The Client Acquisition Machine for Insurance Agents

The Client Acquisition Machine for Insurance Agents

"The More you Learn, Understand and Apply the More you'l Earn!"

THE CLIENT ACQUISITION MACHINE

A SIMPLE, Step-By-Step Blueprint for Capturing and Converting MORE Customers Online by Using Facebook and Digital Marketing the RIGHT Way!

ALEX CARAGIANNIDES FOUNDER OF BSM VAULT A TOP RATED MARKETING AGENCY

Table of Contents:

Introduction

Social Media Fundamentals

Your Facebook Strategy is Everything!

The ONLY Four Things That Matter

Clear Process to Revenue Workflow

Clarity

Facebook Ads Strategy

The Best Facebook Ad Campaigns You Should Be Running

The Ultimate Insurance Text + Email Playbook

10 Things Every Agent Should Be Doing (But That Most Aren't)

252 Facebook Posts and Video Tip Ideas

About the Author

Introduction

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If you’ve picked up this eBook, you know the importance and impact that a solid marketing plan can have on your business growth. Regardless of what you sell, whether it’s a product or a service, a complete online marketing strategy is fundamental to your success. The main goal of this book is to simplify the most common and proven concepts and techniques so even those with little to no marketing knowledge and experience can build an online presence that will help them grow their business. The digital era has changed the way we do business, and it’s important for you to keep up with the demands of your prospects by building a well-oiled lead generation machine You are now embarking on an exciting journey to discover how to capture and convert leads online using Facebook and Digital marketing the right way. I emphasize the right way because things are always evolving with Facebook and Digital marketing. Lead generation is broken down into sets of marketing activities that correspond with stages of the buyer’s journey, starting with generating traffic, then converting visitors into leads, and eventually converting those leads into customers. This training guide and its coordinating videos are a compilation of the best strategies and tactics I’ve learned and implemented for our paying clients since 2012. The content in this guide has been carefully shaped in a way that will help you digest it one bite at a time. From strategy to execution, we’ll cover the essential keys to an epic marketing strategy and growth plan.

Social Media Fundamentals

When it comes to social media marketing, it’s important to have strategies in place that will help you maximize visibility and stand out from all the noise.

The Formula for Success

As viable marketing strategies continue to evolve in real-time, here’s the simple formula for social media marketing success that is guaranteed to help you stay ahead of your competitors in this digital age:

Reach + Engagement + Consistency = Opportunities

Now let’s break this formula down into its 3 key components and discuss the ins and outs of each.

Reach

“Reach” is the first key metric that businesses typically track in their social media marketing efforts. Reach is defined as a measure of the range of influence of your posted content. So, on Facebook for example, your post can be said to “reach” someone when they view it in their newsfeed. The goal you should aim for here is to obtain a reach of at least 10,000 views per week within your target audience. You accomplish this by posting often on your business page, which means you should – at a minimum – be posting every 4 hours, 6 times per day, for a total of 42 times per week. “Engagement” is the second key metric that businesses track in their social media marketing efforts. Engagement measures the actions taken by people that viewed a post. On Facebook, engagement is measured by the number of times people like, share or comment on a post. In this regard, content is king. Keep your content hyper-local, focused and engaging to maintain relevance and increase activity, thereby ensuring your posts have greater “viral reach”. The goal you should aim for is to generate at least 1,000 engagements per week from all your posts combined. Engagement

(Facebook even compiles and lists the total reach/engagement stats below each post and in several sections of your business page account dashboard).

Consistency

In social media marketing, success is achieved over time as your consistent marketing efforts build a dynamic community where users actively engage with your posted content and stories on a regular basis. Therefore, the final key to your success is simple: be consistent! Generate a well-running social media marketing machine that utilizes the technology available for automating at least some of your posts and content-finding. Sites such as Hootsuite offer you one- stop-shop-style social media management dashboard where you can set content to post to multiple pages/profiles and measure campaign results. You can also set content to auto-post through RSS feeds of your choosing, thereby increasing your capacity to post consistently…which, in turn, will lead to ever-greater success and opportunities for your business!

