Judge for yourself, but based on everything I’ve seen around the industry, FTJ looks like ground-breaking site architecture.

Interested in comments….

Short-term thinking - IMHO.

Quick story…. Was working on a potential opportunity to develop a cutting edge new broker portal for an individual medical carrier (sorry no names - but trust me - true story). So I get an email last week saying, “ABC (and most other major carriers) reduced its ‘08 earnings forecast and thus, began cutting costs. …. We’re doing the same on the ABC LOB side of the house for the broker portal, and likely other tools, as well. Will keep you posted if things change.”

So I sent a reply, “So cutting costs… as in inefficient paper-based processes and leveraging incredibly inexpensive Web processes?!?!” Tongue-in-cheek to be sure, but you know what I mean.

The insightful reply, “Ha! As you know, the trouble with spending money to save money, is the savings aren’t typically realized within the current or next immediate fiscal quarter. Wall Street has a severe case of ADHD, so what seems logical and reasonable isn’t always what gets approved and implemented. The market’s ADHD is exacerbated when companies don’t hit their forecasts, so long-term thinking within the company has been spanked and sent to bed without any supper. The good news is that free markets are fluid, and this too, shall pass.”

I can’t put my finger on thoughts… trying to digest the concepts. Of course, I understand. I guess I’m just trying to figure out if there’s a silver bullet that can end this repetitive, downward spiral carriers seem to be in relative to Web technology. With the coming administration, whoever that may be, I would be surprised if any good news comes from that front. We’ve got to get a handle on this - and fast.

Any suggestions? “GRAY, JACK! The world is GRAY.”

__________________________________________________

Some recent pics: (click to enlarge)

Hummingbird in my wife’s garden
(see more here)

Insuranti guys at a Tribe game
(see more here)

The 2008 PIMA Summer Conference kicked off with a bang. Played golf at the Newport C.C. Not only that, but the weather was perfect, my son came along to take pictures and be a spotter, my host was magnificent, my partner bought me and Zach a new pair of golf shoes and NCC hats for the family, and to top it all off, I played the best I have in years. PTL!

Newport C.C. with Dave Galvin, Kevin Leys, Doug Clarke
Best round of golf life-to-date. Incredible day.

Had a great conversation with a company guy about building an exclusive online community for the Agency folks inside PIMA - sort of like the CEO Forum only online. Must be invited to join, must contribute thoughts and ideas to retain membership, that kind of thing. And the content inside would be quite valuable in terms of day-to-day operational stuff inside an agency, as well as futurist conversations within the community. Something to noodle on, but relatively urgent.

The conference itself featured an opening Keynote that really rocked everyone’s world. Karen Ignagni and George Olsen spoke about what’s very likely about to happen within our health care system as a result of the election. Different people will remember different things, but my take on the talk was this: As an industry, we need to focus on administrative simplification and driving out costs. We also need to create portals for constituents - members, providers, distributors, everyone in the value chain. When it comes to insurance plans, members need to be able to choose from all Plans. We need to leverage the power of the grass roots, let people see and understand, and make decisions for themselves. Also, longterm care insurance will be a big deal in the near future, so we need to put more emphasis on that. All this seems to point to more and more technology. I hope people, especially internal IT folks - CIO’s, Directors, and so forth, see the value of consulting with proven Web developers on the strategy and tactics necessary to survive the coming “perfect storm.” I don’t want to seem like a loon, but it’s a big deal - investing in these technologies now will get you through the learning curve so you’re where you need to be when the storm hits.

Karen Ignagni, CEO AHIP and George Olsen, Williams & Jensen
spoke about what’s very likely about to happen
within our health care system as a result of the election.
Moderated by Ann Nagle, BankNewport

Frank Abagnale knocked us back a few paces with his talk about Identity Theft and identity management. My take: stop writing checks; stop using debit cards; get a confetti shredder; pay all bills with a credit card and then pay off the credit card with money from your savings account; keep savings in a separate account; don’t access your money using a wireless network; protect your kids identity as well; identity thieves get big money for identities and only 1 in 700 are prosecuted; the longer someone keeps a stolen identity, the more valuable it becomes; it’s incredibly easy to steal an identity; I’m going to read his book; abagnale.com mypublicinfo.com zabasearch.com Scary stuff - all about protecting hard-earned assets - a time-less issue.

A few other miscellaneous pictures from the trip…
See more on SmugMug

“Everything goes better with bacon.” E.H. Pru

True.

Falls Village, CT

Great place to jump!

