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These days, not having a website can be highly detrimental to trying to run a successful insurance business. It could result in countless lost opportunities, less awareness from shoppers, and fewer customers. Whether you're an independent agent or an insurance agency, a website is a valuable and necessary asset. Your customers (and potential customers) are already online, so you should be, as well.
Having a website allows you to connect with your customers, nurture leads, and ultimately grow your business. Now that pretty much everything can be done online, people expect to be able to contact you, schedule appointments, and learn more about the services you provide, all from a convenient, easy-to-use website. Additionally, a well-planned and well-executed site enables you to promote your services, build trust, and generate more leads.
If you don't have a website yet, you'll want to consider setting one up. Building a fully functioning site can appear challenging, at first. Fortunately, it's nowhere near as hard as it seems. If you're on the fence (or you're just getting your insurance business started), here are a few reasons why you need a website and how to get one for your agency.
As an insurance agent, growing your business requires attracting new customers. While you can use word-of-mouth advertising and handing out business cards for getting customers, it will only get you so far.
If you're looking for a way to expand your reach, having a website is essential. A website allows you to use various digital marketing strategies that attract more traffic and increase your brand awareness.
For instance, optimizing your site and crafting consistent, valuable content helps your site appear closer to the top of the first page on search engines for relevant search queries. You can also leverage digital advertising to target prospects in the areas you serve and direct them to your site.
Keep in mind that you don't want to create just any regular website. You shouldn't just throw content on pages and hope for the best. With the number of insurance companies out there with websites (including big-name agencies), you need to be able to stand out from your competition. A professional-looking website will help you get your brand in front of as many potential customers on the market in the most effective way possible.
There's a good chance that many of your prospects and existing customers will visit your website at some point. Prospects generally end up on your site in the first place because they're searching for a specific type of insurance solution. And most of these people who end up on your website aren't going to know who you are or what you do until they start poking around.
The most critical step in "selling" your business to these potential customers is to help them understand what services you offer. That requires creating individual pages for each of the products and services you sell.
Individual product and service pages make your pages easier to navigate and share. Making your clients aware of everything you offer also helps increase your chances of cross-selling insurance products and getting referrals.
Let's face it. Insurance can be a complicated subject. Many shoppers are likely to need help understanding it and how you can help them. By having individual pages for every product or service you offer, you can go into great detail and list all the information related to each service. You can explain the benefits of each item and provide answers to some of your most frequently asked questions.
In essence, your pages act as your voice, giving potential clients the information they need before they even contact you. The better you can help someone understand your specific services, the more likely they'll be to trust you and become a lead.
Building a successful insurance business requires establishing credibility and gaining the trust of your customers. A website is one of the easiest ways to increase both. Your prospects will perceive you as more reliable almost instantly if you include a link to your website on your business cards and email signature.
A website can be an invaluable asset for agents who do business with out-of-state clients. Let's say you don't see many of your customers face-to-face. Everything either happens over the phone or the internet. Your site serves as an excellent tool for showing those clients who can't physically see you that you're trustworthy and dependable.
Credibility also comes from a well-designed, modern website. If your site looks old and outdated, there's a good chance you'll lose the trust you've worked so hard to build. This can indicate that you're out of the loop or out of touch, and a sleek design and template will carry a lot of weight for customers.
Writing unique and original content around your products and services can also be beneficial. Not only will it help to sell your offerings to your customers, but it will also give them the information they need. Fresh, new content can provide answers to many of their insurance-related questions.
Your website doesn't just allow your customers and potential customers to learn more about you. It also allows you to learn more about them.
With analytics and marketing software, you can track and see who visits your website. You can get a much clearer idea of who your main demographic is that's visiting your site, which demographics are and aren't converting, what pages are the most popular, what channels are driving the most traffic, and more.
But what are you supposed to do with this information? Reviewing the data you collect will give you a better understanding of what your clients want. You can use it to tailor your website and services accordingly, allowing them to become a more effective marketing tool for your business. The more information you have, the better your website, and the more leads you convert to clients.
Most insurance agents aren't web developers. For this reason, you might be thinking that building a website for insurance agents could be a significant challenge. Fortunately, there are some easy solutions for building well-designed, manageable sites, some of which are specific to insurance agents.
The goal here is to provide you with just enough information to help you start researching and give you options to compare as you look for the best solution for you and your business.
There are dozens of drag-and-drop website builders you can use. Not all of them are of equal caliber, though. Some aren't all that helpful, and others might not offer what you need to scale your website as you grow.
With a drag-and-drop site builder, you're getting something affordable, doesn't take a lot of time to set up, and allows you to easily make your site visually appealing.
As you look at your options, you'll likely find out that many of these solutions offer free versions, but these aren't usually the best options for a professional. They tend to have advertisements at the top of the page, don't allow for custom domain names, and have limited storage space. You may also be more limited when it comes to customizing your site.
