It is one thing to generate traffic to your website. It is another thing entirely to generate traffic that converts. As an insurance agent, your primary goal is to increase both traffic and leads to ensure that you always have fresh consumers in the sales pipeline.
According to webmarketing123.com, a top internet marketing firm, lead generation is a main objective in both the business-to-business and business to consumer environments.
After surveying more than 500 online marketing professionals, webmarketing123.com created an infographic that visualizes traffic channels used by businesses today.
How are you Generating Leads?
You are not alone if you have any interest in generating leads online. While cold calling and direct mail may be part of your overall marketing plan, it makes sense to focus plenty of time and energy online.
When marketing in the hyper-competitive business to consumer sector it is critical to spend your time and money wisely when it comes to online insurance lead generation.
Approximately 50 percent of those surveyed feel that search engine optimization (SEO) is more effective than social media and pay per click (PPC) when it comes to generating leads via the internet.
For this reason, a growing number of people, insurance agents included, are beginning to spend more money on SEO and less money on other methods of online lead generation.
In fact, 54 percent of people surveyed plan on spending the same amount of money on SEO in 2013. Along with this, 41 percent plan on increasing their budget. Only 4 percent of people are going to decrease how much money they devote to SEO.
PPC Falling Behind
You have to spend money to make money, right? This is how many people feel and there is nothing wrong with buying traffic to your website. If done appropriately, PPC is a great option for generating traffic without the wait. However, it can also be a huge drain on your online marketing budget if you don’t know exactly what you are doing.
The rising cost of clicks in the consumer insurance market, coupled with the hands-on environment, has many people turning away from pay-per-click marketing.
Measure Your Online Success
Although SEO is becoming increasingly popular among those looking to generate leads online, there is one major issue with this: measuring return on investment.
Of those surveyed, 70 percent are frustrated with their ability to connect their return on investment with their SEO plan.
Unless organic traffic is your only traffic (this is highly unlikely), you will find it difficult to track your exact return on investment. That being said, you can definitely see an increase in traffic as your targeted keywords begin to creep up the rankings. Of course, a downfall is the erratic and drastic changes that can occur from one day to another as many have experienced with Google search updates.
Tip: It is essential to install an analytics program that can track everything from the number of unique visitors to the page views to the keywords that are generating the most traffic.
Agency or In-House?
Some insurance professionals enjoy online marketing. They want to learn more so they can control every aspect of their campaign. Of course, the issue with this is time. Do you really have enough time in the day to focus on your online marketing plan?
Consider hiring an online marketing agency if you don’t have enough time or expertise. You are going to spend money on this, but in the long run there is a good chance that you will be more satisfied with the results. Not to mention the fact that this will free up a lot of time in your day.
According to the same survey, 21 percent of people who hire an SEO agency are highly satisfied with the results. This is compared to only 11 percent of people who are satisfied with in-house performance.
Diversification is Essential
By now, you probably understand the importance of generating leads online. If you are like the majority of people, you have invested a decent amount of your time and money on search engine optimization.
Neglecting to diversify your marketing plan is a mistake you don’t want to make. Even if you are making major strides with your SEO plan, you still want to experiment with social media strategies and pay-per-click.
Additionally, don’t turn your back on marketing strategies that have worked in the past. Are you still making regular cold calls? This does not cost you anything but your time. Even though this is an “old school” way of generating leads, many agents are still using it to their advantage.
Direct mail marketing has also made a comeback, especially in the insurance industry. Not only are agents finding more success with this, but most enjoy the fact that they can measure the return on investment.
The key with lead generation is focusing on the methods that bring the best return on your time and money while also staying diversified in your lead channels to prevent becoming too dependent on any one single source.
Buying Leads
When you consider the marketing tactics detailed above – from search engine optimization to direct mail to cold calling – you may begin to realize that there is no guarantee. Even if your website ranks highly for many competitive keywords, there is no guarantee it will stay there or that consumers will visit and submit their information.
This brings up the question: How are you going to ensure a consistent and dependable flow of leads?
A growing number of insurance agents are devoting a lot of resources to buying leads. There are many benefits of doing so, especially when compared to other options:
• You are in total control of your budget. Spend what you can afford, when you can afford it. From there, you can cut back until you replenish your marketing budget.
• When you buy leads you know you are getting something in return. Compare this to pay-per-click traffic. Sure, you are driving traffic to your website but there is no guarantee of capturing a lead. On the contrary, when you buy an insurance lead you know you are going to receive the consumer’s contact information.
• Filtering options. Even if your website is able to generate leads, you don’t have the ability to filter them. Instead, you “get what you get” and have to do the best that you can from there. When purchasing leads online, you can use a variety of filters. From location to lead type and much more, you know that you are going to spend your money on exactly what you want.
If nothing else, you know that you are getting something in return when you buy insurance leads. This is by far the most dependable method of lead acquisition.
Final Word
It is important to know what type of web traffic generates the most leads for your business. Along with this, you must have a diversified plan that allows you to generate leads both online and off.
When you focus on both SEO and purchasing leads, there is a good chance that you will be happy with the overall results – day after day.
