Post-AEP Analysis: What Your Call Data Tells You About Next Year
The Annual Enrollment Period is the Super Bowl of Medicare call centers — eight weeks of maximum volume, maximum pressure, and maximum revenue opportunity. When December 7th hits and AEP closes, most agencies breathe a sigh of relief and move on. But the agencies that dominate the next AEP are the ones that spend January through March dissecting every data point from the one that just ended. Your call data holds the blueprint for next year's success — if you know how to read it.
What You'll Learn
- How to analyze conversion rates across lead sources and agents
- Evaluating publisher and lead vendor performance with call data
- Measuring compliance scores to identify risk areas
- Agent-level metrics that reveal coaching opportunities
- Building a data-driven plan for next year's AEP
Why Post-AEP Analysis Matters More Than Pre-AEP Planning
Most agencies invest heavily in AEP preparation — hiring agents, securing lead contracts, stress-testing systems. But the pre-AEP plan is largely based on assumptions. Post-AEP analysis replaces assumptions with facts. You're no longer guessing which lead sources perform best, which agents need additional training, or where your compliance gaps live. You have the data to prove it.
Agencies that conduct thorough post-AEP reviews typically see 15–25% improvements in key metrics the following year, simply because they stop repeating mistakes and double down on what worked. This isn't about working harder next AEP — it's about working smarter with data you've already collected.
What Data-Driven Agencies Gain Year-Over-Year
Metric 1: Conversion Rate Analysis
Your overall AEP conversion rate — enrollments divided by total calls — is a starting point, but it's too blunt to be actionable. The real insights come from slicing conversion by every dimension you can: lead source, agent, time of day, day of week, product type, geographic region, and call disposition path.
Conversion Rate Breakdown Dimensions
By Lead Source
Which sources produced leads that actually enrolled? A source with 500 leads and a 5% conversion is less valuable than one with 100 leads at 20%. Calculate cost-per-enrollment per source.
By Agent
Identify your top converters and understand what they do differently. Also identify agents who struggled — these are coaching opportunities, not firing decisions. What can your top agents teach?
By Time Period
Did conversion rates change through AEP? Many agencies see a mid-period dip when agent fatigue sets in. Plot weekly conversion rates to identify when performance drops and plan staffing accordingly.
By Product Type
MA vs. MedSupp vs. PDP conversion rates differ significantly. Understanding which products your team closes best helps you optimize lead buying and agent specialization for next year.
Track these metrics using the KPIs framework we've outlined, and you'll quickly see which levers have the most impact. A 2% improvement in conversion rate from your top lead source might be worth more than a 10% improvement from a minor one.
Metric 2: Publisher and Lead Vendor Performance
Your lead vendors and call publishers are one of your biggest AEP expenses. Post-AEP analysis should answer one critical question for each vendor: did the revenue from their leads exceed the cost? Everything else is detail that supports that answer.
Example: Publisher Performance Comparison (AEP 2025)
| Publisher | Calls | Enrollments | Conv. Rate | Cost/Call | Cost/Enrollment | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vendor A | 2,400 | 312 | 13.0% | $18 | $138 | Scale Up |
| Vendor B | 3,800 | 266 | 7.0% | $22 | $314 | Renegotiate |
| Vendor C | 1,200 | 36 | 3.0% | $25 | $833 | Drop |
| Vendor D | 900 | 153 | 17.0% | $35 | $206 | Scale Up |
Pro tip: Don't just look at conversion rate in isolation. Vendor D has the highest conversion rate but also the highest per-call cost. The right metric is cost-per-enrollment, which accounts for both quality and price. This is why your publisher performance tracking needs to connect call data to enrollment outcomes.
Metric 3: Compliance Score Analysis
AEP is when compliance violations are most likely — high volume, new agents, pressure to close. Your post-AEP analysis should include a thorough review of compliance scores across every measurable dimension: script adherence, required disclosures, SOA completion rates, and flagged calls.
Script Adherence Rates
What percentage of calls included all required disclosures? Identify which specific disclosure agents skip most often. This becomes the focus of pre-AEP training next year.
SOA Completion Rates
How many enrollments had properly completed Scope of Appointment documentation? Incomplete SOAs are a top CMS audit finding. Track by agent and identify systemic gaps.
Flagged Call Rate
What percentage of calls were flagged by QA or AI monitoring for potential compliance issues? Categorize flags by type: missing disclosures, unauthorized plan comparisons, misleading statements.
Compliance Score Trend
Did compliance scores improve, decline, or stay flat through AEP? A declining trend suggests agent fatigue or understaffing. Use this to argue for better staffing ratios next year.
Metric 4: Agent-Level Performance Deep Dive
Your agents aren't interchangeable. Post-AEP analysis should produce a detailed performance profile for every agent who worked the period, covering productivity metrics, quality metrics, and outcome metrics. The goal isn't ranking agents — it's identifying specific coaching opportunities and staffing decisions for next year.
