Month: August, 2010

Bleeding for Insurance and Rhode Island

Share

Recently, the Astonish Results social media team ventured to Rhode Island’s capital city to donate blood as part of a Rhode Island Blood Center “Tweet ‘n Greet” event that leveraged the power of Twitter and Facebook to bring in blood donors. Aside from just giving blood, Astonish used the opportunity to do some fact-finding as we plan on doing our own company-wide blood drive later in the year.

In what could possibly be the coolest blood drive venue ever, the Johnson & Wales Culinary Museum played host to the event offering free admission and refreshments to everyone who donated. Surrounded by culinary and foodservice artifacts spanning hundreds of years, the museum provided a shot of fun for blood donors who had time to nosh tasty treats and play skee ball while recovering for the customary 10-20 minutes.

To get some perspective on how the Rhode Island Blood Center is faring, community manager Nick Brown spoke to the Director of PR and the Director of IT about the efforts across the state and how the program is growing. Please enjoy the video interview below.

Astonish Results’s social media team also spent some time exploring the J&W Culinary Museum. Their exploits are shared in a slideshow below.

Email Marketing Still Important to Life and Health

Share

The internet and social media get a lot of attention in our efforts to generate insurance leads. However, the unsung hero of insurance agency marketing strategies is the tried and true email marketing campaign, which, when implemented smartly and tactfully, provides agencies with a valuable communication to existing and potential policy-holders.

Astonish Results President Tim Sawyer recently sat down with the publisher of National Underwriter, Tashawna Rodwell, to discuss how insurance agency e-mail marketing can drive focused messages to a large audience.  The “Serving the Modern Consumer” video discussion also veered into how combining the use of e-mail with other marketing tools can help build a loyal following.

Mark Shuster of Life Health Solutions and Elaine Henderson of Ken Johnson Insurance also shared stories of how e-mail marketing has worked for their agencies. Mr. Shuster spoke about how sending out automated monthly newsletters, birthday updates, and insurance industry news has helped create awareness of his agency in a way that shows people they aren’t just concerned with selling insurance, but actually contributing to peoples knowledge and understand of it. And because there is a system in place that monitors who is opening the e-mails,  who is reading, forwarding, and engaging in them, everything can be quantified..

Elaine Henderson tells how Ken Johnson Insurance of South Carolina has a full time employee whose job is to create and implement e-mail campaigns while ensuring the quality is reflective of the agencies values and expertise. They add about 200-300 people a week to their e-mail list and earn many referrals because of it.

Tim Sawyer offers four factors that are critical to making e-mail campaigns a successful insurance marketing strategy:

1)      Who you are sending these e-mails to.

2)      What you are sending.

3)      How often your are sending them.

4)      Who is opening them, reading, and forwarding them to peers.

You may view the video in its entirety below:

  • Like us?

  • RSS Insurance Marketing HQ

    • Show Your Readers Some Love During the Month of February! January 30, 2012
      Ah February, the month of love! With Valentine’s Day around the corner, I thought it would be interesting to write up a post about love. As a blogger, you hope that all readers will fall in love with your blog and keep coming back for more. However, in order for this to happen it is […]
      bscartabello
    • Sharing Is Caring: How to Share With Your Audience to Strengthen Your Insurance Social Networking! January 27, 2012
      As an insurance agent, it is a constant goal to attract and keep your customers. Having reliable products is one factor in being able to provide great services. However, one crucial component to reaching success may not be as obvious as you think. With social media on the rise, it is important to create quality […]
      eguest
    • Your Agency and Social Media Etiquette January 24, 2012
      Now that your business has developed an identity on social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter, you and your employees have probably created personal accounts in addition to your agency’s fan page. It’s good practice for you and your agents to have pages so you can connect with clients if necessary and it also […]
      wmanly
    • Two Strategies, One Goal: How SEO and SEM Should be Part of Your Digital Marketing Plan January 20, 2012
      It’s a question that I am often asked by my clients who are looking to launch their digital marketing strategy: should they focus on Search Engine Optimization (SEO) or Pay-Per-Click (SEM, PPC)? Too many people are under the impression that their online marketing presence should be guided by one strategy or the other.  I’m here […]
      dosowa
    • 3 Easy Ways to Build Links January 17, 2012
      You’ve probably heard time and time again that it’s important to get other websites to link back to your website. When you hear this, you smile and nod…but you have no clue why any of it matters. Don’t worry! The whole concept of link building is actually really easy to understand; when other people link […]
      mmack
  • RSS John Boudreau Blog