Shattuck G.C., Jaffrey, NH
Mt Monadnock, 2nd most-climbed mtn on earth
See more on SmugMug

PIMA 2008 Summer Conference
Breakfast Roundtable Sessions Courtyard of Hotel Viking, Newport, RI
See more on SmugMug

Things seem to have changed a lot in the past three years. I’m curious as to what people feel are the essential ingredients of a comprehensive Web presence for a marketing company, especially insurance, given the state of the Web today?

IMO, the presence need to accomplish the following critically important functions. (I got these from Bill Tyson who I think got them from Groundswell.) Btw, if anyone can recommend any reading material or “Understanding Web 2.0″ sites, I’m all eyes…

So what are the tools to do all this? Corporate site with content management? Individual blogs? Corporate blogs? Portals for distributors, agents, vendors, etc.? Corporate MySpace page? Nimble and well-designed quoting and enrollment site? Asking for referrals every where? Employee portal?

Interested in comments.

Next week: PIMA Summer Conference in Newport, RI. - but first a little R&R. Check smugmug for the pictures along the way…

Meantime, I had some international soccer coaches staying at my house last week - Reginaldo from Brazil and James from England. We introduced them to corn hole, smores, and fireworks. Got a tri-pod and tried my hand at shooting fireworks. Interesting learnings if anyone is interested… See more - click here.

By Mike Wise, VP IdeaStar Insurance Technologies

Social networks - Possibly the next frontier of affinity and association marketing… Some interesting stats:

• MySpace – 1 billion visits/month (did not even exist 5 years ago)
• Facebook – Traffic ranking among all websites increased from 60th to 7th from 09/06 to 09/07 (source: Alexa)
• Linkedin – 700% growth in 2007, 11 million visits/mo as of 04/08
• misc –
  • 91% of consumer use social network for information
  • Social networks are 21st Century word-of-mouth
  • Considered “most reliable source of information”
  • 67% of purchases influenced by word-of-mouth
  • Real people, real lives, high level of trust
  • Promotes exceptional ‘virality’

Source: Building Your Brand in the World of Social Networking
Webinar by American Marketing Association and Ramius Corp.

Did you get your copy of Groundswell yet? Some more stats from the book… I only wish it showed associated growth percentages for the last couple years - and sheer numbers of users. Might be an eye-opener.

Some recent pictures:

If any Boomers can identify this house, I’d be impressed. Hint: it’s from an after-school TV show in the late 60’s, very scary… located in Oradel, NJ.

Zach Wise, my son, playing volleyball..

Latest soccer favorite…

Postlude to the Social Networks series: Interesting article on Corporate Blogging and how it can lead to NEW BUSINESS! I’ll go further than that. I got a call this week from a major player in a major insurance category who found me via a Google search on ‘online insurance quoting’. I came up in third place on his natural results. I was happy to get that call.

FTJ.com

We had a major launch three weeks ago now. (Been busy!) Check it out. I’m in the process of writing a white paper on the underpinnings of the site because it seems to be ground-breaking. It really seems like we have moved a category to a higher ground with this site. I could be out in left field, but I haven’t run across anything quite like it yet.

Here are some stats:

30+ carriers
80+ associations
100+ products
thousands of members

All of this complexity is being administered through the site. Online, e-signature enrollments are available in core products. Other products have links to fillable pdf’s, standard pdf’s, brochures, or external links - with tracking for commissions. Of course, best-practices were used for high-conversion rates on the e-signature workflows. Almost everything seems to be in place. And Phase Two has some very interesting ideas. I must say that even though this site took almost a year to develop, test, and launch (with adversity of course), I’m not sure there’s another company out there that could have pulled it off in the timeframe and budget we did, especially not the IT department, no disrespect intended, just candid observations.

On a personal note, saw my youngest graduate from High School last weekend. Been working on a music video, a collection of accumulated pictures set to three sound-tracks. It’s a bittersweet time.

But first… Why are Friday’s SO much better than Monday’s?!?! …

Been a while since I posted. Been working on the underpinnings of this Blog. Switched from blogspot to WordPress, hosted on my insurance technologies site. From a visitor standpoint, everything is the same. But now I have a little more control of site technology and content histories. Might be a better long-term strategy. Took a little longer than I wanted, but..you know…cobbler’s children. Had a hard time getting IT resources!!! Pesky clients taking up all the bandwidth. LOL.

