Digital Marketing on a Budget: Content Marketing for Your Independent Insurance Agency

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Digital Marketing in the Independent Insurance AgencyA recent SIS survey revealed 54% of agencies are “neutral” on how they view their marketing success. “Some days we see results, some days we don’t. Overall, we’re unsure of our success,” many reported. This kind of vagueness is unsettling—how can an agency improve its marketing efforts without a clear picture of its current status?

With limited funding and performance uncertainty, it’s no wonder over half of agencies surveyed identified their largest marketing problem as “Understanding how much to invest in marketing, and whether it’s worth the investment.”1

Those with successful marketing campaigns can testify: digital marketing is worth the investment.

Online visibility is a must. A recent AdWeek survey showed 81% of consumers do online research prior to purchasing.2

Content marketing is one of the most affordable, doable, and measurable digital marketing techniques utilized today. According to a recent Content Marketing Institute survey, 88% of both B2C and B2B businesses use this impactful digital marketing method.3

The biggest budget benefit to content marketing is it requires the resources most agencies already possess. In this whitepaper, we’ll cut through the myriad of (often overwhelming) advice out there and focus in on the content tactics and tools that work. With the right tools and team, independent insurance agencies can create, implement, and track an effective content marketing strategy.

1http://www.independentagent.com/Resources/AgencyManagement/ACT/Pages/marketing/Internet/2013-Agency-Website-Survey-Results.aspx 2http://www.adweek.com/socialtimes/81-shoppers-conduct-online-research-making-purchase-infographic/2085273http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/2016_B2B_Report_Final.pdf

To add to the problem, 66% of agencies budget only 1-5% for marketing.

of the most effective marketers have clarity on their content marketing success3

79%

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Part I : Tools

Part II : Strategy

Part III : Execution

Part III : Measurement

Conclusion

Digital Marketing on a Budget: Table of Contents

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ToolsA simple web search yields dozens of ways to enact digital content marketing. Some call for expensive tools or require bolstering staff with strategists and writers, and neither is practical for a small business. High impact and low budget is possible with the right resources.

WebsiteA strong website is foundational for any content marketing strategy. It serves as the magnet to draw people in and the target at which to point your external efforts. Focus your initial efforts on creating a website that will have maximum impact.

Email or Marketing Automation PlatformAn email marketing platform is a tool for creating, sending, and tracking the impact of emails sent to your constituents. Quality platforms provide customizable templates, making your messages stand out.

A marketing automation system provides a wider look at digital interactions. Similar to an email marketing platform it implements and monitors digital marketing efforts. But the field is larger: email campaigns, website engagement, and social posting are all tracked in one tool. Besides monitoring touchpoints, marketing automation provides lead scoring and the ability to automate marketing strategies.

Social Media Pages According to our Agency Marketing Survey, social media proves the best way to reach an audience, with LinkedIn, Twitter, and YouTube ranked as top three3. Social media can be used to expand your content’s reach, help you gain ideas for content, and provide additional avenues for customer interaction.

To have maximum impact, your website must n Clearly communicate your

agency’s purpose and

differentiator

n Be findable (SEO friendly)

n Be responsive / easy to view and

navigate on all mobile devices

n Employ strong calls to action

n Track visits and interactions

n Link to your social media sites

n Be updated frequently (a blog is a

good way to do this)

Note: To maintain brand integrity on social accounts and your website, all new branding content added to your website should be integrated with your social media platforms.

Social Media Publishing

websiteemail, marketing automation platform

Social Media Pages

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) System

Google Keyword Planner

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Tools, continued

Social Media PublishingHootsuite and other social media publishing tools allow you to schedule social posts in advance. Most offer impact tracking, number of likes, retweets, views, comments, and shares.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) System A CRM tool tracks customer and prospect engagement and their progress in your sales funnel. For most agencies an agency management system operates as a CRM, but others may use an additional tool. A CRM is critical for monitoring your strategy’s impact, tracking how prospects found you and what is moving them through your sales pipeline.

Google Keyword PlannerUse Google Keyword Planner to identify the high impact keywords for your website, social posts, and content. This tool analyzes search phrases and shows you what is searched most often—valuable knowledge for your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) efforts.

While website hosting and email/marketing automation require an initial investment, the other tools have free service options to help keep costs down. Even these small costs are quickly recouped once your content marketing gains momentum and brings in new business.