Instead, you'll want to consider the paid version of all drag-and-drop website builders. While you do have to pay for them, these options are the most reliable, and they offer the most features. Here are two of the most popular drag-and-drop website builders:
Squarespace features an easy-to-use site editor that enables you to customize templates, add content, and much more. The platform boasts more than 100 high-quality templates, which are automatically mobile-responsive. They'll display perfectly on mobile devices without you having to make any changes to them. All of the features are built right into the editor instead of on a separate app market, so you won't have to worry about going back and trying to find (or pay for) additional items you might need.
With Wix, you have access to more than 800 designer-made templates, including one specifically for insurance agencies. That particular template allows you to make insurance websites for agents quickly and easily. It comes with quote requests, location information, a contact form, and more. You can start from this template (or any of the others) and customize it to create the perfect website for your agency.
Wix has a simple drag-and-drop editor, making the process of building a website for insurance agents that much easier. You can move around elements on a specific page, select your font style and color, and add or remove pages or sections of your site. While it can take a few hours to learn and get your Wix site set up, the platform does walk you through the process step by step. You can also set up a blog on your Wix site with the Wix Blog app and find additional features on the Wix App Market.
Insurance website builders often come with a team of professional website designers and marketers, as well as a whole suite of marketing tools. An important fact to remember is that you do have to pay more for them while you do get all of these extra features. You should also bear in mind that every insurance website builder is different. You may want to make sure that you have the freedom to customize and update pages when you want without always having to turn to your dedicated team to do so. It's also essential to make sure that you get to keep your website if you ever stop working with the company.
Due to the popularity of website builders, many insurance agents and agencies use them. Not only that, but these services tend to be more templatized than they're sold to be. As such, you're likely to end up with a website that looks like the websites of other agencies. So, while these solutions are insurance-specific and make the process of building a website quick and easy, they're not ideal if you're looking to create a more unique and personalized experience for your customers.
You may also want to exercise caution when it comes to builders with flashy marketing features such as "content libraries" containing pre-made content you can use on your site. Buying and using this type of content could create duplicate content issues with search engines. You could end up hurting your ranking on search engine rankings rather than boosting them. When you're trying to stand out from everyone else, this is one of the last things you want.
Here are a couple of the most popular website builders specifically for insurance agents and agencies:
Leadsurance is a two-for-one deal. It's both a website builder for insurance agents with 24/7 customer support, as well as a drag-and-drop website builder. Leadsurance offers numerous helpful features, including newsletter automation, email marketing, online review requests, a quote builder form, and so much more. It also offers some rather attractive add-on items, such as chatbots and digital marketing support. Overall, it's a comprehensive and easy-to-use platform that can help you create the website you want for your agency.
Advisor Websites is a niche financial and insurance website builder platform. Since it focuses on the insurance industry, it offers many features most insurance agents need to have on their websites, including lead management, email marketing, analytics, and more. It's certainly worth investigating, especially if you'd prefer to work with a platform that specializes in and understands the world of insurance.
While DIY drag-and-drop platforms and insurance website builders can help you create a well-planned and comprehensive website, a professional web designer is still one of the best options. With the help of a professional, you can set your website and your agency apart from your competition.
A professional web designer is an expert in crafting unique, personalized websites for their clients. They go above and beyond generic site builders and templatized services. They'll meet with you to discuss your specific needs, learn more about your agency, and do what it takes to deliver a unique and high-performing website. Additionally, once the designer completes the website, it's yours to keep for good with a small monthly cost to host it on the server of your choice.
So, where do you find a professional web designer? In today's digital age, you can often find and interview them on freelance sites like Fiverr or Upwork. Remember, though, that you often get what you pay for. Sure, you may end up with a nice-looking website for your agency, but you could end up requiring coding knowledge or the assistance of a web developer later on just to make small changes to your pages.
If you decide to go with a professional web designer, have your site built so that you can update it when you want and easily manage it yourself. A user-friendly platform like WordPress is particularly beneficial. Discuss the details with any web designer you interview before you make your decision. Communication with your designer is key to ensuring that you get the website you're looking for.
A website is an invaluable asset for any insurance business, no matter if you're a one-person show or if you run a small agency. While most agents don't have the know-how to build a site from scratch, there are plenty of tools available that can help.
If you're looking into your website building options, take your time. Rushing into a hasty decision could mean that you end up committing to a service that's too expensive or that doesn't fit your specific needs as you continue to grow your business.
Additionally, committing to a platform that doesn't fit your budget or meet your needs could make it more challenging to change platforms later. Not only that, but you could end up spending a substantial amount of money to migrate everything you've already built to that new platform.
It will also take time to drive traffic to your site once you go live, so be patient. Here's the thing, though: you don't have to let your lead flow slow down while you wait. Instead, you can use Nectar for a consistent influx of incoming leads until you're generating leads yourself using various marketing channels and SEO traffic.
With Nectar, you can essentially fill the gaps by purchasing real-time leads. Nectar connects insurance shoppers with agents that offer the specific services they need. Shoppers get a more personalized experience, and you receive higher-quality leads. Sign up with Nectar today to get started!
This article reflects the features of Nectar as of the date of publication. Features are subject to change at any time. This article is meant for informational purposes only, it is not a guarantee that using Nectar will help you achieve specific business or financial results and is not intended to serve as the sole recommendation for any business financial decisions.