Your Facebook Strategy is Everything!

Your Facebook strategy should be the centerpiece of your marketing plan. Period!

Taking the time to build this solid foundation will help all your other marketing efforts to develop and perform better. So how do you build a killer Facebook strategy?

Start with these 3 steps.

Establish a Digital Target Farm Area

First things first. You need to identify a digital target farm area. This farm area should consist of a local area that ideally includes around 100,000 people. For example, you may pick a small city or suburb you want to focus on, or perhaps a neighborhood that’s well-known within your city. Begin to relate to this target farm area as your “exclusive” territory in order to develop the right mindset and maximize future marketing and networking efforts. Once you have identified your target farm area, you need to build a credible community/lifestyle page on Facebook that offers focused, relevant content per that area. Come up with a clear but catchy name – such as Johnstown Homes & Lifestyles. However, be sure to note that this page should be non-branded, meaning it should not contain any of your personal Real Estate company branding or wording. By doing so, your community page will present itself as a trusted source for intel and happenings in the area. Build a Community/Lifestyle Page on Facebook

Target Your Audience

Target the audience (current homeowners and potential home buyers) within your digital farm area and implement strategies to generate followers and engagement on your page. You can engender a high level of interest and loyalty by doing three things.

Firstly, post often and consistently.

Secondly, keep your content hyper-local to maintain relevance and increase engagement. Lastly, consider placing targeted Facebook ads to funnel traffic to your community page to enhance traffic and activity. The bottom line here is that your Facebook strategy is everything. It’s the most important part of succeeding as the "King of your City"…on social media that is! So now that you know the steps to take, the question is: Will you do the work and take them? You are the master of your own destiny, so dive in and have fun building your foundation and your business!

The ONLY Four Things That Matter

I don't care what industry you're in, I don't care who you are serving. There are only four things that matter. I'm going to break them down one by one here.

Number one

Brand awareness, iterating your U S P and opportunity statement.

USP is your unique selling proposition and opportunity statement. People care more about what your why is than what you do. So, brand awareness, always iterating your unique selling proposition and opportunity statement.

Number two

You want to reach at least 10,000 people per week with Facebook. That is easily a goal you can attain. You want to have opportunities to speak with people and have a consultation and strategize about their current situation. Where are they now? Where do they want to go? Where's the gap in the middle? Can you fill in the gap?

Number three

Engagement. Now that you have the reach, now that you've got your USP, your opportunity statement out there, you need to engage with people at least 1000 people per week. Ultimately, you want to do strategy sessions. You're generating strategy sessions with the engagement.

Number four

Consistency. That's the name of the game. Service delivery machine is ultimately what you're trying to build using technology and automation to be consistent and delivering a product and a service at the highest level. I call this giving a Nordstrom experience with a McDonald's assembly line. It's a cool quote that I came up with. A lot of people laugh when I say it, but it's true. Nordstrom experience with a McDonald's assembly line.

Keep it simple and execute on these four things daily!

Brand Awareness + Reach + Engagement + Consistency = OPPORTUNITIES!

Clear Process to Revenue Workflow

The biggest mistake I see business owners make when they start getting success in marketing is that they simply stop. They get busy or overwhelmed and take their foot off the gas. When they want to start things back up, they’ve lost all momentum. Test everything. Having a plan for your marketing activities doesn’t mean that once it’s laid out, it’s all said and done. It’s important to test everything. Test your assumptions, test your campaigns, test everything. It’s ok to assume things (about your business, your value proposition, your clients) but never hold these things as absolute truths unless you’ve tested them repeatedly. Innovate and adapt. An online marketing plan should eventually change to adapt to the reality of your business, the value you offer, the channels available, and the clients you’re serving now. Things change rapidly in this new economy and my mission in this book is to give you the true and tested fundamentals of a solid marketing strategy. I want to give you an overview of our clear process to revenue workflow. The goals and targets with the strategies you’re going to be deploying it is to get your team conversations with prospects. It's not just about generating leads online; it's getting conversations with prospects. Leads are great but leads really don't mean anything unless you talk to people that could use your services. We want all the leads that come in for retargeting purposes and the ability to create custom lookalike audiences, but the true objective is an actual conversation to be continued from Facebook and directly with you or your team.