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Strategy

Any successful marketing strategy requires good planning—and planning starts with goal setting. Goals will inform both strategies and success measures.

Ask yourself,

n What, specifically, do we want our marketing efforts to accomplish?

n How will we measure success?

SIS survey respondents named the following as 2016 top marketing goals:n Convert a higher percentage of

prospects

n Retain existing clients

n Increase agency awareness

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Identify Your Audience

After establishing goals, the next step is to know and understand your audience. You are the expert on your agency, and through a few simple steps can set your own goals without spending a cent.

In some regards, your goals will define your audience. For example, if your goal is to cross-sell or renew more accounts, your audience will be comprised of your current clients. If your goal is to generate new leads, your audience will be comprised of prospects with little to no knowledge of your agency.

In either case, get beyond the title “client,” or “prospect” to understand who that person on the other end of your marketing effort really is and the drivers that would influence a buying decision.

Start with the basics: age, gender, income level, address, marital status, etc., then dive a little deeper to get to the drivers. Marketers call this the buyer persona—defined by HubSpot as “a semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer based on market research and real data about your existing customers.”4

You may find that your buyer persona is not the same for each type of insurance you sell. Auto insurance buyers needs differ from home or renter’s insurance buyers. Selling commercial or niche insurance? Identify the characteristics in each market.

Insurance Persona Examples

n “Good Driver, Discount Seeker”:

Married, early 40s individual with

a clean driving record who insures

their spouse and home with the

same agency. They have filed no

claims and are seeking a discount

for their good record.

n “Business Owner, Looking for

Low-Cost Quality Coverage”:

Long-time business owner looking

to save money without losing

coverage quality. Seeking liability,

worker’s comp, and property

damage coverage for mid-sized

business.

n “High Risk, Seeking Good

Coverage”: Single, early 30s

individual who travels a lot for

work. Their company covers

insurance costs, so they are

seeking high coverage for their car

and their home, which is located in

a high-risk area.

http://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/buyer-persona-definition-under-100-sr

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Solidify Your Message

Once you know who your audience is, concentrate on what you want to say in your marketing. The answer is a combination of the services you offer and how you provide a unique value in those services.

Ask yourself:n What is it we offer to clients?

(services) n Why do we do it? (mission) n How do our clients benefit from

what we have to offer? (value)

Survey your whole agency to address these questions. The more information you gather, the better. This exercise can also serve as a way to get your whole staff invested in marketing.

If you can’t understand your messaging neither will your prospects, and your marketing will suffer. Take time to document your messaging—and make sure everyone responsible for marketing or selling at your agency is able to communicate it consistently.

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Craft Your Editorial Calendar

Start by brainstorming the key topics that will appeal to your audience. There are a number of no-cost ways to do this: reach out to producers to see what questions they get asked most frequently, read industry publications, or use tools like Google Keyword Planner or BuzzSumo

to see what topics are trending.

It’s okay to use content from other organizations for inspiration and details, just be sure to credit sources.

Once you have topics identified, move on to format. How do you want to present the content? Options include blogs, infographics, videos, and whitepapers, among others. There are multiple options for content creation. Each has its use, but the purpose remains the same: provide something valuable to the user and tie that value to your agency.

Next, identify how you want to distribute content. Web, email, newsletters, and social media are just a few potential channels. Distribute your message as many ways as you can, starting with the channels you’ve identified as most relevant to your audience personas.

Next, identify who on your team will create each type of content.

Finally, think about distribution frequency and document intended publication dates. This will vary by persona—with some you may find weekly content effective while others desire daily updates.

To keep a steady cadence, all calendars should be created months in advance and be updated regularly.

Content Calendar Checklist

Be sure to include:

n Key topics

n Content format

n Delivery mechanism

n Author

n Frequency

n Publication datesNote:

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Execution

Once the foundational strategy pieces are in place, it’s time to execute.

In general, there are three main methods for executing your strategy:

Email Marketing

Use your agency database to compile email lists, breaking them into personas. For each list, craft a slightly different email, adjusting it to speak to that specific group. For example, your long-time customer persona email may thank them for their years of business, while an email to new prospects might highlight the services your agency offers. Once messages are ready, send a test version to employees to catch errors.

Social Media Marketing

Different social platforms will speak to different audience groups. Use the right channels to reach each persona, sending messages at the highest impact times.

