Three Lessons Point to What Social Is (and Isn’t)
May 15, 2012 by Rick Morgan · Leave a Comment
Thousands of main street insurance agents have now joined the early adopters in our industry’s foray into social networking. Social networking is working for some, but not so much for others. Users continue to better understand the significance and impact social networking is having on the way insurance firms connect and interact with customers and prospects. They also are taking advantages of the new opportunities an effective social networking initiative can offer.
The following three key concepts are foundational lessons that have emerged in the past couple years – that must be recognized and incorporated into any successful social networking initiative:
1. It’s not about the technology. Success with social networking isn’t just about the latest technology. Technology is transitory. It is the means to an end: Connecting with people. Social networking represents a permanent cultural transformation and a market disruption.
Many of the old ways of doing business are no longer effective. For example, traditional Yellow Page advertising is no longer effective in reaching most consumers. Read more
News without Paper? Get Social.
April 30, 2012 by Dave Willis · Leave a Comment
Several years ago, I heard futurist Daniel Burrus speak at an industry event. Since then, I’ve followed his Technotrends newsletter. I find his insight fascinating and overwhelming, all in one.
Burrus recently shared his “Top 20 Technology-Driven Trends for 2012.” One is “social business takes on a new level of urgency as organizations shift from an information age ‘informing’ model to a communication age ‘communicating and engaging’ model.” He also said 2012 is when electronic books, newspapers and magazines “pass the tipping point, due to the abundance of smartphones with readable displays, tablets that provide a full color experience, and publishers providing apps that give a better than paper experience by including cut, copy, paste, print, and multimedia capabilities.”
A couple of weeks ago, a Burrus article in Technorati focused on the future of newspapers. Advertising was down 7.3% in 2011, he said, a point higher than 2010’s drop. Surprising, he wrote, “was that it was only down that much.
Learning to Adapt
March 20, 2012 by Rick Morgan · Leave a Comment
“Digital Darwinism – The evolution of consumer behavior when society and technology evolve faster than the ability to exploit it.” – Brian Solis
What a great term—Digital Darwinism—to describe the fear many agencies and carriers feel as they struggle at make sense of the many challenges they face in today’s rapidly evolving environment.
Mobile, cloud, and social technologies are evolving faster than ever. These technologies are also transforming our society and giving rise to a new empowered and connected consumer. The reference to Darwin suggests that failure to adapt eventually will lead to the demise of the business of insurance, as we know it.
I believe that the challenge facing our industry is not just about making sure agents have blogs, Facebook pages, Twitter accounts and are using Pinterest to curate relevant business information. Yes, it is important to learn how to effectively use new technology.
It’s Christmas Eve. Let’s Go to Grandmother’s House (on Facebook)!
December 20, 2011 by Charles Wasilewski · 1 Comment
“Over the river and through the woods,
To Grandmother’s house we go;
The horse knows the way to carry the sleigh,
Through (the) white and drifted snow!”
– traditional children’s song
Those who don’t get to Grandmother’s house by horse and sleigh (or airplane, bus, car, or train) are now traveling there via Facebook. They’re going to all kinds of places on the social networking site.
Facebook.com was the most-visited web site on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day 2009, and on New Year’s Day 2010, according to data reported by Experian Hitwise. “Facebook” was also Read more
Greater Visibility, Lower Cost: Top Agencies Prove It
December 6, 2011 by Charles Wasilewski · 5 Comments
Agents and brokers are boosting their advertising and marketing efforts.
But they’re doing so without spending more. In fact, the data show they’re spending less.
That’s according to Shirley Lukens, AAI, principal of Reagan Consulting, who shepherds the annual Best Practices Study, a joint project of Reagan and the Independent Insurance Agents & Brokers of America (Big “I”). Formerly the head of industry affairs for Big “I”, Shirley was a mover behind launching the Best Practices initiative in 1993.
Speaking at the ASCnet TENCon industry event in September, Lukens noted that the most recent 2011 Best Practices research showed that agencies in the study “really stepped up their marketing advertising. They really aggressively advertised and marketed in ways that they hadn’t done in years past.”
But the agencies were not increasing their outlay for marketing; they were keeping it level or even reducing it in some cases, according to the financial data in the Best Practices research. Lukens looked more closely and even spoke to a few of the agency principals. She reported: Read more
Social Strategy: What Agents Want & What Carriers Can Do
November 15, 2011 by Rick Morgan · 1 Comment
I had a very interesting and thought-provoking conversation with Terry Golsworthy, president of The Customer Respect Group last week. We were discussing the effective use of social technologies by our industry. Specifically, we were discussing what carriers could or should be doing to be more effective in their own social initiatives but more importantly how they could be doing more to help their agents and collectively present a more compelling presence in the social universe.
