Social Media Involvement: Three Time-Saving Strategies for Insurance Agencies

With social media, it has never been easier to uncover opportunities, engage in conversations, discover new information from trusted sources, and forge new relationships. But finding the time to devote to a solid social media program can be a challenge.

But don’t feel that you have to devote hundreds of hours to see a return from social media. A well-defined strategy (as well as a few time–saving tools) can help you strike a balance between the time you invest and the value your investment adds to your bottom line. Here are some strategies for social media involvement to consider and based upon the amount of time you want to commit.

 

Listen (1-2 hours a week)

• Outline actions and responsibilities within your agency to prevent redundancy, maintain focus and meet your social media goals. For example, you could assign a single person in your agency to review Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn for one hour, twice a week.

 

• “Like” competitor Facebook pages from your personal profile to more easily follow their updates when you’re online.

 

• Create a Google Reader account for one-stop monitoring of key insurance blogs and publications. Content hubs can save you hours a week by better organizing content for quick review.

 

• Use a reputation management tool to monitor what people are saying about your agency. Consider using free services like SocialMention and Google Alerts, or more robust paid services like ChatMeter, LocationMonitor, or Tackur.

 

Respond (2-5 hours a week)

• Focus on a few active online communities rather than jumping around looking for every opportunity to respond. You’ll get to know the members better and your participation will build credibility that can lead to references across the social network.

 

• Develop a FAQ of common topics, your responses, and online resources you can share. Using these responses as a starting point can save time when responding to similar questions or comments.

 

Publish (5+ hours a week)

• Put a process in place to keep your involvement consistent and efficient. Assign a producer, CSR, or outsource the project to a freelance writer as your social media manager to ensure a single point of contact.

 

• Share any quality information you think followers may be interested in –it doesn’t always need to be about insurance. Not only can this save you time developing your own content, it provides value to fans, followers and readers and increases the chance that others will share your content with their communities.
• Mix up your content. A thought-provoking question can be as effective as a blog post, and takes a fraction of the time to compose.

 

Final Thought: When it comes to social media planning in the insurance industry, there’s no right or wrong level of involvement. The most important factor is consistency. Start by setting goals for your agency’s participation. Whether it’s regular interaction with customers on Facebook, a tweet every few days, or a weekly blog post, you can strengthen you social media presence by establishing clear goals.