If you are running a successful insurance brokerage you might be wondering why yoneed a blog, here are 5 reasons you need a blog for your business.
1. Demonstrate your expertise - explain complex concepts in simple terms
You’ve spent years honing your insurance knowledge and skill so tell people about it, help your clients and prospects understand the complexities of insurance in plain English, you can take complex insurance covers, take out the jargon and set them out in simple terms.
This could be as simple as explaining the different types of liability insurance or a more in depth look at a particular type of insurance, for example, business interruption or cyber insurance. Help you reader by using conversational language, it’s easy to use lots of technical insurance speak but will your customers understand this? I know what readers like about my posts is how I write them and the voice I use is how I’d explain it to a friend over a coffee and slice of cake. Lastly use lots of real-life examples that spell out the risks or help highlight the story to the reader, if people can relate to it then it is likely to make them want to read more about what you do and how you can help solve their problem – i.e., sell them insurance!
2. Attract people to your website
It’s easy to rely on social media content to attract clients but everything you post on social media is sitting on someone else’s platform, and it could vanish overnight – I know someone whose YouTube channel closed overnight and another whose Instagram account with over 10k followers was closed out of the blue. It takes time to build an audience.
While I am not discouraging you from posting on social media, it is a great way to engage new clients, it should be one of many strands to your marketing plan and I would strongly recommend that you do talk about your blog on social media as it can drive traffic to your website.
By writing a blog you have your own content on your own website that you control, you can sign them up to your mailing list, this is marketing gold. Once you have their email address you can send them valuable content on a regular basis, without relying on other people’s platforms to share your message.
3. Set you apart from your competitors
And isn’t this what we all want? Just because other brokers might be writing blogs doesn’t mean for a minute that you shouldn’t. While some of the technical aspects of insurance are the same it’s the way you bring it to life for the reader that will make the difference, this is the opportunity for you to show people your brand voice, be conversational and bring personality to your posts.
Creating regular and engaging blog posts is a huge opportunity for you to create your own body of work that you can keep using to share with people and really show them what you do and why they should work with you, it’s a really powerful tool.
4. Build relationships with your clients and prospects
We all buy from businesses and brands that we feel understand what we need and why, by helping your clients understand who you are, what you do and, most importantly, how you can solve their problem you build trust and relationships with existing clients and new ones.
Writing blogs that speak to your clients, understand what they need and explain how you can help them, you can help win and retain them. Think about they things you provide, advice, claims help, business support – what do they ask for and how do you help them?
It might be understanding how a change in legislation might affect them, the best online accounting tools, explaining why they need cyber insurance, what to do ahead of their insurance renewal, when to tell their insurer about changes to the business, the list is really endless! But this is all information you and your colleagues have in their heads already, it’s just a case of getting it down on paper!
5. Create a supply of shareable content
While sharing your blog posts in newsletters or email marketing is great, blog posts also provide a goldmine in terms of providing you with amazing content for your social media accounts.
You’ve taken the time (and it takes on average 3 hours and 57 minutes to write a blog post) to write the blog so why not repurpose it into images, quotes, tweets, questions and even video or audio content.
By cleverly repurposing content you have already written you can save time and attract people who prefer different ways of consuming content, broadening your appeal to existing and new clients. This could take just a couple of hours a week to produce once you ge the hang of it!
Getting started
If you want to start writing a blog for your business but not sure where to start you can download my free blog writing template here https://mailchi.mp/0471ff682d32/blog-writing-breifing-template
The template gives you the planning structure for you need by taking you through your ideas for a title, shaping the idea, to who it’s aimed at, what the blog is hoping to achieve, how you want the reader to feel as well as an outline of the post and who needs to approve it. Everything you need to build the structure of your blog every time you write one.
If you have any questions, please drop me a line at catherine@catherinefrance.com