10 Marketing Tips for New Insurance Agents
Top Marketing Strategies for Insurance Agents
In 2018, approximately 36,500 independent insurance agencies operated in the United States, according to the 2018 Agency Universe survey conducted by the Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers of America (IIABA). In 2019, independent broker-dealers accounted for 24 percent of sales of individual annuities, while independent agents accounted for 20 percent.
That’s a lot of competition. Also, as an independent insurance agent, you not only have to compete against your peers but also against large firms. You, therefore, must find a way to stand out from the crowd to drive sales and that’s where utilizing effective marketing strategies for insurance agents comes in.
As an independent insurance agent, you’re likely great at sales. You understand people and know how to close the deal. However, marketing isn’t quite the same, especially since determining your return on investment can be challenging.
While sales are easily quantifiable and will ensure the success of your business, marketing will help you get those sales and scale up your business. Effective marketing strategies for insurance agents will help you generate qualified leads, build relationships with prospects, and even generate long-term loyalty from existing clients.
Read on to discover some highly effective tips for marketing for insurance agents. However, keep in mind that the overall strategy you employ needs to be your own and should be dictated mainly by what your customers need and want.
1. Polish Your Online Real Estate
Nowadays, most consumers research products and services online before making a purchase. Even purchases made in brick and mortar stores and offices. So, having a professionally designed website is essential if you want to succeed.
The goal isn’t just to be present online, however. To maximize the benefits of your website, make sure to provide valuable content showcasing your expertise. It will help you build credibility and ensure that your prospects and customers consider you their go-to source for all their insurance needs. This makes it an outstanding low-cost approach to marketing for insurance agents.
To expand your online reach, consider asking for links from your business customers. It will provide both parties with excellent cross-marketing opportunities.
2. Always Be Networking
You should never miss an opportunity to network, whether you’re at an event or just popping down to the store for a carton of milk. That means always having business cards on hand to hand out.
It might seem old school, but business cards are still the most effective way to provide prospects with your contact information. Of course, it helps if they are professionally designed because first impressions matter.
3. Go Mobile
People use their mobile devices nowadays for everything from chatting to friends to making important purchases. In fact, an increasing number of people are using their smartphones to interact with the web than laptops.
It’s definitely an opportunity you shouldn’t miss out on, which means ensuring that your site is mobile-friendly. If people can’t browse your site effectively via their mobile devices, they’ll take their business to someone else.
4. Become a Sponsor
Sponsoring a community event, whether it’s with funds or by volunteering your time, is a great way to get involved in the community. It will help increase awareness of your services. However, it will also help build goodwill and show that you genuinely care about the community and the people you do business with.
5. Turn into a Social Butterfly
Social media is bigger than ever, which makes it an invaluable tool for marketing for new insurance agents. However, building your presence on social media requires constant interaction. So, make sure to choose only one or two channels to start with because you don’t want your social media marketing efforts to end up dragging the rest of your business down.
Just make sure to create a plan and stick to it. Facebook and LinkedIn are outstanding options to start with, with the former being ideal to prospect individuals and the latter a good option for commercial customers.
6. Track Down Your Potential Customers
Just like you would join social media sites where your customers hang out, you should do the same thing in real life. Consider your target market carefully and where you’re most likely to find them. If you focus on health insurance for freelancers, for example, you could check out co-working spaces.
7. Educate Your Clients
The internet provides with a slew of inexpensive tools you can use to educate your customers about insurance and the products you offer.
Podcasts, slideshows, and webinars are a great way to not only provide value for prospects and customers, thereby generating goodwill, but can also help you lay the foundations for long-term relationships.
Just remember to provide lots of value. The more value you provide your prospects and customers with, the more indebted they will be to you, and the more likely they will be to do business with you.
8. Work with Other Professionals
Another great way to approach marketing for new insurance agents is by partnering with professionals in other fields to share leads. For example, consider entering a referral agreement with your accountant, where you will both promote each other’s services to your clients. This is a great way to expand your customer base while building a strong professional network.
9. Advertise Online
Online advertising is highly effective. II provides numerous metrics you can track and the ability to quickly adjust your ad campaigns to improve effectiveness, making it one of the best advertising mediums. Pay-per-click, banners, and site sponsorship are just a few of the online advertising tools at your disposal.
However, for the best results, you should consider contracting professional insurance agent marketing services. This is especially true for pay-per-click and similar advertising strategies that can become a money sink if you don’t know what you’re doing.
10. Give to Receive
It may sound mercenary, but the fact is that when you give people something first, no matter how insignificant, they feel indebted to repay you. Charities often take advantage of this strategy by sending out small gifts to encourage people to donate.
You can do something similar with a giveaway. To really take advantage of this approach to marketing for insurance agencies, make sure that what you’re giving away is related to the product you are selling in some way.
Sending insurance newsletters to clients and prospects on a regular basis helps keep them up to date on ways to reduce risk and improve their lives — and strengthens your image as an insurance expert. Print newsletters are especially effective because, unlike email, most postal mail actually gets opened and read.
While there are a lot of effective marketing strategies for insurance agents, in the end, which ones work for you will depend on your products and target market.
Also, don’t get attached to any one strategy. If something isn’t working, don’t be afraid to swap it out for another approach. For example, if you find that you aren’t generating leads or really connecting via social media, don’t be afraid to try a different platform or even completely switch to cold calling or in-person meetings.
The key is to be flexible and scale up once you’ve discovered the marketing strategies for insurance agents that work for you.
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