North American Company for Life and Health Insurance®
While the primary use of life insurance is death benefit protection, your clients may also have other needs that can be met through life insurance. The sales concepts and accompanying marketing materials below may help you broaden your sales potential.
As independent contractors, it is up to you to choose which of these concepts may work for your particular sales strategy and clients, and which do not. Please note that North American does not require you to use any of these sales concepts; they are resources that can be used at your discretion for your own individualized sales presentations.
As you meet with clients, use the tools below to help identy their needs and hone in on the concepts that can help fulfill their financial objectives. Then, turn to our sales concept kits which provide marketing materials along with the know-how to put these strategies to work for you!
Annuity maximization
Annuity maximization is a leveraging technique in which annuity assets1 are used to purchase life insurance. The goal is to provide a greater death benefit for beneficiaries. Though annuities may be an excellent tax-deferred growth vehicle, they are not generally designed to transfer wealth. Life insurance may be an ideal wealth transfer solution for your clients.2
Business insurance: buy-sell
Whether your clients own a large company or a small family-operated business, the success of any business depends on smart strategy and planning.
Business insurance: executive bonus
An executive bonus arrangement can be a powerful, yet simple way to provide a valuable benefit for company owners and key employees. It can help reduce turnover of key employees that could result in significant financial losses.
Business insurance: key person
Most companies have a person(s) whose skills are vital to the success of the business. A key person may be an owner, partner, or employee without whom the business would suffer serious consequences.
Business insurance: Split dollar3
Split-dollar plans are arrangements between two or more parties, usually an employer and employee, to purchase and share the costs and benefits of a life insurance policy. Learn more about what these types of cases, using an economic benefit design, have to offer.
Client review
Not only does life change, but life insurance products change over time. That's why it's important for you to have a regular client review practice in place.
College funding
The primary purpose of life insurance is to provide a death benefit to beneficiaries. It can be designed to meet your clients' changing needs with features such as flexible death benefit and flexible premiums. Death benefit protection can make life insurance an attractive choice for establishing a self-completing plan to help fund a college education. Permanent life insurance that can accumulate cash value may be used to help pay for college costs.4
Estate planning
Most clients will accumulate significant assets over their lifetimes. Help address your clients' death benefit needs and find smart, affordable estate planning solutions.
Income protection
Help protect the future of your client's family in the event of the loss of a wage-earner or non-wage-earner through the death benefit protection offered by life insurance.
Legacy building
Legacy building is a strategy that uses permanent life insurance to offer death benefit protection and efficiently pass on assets to beneficiaries. Typically, the strategy starts with funds the client already plans to pass along to family. These funds are used to purchase a life insurance policy, which may immediately increase the amount in the form of the death benefit.
Longevity planning
Longevity planning is a strategy that helps your clients prepare for a long, healthy retirement, while also providing for loved ones in case of death. The desire to travel, a new home, new hobbies, and gifting assets are all desires that might be beyond your client's current plan for income replacement in their later years. An unexpected illness might also make a long retirement more costly.
Pension maximization
The typical defined benefit pension plan may pose several challenges for your clients—mostly, a potentially lower monthly income during retirement, as well as a lack of flexibility to change the beneficiary or the election option. The pension maximization strategy can help your clients gain death benefit protection while making the most out of a pension plan.
Retirement planning
The retirement planning strategy uses permanent life insurance to provide clients with death benefit protection while offering the potential to help supplement their income during retirement.
Smart money
Smart money is money your clients want to control and be able to access during times of need. While there are several options for where to keep this smart money, one that's often overlooked is permanent life insurance. It can provide the opportunity to build cash value for financial needs down the road, while also providing death benefit protection to help a family continue, or to pass down a legacy.
DIME/OTCA
Striking out when meeting prospects? Try these simple methods to set up meetings and to determine a client's life insurance need.
For marketers
The North American Company sales concept playbook was designed exclusively for our MGAs and their staff. The purpose of the playbook is to help you build deeper relationships with your financial professionals by providing you with a resource to help them succeed.
1. Removing funds from an annuity may result in surrender charges and/or income taxes. North American Company nor its agents give tax advice. Please advise your customers to consult with and rely on a qualified legal or tax advisor before entering into or paying additional premiums with respect to such arrangements.
2. The tax-deferred feature of the universal life policy is not necessary for a tax-qualified plan. In such instances, your client should consider whether other features, such as the death benefit and optional riders make the policy appropriate for your client's needs. Before purchasing this policy, your client should obtain competent tax advice both as to the tax treatment of the policy and the suitability of the product.
3. Under an economic split dollar arrangement, the value of the life insurance afforded the employee is taxable to the employee. The employer should provide the employee with tax reporting based on requirements specified in the tax code. The parties to the economic split-dollar arrangement should seek their own independent legal and tax advice as to whether and how to enter into an economic split-dollar arrangement based on the employer’s and employee’s unique circumstances.
4. The primary purpose of life insurance is to provide a death benefit to beneficiaries. Because of the uncertainty surrounding all funding options except savings, it is critical to encourage your clients to make personal savings the cornerstone of your clients' college funding program. However, even a well-conceived savings plan can be vulnerable. Should your clients die prematurely, their savings plan could come to an abrupt end. To protect against this unexpected event, life insurance may be the only vehicle that can help assure the completion of a funding plan. In addition to the financial protection aspect of insurance, the tax-deferred buildup of cash values can be part of your clients' college savings plan. Generally, if the policy is not a Modified Endowment Contract then tax-free withdrawals can be made up to the contract's cost basis. Moreover, if the policy is not a Modified Endowment Contract, then loans in excess of the cost basis are also tax free as long as the policy remains in force.
FOR AGENT USE ONLY. NOT TO BE USED FOR CONSUMER SOLICITATION PURPOSES.
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