Do you need to market on Snapchat?
There’s no doubt that digital marketing is a requirement for insurance agents. However, there’s been a lot of talk about Snapchat and how to use it in marketing insurance. Many agents and agencies took to Facebook to stay relevant in an online community where their prospects hung out, socialized, and spent a lot of time. The latest craze, specifically for the millennial market, is Snapchat. Why is Snapchat important to your business?
It’s essential to stay relevant and care where and who your customers are, or they’re not going to find you relevant or care where or who you are.
With that being said, Snapchat is a gamechanger for marketing, but not a necessity. If you’ve got a list of 15 things that are already on your priority list, this should probably be a future project you work on. However, here is a short list why you will want to start using Snapchat in the next 12 to 18-months for your business.
Starting with the obvious, it’s where all the millennials “hang out”. Any good business knows that you’ve got to be where your customers are. You’ve got to see through the customer’s eyes and if you’re looking through the eyes of millennials, you’re probably looking into the eyes of a mobile device with Snapchat. If you don’t know Snapchat then a lot of this may not make sense, so we won’t go into too much detail. There are things called Geo Filters that can be used at weddings and parties, special events to groups, to signify and unify pictures in a collective album. It’s similar to how hashtags work. In addition to Geo Filters, SnapChat also allows for ad products targeting specific demographics.
The difference is, if you’re a business, you can take advantage of a filter feature! Let’s say you’re at a special event (e.g., community fair) or someone comes into your office. You, or your customer, can take a picture and use a customized filter that you’ve created branded for your agency! This could be used in many ways to help advertise and create a modern branding image to use through Snapchat for your agency.
Taking advantage of this opportunity could set you apart in the market. Adopting technology of any kind early on has its advantages. The real power in anything you do is to be the first at something. Using Snapchat for customer testimonials, sharing insurance tips, local event updates – the key is to get your brand out there in the hands of your target audience. What’s nice about these 10-second videos shared via Snapchat is that they come across authentically and your clients’ testimonials won’t sound scripted or rehearsed, ultimately gaining more credibility.
Snapchat allows users to share videos, pictures, and messages both individually and/or to a group of people. The app has more than 100 million monthly active users and almost 70% of those users are under the age of 35.
When using Snapchat for pictures and sending to groups, you can show how last minute changes can make a large impact on your clients’ premiums. If you’re working with a client and see something that can make a big difference, share that with your followers. This will help people learn more about their own options and will also showcase your knowledge on specific details of the products you offer.
Once you have a few followers that engage with you regularly, use Snapchat as an opportunity to gain information on the market. Ask your followers questions: “What’s the most difficult thing about your insurance?” or “Have you had the same agent for a while? If so, what do you like most about their service?” This will give you the ability to see how the market is reacting to the industry, and what you can do to improve professionally or add value to other clients in the future.
Do you have a blog? A YouTube channel? A Facebook page? If you’re on other social media channels, you can also use Snapchat to promote your content. What’s nice about Snapchat is that it will notify you if someone has posted a screenshot of something that you’ve sent out, which is an indicator that others are interested or engaging with that type of content. You can use that information for future posts.
There are many other ways Snapchat can be used for your marketing efforts. Before you think that Snapchat is not full of your prospective clients, remember social media sites historically “age down.” When a platform is relatively new, it starts to become popular with the younger demographic and then as its popularity grows, older generations jump on board. That’s what happened with Facebook (e.g. originally intended for college students) and that’s what will happen to Snapchat in the next 12 to 18 months. Snapchat is popular, but competition for attention on the app is low, so those who jump on board first will have an easier time at creating an audience!
If you need further guidance on creating your Snapchat account, setting up Geo Filters, or other marketing tips & techniques for your agency, please contact Agent Pipeline at 800-962-4693 now!