Now that You’ve Cracked Web Intent, How Do You Nurture Your Insurance Sales Leads?
Got insurance leads? Now it’s time to nurture them. Lead Nurturing is nothing other than the contact maintenance of the leads you’ve acquired. However, it encompasses all the measures you take to address a prospect with relevant information at the right time, and in line with where they are in their purchase decision.
Lead nurturing can pursue different goals as well. For example, increasing the number of qualified contacts, shortening the buying process, improving the conversion rate, or increasing your marketing ROI. Though in the end, nurturing insurance sales leads is all about customer retention, right?
The great thing about lead nurturing is that it can be carried out in every phase of the buying process. You can nurture your leads in several areas: acquisition of new customers, customer retention, customer recovery, and reactivation of former or inactive customers. (That’s four different email sequences by our count.)
And that’s the really exciting part.
Why it’s Important for You to Understand Where Your Customer is on their Buying Journey
Strike while the iron is hot. We’re so far away from the days of going to the blacksmith to get new shoes for our fence that we forget what it means. As an insurance professional, you want warm leads (when the iron is ready to accept its new shape). Think about it another way: be there with a warm jacket at the same moment your customer feels cold.
Insurance is a lot like a warm jacket in winter. It protects us, and that’s our intent in winter -- to stay dry and warm. You’re not selling a policy, you’re selling peace of mind. You’re selling the what if.
Only when you know your customer’s journey can you adapt and nestle around them. In the long run, this brings higher customer loyalty and higher customer satisfaction. Just make sure you’re consistent in every stage of the journey.
Don’t Give Away the Farm on the First Date
Remaining consistent with your marketing throughout your customer’s journey is hard. We invest a lot of time in generating and nurturing our insurance leads, and then once they sign a policy, we leave them out in the cold in the name of onboarding new customers. Just don’t let them freeze while you’re unwrapping that warm jacket.
On the other end of the journey, we are often less helpful -- like when the jacket needs repair, or it’s lost. In fact, we might completely ignore the fact that our competitor offers an even warmer jacket in a nicer color. How many customers have you lost during the claims process? Can you afford to lose those referral sources? Are you aware of the price of replacing a lost customer?
We can overthink our customer’s journey more than we need to too, so:
don’t overcomplicate things,
use your (web intent) data,
and modify as you learn.
Look inside and out of the sale: identify your customer’s pain points and be watchful for any friction in your processes that may slow things down. That’s a fancy way of saying “know your customer’s color preference and hand the jacket to them unzipped.”
“90% of companies lose potential customers during the digital onboarding process, according to ABBYY State of Intelligent Automation Report Q4-2022” BusinessWire
Here’s what we mean by real nurturing: An Example of a Property Insurance Nurture Route
Let’s assume an entry point has already been defined and the process set up -- a series of social media posts perhaps, and connected to a landing page is one option:
entry point: download a life insurance brochure
Send an email with a link to a related article (Health? Lifestyle? Is your customer a fitness club member? Do they smoke? Overweight?) after a period of 3 days
after 7 days, send a (specific) case study (include a video and infographic for retention) available for download by email
after 14 days, send an email with the invitation to an information evening (near their office - not their home)
The lead is provided with accurate and personalized information, and accompanied through the decision-making process until they finally reach the status or maturity to be contacted by an agent.
So How is Web Intent Data Important to Your Insurance Lead Nurturing?
If you’re going to strike while the iron is hot, you need to know, well, when the iron is hot! That’s where Web Intent Data comes in.
Web Intent Data shows us what potential customers are interested in and what they’re looking for online.
Let's say a retired couple is looking for "boat moorage rates in Alaska" online. It’s reasonable to presume the couple has a boat and is looking to park it. Why? They may be moving to Alaska or spending the summer there.
Intent data provides information about what is being searched for and how high the purchase intention for a product or service is -- like boat insurance perhaps. If someone is already specifically looking for “boat moorage rates in Alaska,” you can presume their intention is high.
Here are some of the ways Web Intent Data can help your Lead Nurturing at various stages of the buyer’s journey:
Buyer's Journey Awareness Stage: Identifying and Assisting (your competitor’s) Unhappy Customers
Sure, the cake has been cut and served but that doesn’t mean you can’t get a bite of your competitor’s. One of the easiest ways to beat out the competition is by recognizing and engaging with potential consumers when they have problems. (Social media is a great place to see those pain points play out, as well.)
People search for answers to their problems. Web Intent Data seems that. Sometimes people aren’t even aware of the many solutions available. You remain a consultant, offering answers in the form of content marketing: emails, videos, and informational events. Help the customer identify and solve the problem themselves. The competition failed to do that – and they lost a customer -- to you.
Buyer’s Journey Consideration Stage: Personalized Offerings
Personalization plays the most crucial role in both lead generation and lead nurturing. You should know the exact personal challenges and problems of your target group. What problems can you solve for them? Together with your CRM data, Web Intent data can help nurture your insurance leads.
If you know what people are looking for, you can create relevant, tailored content so your customers feel personally addressed.
“Personalizing content and communications is crucial for your lead generation and nurturing. Whether it's segmenting your database for email marketing campaigns and workflows or adding personalization to subject lines and landing pages, relevance triggers better engagement.” Andrews Wharton
Buyer’s Journey Retention Decision: Ready-to-Buy Consumers
Ready-to-buy customers are your best customers. But it’s not always obvious when someone’s ready to buy. It could be a spur-of-the-moment decision. Sometimes you need to stretch a bit.
Buying a new boat: need insurance?
Moving a bigger boat: perhaps an insurance upgrade?
Selling a boat: why? Are they moving? Is their current property insurance coverage enough?
Often customers are telling us “Hey, I want to buy something!” and we simply don’t recognize those signals. Missed signals can cost you the ball game – or a missed sale. Web Intent Data can help you see where customers have been, and where they’re going next.
Buyer’s Journey Retention and Advocacy Stages: Identifying (Your) Unhappy Customers
People not only interact with your business on social media but also talk with others about their experiences. They can be your best advertisement. Or worst. That’s up to your service.
Content you create for your lead nurturing is also useful as a lead generation tool. People who are happy with something will tell others. We call that “Nurture Generation.”
Distinguish which customers are on their way out the door and re-capture these consumers before they leave. Give them something to be delighted about before they think about leaving the party, and they’ll rope in their friends, too.
A Nurturing Relationship is Our Best Insurance
Happy relationships are based above all on security. If we feel safe, we are happier and will be less likely to seek a different place. The same goes for our customer relationships.
With demanding audience and data-driven project requirements, Andrews Wharton is the proven direct-response solutions provider with a long-standing reputation for solving the toughest marketing challenges.
Success. Delivered.
