Sean Nero

The suc­cess at­tained by pre­mier in­sur­er T&T In­sur­ance Lim­it­ed (Tatil) could not have been re­alised with­out the qual­i­ty cus­tomer ser­vice de­liv­ered by its sales force, says Ronald Mil­ford, man­ag­ing di­rec­tor of the Tatil Life.

Speak­ing at the com­pa­ny's 2015 Sales Awards cer­e­mo­ny at the Hilton Trinidad and Con­fer­ence, he said the com­pa­ny could not en­joy the rep­u­ta­tion it had if the peo­ple they em­ployed were just about get­ting the con­sumer to buy a prod­uct with­out fol­low up ser­vice.

Be­cause they en­deav­oured to do more and be more, Mil­ford said, the Tatil brand con­tin­ues to soar and ma­ture.

"In most cas­es, we sell a prod­uct that is con­sid­ered a com­mod­i­ty and most in­sur­ance com­pa­nies have the same suite of prod­ucts, with changes here and there, with a slight dif­fer­ence in pric­ing and maybe pre­sen­ta­tion. It is my opin­ion that the prod­uct that we sell as a com­pa­ny is ser­vice. That is the prod­uct! As fi­nan­cial ad­vi­sors, we must be­come more ser­vice ori­ent­ed by de­vel­op­ing long term re­la­tion­ships with our cus­tomers," he said.

Mil­ford con­tin­ued: "I chal­lenge you, our agents, to be­come more long term in your think­ing, as it re­lates to re­la­tion­ship build­ing. The dif­fer­ence be­tween a sales­man and a fi­nan­cial ad­vi­sor is one of re­la­tion­ship. If you as­pire to be a sales­man, then af­ter the prod­uct is sold, chances are you will nev­er see the cus­tomer again. How­ev­er, if your de­sire is to be a fi­nan­cial ad­vi­sor, where you can grow and build long term re­la­tion­ships with you clients through needs based sell­ing, you are now a fi­nan­cial ad­vi­sor and cher­ished mem­ber of the Tatil team."

Mil­ford said to so­lid­i­fy Tatil's lead­er­ship role in the in­sur­ance in­dus­try the team had to pos­sess a greater abil­i­ty to set long term goals and take care of the clients' needs. He said the brand was built over the years on a rep­u­ta­tion of in­tegri­ty and the de­liv­ery of ex­tra­or­di­nary ser­vice and it was be­cause of these qual­i­ties, it was one of the most recog­nis­able in the coun­try.

"We are al­so for­tu­nate to be part of one of the most pow­er­ful brands in T&T and the lead­ings con­glom­er­ate in the re­gion. By set­ting long term goals, one is as­sur­ing the fu­ture suc­cess of our busi­ness. I am cer­tain when our founder, Dr An­tho­ny N Sab­ga was build­ing his em­pire his thoughts were not on the short term gains," Mil­ford said.