More Active Way, And Allowing Our Clients To Drive The Ongoing Features Of Our Systems
Our position is, "this is YOUR system so you, our clients, should have the most say in what features are added to the systems and the order in which they are added."
For years Mr. Chesnut watched vendors add features most of their clients simply didn't see the value in. Who were these features added for? Why was the vendor creating features that didn't benefit very many clients when they could've used the same programming time to add features more clients wanted? Why weren't the vendor adding the features the clients were asking for?
This just didn't make sense to Mr. Chesnut.
We've put in place a process to review upcoming features to offer your input on them, to request features, and to vote on features to determine which should be added first to establish the order in which they're added.
After the "core" features of CP Manager have been added, the power switches to our clients who will determine what features to add and the order to add them. You'll really like what we're doing here.
Agency AutomationTEAM Is Not Your Typical Vendor and CP Manager Followed By The TIME System Are Not Your Typical Management System...
By the time Mr. Chesnut took on the monstrous task of designing and then having an agency management system written he had experienced enough and worked with enough vendors to realize there would never be a productivity workflow driven system created because vendors just didn't have the skill set to pull it off or the desire to create a new system from the ground floor up which is the only way the proper table structures could be put in place to support a system like this.
Mr. Chesnut could've semi-retired and just enjoyed life. He could've continued to work with agencies helping them to increase their productivity the best they could based upon the system they were using, he could've written numerous courses like "How To Put In Place The Best Business Model For Your Agency," and numerous other courses all while staying home and loving up his family which is very important to him.
Mr. Chesnut has a great home office he loves working from. In fact, Mr. Chesnut has worked from home all but 2 years the last 30 years. The idea of going to an office and being away from his family was not something that excited him. He knew that if he took on this job that he'd have no choice but to go to an office to work with and train the account managers, CSRs and trainers, and then continue to work with them.
He did not need to do this. But he did because of his love of this industry, because of the many close relationships he's developed with agencies and organizations over the years who were all begging for an easy to use highly productive system, and because he knew this was the only way a system would be created which would support productivity strategies and workflows. It has baffled him for years that with this industry being "workflow driven" that there has never been a workflow driven management system... this just made no sense at all!
After many conversations with his family and hearing from so many of his clients who were frustrated with the options available he took this on starting by spending the first year --Yes, a full year-- developing the blueprint to CP Manager. By the time he was done he realized he had just designed the most productive, easiest to use system to ever hit this industry!
In the midst of all of this, he created the by-laws of the company based upon his experiences over the past 25 years of working with other vendors and hundreds of agencies. AAT is 100% client focused and driven. Clients are why we're in business and how we'll stay in business... their needs first!
In addition, once the decision was made to move forward with having CP Manager created, it has always been Mr. Chesnut's desire and plan to be on the floor working with prospective agencies and clients alike. He has absolutely no desire in being in an office behind closed doors when his real strength is helping agencies make a good decision on their automation and then helping them to use it efficiently to increase the productivity of their agency. He loves working with agencies!
The point here is, CP Manager isn't like any other system you've ever experienced. We did what's never been done before but has been long overdue by creating a management system based upon productivity strategies and workflows. What we're hearing is:
- "CP Manager is the most insurance specific system we've ever seen"
- "If easy to use was your goal, you nailed it"
- "We love how CP Manager supports our commercial lines business"
- "I've never experienced a more single-entry and intuitive system than CP Manager"
- "Moving over to CP Manager was pretty darn smooth, way better than what I had to go through with the last vendor"
Along with this, Agency AutomationTEAM (AAT) will be the most client focused and driven vendor you'll ever do business with. You'll really appreciate how we'll serve you and take care of you, along with all of the things we'll be doing for you like FREE local workshops in areas with at least 20 CPM clients.
Along with the local workshops we'll be providing no cost group training webinars to our clients covering the basics to using CP Manager.
It was and is our intentions of breaking many of the "traditional" ways vendors work with their clients and taking a stand in doing what's right and best for our clients. Excitedly, after 30 years in this business and industry we have a pretty good clue of what we need to do. We've written about those things already in other informational pieces.
Now that you know the "rest of the story" and why Mr. Chesnut took this on, let's take a look at...
Our Users Favorite Features...
CP Manager Was Designed To Be Highly Productive
From years of working with agencies helping them to increase their productivity Mr. Chesnut found the biggest obstacle to helping the agency create the level of productivity they desired was the management system. The biggest problems were:
- Not being single-entry causing the agency to re-enter data already in the system into other places. The biggest area in the systems facing this issue is in the area of Commercial Lines client and policy management!
- Poor layouts forcing the agency to jump all over the system for common things they use daily.
- Poor workflows. Again, forcing the agency to jump all over the system to find the tools they need to do the task at hand.
- Having to go through so many windows and having so many steps just to do something.
- Not properly integrating tools like Notes, Attachments, Follow Ups and Correspondence into the system, but instead treating them like an add-on module and not the integrated tool it needs to be.
- Not managing key policy issues like Renewals and Endorsements properly.
- Locking down the client record or policy when doing something not allowing the user to multi-task and do other things until they finish what they are doing.
