When it comes to marketing their firms to customers and prospects, agents and brokers do a lot of silly things.

Case in point: An agent proudly showed me his business card, saying he had just had them printed up. “What do you think of our new logo?” he asked. As I was fumbling to say something along the lines of “really horrible,” a la celebrity judge Simon Cowell on American Idol, he dropped the other shoe: “My wife designed it.”

Duh-oh!

“It looks nice,” was all I could muster. (Now I was Paula Abdul, who always pumps up the contestants on American Idol even when they sing like an alley cat.)

These rookie mistakes can be costly – in wasted ad dollars or in wasted positive branding opportunities. My advice: Don’t try to do it all by yourself. Hire a local advertising or marketing communications firm. Heck, bring in an advertising or marketing communications person, period. A pro can help you with a marketing strategy and tactics, including brand issues, creative design, media placement, and measuring results. At least get some professional advice. Start with the marketing firms you insure; take a couple to lunch. Get a feel for what they could do for you, and how they could help you measure success.

You don’t have a budget to hire someone, you say? Have a bake sale or a car wash, for goodness sake! For the same reason you ask your customers to hire you to consult on your coverage and risk management techniques, you should hire an expert to manage your creative and media placement strategy.

But the silliest of all mistakes is when agency owners get caught up designing fancy headlines, logos, slogans and toll-free numbers, and forget the number-one feature of their firms: their people.

You build a local insurance brand with people. Your employees literally are living the brand every day. They touch your customers and prospects every day in words and deeds. They are your paths to revenue growth. Don’t hide them in the cubicles.

One successful commercial lines agency in Florida occupies an impressive old bank building. The principals had beautiful brochures printed up showing the interior and exterior of the building. And where was the wonderful, capable staff? On the wrong side of the camera, of course! In fact, a group of contractors in a customer discussion group even pointed that out all by themselves. They essentially complained: “Where’s the beef?”

So the agency reprinted the brochures.

Often agents will say they don’t want to print up pieces with photos of employees, because if someone leaves the material will be outdated. Bad excuse. Bite the bullet and reprint if you must. One agency prints individual sheets with a photo of the staffer and a bio. They and some other staff sheets, depending on the situation, go into a section of a customer or prospect kit called “Your service team.” This would give you some flexibility in your printing.

Now is an excellent time to lay everything out on the lunchroom table and really examine just how outdated everything looks. Business cards, letterhead, marketing pieces, screen prints from the Web site – you name it – throw it on the table.

Hire a photographer to take nice photos of all staff; have everyone wear something nice (no sweatpants, please) on one day and knock off the photos all at once. They’ll look consistent and professional. Take some group shots as well.

Now use those photos everywhere. You can have your CSRs hand-write a couple of postcards each week and mail to clients. One side could have the CSR’s photo on it. Use them in your marketing pieces. Show off the fine sales and service team. They’re professionals; treat ‘em like it.

One smart North Carolina agency understands the value of showing its staff. All marketing materials show employees in groups or by themselves, depending on the circumstance. For instance, every weekday it runs small (two-inch-square) ads in the local city daily paper. Each ad always show a person from the agency – the pictures and ad text rotate based on the line of business.

I would go further than touting the sales staff. Sure, show off your prima-donna producers. Don’t forget about the service people – remember they’re doing the heavy lifting to retain important clients. Heck, show off your receptionist – who, by the way, when it comes to branding occupies the most important position in the agency, if you didn’t know that already.

One last pet peeve on using photographs of your staff: Please, for the sake of our children and the advancement of our society, glamour shots are not acceptable, professional shots! The big-hair look ended with the 1980s. Come on, people, this is a new century.
 
VU faculty member Peter van Aartrijk (peter@Aartrijk.com) is co-author of Zoom: Focusing on Brand Dominance, a guidebook for independent agents and brokers who are members of IIABA’s Trusted Choice® consumer brand. Besides Zoom, Peter recommends a guide for placing local ads, The 33 Ruthless Rules of Local Advertising, by Michael Corbett.