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

Part One – General Ideas
Part Two – Public Networks
Part Three – Private Networks

Part Four: Viral Marketing and Referrals

Please comment on any of this.

Aren’t referrals the Holy Grail of sales and marketing? (By the way, speaking of Holy Grail, saw the new Indiana Jones movie. Einhh. Shia LaBoef saved the movie – my opinion of course. I also think he might have done wonders for Harley sales to the next gen…)

So what better way to generate leads and sales than by getting current customers to recommend their friends (who are also likely to be in the same life-stage) to your product? And how easy is that with e-mail and links? I think, again my opinion, that we haven’t even begun to tap into this awesome power.

That’s why I think it’s critically important to start using things like “E-mail this page to a friend” messaging in Web page design templates, Facebook sites, MySpace sites, etc.. Simple but useful stuff, perhaps even cool new tools ’sponsored’ by the insurance company (Al Drowne’s idea). It seems to also make sense to give people some sort of offer for referring friends. Understanding that State DOI’s (Department of Insurance) have rules against – I forget the word – comment if you know it – engaging in too much of this kind of incentive, but a free bumper sticker, some cool $2 chotchkie, anything like that is probably OK. The point is, as with any sales effort, when someone makes a purchase, at the point of sale, ask for referrals. Hey, give it a try and track the results. Do A/B tests, etc. Seems like it might be good.

So we’ve talked about the growing trend and perhaps a new ‘affinity’. Then we discussed some of the public social networks, and lastly, some ideas on sources of software for private networks that you control. The point of all this, again my opinion, is to GET IN THE GAME. The more I read and learn about social networks and the Web, the more passionate I become about the fact that we need to understand and leverage. As affinity and association insurance marketers, as well as agent-driven marketers of insurance, we all need to ENGAGE in this medium. Last one there is a rotten egg.

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