Also been focused on setting the agenda and speakers for PIMA MarkeTTech 2008 in November in Baltimore at the Marriott Inner Harbor. (Btw, check out the new PIMA site!! Very cool new design! YES!) Got what I hope to be an innovative opening keynote - Kristin Brewe, the creator of Erin Esurance. You’ve probably seen Erin on TV commercials - cartoon action hero, fighting crime, and rep’ing Esurance - Quote, Buy, Print. Should be a terrific story. Erin Esurance is one of the top icon properties in MySpace and Facebook. For a budget way under G-co and Prog, they’ve accomplished similar results in the viral marketing space. Also looks like we have a rep coming from MySpace and potentially one of the authors of Groundswell - awesome book. Should be a GREAT program.

Part Four: Viral Marketing and Referrals

Please comment on any of this.

Aren’t referrals the Holy Grail of sales and marketing? (By the way, speaking of Holy Grail, saw the new Indiana Jones movie. Einhh. Shia LaBoef saved the movie - my opinion of course. I also think he might have done wonders for Harley sales to the next gen…)

So what better way to generate leads and sales than by getting current customers to recommend their friends (who are also likely to be in the same life-stage) to your product??? And how easy is that with email and links? I think, again my opinion, that we haven’t even begun to tap into this awesome power.

That’s why I think it’s critically important to start using things like “Email this page to a friend” messaging in Web page design templates, Facebook sites, MySpace sites, etc.. Simple but useful stuff, perhaps even cool new tools ’sponsored’ by the insurance company (Al Drowne’s idea). It seems to also make sense to give people some sort of offer for referring friends. Understanding that State DOI’s have rules against - I forget the word - comment if you know it - engaging in too much of this kind of incentive, but a free bumper sticker, some cool $2 chotchkie, anything like that is probably OK. The point is, as with any sales effort, when someone makes a purchase, at the point of sale, ask for referrals. Hey, give it a try and track the results. Do A/B tests, etc. Seems like it might be good.

So we’ve talked about the growing trend and perhaps a new ‘affinity’. Then we discussed some of the public social networks, and lastly, some ideas on sources of software for private networks that you control. The point of all this, again my opinion, is to GET IN THE GAME. The more I read and learn about social networks and the Web, the more passionate I become about the fact that we need to understand and leverage. As affinity and association insurance marketers, as well as agent-driven marketers of insurance, we all need to ENGAGE in this medium. Last one there is a rotten egg.

Pictures…

Hey, shot some rugby this week. Got some BLOOD! (click to enlarge)

Part Three:

Private Networks –

Please comment on any of this.

Embedded – customizable, plug-and-play utilities

Some possible sources of SN software to plug into your site…
http://www.smallworldlabs.com/blog/calling-all-competitors
http://www.alstrasoft.com/efriends.htm
http://www.onesite.com/
http://www.kickapps.com/

Lots of others…some open-source

Starting conversations, seeding conversations — What are some do’s and don’t’s?

Moderating — should the good, the bad, and the ugly all remain on the site? Will users see through it if only the positive comments are left in view?

Didn’t SN’s used to be called Forums?

Not everything goes nuts right away. The activity ebbs and flows — that’s OK, right?

Some comments are out in left field, some aren’t. Some Social Networks rate content and the subject matter experts so that different SME’s are more highly valued than others. Interesting concept that makes sense.

Common Objections I’ve heard:

What about negative comments if we did something bad/wrong? We don’t want people slamming us on our own site?!!?! Any thoughts?

What about compliance — user-generated content on company-sponsored pages? Are Disclaimers enough to keep the lawyers at bay?

What about “Profile Burnout” — will people be constantly creating profiles in order to play in the game? If it’s important, yes! I’ve heard there is an increasing volume on the need for standards within Social Networks so that people can maintain one profile and link-in the data into the various networks they join.

Btw, LinkedIn — I just read: more than 20 million registered users. (source: Wikipedia)

A book recommendation from Bill Tyson, Ampac. Scroll down the search results to see others.

Unrelated:

I sat on a panel discussion here in Cleveland last week. All about the evolution of Web content. See more here…(PPT slides coming soon to the Web Association site)

http://www.webassociation.org/eventDetails.cfm/eventid/27

Please comment on any of this.

We are in the middle of a conversation on Social Networks and insurance marketing. Again, I could be all crossed up, but from an affinity marketing point of view, Social Networks seem to show promise as insurance direct mail response rates decline and keyword inflation enters stage-left on the search engine marketing scene.

• Last week - Part One: General Ideas
• Now - Part Two: Public Networks

Someone asked me yesterday, “What’s a social network, anyway?” My answer… Have you ever been to an industry conference? Sure. There’s people you want to meet there, right? Do some business, make some contacts, get some ideas, share stories. That’s a social network… on the professional side.

But how do you keep the relationship going in between the face-to-face events? Phone calls, now emails, newsletters, etc. Well, now we have online social networks — same thing, just a different medium, a little easier to keep people in your network connected to you.

