Insurance is many things, but riveting to learn about is not usually one of them.

This makes marketing insurance increasingly difficult in a time of shorter attention spans when customers can get information just about anywhere. The text and graphics used to capture attention (commonly called “the creative”) are crucial for the campaign’s success, but what goes into making great creative materials for insurance?

How Insurance Marketing Differs from Other Marketing

Insurance marketing faces a unique set of challenges that most other industries do not face, making it a formidable task for many marketers.

Compliance Regulations for Insurance Marketing

One of the biggest differences between insurance marketing and marketing for just about any other industry, with a few exceptions, is that insurance is highly regulated and therefore brings many compliance requirements along with it.

Even more challenging is that compliant content in one state may not be compliant in another since states—and individual carriers—regulate their own insurance . What one carrier and/or state allow may not be allowed by others.

All this is said to remind you that remaining compliant is crucial even while trying to create compelling marketing materials.

Insurance is a Complex Product

Marketing insurance is difficult to do without an in-depth understanding of the product. Many marketing agencies rely on a basic sales sheet to learn a brief overview of the products they will be marketing without any additional details.

An insurance marketer must understand and appreciate the product they are selling and understand the benefits and exclusions that may apply. A good creative team should believe in the product, and that can’t happen before they know what that product’s value is to the customer.

The team must be able to distill down complicated information in a way that is clear and easy for customers to understand. If you can’t sum up the benefits of the product in one compelling phrase, then you aren’t in a good position to sell the product.

Intangible Products Are Difficult to Translate

Think about children watching TV, who suddenly start yelling from the living room about the new life-like baby doll they saw that can blink its eyes (wow!). They want to add it to their wish list right now!

Visuals can evoke an immediate feeling of need for a product. The problem is that visuals are significantly simpler to use for tangible products than they are for intangible ones.

How do you effectively show the value of an insurance product through a captivating and eye-catching visual that drives individuals to pick up your ad and read further?

It’s not easy, which is part of why insurance marketing is truly different from many other industries.

Our Fundamentals for Successful Marketing Using Creative

Creative choices should be based on empathy for your consumer, personalized data, and testing. Combine all these factors into quality text and graphics, and you get something that speaks to them and drives more conversions.

1.      Test, Test, Test

People vote on your marketing with their wallets. Collecting data about what works and what doesn’t is more than half the battle when it comes to deciding what creative will convert to a sale. Testing allows us to narrow down our options into the choices people want.

It’s important to utilize real-time learning methods from your tests that allow you to look at a campaign before it launches, while it’s running, and after it’s completed. All marketing should be data-driven to test the response throughout the entire campaign, and changes made accordingly.

2.      Less is More

When designers create new, outlandish designs, they never truly last. New trends come and go but what has endured is the simple black dress. Just like fashion, the simplified version of a letter or landing page has proven itself over time.

All marketing material should be designed and worded for ordinary people, not just professional agents who deeply understand the market. Make sure the decision to enroll is easy by using succinct communication with strong calls to action.

This simplicity extends to the options you’re offering. Customers should have just enough options so they can choose the one that’s right for them without being overwhelmed by choices. Knowing the right amount can be difficult, but testing helps with this as well.

Finally, be very careful not to give customers any barrier to entry to engage with your offer. They shouldn’t have to look up information or spend a long time filling out a detailed form.

3.      Convey the Value without the Fear

Evoking emotion is one of the most tried-and-true methods of marketing, but make sure you are evoking the right emotion.

With insurance, it’s easy to think evoking a fear response from the consumer may be the best way to get the purchase, but that is actually not the case. Establishing the need for the product is very different from using scare tactics, fear statistics, or graphics to try to show customers what could happen to them. These fear tactics are prohibited for use in insurance marketing, and they also just don’t work.

Statistics like, “More than 46,000 people die in car crashes each year” may seem like they would encourage people to think, “I want to get insurance in case I’m one of the 46,000!” However, they can scare people from engaging at all.

Instead of going for fear, focus on the value you offer. Give the customers the answer to “What’s in it for me?” and the benefits that directly address their pain points. Make sure you are following the “you, not we” rule and talking more about the consumer and less about your company.

Finally, don’t lead with limitations; rather, convey the value first to help them see the benefit before showing any limitations there might be.

FM Engage Has the Creative Experience

Insurance marketing is challenging but with over 50 years of industry experience, FM Engage, knows exactly how to navigate the challenges and turn them into positives—and revenue.

This experience has resulted in extensive data on what works—and what doesn’t. Contact us today to see how we can put this knowledge to work for your insurance company.