I recently attended a meeting of a national collectors society to which I belong. Tracking the aging of many such clubs — even as old as I am — I was among the younger members in attendance. My attention perked up when our membership chairman indicated that our membership role has seen an unexpected GROWTH in the last year.
It appears that another of the “younger” members started a Facebook group for our collector specialty and participants on the social media network was taking notice, joining the Group, and participating in discussions. This led to the inevitable addition of members who ‘found’ us through social networking and share our collecting passion.
As you can imagine, this offhand remark caused my synapses to start firing on all cylinders. If it works for a collectors group where almost everyone interested is beyond their 50’s, it will work for insurance buyers with one significant exception.
For most people, talking about “protection” and “insurance” is akin to talking about having teeth pulled and planning for your own funeral – probably necessary, but never pleasant. Remember, insurance is asking for people to pay lots of money in case something bad happens but always planning for and hoping the “bad thing” doesn’t happen.
If something unfortunate happens that triggers a claim, every insured gets a cold feeling in his heart fearing that the claim won’t be paid, won’t be paid in full, or won’t be remedied quickly. YOU, the agent, can be the hero by supporting and shepherding the client through the claim process (although most agents don’t). But, like most insurance buying clients, if nothing ever happens, insurance seems like throwing money away and you, as the agent, are a cog in the wheel that takes money out of the clients’ pockets.
So how can you use Social Networking to attract new clients? How can you keep your long-time clients engaged and happy with you as a service provider who doesn’t provide a return on their investment unless something bad happens?
The answer is to use Social Media to inform and make folks comfortable and familiar with you WITHOUT EVER “SELLING” ANYTHING!
Let’s face it – talking about insurance is not like talking to car aficionados about the hot cars of the 50’s. It’s not even like talking about a collecting interest, whether it’s stamps, glass, or any other common or esoteric collecting interest. A hobby is something you enjoy – time you steal away from the daily grind. Talking about insurance is different – it’s the “grown up” thing you have to do to be a “responsible” adult, caring for your family and protecting your assets.
But responsible adults will want to protect their assets, both physical and human, and they need someone to trust as much as they trust their doctors to care for their physical well being.
Social Networking is a way for you to keep in front of your clients and your prospects to demonstrate to them your eminent qualification to be that “protector” of their physical assets. Blogging or posting regularly and attracting a following on social media should concentrate on education and familiarization with a focus on things that will help the reader without appearing to want to “sell” them something.
Your clients are seeking reasons to confirm their decision to use you as their insurance agent.
Your prospects are looking for someone they can trust to give them good advice without reaching into their pockets to sponsor that advice.
Both clients and prospects would LOVE to boast about how good their ‘insurance guy’ is and this media is a great opportunity to give both types of insurance consumer that warm and trusting feeling about you.
The method of sharing your knowledge and how you can help and benefit clients is by posting REGULARLY (at least a few times each week) and building a friends or subscriber network on the social media that you will likely use (LinkedIn for business relationships, Facebook, Twitter and other arising similar sites for personal relationships).
If social networking can work for a bunch of old fogeys sharing their collecting interest, it will also work to build a trust relationship with your own clients and prospects for your insurance knowledge base. That, in turn, will result in business growth as you overcome the major hurdle of reluctance of strangers trusting other strangers with their most personal details of their assets.