Clarity

Clearly define what you want your business and life to look like so you can design them accordingly.

The Top Ten Clarity Mistakes Agents Make When Building Their Business

1. Short term thinking that leads to a business that won’t scale 2. Designing the entire business around yourself 3. Lack of clarity around financial expectations for the business 4. Failure to document procedures and protocol 5. No concrete plan for after sale service and value 6. Business is not structured around its unique value 7. No clear career path for it’s employees 8. No written plan exists or one does but it is too complex 9. Standards and expectations that don’t exist or are not followed 10. You forget to build the business to serve your life rather than visa versa

Too many people in business dive in head first without a clear plan. This happens all too often because so many of us start off as amateur agents before we find ourselves turning into business people. We just keep going and going, mostly focused on finding our next client. But before you know it, you have created a business with no foundation, no direction, and no identity.

Most fail to clearly to define their plan. They don’t know what they want for their business or for their life other than that they want to be successful or that they want to make money. That is not enough.

The great Yogi Berra gave us the wonderful and absolutely timeless quote that, “If you don’t know where you are going, you will end up someplace else.”

Success in business requires a very clear sense of direction, conviction about what your business stands for, and exactly who you want to serve all tied together around a two page business plan.

Begin with the end in mind

The great Stephen Covey, who we miss dearly, gave us this powerful statement, “Begin with the end in mind.” Here is how he defines it, “Begin with the end in mind means to begin each day, task, or project with a clear vision of your desired direction and destination, and then continue by flexing your proactive muscles to make things happen.” A very common example of this occurs when agents structure split structures for their team that seem to make sense today but are unsustainable in the long run. Or when making hiring decisions with shortsighted compensation plans that work today but become a choke hold on your profitability in later stages of growth.

Core Values

Documented core values are a funny thing. They are one of the most important things any business needs yet it is the most likely thing for you to ignore. I understand why. I remember feeling like spending time on core values was a waste of time because there was so much business to do, so many fires to put out, and even more and opportunities to capture.. I certainly didn’t feel like it was the best use of my limited hours.

Amazing how now that I have a big business, it is one of the central points of focus when making nearly any decision for the business.

If you don’t have clear core values,you will find yourself needing to clean up a lot of messes. It will also be hard to develop alignment and get buy-in from your team. You will suffer greater turnover, it will take longer to make decisions, and you won’t enjoy your business nearly as much as you should.

Core values tied to a strong culture will elevate your business above all others. A business reaches a point when it cannot grow in a healthy manner without them.

If you take this seriously and build the core of your company around what you want your culture to look and feel like 10 years from now, you will have a great advantage over other agents who don’t make this a priority.

To help develop your core values, ask yourself the following questions: 1. Why are you in business (other than to make money)? 2. Why do your best customers choose you? 3. What do you want the community to say about you and your business? 4. What traits exemplify you and your best team members? 5. What do you believe it takes to be successful in your business? 6. What traits do you most value in others?

Ask each of your key team members to do the same. Brainstorm answers to these questions, play with them, edit them, and just get something down on paper. Commit to them for at least a quarter. Read them daily. Post them on the wall. It is entirely natural that you will come back to them and make edits over the course of the year on a quarterly basis until they feel just right. But just get started and don’t worry about being perfect on day one. You won’t be.