Just to kind of lay the foundation, here are what seem to be the most visible social networks. (Btw, if anyone has a contact at anyone of these companies, I’m looking for a speaker for PIMA MarkeTTech next November. Need to lock them in by the end of May.)

1. MySpace – got to be a member to be in the game, to search, to post
2. Facebook – started out as a college network (so create a group for your classmates while you’re in college), then expanded to high school, now opening up to adults. But definitely more of a personal space. But isn’t insurance often… personal???
3. Linkedin – brilliant! These guys have web-enabled the old concept of Six Degrees of Separation, aka the game of Makin’ Bacon. Want to get connected to someone? Isn’t it better to get a referral from a friend of a friend? Absolutely.

Here’s a link to my Profile in Linkedin. Linkedin provided this widget. Cool. If you’re not on, do. The sooner you get started, the better. Seriously.

Some general common-sense stuff:

• Content or comments must add value, be transparent and real,
• Must be persistence relative to the natural flow of a lifestyle. Pick a network and stick with it for the long haul. Like anything in life, you get out of it what you put into it.
• Need to be extremely careful not to see everyone as a prospect, not to be selling 24/7, use guerrilla selling tactics, invading friends’ personal spaces with your work.
• Since Linkedin is more of a professional network, it definitely seems suitable for professional and trade insurance approaches, but remember…
• Hard sell is dead. Got to PULL them along. Takes longer to fill the pipeline of business, but if you do it right, it should open the door to referrals, and as we all know, one referral is better than 10 cold calls.
• SN’s are a perfect place to be educational, provide tips and tools, links to the best sources of information, the best deals, products with the richest benefits, companies that are the easiest to do business, even how to handle claim events. What better source of information than the actual policy holders who already went through the process. Powerful stuff..

That’s it for now. Next week: Private Networks. Careful now, especially with independent agents.

Hey, I’m in Omaha right now. I felt the earthquake in the midwest last night/this morning. It also sounded like thunder. Man, all I gotta’ say is… Glad I know where I’m going when the you-know-what hits the fan.

Check out the shot of the week from last Sunday. My weekend gig - Cleveland City Stars pro soccer photog. Got lucky on this one….click to enlarge.

Columbus Crew backup keeper just missed the save…
Which made for a sweet goal picture!

Click here to see more….

Over the next couple weeks, let’s consider Social Networks and insurance marketing. I could be way out in left field, but from an affinity marketing point of view, as I’ve said in the past, I think Social Networks show promise as insurance direct mail response rates decline. There’s a lot to cover, so I’m going to break it up into a few parts.

• Part One: General Ideas
• Part Two: Public Networks
• Part Three: Private Networks
• Part Four: Viral Marketing and Referrals

Part One: I’m catching a similarity to Affinity Groups and Associations. The concept first caught my attention when I saw my son’s Facebook page. As a graduating senior from High School, he had joined a group for his high school class year — CVCA2007. He had then joined a group for his college class year – before he had even started!!! (By the way, this was at the promotion of the college orientation team.) So apparently while the school will continue to support the traditional Alumni Association, his class has an informal Alumni Association that might have even more relevance over time. Then there’s the phenomenon of Classmates.com…

Next… We all know the power of search engines like Google, but what about networking? However, keyword inflation is rampant, it’s impossible to compete against mega-branding budgets, and rising in the natural listing for competitive keywords like health insurance is played out, literally. And yet Networking has been around forever and will always be around as long as we continue to do business the way we do. no doubt Affinity groups are a significant force in networking – trusted sources of information to help overcome “stranger danger” (something that is programmed deep into our cultural make-up). I go to conferences every year to connect with peers, share ideas, find experts in areas I’m not, etc. Works great!

Now it seems that online networks are forming not to replace but to add value, to keep the conversation going between events, etc… But we still want face time –- reunions, gatherings, meetings, conferences, symposiums. And once we are embedded in the conversation, as insurance marketers, the point is to be at the right place with the right message at the right time. The concepts in play seem to be:

• Pull versus Push
• Engaging in the conversation
• Real-time current contact with on-the-scene subject matter experts (SME’s)
• Helping educate on more topics then just the main thing
• Sponsorship of conversations and tools, new thoughts and approaches
• Branding

Here’s a novel idea perhaps: What about leveraging home office employees, creating informal advocates, generating and directing subsequent leads, perhaps sharing commissions and bonuses — call ‘em TIPS, and staying in touch with new clients more locally. hmmmm.

Some pictures from vacation (click to enlarge): Click here to see more…

Pictures from a business trip this week: Click here to see more….

Life is good!