General Business Insurance

We’ve identified several target markets or industry verticals on which The Coyle Group focuses, such as Manufacturing or Technology. But what if your company doesn’t fit into one of those categories?

Not to worry!

We work with just about every type of business on their insurance needs, that includes:

Retailers,
Restaurants and Hospitality,
Building & Construction Trades,
Real Estate,
Media,

Fashion & Design,
Healthcare,
Marketing & Sales Organizations,
and General Businesses.

In fact, there’s only a handful of sectors or industry verticals that I can say we don’t work with and they include:

Municipal Entities,
Trucking and Transportation,
and Agriculture.

If you’re looking for business insurance, there’s a good chance we can help you and become your insurance broker of choice.

What’s In a Business Insurance Program?

The core of most business insurance programs starts with property and general liability insurance, which is often combined into a package or BOP (Business Owners Policy). Depending on the risk factors and issues of a particular client, the following policies are often added:

Workers Compensation
Business Automobile
Umbrella or Excess Liability
Cyber Insurance
Crime Insurance

Marine Insurance
Directors & Officers Liability Insurance
Errors & Omissions Liability Insurance
Product Recall

The bottom line is that a business insurance coverage program can be extensive or simple based on the company’s risk characteristics. The seasoned professionals at The Coyle Group can help you identify your needs and craft a tailored coverage program, deploying coverage from top insurance companies.

The Coyle Group Process

In our world, every account is unique and deserves to be handled like it’s unique. One size does not fit all when it comes to business insurance and risk management, and that’s why we created The Strategic Risk Process (TM) for larger accounts.

This process can be scaled based on the size of the prospective client, but all engagements begin with a Discovery Conversation focused on you, your firm, your goals, challenges, and what keeps you up at night.

Depending on the size of your business, we may also walk through a Threat Assessment, which goes beyond just insurance, to view your current risk strategies.

If insurance is already in force, we’ll request copies of your policies to identify what you’ve got, what’s missing, where friction points are, and how to improve the program.

For larger firms, our Total Cost of Risk (TCOR) Analysis will determine costs outside of premiums that are embedded in every claim your firm experiences in uninsured loss dollars. Understanding TCOR is critical to improving your firm’s insurance and risk costs.

Our Risk Optimization System focuses on what and how to implement the right risk control systems to reduce TCOR and improve productivity and enhance profitability. Often, the biggest challenge for middle market firms is implementing risk improvement processes and change. Here we have a system to help document risk control plans and process so that they actually do get implemented.

Finally is our Cycle of Continuous Improvement. Your business changes over time, and so do the risks you face. Our strategic renewal process helps identify and adjust coverage needs and risk control needs over time so your protection remains relevant and accurate.

The bottom line goal is peace of mind while improving productivity and profitability.

How Do You Get The Best Business Insurance?

That’s a great question.

We think that the best business insurance does not come from:

Buying direct online with little to no human interaction.
Buying direct from an insurance company; or
Buying from multiple brokers, and here’s why.

As we’ve illustrated on this page, business insurance regardless of the size of a company should be tailored to your specific needs and issues.

If you “do it yourself” how do you know what you need?
If you’re shopping to replace an existing policy, how do you know the policies you have are right?
If you replace existing policies with the same thing at a lower cost, what good is that?
If you buy direct from one insurance company, how do you know that’s the best deal?
If you buy different policies from multiple brokers, how do you know if there’s overlaps or gaps in your coverages?

Here’s out take on how to get the best business insurance:

Select a broker who is an expert at business insurance, not a “jack of all trades” type of broker that does all types of insurance.
Work with a broker you can trust. They’ve got the right skill set, they’re friendly, and you can trust them.
Work with a broker that has broad access to the business insurance marketplace, not one that only represents one insurer or is a direct writer.
Work with a broker that’s easy to work with. They’ve got the systems and team to help you make the right decisions.
Finally, work with a broker that has a process that engages you well before the renewal of your policies to make sure everything is up to date and a strategy to navigate the renewal process.

The best business insurance is crafted for your specific risk issues, is updated regularly, and is managed professionally, and I think that’s what we do best here at The Coyle Group.

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How Much Does Business Insurance Cost?