Purpose Statement

Every business needs a rallying cry. And this is yours. A one to two sentence statement that defines why you are in business and what drives you to crush it day in and day out. What makes you and your organization tick? It could be anything from charitable purposes, to the thrill of winning, to serving your customers at a high level, or to developing your team members beyond their wildest dreams. This is tied to what is commonly known as “your big why.”

Define Your Ideal Customer

Some refer to this as your avatar. Who is your ideal client? Where do they live? What kind of community? What price point? What lifestyle? Do you work with buyers? Sellers? Investors? Do you specialize in families or empty nesters? Horse property? Perhaps you are ultra focused on a particular type of architecture like mid-century modern homes or high rise buildings. Or maybe single level ranches. There are a ton of possibilities and combinations.

If you think about it, marketing for horse property is going to look very different from beach property, which is also going to look very different from condo living. Know who you are.

You need to have great clarity around your ideal customer and then design all of your marketing and messaging around that profile. Everything is geared toward your ideal customer from your logo design to your blog posts and online video messages. Most businesses tend to define their ideal customer as a human being willing to hand over money and buy or sell. And I am not being cheeky. It really is that general for most. The issue with that is you never know who you are talking to. Which means you can never have a crystal clear marketing message. You are trying to be all things to all people. And that never works. As an example, if you live in the metro urban area of your city and you want to live a life where you can walk to work, restaurants, and play, then don’t accept every piece of business that makes it’s way to you 45 minutes out in the suburbs. That extra piece of business is hurting you in ways you don’t yet see. If you are selling to everybody, you are selling to nobody. You should design your logo with an urban feel, feature the downtown area in your marketing photos, reference the downtown area in your videos and blogs, etc. Make it your focus and build your business to serve the life that you are looking for. This sounds obvious, but most people in the real estate industry do just the opposite. They take on absolutely everything and anything that comes their way. They go wide, but never deep. When you try to be all things to all people, two things happen: 1. You never develop true expertise. 2. It becomes prohibitively expensive to market your business and you get crushed by those that better focus their resources.

Two page business plan

If you are like me, you learned in college that a business plan should be at least 40 pages long. Kiss that concept goodbye. Most of us tend to over complicate our businesses and a massive business plan isn’t going to do anything to simplify it. Plus, who actually reads a 40 page business plan? Not me. Not you. They may be useful for businesses that are looking for investors and venture capital money, but that is typically not the case. A business plan should provide MASSIVE CLARITY. It should be revisited on a weekly basis. It should be a living and breathing document that not only lays out your plan for the year but also provides a clear picture of what has to happen each quarter in order to be successful for the year. Laminate and review your plan regularly. Keep a copy everywhere you are likely to see it. Bathroom, nightstand, car, desk, etc. And make sure everybody in your organization has a copy.

Contents Of Your Two Page Business Plan And Questions It Should Answer:

1. What is your Purpose Statement?

2. What are you Core Values?

3. Where do you do business geographically?

4. Who is your ideal customer?

5. What is your unique selling proposition?

6. How does your company differentiate itself in the marketplace?

7. Who are your main competitors?

8. What are the greatest threats to your business and your industry?

9. What are your transaction sides, revenue, gross margin, and profit goals for the year, 3 years from now,

and ten years from now? How do you know you can hit them?

10. What are you company goals for the year?

11. What are your company goals for the quarter and who is accountable?

12. What are your personal goals for the quarter?

“ When your “system” is so complicated or inconsistent that it requires world-class talent to operate, it becomes extremely difficult to grow the business.

Facebook Ads Strategy

San Diego, CA 92101

(619) 701-5291 | [email protected]

2420 17th Street, Suite 300, Denver, CO 80202

1. Audience building ads

You need to run Page like Ads to build your Facebook audience.

Page like ads are meant for drawing attention to your page, but specifically targeted to people who are most likely to want to use your services, in order to gain a targeted audience (aka page likes). In other words, you are gathering targeted page likes. People who are raising their hand (aka showing their interest). No, you aren’t “buying” page likes. You are putting your page in front of people who are actually interested in staying connected with you.