When you have this level of detail for every agent, patterns emerge. Maybe your highest-converting agents spend 2+ minutes longer per call on needs assessment. Maybe agents who use the AI coaching suggestions have 15% higher compliance scores. These patterns become next year's training curriculum.
Identifying Operational Improvements
Beyond individual metrics, post-AEP analysis should surface operational issues that affected the entire team. These are the systemic problems that no amount of individual coaching can fix — they require process and infrastructure changes.
Common AEP Operational Issues to Investigate
- Peak volume overwhelm: Were there days where incoming calls exceeded agent capacity? Calculate your call abandonment rate by hour. If abandonment spiked above 5% during certain periods, you need more agents or better scheduling during those windows.
- Speed-to-lead decay: How quickly were new leads contacted? If your average speed-to-lead was under 5 minutes in October but over 30 minutes by late November, lead quality perception dropped and conversion suffered.
- Technology bottlenecks: Were there system slowdowns, dropped calls, or CRM lag during peak hours? Document every technology incident with timestamps and impact — this is your ammunition for infrastructure upgrades.
- Agent burnout trajectory: Plot agent performance week-by-week. A consistent decline in conversion rates and compliance scores from Week 4 onward signals burnout. Consider shorter shifts, more breaks, or a larger team next year.
- After-hours lead waste: How many leads arrived when no agents were available? Quantify the revenue lost from leads that went unworked for 12+ hours because they arrived outside operating hours.
Benchmarking: How Do You Compare?
Your internal metrics tell you how you performed, but benchmarks tell you how you performed relative to the industry. While every agency's situation is different, these benchmarks from high-performing Medicare call centers provide useful reference points:
AEP Performance Benchmarks (High-Performing Agencies)
Conversion Metrics
- Overall conversion rate: 10–15%
- Inbound lead conversion: 15–22%
- Transfer call conversion: 18–28%
- Aged lead re-engagement: 3–6%
Efficiency Metrics
- Avg. handle time: 10–16 minutes
- Speed-to-lead: under 5 minutes
- Call abandonment rate: under 3%
- Agent utilization: 75–85%
Quality Metrics
- Compliance score: 90%+
- QA pass rate: 85%+
- SOA completion: 98%+
- Customer satisfaction: 4.2+/5
Financial Metrics
- Cost per enrollment: $150–$300
- Revenue per agent: $60K–$120K
- Lead cost as % of revenue: 25–40%
- ROI on lead spend: 2.5x–4x
Building Your Next-Year AEP Plan from Data
The ultimate purpose of post-AEP analysis is to produce a concrete, data-backed plan for the next enrollment period. Here's a framework for translating your findings into action:
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Reallocate lead budget based on cost-per-enrollment dataShift spend from underperforming vendors to your top converters. Use your publisher analysis to negotiate better rates or minimum quality guarantees with vendors you keep.
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Build targeted training based on agent performance dataDon't give every agent the same pre-AEP training. Use your agent profiles to create personalized coaching plans. Your top agents might need advanced negotiation skills; newer agents need script fundamentals.
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Staff to your volume curve, not your averageUse your hourly and weekly volume data to build a staffing model that matches demand. Over-staff the first week and final 10 days of AEP where volume peaks. Plan for agent fatigue in weeks 4–6.
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Fix compliance gaps before they compoundIf your analysis revealed that 15% of calls missed a required disclosure, that's a systemic problem. Build automated compliance prompts, update your scripts, and add pre-AEP compliance certifications. Review your AEP preparation checklist with these findings.
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Upgrade technology where data reveals bottlenecksIf your analysis shows peak-hour system slowdowns, after-hours lead waste, or inadequate reporting capabilities, these are quantifiable arguments for technology investment. Show the revenue impact of the problems.
Conclusion: Your AEP Data Is Your Strategic Advantage
Every call your agents made during AEP generated data. Every disposition, every call duration, every compliance check, every enrollment outcome — it's all sitting in your dialer and CRM, waiting to be analyzed. The agencies that treat this data as their most valuable post-AEP asset are the ones that improve year over year while their competitors repeat the same mistakes.
Start your analysis within two weeks of AEP closing, while the experience is fresh. Pull your key performance indicators, run the publisher comparisons, build agent profiles, and document the operational issues. Then turn those findings into a concrete action plan with owners, deadlines, and measurable targets. When next year's AEP arrives, you won't be guessing — you'll be executing a strategy built on data.
Unlock Your AEP Data with AgentTech Dialer
AgentTech Dialer captures every call metric, publisher performance data point, compliance score, and agent stat you need for a comprehensive post-AEP analysis — with built-in reporting dashboards that make insights actionable.
Try AgentTech Dialer NowReferences & Authoritative Sources
The information on this page is supported by the following official and authoritative sources.
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Medicare.gov CMS