When it comes to keeping clients happy and feeling loved, it all boils down to communication. How you communicate, how often you communicate, how enjoyable your communication is and how relevant your communication is to your client's lives all play a big part in whether or not your clients will stick around during the next cycle of rate increases. One of the many ways to improve your communication is to make sure it is both personal and business oriented. In fact, finding the right mix of business and personal communication is vital to your communication success. Here are a few tips to get more out of your "social" media:
- Remember, it's called social media, not insurance media, education media, sales media or business media. While you can, and should, use social media outlets like Facebook and Twitter to grow your business, their primary purpose is for people to be social. This is your opportunity to lighten up a little and have some fun with your clients! Use your social media outlets to share personal stories and photos in addition to things that are more business related. Clients and prospects want to know that you're a real person, just like them. I used to pay a company to produce 6 insurance newsletters for me per year and mail them to my clients. I never heard from anyone to let me know they appreciated it or even read it. But when I started writing my own newsletters that had stories about things I was doing and the adventures my family were having, I immediately started getting great feedback from my clients. I also started getting more referrals and better cross-sales too! Try to keep a 60/40 mix of business and personal in order to keep your clients interested and coming back for more.
- Get your clients involved. You want your social media to be a two-way street with your clients. The more interaction you can get, the better. Use contests, surveys, jokes, comics or anything else that fits your personal style to get involvement from your clients. Have your clients post pictures and stories to your Facebook page as a part of a contest so you can learn more about them as well.
- Find the right media to reach your clients. Not all clients like to get on Facebook, and age has nothing to do with it. One of the fastest growing Facebook crowds is the over 65 year old folks. People like to get information in a variety of ways, so give them a variety of ways to get information from you. You can share the same story, article or contest through many different formats. For example, starting a contest on Facebook and then promoting it through an email blast and discussing it in your printed newsletter will get 3 different segments of your clients to participate. People want to be reached on their terms, so give them plenty of options. Consider sending out a survey to all of your clients (or your best clients) and asking them how they prefer to get their information. There isn't one media that is any better than another. The best media is the one your clients pay attention too, and that is going to be different for each of your clients.
As you implement new ways of communicating with clients and start turning up your social presence, keep in mind that anything you do is better than most of the other agents around town, because most other agents won't do anything at all! Start communicating and reaching out to clients on a more consistent basis and you'll see big, positive changes in your agency. Test your messages to make sure they are a good mix of business and personal and test out different ways to reach folks. The more you do, the easier it becomes and the better you become too.