Top SMS marketing tips for insurance companies

Building customer loyalty and earning customer trust is incredibly important to insurance companies. To achieve that trust, insurance companies need to build meaningful relationships with their customers. 

And what’s the first step to building any good relationships? Clear communication.

Communicating with your clients has become much easier through SMS messages. But just texting your clients some generic content once every year won’t work, will it?

Here are 13 of the best tips and practices for insurance companies to send memorable and effective messages to their clients.

1. Get a yes

Before you start sending your clients regular SMS messages, ensure that they have opted for it. Not everyone wants messages from their insurance provider to take up space on their phones. Your clients may already be receiving far more messages than they would like to.

Send an informative and clear message that mentions how frequently you will be texting and what kind of content you will be sending. 

Put a short codeword or code letter, for example, “Y” for yes or “N” for no that your clients can reply with to express their consent or lack thereof. If you make replying a convenient thing to do for the recipients, you are likely to receive more replies.

For the clients who sent positive responses, send a confirmation message to ensure that they are aware of being signed up. Automating SMS messages can really help out here, and you can use Octopush’s wide range of packages to send such messages at an affordable rate.

2. Make it personal by sending memorable messages

Earning a client’s trust is key when you are in an insurance company. This is a huge step for insurance businesses to achieve as people usually treat insurance as grudge purchases. They invest in insurance because they would feel guilty if they didn’t and would rather spend on something else. Even though insurance serves a crucial purpose in people’s lives, they relate the word to morbid events like death, diseases, or accidents.

However, as an insurance company, you know the harsh reality. You know about how you are paying your clients’ claims more often than not. But how do you convince existing and potential clients?

You build a relationship with them through clear and effective SMS communication. Even simple things like including the client’s name in the text can help the client feel like they are talking to a human being. Add a short signature of a team member at the end to enhance this feeling. 

Without any personal touch to the texts, your clients will feel that they are talking to a bot and not to a human being. Adding such things helps you send memorable messages to your clients. But manually changing the names on each text you send is inconvenient, to say the least. No worries, because Octopush’s SMS Pro will help. You can send texts of whatever length you like and build a relationship of trust with your customer. The best part is that you can invest in this for very reasonable rates, so increasing ROI will not be difficult.

3. Share knowledge based on the type of insurance package your client has bought

Apart from delivering value to your customers through simple messages, sharing knowledge with your clients will also convey a sense of caring.

You can send useful SMS content such as advice on how to drive safely for those who have bought car insurance packages. Send tips for exercise or healthy eating can be sent to clients with life or health insurance. Latest trends on home decor or tips to reduce fire hazards in homes may prove useful to clients who have purchased home insurance.

Simple messages like this can be memorable to your customers. They will perceive it as a way for you to check in on them as old friends do.

Moreover, implementing such tips can help reduce the number of claims you receive, too. They will probably never read the emails they receive from the gyms that they signed up for. But with a 98% open rate for SMS messages, Octopush can assure you that they will at least read your SMS. 

4. Send appointment reminders

Sending SMS messages through Octopush can be an effective way to remind clients about their appointment with you. 

You can also schedule texts for existing clients. For example, after finishing a meeting with a client, you can schedule a text to be sent after a year. The text may be asking the client if they would like to schedule a meeting again to update their plan and reminding them that it has been a year since the last meeting.

You can set up meetings through SMS, too. If you have received a referral who isn’t picking up your calls, you can simply leave a text to set up a meeting.

Or maybe someone has requested a quote from you. You can leave a clear yet simple SMS message like the one below.

Other than making reservations, you can also set up a system for canceling meetings through SMS messages. Since clients will only need to spend a few seconds messaging you about a cancellation, you can receive a notification beforehand. This will save you from wasting time and resources for appointments because your clients didn’t notify you about cancellations. You can easily put that time and resources to better use elsewhere.

5. Automate text messages whenever possible

Automated SMS save a lot of time and can expedite processes. 

Suppose you want to remind a client about an appointment. You can create a template for appointment reminders, and just change the name before sending it to each client. 

Some clients get very frustrated with late replies. Creating automated texts helps a lot in such cases. 

Also, automated texts are perfect for messages like confirming opt-ins through replying using a code word. After identifying the code word, the SMS platform can add the client’s number to a list. Assigning an employee to do these tasks will just be a waste of time and valuable resources.

And changing the details yourself each time can be quite troublesome. This is where Octopush’s customizable SMS packages can help. All you need to do is just come up with the template. 

6. Update clients about their insurance claims or refunds through SMS messages

Over the years, the focus of insurance businesses has gradually shifted to making sure that claims are settled as soon as possible. It also helps improve customer service as people who have filed claims are usually worried about when they will get the funds. 

And guess what? SMS messages are a quick way to relay information. You can keep your clients updated as their claims are being processed. 

