S3E7: Nate Isaacson on the Future of Social Media Marketing

Denim Rivet

On this episode, Gregory is joined by Nate Isaacson, director of social media for Guardian Life Insurance Company. The two discuss the future of digital and social media marketing in the insurance and financial services industry. They cover tools and technologies being used to connect with Millennials, Guardian’s engagement with the Denim platform, and mixing human interaction with AI. You’ll also get a few tactical steps marketers can take to jump-start their social media efforts.

The Most Important Thing to Know About Social Marketing

Nate believes the biggest thing insurance and financial professionals need to know about social marketing is that it’s not a silver bullet. Social is not a quick fix. Just having a business page on LinkedIn and Facebook won’t solve all your problems. This isn’t a short-term game; sending out one tweet or InMail isn’t going to change your business overnight. Over time, social media marketing begins to make your marketing efforts more efficient and effective.

Future of Digital Marketing

Nate has been seeing firms put more dollars into digital even on the corporate end. There have been attempts across the industry to try and move away from applying full-on old-school practices in the digital realm. Trying to change old behaviors in people who have been in the industry a long time is difficult though. Nate sees the future in integrating social into the DNA of new employees. There is tremendous opportunity in revamping the onboarding process to make social a key part of how people view digital marketing going forward.

Millennial Market

Some people only want to deal with a human when they need to. So Guardian has put a lot of emphasis on Sales Navigator as a tool to help engage Millennials. They’ve seen that Millennials can have a high call reluctance and sometimes just want to keep to themselves. Grapevine6 is a new tool that gives people content relevant to their market, and it has given Guardian the ability to make better use of Facebook. Guardian is also using the Denim platform to increase engagement with advisors' Facebook pages.

Jump-Starting Social Efforts

A first step Nate suggests is to educate your business partners. Showing your partners what you are trying to accomplish and the opportunities missed by not engaging properly can help get everyone on the same page. Take a step back and see if you are approaching social with an “old-school” methodology. You don’t have to throw away all your practices, but you need to look at how classic and modern mesh best today. Look at your onboarding of new advisors and how they are being trained. If their training is lacking in the social sphere, you’ll always be battling upstream to get everyone up to speed with the current state of digital.

Links

Nate Isaacson

Grapevine6