A lot of our clients come to us initially hoping to increase their brand awareness. They typically do a few local online searches and view some of their competitors’ websites; and then their competitive nature comes out in full force. They want to have the best website, a great social media platform and they want to show up first in Google. In order to accomplish all of this, you have to first make your website a valuable marketing asset. How? You need people to actually see it. There are a lot of ways people can see your website – and one big way to find your website is through search engines.

The more pages your website has, the more chances to rank in search engines.  The problem is, you don’t just want to throw up random web pages all over your site.  That would be a complete mess, not to mention a terrible user experience. Business blogging is a solution. Each and every time you write a new blog post, you have a new web page on your website, and it’s all housed under your blog so your website doesn’t get cluttered with pages everywhere.

So, each new blog post = new web page. Each new page you create is one more opportunity for your site to rank in search and appear for people searching in search engines.  When someone asks Google, “do I need flood insurance for my new home” hopefully one of your blog posts shows up!  Wouldn’t that be great?

You can apply this to other digital channels, as well.  For instance, every time you publish a new blog post, it’s one more opportunity for someone to share that post on social media, getting in front of an extended audience. It’s also one more opportunity for another site to link to your post, giving you some great SEO.

This all sounds great in theory, but you may be saying “this won’t work for my agency”. Well, numbers don’t lie. In a marketing survey of over 7,000 companies, they found that:

• Companies with 51 – 100 web pages have 48% more traffic than those with 50 or fewer web pages (having changing content, like a blog, is a primary way most companies have that many web pages)
• Companies who blog 15 or more times per month receive 5x more traffic than companies that do not blog
• Companies with over 200 blog articles have 75x the amount of leads that a company with 10 or fewer blogs generates

Given these numbers, you may find yourself thinking, “we have to start Blogging!”. The insurance industry lends itself very well to blogging. Whether your focus is personal lines, business risk, workers comp, or employee benefits, the reality is that the insurance industry is full of complex issues about which people frequently search for information online. A blog is a great way to answer their questions and provide helpful information.

So, if you want to get better at blogging or if you’ve just ‘seen the light’ based on the above stats, here are some tips to get you going.

WRITE WITH PURPOSE

Before beginning your blog, be sure to understand your target audience and your blogging goal. We begin the blogging process with our clients by identifying ‘buyer personas’. Every element of every post should be written with that target audience in mind and each post should have a clear goal or purpose. For example, if your target audience are owners of manufacturing businesses, your blog should provide useful insurance and risk management insights for their business. Create posts that show your ideal clients that your agency is the ideal advisor for their business.

SIMPLICITY

Keep It Simple (you know what comes next)! Just because you understand all of the technical aspects of a policy and can list ‘insurance jargon’ as a second language, it doesn’t mean your audience can. Put yourself in their shoes, and keep your writing elementary in nature. In fact, some topics that you might think are no-brainers to you may serve as educational blog topics to your audience.

TELL THEM WHAT YOU WANT THEM TO DO

One of the biggest mistakes in blogging is not closing out a post with some kind of offer or call to action. There may be a great story and helpful information in your blog, but most times post end abruptly. You want your audience to have their interest sparked, but you also want to let them know that there is a next step to take. Make sure that you include some type of call-to-action at the end of every blog post that you write. This may be to call you to learn more, or visit your website, sign up for your newsletter or even subscribe to your blog.

BE INTERESTING

One of the biggest arguments against insurance blogging that we hear is, “Nobody wants to read about insurance.”  That is true, and there is no denying that to most people, insurance just isn’t sexy. However, business owners do want to learn how to make their business better. The trick here is to be interesting enough to read without getting too technical. Make it clear to your reader how their business will benefit from the information you are providing. Provide useful information with a balance of imagery or a case study and you’ve got the recipe for success.

UNDERSTAND INBOUND

In the fast-paced world of online marketing, blogging is actually one of the older and more mature platforms for getting your message out. It is also one of the most effective for the simple reason that it is quick, to the point, and frequent. As mentioned in the opening, blogging is an effective search engine optimization tool. Done correctly, blogging equates to higher visibility which means more traffic, and more traffic can lead to more business. This is what inbound marketing is all about!

There is no magic pill to blogging in the insurance industry, but by following the above steps you will have the foundation for a successful blog – and a great lead generating tool for your business!

THE KICKER – DOING WHAT WE TEACH

As you probably expected, here is the call-to-action. Although I have been helping insurance agencies manage their brands and marketing strategies for almost 10 years, my firm Adaptive Inbound Marketing Solutions is brand new! If you’d like to see a company ‘do what they teach’ and build a strategy from scratch, then follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter or Facebook. Whether you are a seasoned pro or inbound marketing newbie, I can promise you that you will gain valuable insights from connecting with us.