As we reach the year-end, the love affair between insurance companies and Twitter, which started strongly in the late spring, gained full speed through the summer heat could be on the wane as the temperatures drop. Life insurance companies have, by and large, ignored customer service as an application and focused on marketing and brand awareness. Follower counts continued to be impressive but trailing Facebook fans by an increasing amount and it is unclear where Twitter falls in the strategic plans insurers.

At the end of the year, the leader in Twitter followers is USAA with over 7500, an increase in the past 3 months of 25%. While this increase seems impressive, it is a long way off the 18-20% per month we saw in the spring to summer period. Consider this follower count against the same company’s Facebook fan base which now stands at 43000; a 56% increase over the same period.

Life insurance companies are more constrained than other industries by state and federal regulations in what they can say to customers, which is driving the focus to marketing. Twitter was used to promote sporting events such as NASCAR, Baseball and golf by State Farm, Nationwide, The Hartford and these are clearly curtailed in the winter months, which might leave a hole in content. Auto insurers have been more aggressive reaching out to customers; Progressive leads the way with an estimated 1000 customer situations handled, or at least started each month with Twitter. Progressive see Twitter as a great way to communicate to customers especially using mobile devices during natural disasters  when desktop computers and landlines might be down.

USAA, State Farm, Allstate and Progressive recruited the most Twitter followers in the past 3 months with honorable mention going to GEICO who went from zero to 400 followers in the period.

Twitter Follower Count

Company         

 Facebook Fans

Looking at Facebook, the leaders in fan recruitment over the past 3 months were USAA, Allstate and American Family. Allstate are the clear Facebook winners moving from 1300 to 14,000 fans in the period as part of a strong consolidated social media campaign. American Family recently announced a plan to use Facebook as a strategic marketing vehicle as they increase their fan base from 3500 to 6200 and we expect continued growth.

The latest Facebook fan status is as follows:

Twitter Activity

In the introduction, it was suggested that the love affair between insurers and Twitter is waning. This is not because of follower count but from an analysis of the ‘tweets’ sent by insurers. Twitter is a transient medium and it is vital to send regular messages to followers. Despite more insurers now using Twitter, the total activity from all companies became static and is now showing signs of decreasing. Comparing November tweets to August tweets, 9 of the top 10 companies by follower count had reduced activity levels. Only auto insurers showed positive activity levels. This activity is driven by customer service outreach and we do not expect these levels to decrease.