You can send them a message when the claim has been received, when it has started being processed, and another one if you require more information. This will also pacify customers. They will understand that you are actively processing the claim and that their wait is not for naught. 

The same also applies to refund requests. Keeping clients updated as their refund requests are being processed will help you maintain their trust and convey a sense of transparency.  

7. Get feedback through text surveys

Getting feedback can help you make your service a memorable one for your customers. You’ll be able to identify any issue lying within your system and improve your service. 

For this, you need to hear from the customer. Sending text surveys is a great way to do so. 

You can send surveys randomly, at a regular interval, or after a certain event. For example, you can automate your message to be sent a day after a claim has been closed. If you need help with this, Octopush’s SMS Pro service is the one for you.

8. Announce promotions and offers on your Insurance plans

One of the best ways to utilize SMS marketing is by informing your customers about any sales, promotional campaigns, offers, and more. 

Offering any early signing discounts? Use SMS marketing promotions to let potential clients know. 

Such SMS content acts as effective messages because 98 percent of the time, the client opens your message. Compare this to emails, where the discounts may sit gathering dust until they expire and the customers won’t even notice most of the time. 

If you want some data, here are some. As of October 2020, only 16.54 percent of all insurance emails are ever opened. The click-through rate for insurance-related emails is 9.68 percent, and the bounce rate 10.44 percent. 

Compare that to the 45 percent response rate and 98 percent open rates for SMS messages sent through Octopush. The contrast is staggering and shows why you need to engage in SMS marketing for your insurance company. 

Moreover, you don’t even necessarily have to send only text messages. If you want to send voice SMS to your customers, Octopush has just the right voice SMS sending service for you to use. 

Or maybe you want to show your clients all the sharp posters or videos you have built for your promotional campaigns. Octopush’s WhatsApp Business API service can help you there.

9. Show your clients that you care

Be there for your clients on their special days. 

Wish them on their birthdays. These serve as memorable messages as it gives your clients the impression that you genuinely care about them. 

Even sending simple messages like this shows the clients that you put in some effort for wishing them, which makes them feel valued. This can enhance customer loyalty to your business, which is very important for customer retention in the competitive industry of insurance. 

If you get to know about your clients’ important life events, like marriages, wish them on those, too – especially for your long term clients. Even if you see them win an award on TV, send them a simple congratulatory message.

10. Announce important events or holidays through simple SMS messages

Perhaps you are hosting or sponsoring events like marathons or football tournaments, or other types of contests. A great way to advertise them would be to send SMS to your contact list. Your clients are more likely to attend the events as they already share a trusting relationship with you. 

Moreover, you can inform your customers about your company holidays. This way, the customers will get to know that they might not get responses if they try to contact your business on those specific days. So no one should get frustrated because they have been waiting too long for a response to their query.

11. Ask for reviews

Encouraging clients to post reviews of your business is easy to do through SMS messages. You can even include a link to the page they should post the review on. 

Positive reviews act as social proof for your business. The higher the number of positive reviews, the greater the perceived number of people who are vouching for your business. This will help you gain more trust from potential customers when they check your reviews before investing in any plan. And you already know how important earning people’s trust in the insurance industry is. 

12. Keep clients updated through effective SMS messages

If your insurance business has recently had any changes in policy, letting the customers know is a great way to maintain trust. This avoids the customers facing any unpleasant surprises later on. 

Or maybe you have introduced rewards or benefits that clients can get if they do not contract major diseases (for health insurance clients) or get involved in a car accident (for car insurance clients). Inform them through simple yet effective SMS messages. Such rewards will help reduce the number of claims clients make and make your direct SMS strategy an effective one.

Moreover, if the new policy requires them to resubmit any information or fill up some new forms, sending them SMS messages is quick and effective. 

You can send a message that will take the clients directly to the page where they can view the new policy or fill up forms. Doing so makes it convenient for the clients to update themselves. Octopush’s SMS 2.0 makes it very simple to implement. You can directly send landing pages to your clients and thus increase response rates.

13. Remind clients about insurance premium services

Payment reminders are also a great use of effective SMS messages. With multiple things on their schedule, clients might just need a gentle reminder to pay the premium. 

Even if they have automated their payments, it might bounce if they do not have sufficient funds in their accounts. Sending them simple messages can remind them to get their expenses and funds in order so that timely payment is possible.

A Bonus tip

Whatever occasion or reason you are sending a message to your client, be careful about the tone of the message. Using a friendly, conversational tone is nice, but you have to ensure that the language doesn’t get inappropriate or unprofessional. 

If you are worried about pulling off successful SMS marketing campaigns or concerned about the cost of regularly texting your clients, Octopush has got your back. They have a wide range of SMS marketing services that are sure to give you the lowest rates for the best packages in the industry. 

What are you waiting for? Visit Octopush and start building trusting relationships with your clients today!