What do agents want from carriers? In the many discussions I have had with agents the answer is, “It depends” and more often than not they are not really sure. Frequent answers include content, leads, and co-funded social marketing programs. Generating good content for their own blogs and social posts is a common concern voiced by many agents. But what type of content do they want from carriers? What can carriers do to really help? For example, are “white labeled” carrier-created articles that agents personalize the best we can do? Read more
“Hahah pretty hilarious”
October 26, 2011 by Dave Willis · Leave a Comment
“Social media has tremendous potential within the P&C industry—particularly among Millennials—but many carriers and agencies are-ill prepared for the challenges and opportunities it presents.” This comment comes from Boston-based Aite Group, which recently prepared a report on the impact of social media in the North American P&C arena.
The Pew Research Center, in a profile, calls Millennials “the first generation in human history who regard behaviors like tweeting and texting, along with websites like Facebook, YouTube, Google and Wikipedia, not as astonishing innovations of the digital era, but as everyday parts of their social lives and their search for understanding.”
I’m the Dad of two of these creatures—a 1988 version and one born in 1993. Through Facebook, I engage with them, of course, as well as their friends. Occasionally, I come across a post that causes me to shake my head. That’s rare. And it’s okay. As Pew said, Facebook is an everyday part of their social lives and their search for understanding. I suspect my parents would have (or did) shake their heads if they knew every part of my social life and search for understanding at that age. Read more
Disaster Communications: We Can Do More with Social Media
October 4, 2011 by Rick Morgan · Leave a Comment
This post is a follow-up to the #Irene #Insurance blog I wrote on August 30. That post was written during Hurricane Irene and I talked about how agents, carriers and associations were leveraging social tools to effectively connect with their customers and communicate valuable information.
Since that post, much of the East Coast has suffered significant flooding from both Irene and Tropical Storm Lee—and the companies mentioned in my earlier post along with many other firms continued to make effective use of social networking to stay in touch with their customers.
They used everything from e-newsletter and blogs to Twitter and YouTube to post information on how to contact carriers, storm updates, emergency shelters locations, road closings, office hours, FEMA info, tips on cleaning, preparing a disaster supply kit, storm surge maps, “thank you’s” to emergency responders, photos of local flooding, and insurance policy coverage information. Read more
I Called You. Now Play a Bunch of Ads. Please!
September 13, 2011 by Charles Wasilewski · 1 Comment
I was reviewing some Forrester data about mobile marketing — 21% of mobile phone owners used a smart phone to access the Internet in 2009, up from 11% in 2006 — and recalled a recent experience with a mobile “marketer” (using the term loosely, of course).
I wanted to do something American one nice summer weekend: See a movie. I was in the car with my family (not driving, of course). We had agreed on the movie, “Lincoln Lawyer.” (Admittedly, seeing a movie spur-of-the-moment was more spontaneous than I’m known to be. But maybe that serves me right, as you’ll see in a moment.)
So I looked up the phone number of a local theater on a mobile telephone.
I’d called movie theaters in the past from an old-fashioned landline telephone, and had been able to quickly find out movie times.
Silly me.
Read more
#Irene #Insurance
August 30, 2011 by Rick Morgan · 2 Comments
I had intended to write about the importance of staying true to yourself when creating an online presence. But as I write this post, Hurricane Irene is barreling down on North Carolina and then heading toward New York City. So, instead I decided to write about how our industry has been using social networking to communicate valuable disaster-related information to their customers.
Often, I hear agents who are not yet actively participating in social networking question its value and/or its return on investment (ROI).Clearly, the use of social networking by our industry during the past couple of weeks has demonstrated that “social” is not just about ROI. During the earthquake and now the hurricane many East Coast agents, carriers and associations effectively used social networking to connect with their followers and communicate valuable information. Some examples include:
- New York agent, Ryan Hanley who created a video blog offering, “6 Hurricane Preparedness Tips for Homeowners”
- Connecticut agency The Founders Group blog posting, “Hurricane Irene is on her way – Tips for protecting your home!”
- Many Facebook posts and status updates by Connecticut agent V.F. McNeil Insurance including links to the town’s emergency preparation and a request by the governor to sign up for CT Alert Emergency Notification.