How Can An Insurance Company Be Innovative On Social Media?

How can an insurance company not be “annoying” on Social Media?  

Thomas Rudelle: If I talk about house insurances on social media I know that it annoys everyone. If you only communicate about your “product, product and product” you risk bothering people and be annoying. But according to our 2017’s assessment, we have noticed that we started receiving fewer negative feedbacks when working with influencers or with micro-influencers! That happens when they are in line with the brand’s DNA while using their own codes to create an impact on their communities.

An example?

Thomas Rudelle: we have recently worked with the French multinational advertising and public relations company Publicis Conseil. The spot showed bike, watch or sneaker collectors; they talked about their passion, then we asked them “what if tomorrow you lost your collection?” that’s how the insurance subject is linked. What mustn’t be forgotten is that on Social Media, your content isn’t in competition with other insurance companies but with family pictures, animals and parties. Your content must be pleasant.

Is it possible for insurance companies to be innovative when communicating through Social Media?

I don’t expect insurance companies to do the funniest jokes in the world on their social media accounts, this is not the main purpose. However, I’m convinced that we can be innovative if we don’t distinguish between brand content and customer relationship. We know that people would rather complain about their insurance company on social media. To give an answer and suggest continuing the conversation in a private chatroom is a fundamental approach.

Which tools do you use in order to answer to your client’s demands?

For 4 years, every time a customer chooses to write us on our Facebook page or on our Twitter account we have always chosen to answer. Our customer service is the team who answers to our client’s inquiries. We also use softwares for customer management to monitor and answer to all the questions during working hours, from 9am to 6pm, Monday to Friday and from 9am to 4pm on Saturdays. We have a customized approach for every type of question starting from car insurance to health insurance. Not all the questions are similar, but whoever the client is, we try to give him an answer the soonest possible.  

Do you use chatbots?

We use them in 2 different ways; during the day, in order to qualify our clients needs from our counsellors and by night, when our offices are closed. Chatbots have been developed by our internal teams. Afterwards, our customer management counsellors go back over the conversation with the chatbots from the following morning, to complete their answers in case something is missing.

Has the use of social media reduced the amount of requests in call centres ?

We think that multichannel communication is essential. A client should be able to communicate with us using the channel that he prefers the most (phone, email, chatbot…) On the other hand, Facebook Messenger has brought a big change. Today it is responsible of 80% of interactions with our customer on Social Media. When talking to our clients, we prefer one to one conversations instead of public conversations on Facebook or Twitter.