How to grow your insurance business with social media

When thinking about how to market insurance on social media, your strategy is everything. Without an intentional social media plan, it can be difficult to see a positive return on your efforts. Here are a few tips for creating an effective social media marketing strategy for insurance agents:

• Set clear goals: Before you dive into insurance agency social media marketing, it’s essential to set clear goals and identify the main priorities of your social media presence. Do you want to market your agency, generate new leads, educate current clients, or something else? With these goals in mind, you can develop a targeted strategy that makes sense for your business.
• Identify your target audience: Social media can help you reach millions of people, but you want to find your target audience – people who are looking for your services in your area. If you’re not sure exactly who your target audience is, you can evaluate your current customer base or analyze your competitors’ clients to figure out which individuals or businesses you should be targeting.
• Develop a content calendar: Consistency is key when using social media for insurance companies. One of the best tips for executing your social media strategy is to develop a content calendar. Your calendar should include an overview of potential topics or planned social media posts, your posting frequency, and which platforms you’re posting to. This calendar could be monthly or quarterly, depending on your strategy.

Social media can be time consuming, especially when you’re just getting started. Fortunately, there are many tools that can make social media engagement easier. Consider these methods to get maximum social media rewards with minimal effort:

• Use social media management software: If you don’t have time to engage with your audience online daily, social media software like Hootsuite and Buffer can help. These platforms offer free plans that allow you to schedule social media content regularly and in advance of holidays or events related to your agency’s niche.
• Buy ads on social media: You can run paid ads on various social platforms to promote your agency to your ideal customer. For instance, Facebook advertisers can market to specific demographics, format their ads, and track their performance. Make sure to choose the social media platform that’s most popular with your target audience.
• Connect with influencers: Don’t overlook the power of influencers if you want to promote insurance on social media. A mention from a popular YouTuber or blogger can significantly boost your brand. Identify relevant publications, blogs, or social media personalities with a large following and engage with them online. You might want to repost their content or even pitch a guest blog to gain visibility with their audience.

Your social media strategy is only as good as the types of content you’re posting. Here are some examples of content that can perform well on your insurance agency’s social media pages:

• Educational content: Posting educational content can be an effective way to generate new leads as an insurance agent. You’re able to provide valuable information and insights to your audience based on your unique expertise. Consider creating content around risk management advice, tips on choosing the right coverage, or common FAQs about the insurance lines you sell.
• Client success stories: Before a client decides to work with your insurance agency, they might look for testimonials from other customers to get a better sense of your offerings, customer service, and pricing. Posting positive client reviews and case studies can be a great way to attract new business to your agency. You can post these reviews on your website and even on your social media pages for more visibility.
• Behind-the-scenes content: Behind-the-scenes content allows you to humanize your brand and show customers what it’s like to work with your insurance agency. For instance, if you’re thinking about how to introduce yourself as an insurance agent on social media, you could post a reel on Instagram and TikTok highlighting your background and business experience, or post a video about company culture, like monthly team outings.
• Interactive content: Interactive content often performs well on social media and encourages users to engage with your brand. Some examples of interactive content are polls, Q&A sessions, live videos on Instagram or Facebook, quizzes, and calculators. Depending on your lead generation goals, you could incentivize users to engage with your interactive content by offering contests or rewards.
• Industry news and updates: Social media is a great place to discuss insurance industry news, like recent regulations, trends, and policy changes. For example, if your state updates its auto insurance requirements or if home insurance companies stop doing business in your state, posting about these updates with expert commentary can be beneficial for prospective customers.

Social media is more than a place to advertise your business – it also allows you to engage with your audience. Building relationships with current and prospective clients can go a long way, especially when it comes to customer loyalty. Here are some ways you can get and retain customers through social media engagement:

• Introduce yourself and your employees: Post mini profiles of yourself and your agents on Facebook or Instagram. The profiles should detail your background in insurance and the services you offer. Don’t forget to include a high-quality photo, too.
• Post relevant articles and events: Engage prospects by sharing articles and events that may interest them. Topics could include insurance, small business, and money-saving tips.
• Demonstrate your community involvement: Does your company participate in fun runs or donate to nonprofits? Social media is the place to promote your company’s dedication to your local community.
• Share your knowledge: Write LinkedIn posts that show your expertise in a particular niche and share them with your network. This can help build trust with clients and establish you as an industry expert.
• Respond to comments promptly: When you receive a comment or message from a social media user, make sure to respond as soon as possible. You might make it a priority to respond to messages for one hour at the end of the workday, or first thing in the morning, to stay consistent.
• Host live Q&A sessions or webinars: Hosting live webinars is a great way to engage with your audience, and it provides an opportunity for them to ask questions about insurance. Use your social media pages to promote the events and direct users to register. It's also a good idea to record your webinars and Q&A sessions for future content.
• Collect user-generated content and testimonials: Customer testimonials are extremely valuable to insurance agencies that want to find new clients. You can also encourage customers to create user-generated content (like a video review of your agency), which you can repost across your business’s social channels.

Your ultimate insurance social media marketing goal should be to turn your posts into profits. So, how do you exactly do that? Try the following to advertise your business and find new leads:

• Optimize your profile: Customers need to know what you do and how to find you. That means your social media profiles should explain the services you offer and include contact information such as phone or email.
• Contact the decision-makers: Use LinkedIn Premium to bypass the gatekeepers and connect directly to the people tasked with getting coverage.
• Track brand mentions: Do you know who’s talking about your agency online? If not, you might miss out on sales. Social media management software can help you monitor conversations about your business.
• Create a contest: You can offer incentives like contests, which can bring a lot of attention to your social media pages. You can collect email addresses from contest entries to use for future digital marketing. Just remember to check your state's regulations before you design your contest to make sure you’re not violating any privacy or other laws.
• Run targeted Facebook and LinkedIn ads: Paid advertising campaigns on Facebook and LinkedIn can help you target a specific audience. These social platforms also have robust analytics features that allow you to track impressions, clicks, and conversions.
• Retarget website visitors with social media ads: Similarly, you can target people who viewed your website with social media ads. This might increase your conversions by targeting users who are already familiar with your brand and might be looking to purchase insurance.
• Use lead generation forms to collect client information: Once you build a solid advertising strategy, you need a way to collect lead information. This could be a contact form on your website, a newsletter signup form, or an offer through your social media ads (like a free consultation).

Once you implement a social media plan and start posting consistently, it’s important to measure your progress. If you’re not seeing the success you want, you can make adjustments accordingly. Here are some ways to measure the success of your social media strategy:

• Track key performance metrics: Social media platforms have free, built-in tools that allow you to track key performance indicators (KPIs), like engagement rate, impressions, lead conversions, and follower growth. If you notice that certain posts are performing better than others, prioritize those types of content to boost your results.
• Check website traffic and engagement: Use Google Analytics to measure your website’s performance. You can dial in on metrics like the number of visits, the amount of time a user spends on a webpage, and the bounce rate. Understanding these trends can help you decide where to direct users from your social media pages and ads.
• Change your strategy based on the data: Your social media strategy will likely change over time based on your goals and the results of your campaigns. Review your KPIs and metrics regularly to identify what’s working and what’s not. Measuring success will help refine your strategy and ensure you’re spending time creating the best content your audience wants to see.

As you develop a social media strategy for your insurance agency, it can be helpful to understand some of the most common risks to avoid. These are some of the biggest mistakes that can compromise the effectiveness of your social media strategy:

• Posting inconsistently: If you’re not posting consistently, you won’t get the results you want from social media marketing and advertising. It’s important to post consistently across all your social media channels to maintain high engagement and brand awareness. Creating a content calendar is a great way to keep you on a regular posting schedule.
• Over-promoting instead of adding value: Potential customers are looking to your content to add value and provide education. Over-promoting your agency can feel disingenuous and might put off customers who would otherwise want to work with you.
• Ignoring comments and messages: One of the biggest benefits of social media is the opportunity to connect with your audience. If you ignore comments and messages, users might assume you have poor customer service. You care about your audience and want to nurture leads, so it’s crucial to respond to comments promptly.
• Posting the same content to each platform: Not optimizing content for each platform is a major mistake small business owners make when using social media. Make sure the content you’re posting is curated to the platform. For example, a video reel introducing your team might perform best on TikTok, whereas a full webinar recording should get uploaded to YouTube.