Spinfield: Web marketing trends today, tomorrow, and beyond…

We are in the middle of a conversation on Social Networks and insurance marketing. Again, I could be all crossed up, but from an affinity marketing point of view, Social Networks seem to show promise as insurance direct mail response rates decline and keyword inflation enters stage-left on the search engine marketing scene.

Last week - Part One: General Ideas
Now - Part Two: Public Networks

Someone asked me yesterday, “What’s a social network, anyway?” My answer… Have you ever been to an industry conference? Sure. There’s people you want to meet there, right? Do some business, make some contacts, get some ideas, share stories. That’s a social network… on the professional side. But how do you keep the relationship going in between the face-to-face events? Phone calls, now e-mails, newsletters, etc. Well, now we have online social networks - same thing, just a different medium, a little easier to keep people in your network connected to you.

Just to kind of lay the foundation, here are what seem to be the most visible social networks. (Btw, if anyone has a contact at anyone of these companies, I’m looking for a speaker for PIMA MarkeTTech next November. Need to lock them in by the end of May.)

1. MySpace – got to be a member to be in the game, to search, to post.
2. Facebook – started out as a college network (so create a group for your classmates while you’re in college), then expanded to high school, now opening up to adults. But definitely more of a personal space. But isn’t insurance often personal?
3. LinkedIn – brilliant! These guys have Web-enabled the old concept of Six Degrees of Separation, aka the game of Makin’ Bacon. Want to get connected to someone? Isn’t it better to get a referral from a friend of a friend? Absolutely.

Here’s a link to my Profile in LinkedIn. LinkedIn provided this widget. Cool. If you’re not on, do. The sooner you get started, the better. Seriously.

Some general common-sense stuff:

• Content or comments must add value, be transparent and real,
• Must be persistent relative to the natural flow of a lifestyle. Pick a network and stick with it for the long haul. Like anything in life, you get out of it what you put into it.
• Need to be extremely careful not to see everyone as a prospect, not to be selling 24/7, use guerrilla selling tactics, invading friends’ personal spaces with your work.
• Since Linkedin is more of a professional network, it definitely seems suitable for professional and trade insurance approaches, but remember…
• Hard sell is dead. Got to PULL them along. Takes longer to fill the pipeline of business, but if you do it right, it should open the door to referrals, and as we all know, one referral is better than 10 cold calls.
• SN’s are a perfect place to be educational, provide tips and tools, links to the best sources of information, the best deals, products with the richest benefits, companies that are the easiest to do business, even how to handle claim events. What better source of information than the actual policy holders who already went through the process. Powerful stuff..

That’s it for now. Next time: Private Networks.

Social Networks and Insurance by Mike Wise first appeared on his blog, InsuraTech.

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