You’re online right now looking for an answer to the “how much does it cost” question, and there are plenty of insurance websites that will tell you the average cost of business insurance is $80 a month, or the median cost is $62 per month, or whatever number they want to post.

Unfortunately those numbers are just “come-ons”. They don’t really mean anything and they really don’t matter. Who are those customers, what do they do, how big are they? Those questions are never really explained. So, let us explain how business insurance cost is developed.

For most every type of business insurance policy; general liability, property, workers compensation, business automobile, umbrella liability, cyber insurance and others, here are the rating factors most often used:

The type of business you own. Meaning, what you do, what you sell, or what you make. For example: a food manufacturer, a law firm, a donut shop. These are three different types of businesses, and there are hundreds more, is the starting point for all types of business insurance. The more hazardous your business the more your business insurance costs will likely be over a company that is less hazardous.
Geography or where you’re located also has a big impact on business insurance costs. Some states have higher claim costs than others, and in the same state an urban area will typically carry higher rates than rural areas.
Size, or rating exposure. Policies like workers comp, general liability, cyber and others will base your premium on the size of your company by using annual sales, revenue, payroll or the square footage of your buildings. For property policies the size of your building, contents, and business interruption limits are the key rating factors. For business auto the number of “units” or vehicles will determine premiums.

Limits & Deductibles – the amount of insurance coverage you purchase and the deductible you’re willing to accept (what you pay in a claim first) will of course go into determining the cost of business insurance.
Claim History – For all forms of insurance, your claim history becomes a rating element in the premium you pay. If you had two identical businesses and the only difference between them was that one company had no claims, and the second company had multiple claims, the second company would pay more than the first. It only stands to reason that insurance companies want more clients like the no claims customer so they will discount premiums for them and charge higher rates for customers with claim activity.

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How Do You Keep Your Business Insurance Costs Low?

Out of the five rating factors explained above, the only one you really have influence over is your claim history, so the best way to keep business insurance costs in check is to keep claims in check. You do that by installing risk controls that help minimize the opportunity for claims to occur and when a claims does occur, certain risk controls can help minimize the ultimate cost of that claim.

We work with our clients in this area, so you should look for a broker that can help you with risk control.

Secondarily, if you have a well document risk control process, it should be used as leverage in negotiating your insurance premiums. As we mentioned above, insurance underwriters want to write accounts that have controls in place to reduce risk and will reward those types of clients with lower premiums.

The next biggest thing on the list to keeping insurance costs low is working with the right broker.

Who is the right broker for my business insurance?

We think the right broker for you is one who:

It represents a wide variety of insurers, so you get choices and options.
It has the expertise to help you with risk control, crafting the right coverages, and a system to help you through difficult renewal periods.
Is interactive and able to communicate often and effectively. Too often, business insurance policies become stale and ineffective because the insurance broker didn’t reach out and ask questions or prepare you for renewal, or be a resource when you needed support.

Where do we fall on these measures in the industry?

In our opinion, we rank towards the top of the list for clients paying anywhere from $10,000 to $1,500,000 in insurance premiums. Sure, we have clients larger and smaller than that range, but we consider that lower middle market our sweet spot, and we excel at working with clients in that range, whether they fall into one of our targeted practice groups or not.

We aim to get you the best coverage program at the lowest cost and help you maintain low costs over the long term.

Want to learn more?

Why not contact us and have a conversation

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Why Get Your Business Insurance From The Coyle Group?

On this page, we’ve talked about many factors that go into business insurance an how to get the best coverage and the lowest price. We’ve also discussed how to get to that lowest price and what factors influence your price for business insurance.

The Coyle Group is a boutique commercial insurance brokerage; we only do business insurance. With that exclusive focus, we’ve developed a team of seasoned experts who love working with our clients. We have a strong background in risk management and represent most of the top insurance companies. Combining strong technical expertise, strong systems to support ease of doing business with us, a bulletproof renewal process, a team of professionals, and a culture of continuous improvement all add to an excellent customer experience.

Don’t take our word for it; look at our Google Reviews and our testimonials and see what others say and how they feel about working with us.

We hope you’ll come to the conclusion that The Coyle Group is the right choice for you and your company’s business insurance needs.

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