To learn more about the basics of SEO, read our book where we dedicate quite a few chapters to online marketing and share many more authoritative sources on the subject that can provide a more comprehensive process for agents. Or stay tuned and stop back to our blog periodically as we go over more ways to fine - tune your SEO strategy so you can rank for keywords and generate free leads from your website.
Remember, however, that a percentage of something is better than one hundred percent of zero sales – so it is a good idea to network with more experienced marketers. Take advantage of the expertise and training that they offer, and use their resources to build your business. One you are ready, you can always bring in new people, and even share leads with them – building your downline so that they will supply you with a good residual income.
Of course, not all shared internet leads are bad. You could get lucky and find a geographic “diamond in the rough” where there’s not much competition for leads, allowing you to achieve a profitable ROI. The thing is, you won’t know until you try, so here are five “free” or discounted internet lead opportunities you can find with a quick search online:
Send an Email Newsletter: Sign up for a free MailChimp account and hook it up to your email newsletter widget in your WordPress website. Leverage email to communicate with clients as well as prospects who haven’t become clients yet, offering valuable insights and articles that can keep you top - of - mind when one of your subscribers has a question about insurance.
All of the above info is for those of you who want to learn affiliate marketing for free. As you can see, there is a lot of free help for you if you plan on doing all of this yourself. However, I also know that some of you do have some funding available and you want to create a bit of a shortcut to success. The only way to do that is to outsource right now.
In addition, you should always know who you’re getting your information from. There are far too many “guru’s” out there who really have no idea what they are talking about. When you sign up for your free account, you’ll be learning directly from Mark Ling and Simon Slade who are both affiliate marketing MILLIONAIRES. They’ve also helped to hand select some other successful affiliate marketers for their training videos. About a year ago, I had my own free training videos right here on this site, but I realized after a while that I just can’t create the type of quality training that Mark Ling and his crew have already put together and continuously update.
Utilize ICE or Beneficiary Contacts: Most applications have an alternative person to contact in case of emergencies (“ICE”), in addition to a beneficiary. Simply ask the client if it’s OK that you notify these contacts and offer to answer any questions they may have. While you are notifying these people, it only takes a minute to ask about their own coverages.
New prospective users often ask me how easy it is for their affiliate to share their link. It’s “stupid simple.” Here’s how it works… When your affiliates sign up with you, they’ll automatically receive an email from you welcoming them to your affiliate program. This email will contain their unique referral link. It will also contain a “one-click” login link to their Affiliate Dashboard. The Affiliate Dashboard is where your affiliate can share their link via email and social media with a single click. For example, when they click the Facebook button, they’ll automatically be forwarded over to Facebook, with a new post pre-populated, and their affiliate link already embedded! They can add a personal note or recommendation if they’d like – or they can simply click “Post” to get the message up on their Wall immediately. This “convenience factor” is huge. Affiliates are able to share their link early and often with their friends and colleagues. It really couldn’t be any easier. The Affiliate Dashboard is also where they can grab marketing materials like banner ads for their website or blog. The banners will already have their affiliate link embedded. So, your affiliate can simply copy the HTML and paste it to their site – or they can have their web developer do this for them.
Make a How - To Video: As opposed to the introduction video we suggested earlier, a how - to video teaches consumers to do something for themselves that they didn’t know how to do before, while building credibility for your brand at the same time. Consider a how - to video on navigating the Medicare drug plan finder, or a video about shopping different types of burial plans and what to expect.
It's easy to find free professional business leads that are industry or trade specific. All you have to do is go online and start visiting trade association websites. There are literally thousands of associations out there—from associations that represent the chocolate industry to those that represent the jewelry industry to associations that represent the tourism business.
Ask People If They Are Happy: Simply ask prospects if they are truly happy with their insurance plan. Even if they say they are (because no one likes to admit they made a mistake in choosing a bad plan), ask people how they would improve their plan or the service offered by their current agent, if they could. This will give you what Randy Schwantz refers to as a wedge, allowing you to wedge in between prospects and their current provider to offer better service or plan alternatives.
Agents might find lead vendors giving away free life insurance leads for agents, discounts, or matching deposit bonuses for signing up with their system. You usually see this with internet lead providers. Unfortunately, the quality of internet leads can be questionable because they may be shared leads, which means they’re resold to multiple agents (sometimes to multiple agencies) at once, driving up competition and causing agents to spend more than just money on these leads. Or, these leads may come from questionable lead generation strategies that entice or reward prospects for submitting a quote form when no interest originally existed—known as “pitching wood” in Boiler Room terms.
Become Versed in Digital Marketing: It’s imperative to keep up with digital marketing trends going forward if you want to survive in the insurance industry as it evolves alongside technology and consumer buying behaviors. If you don’t stay in the loop (perhaps by reading our blog), then you risk falling victim to the latest algorithm changes, or falling behind in opportunities to maximize your brand’s online lead generation opportunity.
Tailwind is a super simple yet supremely powerful content scheduling solution for Pinterest and Instagram. You can use it to save time with bulk image upload, really easy drag and drop calendar, multi-board pinning and pin looping, hashtag lists, and more. Plus, you can automatically optimize your Pinterest and Instagram schedules based on when your audience is most engaged.
Creating a unique tracking ID for an Amazon link is easy. Simply log in to your Amazon affiliate dashboard, click “Account Settings” at the very top on the right, then click “Manage Tracking IDs”. From there you can make a new tracking ID so you can track which web page/campaign sold what. You can learn more about using Amazon’s Tracking IDs here.
To learn more about the basics of SEO, read our book where we dedicate quite a few chapters to online marketing and share many more authoritative sources on the subject that can provide a more comprehensive process for agents. Or stay tuned and stop back to our blog periodically as we go over more ways to fine - tune your SEO strategy so you can rank for keywords and generate free leads from your website.
It’s estimated that in under 2 years almost 90% of web traffic by volume will be video. If you have the skills, or can hire a good SEO specialist, it is possible to rank a sales video on Page 1 of Google with relative ease depending on how competitive your niche is. Put a visible call to action in the title which appears in the search engine results page, and link the YouTube video through to your web site and with luck you should have a nice flow of leads as long as your video is listed on Page 1.