For example, if you’re targeting millennials looking for first time home insurance, Twitter is your best bet for interaction.

However, if you’re targeting business owners for commercial insurance, you may fare better on LinkedIn.

Regardless of the channels you choose, create and maintain a branded profile for each. Too many make the mistake of creating a profile just for posting, and add nothing to it. This is something a member of your marketing team should manage. The profile should display your agency logo, mission, and website, and be regularly updated.

SEO Marketing

Your website is your content hub and where all your audience members will ultimately land. SEO marketing can help get prospects to your site through search, and the content you create is part of that SEO optimization.

Social Platform TipsLinkedIn

n “How To” and statistics-based

articles perform well

n Be specific about how you share:

publicly, with specific connections,

or with professional groups

Twitter

n Employ hashtags so users can

find content (i.e. #insurance

#riskcoverage)

n Be succinct—need to pack a lot in

a small space

Facebook

n Use photos to boost views

n Share relevant articles to get

conversations started in comments

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Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO doesn’t have to be scary.

Writing for search engine optimization means creating content that can be easily read and understood by search engine web crawlers. Once you’ve identified your high impact keywords, use them in content titles and the first paragraph of pieces to increase your search engine ranking. The more relevant your webpage, content, or social post is to keywords used in a search, the higher it will rank on a search page.

 

Steps to SEO Friendly Writing

n Identify keywords relevant to your

site with tools such as Google

Adwords

n Use keywords in page titles, first

paragraphs on pages, and image

descriptions

n Keep content short (500-700

words)

n Employ lists and headings

n Keep content fresh

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Measurement

As soon as content is distributed, start tracking its impact. Go back to your goals. Establish a baseline and track progress on each distribution channel.

Use your tools’ built-in tracking to compare month over month to see what you’re doing right and what you need to improve.

SEO Use your website analytics tool to track page visits and views. Sync this information with your agency management system or CRM to get a complete picture of audience engagement.

EmailTracking is easy thorough an email or marketing automation platform. Get to know the ins and outs of it, and test out different styles, subject lines, and mailing times to find the right blend.

Social mediaSocial marketing can be a pain to track when employing multiple social channels, but a marketing automation or a social media publishing tool can help. Like email, test out different posting times and wording to see what gets the most hits.

Track to improveReport progress weekly and monthly on your area of focus to get a good picture of how your efforts are proceeding. When setting your goals, break them into certain benchmarks. This incremental change will add up to big growth.

Pay attention to and address why you are or aren’t hitting your goals. It is this continual evaluation and adjustment that makes for a winning marketing strategy.

 

Metrics to Measure

SEO Marketing:

n How much traffic is my website

getting?

n How many hits to the blog?

n How many leads are coming

monthly?

Email Marketing

n What are the numbers we hit in

terms of Open %? Click-Thru

Rates? Response Rates?

n How many forms are filled out after

I send an email?

Social Marketing

n How many followers do

I have now?

n How many re-posts/re-tweets

do I get?

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ConclusionWith content marketing, effective digital marketing is attainable for an agency of any size or market. Once you start moving on your strategy, the key is to keep the momentum. A small initial investment in the right tools means your agency can keeping building on your content marketing without spending an extra dime.

To stay on top of your progress, continually work ahead in your content calendar, giving at least a month’s breathing room to allow for adjustments and improvement. Established processes help here: have a defined procedure for content creation, review, distribution, and tracking. Be sure to continually gain data on audience interactions, and use this to inform your future content plans. There is no silver bullet: only your agency’s consistent efforts will yield results. With these established marketing processes, your agency can finally stop wondering, “what’s our plan?” and start asking “where can we go next?”

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About SISHeadquartered in Columbus, Ohio, Strategic Insurance Software (SIS) is the team behind Partner XE. Built on a foundation of strong technology and exceptional service, we’re moving forward with a constant eye on innovation that will make independent agents’ lives easier. About Partner XESupporting downloads from nearly 325 carriers, real time interaction, integrated agency accounting, and much more, Partner XE is a full-featured agency management system at an affordable cost for the independent insurance agency. For more information, please visit www.sisware.com.

A special thank you to our partners at NuGrowth Digital for their assistance in pulling together this white paper. For more information on NuGrowth and content marketing in general, please visit their website at www.nugrowth.com.