Insurance agencies, like so many small businesses, sometimes struggle to add fresh blog posts to their sites on a regular basis. We get that. When you’re running a business, time for online marketing activities can be scarce. Some good news about blogging effectively in a post-Penguin, post-Panda world is that you can get more “bang” for your blogging “buck” by focusing on quality over quantity and focusing heavily on promoting the content you’re creating.
One way to effectively promote your content online is via your agency’s social media networks. A good rule of thumb there is to ALWAYS post a link to EVERY blog post you publish on your agency’s Facebook page, Twitter account, and Google+ page. Make sure you include an image you have the rights to use when publishing each blog post so the image pulls through on Facebook, for example. Images can be very persuasive in getting more user engagement on social networks like Facebook.
Another way to promote your blog posts and get more traction for your website is by submitting links to your blog posts on social bookmarking sites like StumbleUpon.
What is a social bookmarking site?
It’s a site people use to save content they find on the web that they think is interesting or useful and share it with others. When I say content, I mean blog posts, press releases, videos, etc. Many types of content fall into the “content category” online.
So, how can you best utilize these sites for the best results?
Here are some social bookmarking tips for insurance agencies:
Tip #1. Really get the headline right. The headline is the first thing people see and it greatly influences whether they’ll read the rest of the blog post, press release, or video. People love lists. They love top 10 lists or top 20 lists. Any number will do, though odd numbers sometimes get more views simply because not many people use odd numbers, so it stands out more.
Tip #2. Make sure the content is relevant to what the users of social bookmarking sites are bookmarking. Research before you write a blog post you plan to promote on social bookmarking sites. Find out what people are bookmarking. Is there a way you can do something similar without copying the topic outright?
Tip #3. Look at the way the content on the sites are categorized. On StumbleUpon the categories are things like “parenting,” “celebrities,” and “travel.” They don’t sound very connected to insurance do they? That’s okay there are also categories like “health,” “home improvement,” and “bargains/coupons.”
How could you write something that relates to insurance and also relates to the category (known as an “interest” on StumbleUpon)? Very easily! There are a million ways to write about health. The first article that came up was an article called “50 Incredibly Weird Facts About the Human Body.” This post alone got more than 7,000 Facebook likes, more than 3,400 Tweets, and more than 45 shares on Google+.
Why? It’s just truly fascinating. Could you write something similar? Something such as “49 Claims you’d Never Expect” or “55 Weird Facts about Auto Insurance” or “23 Myths about Home Insurance Explained.” There is a category for “insurance” too. It has 86,000 followers. That’s a great audience to start with!
Check out this blog post that got 27 Facebook likes, 11 Tweets, and 11 LinkedIn shares: “15 Insurance Policies You Don’t Need.”
Tip #4. When you sign up, sign up as yourself. The social bookmarking sites and users will view you as being more genuine than they would a business coming to the site for the sole purpose of promotion.
Tip #5. Don’t forget to engage with the site. How? By bookmarking other people’s content you find interesting. This could be a useful way to get ideas for future blog posts you’ll write for your own blog.
These tips are just the beginning. There are so many ways to leverage social bookmarking sites. The benefit is the more you promote compelling content, the more opportunities you’re giving web users to share your content with their audiences. It’s also a good way to encourage them to provide more links back to your site because every time they share your content, they provide a link. And those links can really impact your online presence!