According to American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), there are over 184 million pets in American households. But less than 2% of them have pet insurance.
Insurance comparison websites and simplified online application process has made pet insurance more accessible. And the pet insurance market has grown on an average of 20% annually over the past five years. This is a huge market with solid growth.
Pet insurance can be sold online, from home or even part-time by insurance agents or insurance brokers – who are required to have a P&C license in most states. You may also promote pet insurance by joining affiliate programs that pay you a commission for sending traffic to their website for a quote or an application.
If you love pets (mostly dogs and cats) and think it’s a great idea to promote pet insurance to cover their medical expenses so they can live healthier, then you’ve come to the right place.
Do I need a license to sell pet insurance?
There are two ways you can earn a commission by selling (or promoting) pet insurance:
If you sell pet insurance as an insurance agent or broker – through face-to-face meetings, telephone calls, or online channels – a Property and Casualty (P&C) license is required for most states.
The benefit of obtaining full P&C licensing requirements is you are considered competent and qualified to sell other products in the P&C lines, such as home insurance, auto insurance, or commercial insurance.
This means you are open to more opportunities when you have accumulated a client base.
If you sell (or promote) pet insurance through affiliate programs – by sending traffic to an advertiser (usually an insurer’s website or product comparison website), and let them do the selling and servicing, there is no requirement for a license.
This can be done purely online. Once you’ve joined a pet insurance affiliate program, you can create referral links that send and track traffic to an insurer’s website.
When someone clicks through the link to request a quote or make a purchase, you earn a commission as an affiliate marketer.
How much can I earn selling pet insurance?
Work From Home Pet Insurance Job (Full-Time)
A recent search on ZipRecruiter shows the national average income for a ful-time “Work From Home Pet Insurance Job” is $54,246 per year.
Work from home pet insurance jobs duties involve sales, marketing, customer service, and claims processing related to pet insurance.
Instead of working in the office, your tasks are done from home or another location outside of the office. This allows you to save your car mileage and time by skipping the travel.
Some people may choose to work part-time in the evenings or weekends. You may expect to earn a portion of this income, depending on the number of clients you have and your location.
Through Affiliate Program (Full Time / Part-Time)
A commission can be earned if you promote pet insurance through affiliate programs by referring traffic for a quote or an application. The commission can range from $1.6-$25 per lead or up to $152 per sale.
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Let’s do an estimation.
If you could send 2 prospects for a quotation per day, you will earn an average of $798 ([$1.6+$25]/2 x 30 days x 2 quotes) per month. Say, if one out of ten coverts, and each sale gives you $80. Then you will have six sales amount to $480 per month.
So that adds up to $1,278 ($798 from quotation plus $480 from sales) per month or $15,336 per year.
The best thing is that you can make this your side-hustle while having a full-time job.
Some people can earn a decent income to replace their full-time job from the pet niche (including but not limited to promoting pet insurance) online.
Who should sell pet insurance?
Although there is no educational requirement for being an insurance agent/broker, you may do better than the others if you like to help people and provide helpful after-sales service.
Below are a few types of people who have the advantage over others when it comes to selling health insurance, be it from home, online or part-time:
Pet owners or anyone who loves pets: Obvious enough, if you spend a lot of time with pets, you will have no shortage of topics to talk about, be it their habits, health and behavior. You may share your first-hand experience in buying pet insurance or even filing claims.
Anyone already in the pet niche: If you are already in the pet niche, such as pet food, pet toys, pet training, or pet spa, your followers will need pet insurance. And why not leverage this relationship you already have and create a new stream of income with pet insurance?
Anyone in the personal finance or money-saving niche: At the end of the day, pet insurance is an investment to save future expenses on vet bills. As figures showed only 1.6% of pets are insured, promoting pet insurance could be your next big growth engine as long as you can teach people how to save more money with it.
Insurance agents/brokers or marketers: Whether your expertise is in pet insurance or not, your knowledge and background in the insurance industry will better differentiate yourself. It will be a no-brainer for you to explain the fine prints and jargons to help your prospects to make better decisions when choosing the right pet insurance coverage.
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Which path to go for? Insurance agents/brokers or affiliate programs?
If you are an outgoing person who enjoys networking, meeting new friends, and see insurance as a long-term commitment, you might want to get a license to become an agent/broker.
And with a license, you can expand your business beyond pet insurance and sell other kinds of insurance in the same line of business, e.g. home insurance or auto insurance.
If you are a tech-savvy person and participates in online communities and understands how digital marketing works, promoting pet insurance through affiliate programs could be your choice.
The best thing about affiliate programs is that you don’t even need to be licensed and can do it anywhere in the world, as long as you can send enough traffic for quotes and applications.
Should I pick a species or breed to start with?
Most insurance plans cover only dogs and cats. Nationwide is by far the only carrier that provides coverage for exotic animals like snakes or birds. But they do not have an affiliate program available.
In fact, according to Google Trends, the interest for “dog insurance” is around 3 to 5 times more than for “cat insurance” throughout the past 5 years. So you can be pretty sure dog insurance is in greater demand.
Dogs generally inherit more genetic issues than cats. And they are more likely to incur injuries during their lifetime. Therefore, they tend to see the veterinarian more often. Thus, the premium for dogs is higher than cats in general.
Most companies will charge higher premiums on certain breeds because experience has shown that some breeds cost more to care for. These breeds may include Pit Bulls, Rottweilers, Doberman Pinschers, German Shepherds, Siberian Huskies, Akitas, etc.
Having said that, you will be alright to start promoting pet insurance with dog owners as the main target.
What’s Next?
Although there is no formal training course on pet insurance, you can start by reading online reviews, pet insurance blogs or even try to get a few quotes to gain some user experience yourself.
You can read pet insurance reviews from websites like CanineJournal, ConsumerAdvocates.org, Investopedia, Review.com, and so on.
If you want to learn more about pet insurance affiliate programs and how much commission do they pay out, also read our post on: Best Pet Insurance Affiliate Programs
