Insurance agencies have made significant changes to their day-to-day operations due to COVID-19. Prospect behavior has changed, and responsiveness is key to your agency’s success.
Insurance agencies are ready to be there for clients when their help is needed the most. The insurance industry is facing many challenges. Traditional marketing and selling won’t work in the short-term, and possibly also long-term. New behaviors will likely continue after the pandemic. People will avoid visiting offices or letting agents visit their homes. They may be wary of meetups at coffee shops or restaurants and avoid the in-person events that many agencies use in the past to meet new prospects. Many virtual tools can support agents’ success in this new context.
Build a pipeline of prospects using digital marketing
Events will continue to have fewer attendees and with more social distancing requirements. Agencies have an advantage in selecting specific geographies. Use affordable digital marketing techniques to ensure prospects find agencies that can meet their coverage and financial needs.
Revisit your digital marketing strategies
Rethink your marketing plans for 2020 – shift from low-impact activities to cost-effective investments to attract new customers digitally. Align your marketing tactics to your goals:
- Website: Is your website optimized so that local consumers and businesses can easily find you online?
- Facebook and LinkedIn: Are you putting out a steady stream of relevant content?
- Email marketing: Are you using emails to reinforce connections with clients to increase retention?
Make your website searchable.
Review your website – ensure people can find it through search engines like Google. When they get there, they can be easily led through a virtual selling path that turns a prospect into a client. Additionally, filling out more Google My Business fields provides a notable result, even before customers reach your site.
Revisit your content strategy
Social media content feeds the marketing engine. By consistently producing relevant social media posts, an agent can exhibit dependability and expertise. Your viewers will rely on and appreciate the insights you post.
Here are some ideas you can execute:
- Post content regularly: Establish a consistent flow in your digital marketing content to increase your touchpoints with clients and prospects and become a thought leader.
- Use Facebook and LinkedIn: Make sure you have a LinkedIn page and a Facebook page associated with you and your agency to target prospects.
- Engage with your connections: Actively engage with your community; those who claim their page, post regularly, and advertise effectively find it twice as useful as those who only implicate one of these.
Personalized communication
Making virtual communications more personal is what makes insurance agents stand out. Think about it:
- Why wouldn’t clients prefer personalized messages?
- Lack of personalization can lead to a lack of trust or clients feeling like you don’t genuinely care. This is one of the main reasons clients leave agencies.
Only those who can master the skill of building personal relationships virtually — leveraging tools like social media, virtual appointment-setting, video conferencing, and a consultative strategy for fear-driven customers — will come out on top.
Streamline your quoting and self-service
To become a digital powerhouse, you find new ways to digitize and save time and resources. You need quoting and binding capabilities on your website, as well as the internal resources to get quotes to customers instantly.
Nurture connections with current clients
Clients are moved to be loyal if they know that an agency shares its values. Take this opportunity to prove to your clients that you share their views to form a strong community of clientele with a sense of belonging.
Customers who aren’t contacted at this critical time — they should be — are much more likely to switch carriers. With a mix of touchpoints, you can ensure to them that you are on their side.
