The National Client Email Report shows that email generates $38 for every $1 spent. This makes sense when you consider that the average U.S. citizen checks their personal email account more than 10 times a day. So if you’re hoping to engage with former, current or prospective clients, email is arguably the best way to reach them. The world is your oyster when it comes to email marketing but it can also be stressful to know exactly what to do to reach a revenue generating sweet spot. Well today is the day to stop stressing and start seeing success. We’ve done the research and here’s the essential checklist for email marketing for insurance agents. Start building a strong email strategy for your agency.
Obsessively Monitor Your CRM
One of the most basic problems we see with unsuccessful email strategies, is that agents aren’t digitizing their data or they aren’t keeping it up to date. Hopefully you’re using a customer management system, but if not, invest in a good one that will help you organize your data. From there, you can export lists from your CRM based on different requirements and create targeted email campaigns. For example, if you’re hoping to upsell a product, export all customers on basic auto insurance and email them out a limited time offer to get better coverage at a great rate. However, without good, organized data it would be impossible to send an effective campaign like this.
Follow-Up Always
It’s unlikely you can convince your potential or current clients to sign for a new product after just one email. So keep that in mind when you’re constructing email campaigns. Instead of bombarding them with loads of information in one email, try to disseminate it through 2-3 ones. This can give the customer sufficient time to think about what you’re offering. Consider purchasing it. And respond with any questions. Remember to include a call-to-action button in every email.
A possible email strategy could be:
- Initial emails where you lay out an issue, and its solution (which is your product).
- Follow-up emails with additional information on the solution, and a sales hook that encourages them to get in touch with you.
- Reminders to take you up on your offer or give you a call.
Focus on FUNdamentals
So fun. Here are 6 fundamental email techniques that are shown to improve your engagement rates:
- Be succinct. Emails may seem fast and easy to you, the sender, but remember the challenges your recipients face. Recall your own inbox with 353 unread emails, and don’t ramble on and on. Instead, get to your point quickly. If your email is super short, odds are better that you’ll get a faster response—and your reader will appreciate your superior communication.
- Have a specific subject line. When the line is highly specific. For example: “Tornado may affect delivery of your purchase” is much more motivating to read. (Also, the email is easier to find later.) In your subject line, offer a summary of the information contained in the message.
- Be clear about what you want people to do. Put your request high up in the email. Don’t bury it in the middle or toward the end. Your clarity will improve engagement rates.
- Discuss only one idea per email. Don’t jam 10 messages into one email; don’t even jam two.
- Make your email scannable. Use super-short paragraphs, employ bullets or numbers, consider subheads (for necessarily long emails.) Just as important, pick a legible font at a reasonable size, and don’t overuse boldface or italics.
- Be sure to proofread. Have you ever looked like an idiot because of spelling or grammar mistakes in your emails? Never send emails right away. Instead, develop the habit of saving them as a draft and editing them an hour later before sending. I know this strategy will seem like a hassle, but you’ll spare yourself a lot of embarrassment.
Send Emails at the Right Time
Another solution to your email marketing woes could be as simple as sending emails on a good day and at a good time. The good news is that there is a lot of research out there trying to answer this exact question: when is the best time to send an email? In this post from CoSchedule, you will find links to ten studies that have delved specifically into this problem.
Here’s what you need to know for optimal email marketing for insurance agents:
The best days to send: Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Wednesdays are considered the best days to send emails to your subscribers. Most studies recommend against sending emails on Mondays and for very obvious reasons. The weekend is over, people are bummed out about going back to work, and they probably have an inbox full of spam messages they received during the past couple of days. So, the first thing they will probably do is delete some of those emails. While the weekdays generally have low open rates, a few studies pointed out that you can actually get more people to read your emails during Sundays and Saturdays. That may be because these days have a low volume of emails as most marketers avoid sending over the weekend.
The best time: Most studies concluded that open rates start to climb around 10 am. People get to their offices at around 9-9:30 am, drink their coffee, talk with colleagues and then open their emails. Open rates peak from 2-5 pm in the afternoon. Check out the chart below for more info.
How to know things are working: As a rule of thumb, you should pay special attention to the click-through rate (CTR,) click-to-open rate (CTOR,) and the open rate.
- Click-Through Rate: The click-through-rate shows you the people who have actually clicked on a link or image in an email. It’s a good indicator of the quality of the content and whether you are pushing the right buttons to get your audience interested in your offers.
- Click-to-Open Rate: This number reflects the people that opened your email and the ones that clicked on a link. This information is vital as it can help you determine what type of content your audience is interested in and what you should focus on. If you want to find out your CTOR, then you should divide the CTR by the open rate and then multiply it by 100%.
- Open Rate: As the name suggests, this number shows how many of your subscribers are opening your emails
We’ll be Your Secret Weapon
At Lift Local, we strive to take the guesswork out of email marketing for insurance agents. Our 3 most popular email campaign services focus on winning back former clients, re-engaging unconverted leads and gathering feedback and reviews from your book of business. We’d love to discuss our customized email products with you and see if they’re a fit. We’ll monitor your send times, subject lines, content, and response rates to achieve optimal reach. And then give you a monthly report. Scroll up to fill out the form on the right to get more info.