- Not being easy to use causing staff to waste time to figure out where something is, how to do something and numerous other issues.
- Not making it easy to stay on top of work in progress.
And the list goes on and on. Take a look at what we did to create a highly productive system which also happen to be our clients top features...
Easy, Easy, Easy To Learn and Use!
From day one of development, ease of use has been an important part of the creation of CP Manager. As Insurance Automation Consultants who have worked with hundreds of agencies and with many different agency management systems we knew what "easy to use" looked like and how to create an easy to use system.
Learn more about how we've created the easiest system on the market...
CP Manager is Very Single-Entry
We hate double-entry and consider it to be one of the biggest thieves of your time. Time is money and when you have to re-enter information already in the system again it's costing you time and money.
Consistently, one of the biggest areas of double-entry in most systems is in the area of commercial lines client and policy management. It's not the only place, it's just the biggest.
We have painstakingly spent many programming hours creating a very single-entry system because we know how important it is to have a single-entry system!
CP Manager Is A Commercial Lines Powerhouse!
Compared to Personal Lines, Commercial Lines is a beast! With Commercial Lines there's more of everything... more properties, more vehicles, more drivers, more everything.
Plus, it's easy to create a mono-line policy management system. Add in packages with multiple sections and it's a whole different ball game.
Because we knew how much more complex commercial lines is over personal lines when we started on the policy management piece of CP Manager we started with commercial lines. Take a look at what we did to create a Commercial Lines Powerhouse...
CP Manager's Price
We understand how important the price is, and we recognize that small agencies tend to go with the lower priced systems even though they may be heavy in double-entry, weak in commercial lines and lack the core functionality to help the agency quickly and easily handle their "day to day work".
You will appreciate CP Manager's price.
Yes, there are a few systems that are lower priced than CP Manager but we easily make up the difference when you factor in:
- How single-entry CP Manager is saving you from wasting your time by re-entering data already in the system, and
- How we'll save you time and money in learning CP Manager because of how easy to use CP Manager is (this is just one of many benefits to having an easy to use system), and
- If you do Commercial Lines you will be thanking us for designing a Commercial Lines powerhouse that'll make managing your commercial lines clients and their policies so much easier and more efficiently (that, or you'll be constantly frustrated if you select a system lower priced than CP Manager and have to deal with commercial lines in those systems).
Contact your account manager today and see how we have priced CP Manager so it's affordable to all agencies, or click the Request A Quote button to start the process of getting a quote...
We Know That As Your Agency Grows Your Agency Automation Needs Will Increase Too.
This Is Why We Planned From Day One To Create Two Management Systems, But We Will Be Doing What No Other Vendor Has Been Able To Do When Offering More Than One System...
We Provide A Natural Logical Upgrade Path From CP Manager As Your Agency Grows To The TIME System, The Next Management System We'll Be Releasing!
We understand the needs of an agency will evolve and grow as the agency grows with more staff. When we break-down agency management systems the foundation is client and policy management. As you grow your automation needs start to encompass staff related issues, sales management, more advanced marketing and more thorough reporting to stay on top of key areas within the agency.
The next system we'll be releasing is the TIME System. Click on the image to the left to see the different Hubs that'll be available with the TIME system.
When upgrading to the TIME system we did what's never been done before but makes total sense and is far better for agencies when upgrading to a new system:
This is how it should work when upgrading to another system by the same vendor, don't you agree?
As we get closer to releasing the TIME System we'll start sharing more information about the TIME System. What you should be excited about is our clear understanding of agency automation in relationship to how an agency evolves and grows, and that we've put in place a logical upgrade path to the TIME System saving you money, time, no interruptions and not losing one iota of information. You can grow with AAT.
The good news is agencies on CP Manager will not need to upgrade soon and will be able to use CP Manager for many years. We included some TIME System specific features in CP Manager and will allow agencies who purchase CP Manager prior to the release of the TIME System to keep these features.
Switching To CP Manager Will Be The Last Time You'll Ever Need To Do A Data Conversion Or Go Through Another Learning Curve!
A very common practice for smaller agencies is to purchase a lower priced system. Then as the agency grows and/or the needs of the agency evolves they find they need a better system and end up switching to another system. It's another data conversion, another new learning curve.
First, CP Manager will support the needs of your agency for a long time! CP Manager is not some low-end system, but instead is a world class automation system which offers your agency a lot of functionality with more features being added monthly.
If you grow to the point of needing more than just advanced client and policy management and need a system which will automate even more of your agency this is where the TIME System will become valuable to you. Keep in mind, the high majority of systems on the market are strictly just a client and policy management system. It's not until you start looking at Epic and 360 can you go beyond just client and policy management.
Because we'll be introducing two systems to the market, as your agency grows you don't need to go to another vendor. You can just upgrade to the TIME System. Having just shared the process to upgrading to the TIME System, you will never have to spend money again on a data conversion, or go through another data conversion again, or go through another learning curve after CP Manager.
We designed Agency AutomationTEAM to support you from startup to becoming a large agency, to include offering advanced training programs to help you build your agency and grow your agency.
