The percentage of clients or policies an agency keeps from one term to the next — a key measure of book stability and value.
Retention Rate
The percentage of clients or policies an agency keeps from one term to the next — a key measure of book stability and value.
Retention rate is the share of policies or clients an agency renews rather than loses over a period, usually a year. If 900 of 1,000 policies renew, retention is 90%.
Retention is one of the most important agency metrics because renewal commission is recurring, high-margin income and because acquiring a new client costs far more than keeping an existing one.
- Small gains compound: moving from 85% to 90% retention meaningfully increases the long-run value of a book.
- Drivers include proactive service, remarketing at renewal, cross-selling (which "sticks" clients), and responsiveness.
Because retention directly affects the value of the book of business, agencies track it closely and often build service workflows in the AMS specifically to protect it.