Why should you run page like ads?

First of all, it’s an easy way to connect with people. Almost “noncommittal” on their part. They still feel anonymous. Second, it’s a powerful reputation builder. As much as we don’t want to solely seek out page likes (because the wrong ones are actually detrimental to your Facebook business page’s health) we do want people to see our business as strong, healthy, and legitimate. Targeted page likes help with this. Third, because page like ads are the best (and least expensive) way to test out cold traffic audiences. In other words, if you aren’t sure if you’ve got your targeting dialed in, you can test run it through a Facebook page like ad campaign and then verify your new page likes… check them out each day to make sure the ads are bringing in the audience you want to attract. If it’s not, you can adjust your targeting. If it is, you are ready to run more expensive ads. Fourth, because your future advertising efforts on Facebook will reap serious benefits. In other words, having already found your target audience and gathered them as page fans, you can then run ads directly to your page fans… who are more likely to respond to your advertising than non-page fans. Who should I target my page like ads to? There are several audiences you should be targeting and, each audience should be its own ad set. You’ll want to target...Cold traffic. These are people who, while they fit your specific parameters of location & other aspects, have no connection with you whatsoever. Page like ads are an excellent “first-step” connection with cold traffic. Website visitors. These are exactly what you think they might be… traffic that has visited your website. You want people to be as connected with you as possible. If they are visiting your website, and you’ve got relevant content on your website (not a bunch of random hyper-local event & activity posts) there’s a good chance they are targeted traffic. Get them connected with you on Face- book as well.

600 B Street, Suite 300, San Diego, CA 92101 2420 17th Street, Suite 300, Denver, CO 80202

(619) 701-5291 | [email protected]

Email subscribers/IDX registrants. You want to integrate people into as many connection methods as possible. If you have email addresses or phone numbers of leads or clients, then you definitely want them to connect with you on your Facebook business page. So, who should you not be targeting? You shouldn’t be targeting your current page fans… it’s a page like ad! Don’t waste your money running it to people who already like your page. You should not be targeting your fellow real estate agents. Make sure you have created audiences of local real estate agents and that you exclude them in all of your advertising. Not because you are afraid they will do the same thing as you, but because you don’t want to pay to run your ads to an untargeted audience! Here’s an extra tip when it comes to page like ads... After you’ve accumulated at least 1500 targeted page fans, create a new ad set for the cold traffic audience above, but be sure to target only friends of fans. You’ll reap social proof in this audience and find that it responds even better than a simple cold traffic audience. Be forewarned though… don’t do this tactic unless you are absolutely certain that nearly 100% of your page likes are targeted… not fellow colleagues around the country, not unknown paid for likes, but actual, targeted page likes of people who are most likely to use your real estate services. When should you be running Facebook page like ads? From the moment your Facebook business page is active (and I mean setup properly and you are posting relevant content on it several times each day without fail) until you cease your real estate business.

600 B Street, Suite 300, San Diego, CA 92101 2420 17th Street, Suite 300, Denver, CO 80202

(619) 701-5291 | [email protected]

2. Content ads

2.Second of all, you need to be running ads to promote your content. Wait, what? I’ve got to create content and then run ads to it? Well… do you want an online lead generation system that first builds know, like, and trust relationships and then entices people who already want to do business with you… to call you? If you want that kind of business, then yes, you’ve got to spend some time creating highly valuable content and running ads to that content. In other words, you’ve got to give to get. What do I mean by this? I am referring to the fact that you are creating powerful, compelling content on your website. I’m not talking about your Facebook status updates. I’m not talking about your neighborhood pages. I’m talking about content you’ve created that is extremely valuable. Content that answers a question and solves a problem for your target audience. Specifically a thorough and detailed blog post that addresses and solves a specific, relevant problem that your audience has in their journey. Then, you need to run ads that promotes that content… in a way that is more a “sharing” of the content. You definitely want lead capture elements within the content, but this is not about sharing a lead capture page disguised as content. This is about giving your all and sharing the solution to a problem that your audience has. Why should you be running ads promoting your content? For a number of reasons including...The fact that you are showing your audience that you fully understand their needs. Your content is solving their problems. They find your content valuable. In other words… you are working on a piece of the “nurture” element of lead conversion. The other reason is to create a targeted website audience… that you are pixeling and that you can then later run “next step” Facebook ads to. Who should I target my content promotion ads to? There are several audiences you should be target- ing and each audience should be its own ad set.