    • Loving and Serving Each Other – Digging a Bit Deeper December 29, 2011
      One of the values that we hold dear at Astonish is “loving and serving our client and each other”. I wanted to dig a bit deeper into that value. People use the word “love” all the time. I LOVE this … Continue reading → […]
      John Boudreau
    • Using Checklists to Improve Results December 10, 2011
      I read another interesting book recently, “The Checklist Manifesto” by Atul Gawande. The author shows how a simple tool, a checklist, can help organizations avoid errors and improve results. Gawande is a surgeon and he was asked by the WHO … Continue reading → […]
      John Boudreau
    • Facing Your Business’ Problems Head On September 6, 2011
      Every business has problems. There are no perfect businesses no matter how elaborate the PR spin. Even the great Apple, known for its stunning revenue growth and fanatical customer base has problems. So how do the best businesses deal with … Continue reading → […]
      John Boudreau
    • Analytics and the Independent Insurance Agency August 28, 2011
      I just read a great piece in Forbes magazine about Jim Goodnight, CEO of SAS. SAS is the leader in high-powered analysis software. SAS helps large to midsized business analyze their data so they can make better decisions. The author … Continue reading → […]
      John Boudreau
    • The Law of Comparative Advantage Applied to Business August 10, 2011
      I just read a great blog post on the Law of Comparative Advantage. According to Wikipedia, the law states the following: “Two countries (or other kinds of parties, such as individuals or firms) can both gain from trade if, in … Continue reading → […]
      John Boudreau
  • RSS Ganis Consulting

    • Monitor and Measure Everything in your Insurance Agency June 3, 2011
      As we travel the country and meet with insurance agency owners, they often tell us they’re a referral based business. When we ask how many referrals they received in the past month the answer is always “not sure”. The reality is, these agency owners have no idea how many referral quotes come into their agency […]
      Stuart Ganis
    • Insurance Agency Coaching and Consulting is a Great Investment May 31, 2011
      I’ve been in nearly 300 insurance agencies in the past 5 years for training, coaching, consulting, marketing and M&A services. It’s amazing how much the business has changed in the past 5,10,15 years. Days of running a yellow page ad, sponsoring a little league team and ringing phones are long gone for most. The fact […]
      Stuart Ganis
    • Happy Memorial Day May 31, 2011
      We’d like to thank all of the men and women who have made the ultimate sacrifice to ensure our freedom. Sometimes we take freedom for granted and it’s important for us to recognize the people that make it all possible. As we head into the summer, keep in mind that your charisma, motivation and attitude […]
      Stuart Ganis
    • This is a Great Time to Sell your Independent Insurance Agency May 22, 2011
      Many agents that own insurance agencies are under the impression that this is a bad time to sell their agency. Our statistics show that over the past 5 months, we’ve received 32 buyer inquiries to every 1 seller. Many agency owners that are considering selling, are afraid that the soft market and bad economy will […]
      Stuart Ganis
    • Personal and Commercial Lines Departments need to Collaborate April 17, 2011
      As I tour the country and meet with countless insurance agencies about building a sales culture, it amazes me how many agency departments don’t collaborate with one another. We’ve implemented numerous ideas into agencies for Personal Lines to contact Commercial clients and cross-sell clients Personal Lines products. In most cases the Commercial Producers are […]
      Stuart Ganis
  • Bookmarking