You’ll want to target...Cold traffic. These are people who, while they fit your specific parameters of location & other aspects, have no connection with you whatsoever.

Website visitors. These are exactly what you think they might be… traffic that has visited your website. You want people to be as connected with you as possible. You want them returning to your website over and over again.

600 B Street, Suite 300, San Diego, CA 92101 2420 17th Street, Suite 300, Denver, CO 80202

(619) 701-5291 | [email protected]

Email subscribers/IDX registrants. You want integrate people into as many connection methods as possible. If you have email address or phone numbers of leads or clients, then you definitely want them to also be visiting (and revisiting) your website. Page likes. Assuming of course that you’ve accumulate page likes that are 100% your targeted audience (not your fellow colleagues or friends/family who took pity on you when you begged for page likes). So, who should you not be targeting? You should not be targeting your fellow real estate agents. Make sure you have created audiences of local real estate agents and that you exclude them in all of your advertising. Not because you are afraid they will do the same thing as you, but because you don’t want to pay to run your ads to an untargeted audience! You should also not be targeting a random audience. You want targeted. If your content solves a prob- lem for homeowners, then you need to be targeting homeowners, not renters (as an example). When should you be running Facebook content promotion ads? From the moment your Facebook business page is active (and I mean setup properly and you are posting relevant content on it several times each day without fail) until you cease your real estate business. The minute you create a new piece of content, setting up content promotion ads should be your first order of business. Now, you won’t want to be running dozens upon dozens of content promotion ads at the same time. I suggest working on creating two insanely valuable pieces of content each month and running an ad for each one for an entire month. And then, over time, you’ll know what content appeals the most to your various audiences. You can create more of that type of content and you can run ads focused fully on the content that resonates with your audience. Here’s an extra tip when it comes to content promotion ads...Over time, you’ll notice that some of your content appeals more than other. If you create something that seems to go gangbusters… run it until either the content expires or, you stop having reactions to that content. A really good piece of content will always work for you. It’s something that is considered evergreen… never dying, never going out of date. Always resonating.

600 B Street, Suite 300, San Diego, CA 92101 2420 17th Street, Suite 300, Denver, CO 80202

(619) 701-5291 | [email protected]

3. Opt-in ads

3. Third, you need to be running lead capture ads. I’m specifically speaking of the preverbal “home value” ad and the “search for homes” ad here. The biggest problem with these types of ads is that they are the first type of ads real estate agents run and they usually run them to cold traffic… traffic that scrolls right on past the ad itself. In reality, these ads are one of the LAST ads you should be running, to a warmer audience. With today’s ability to use ad blockers, most of these ads aren’t even seen by your target audience. They are just another noise maker and are being used to train people to ignore these types of ads. Not only that, but they tend to attract mostly two types of people…The first are the curiosity seekers. Those who have zero intention of buying or selling, but are really just curious. These are the ones that tend to be in your >Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32-33 Page 34-35 Page 36-37 Page 38-39 Page 40-41 Page 42-43 Page 44-45 Page 46-47 Page 48-49 Page 50-51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76 Page 77 Page 78 Page 79 Page 80 Page 81 Page 82 Page 83 Page 84 Page 85 Page 86 Page 87 Page 88 Page 89 Page 90-91 Page 92-93

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