Brian Steiner
July 1, 2024 5:46 PM
Every month should be Disability Insurance Awareness Month.
While the Social Security Administration has concluded that one in four workers who enter the labor market will become disabled at some point during their working lives, the 2024 Insurance Barometer survey by Life Happen and LIMRA found that more than half of Americans (59%) say they have some or no knowledge of disability insurance, which could be a barrier to enrollment.
One way to bridge this knowledge gap is to leverage social media: 59% of Insurance Barometer respondents use social media to find information about financial and insurance products.
But cutting through the noise of social media can be difficult, especially when you want to effectively reach social media users with a topic that may not be easy to understand or interesting at first glance.
The key here is to partner with authentic influencers and use clear, easy-to-understand information.
Social media users, now more familiar with the world of influencer partnerships, are more likely to respond positively and trust products like disability insurance when there is a genuine connection between the influencer and the product.
Take, for example, Life Happens’ partnership with micro-influencer Kim Williams.
Kim, a single mother, uses her platform to share easy-to-follow financial wellness tips with her 75,000 followers.
After working with Kim in 2023, Life Happens tapped her again for 2024 Disability Insurance Awareness Month in May because Kim has personal experience with disability insurance that she can share.
The campaign’s first Instagram Reel gives a first-hand account of how Kim was hospitalized with COVID-19 and had to rush back to work even though she wasn’t fully recovered because she didn’t have disability insurance.
“I wish I had disability insurance,” Kim says in the video.
Within 12 hours, Kim received over 60 comments from followers asking for more information about disability insurance, which is more than the number of comments Kim typically receives on her Instagram Reels.
This is true evidence of how powerful partnerships with authentic influencers can be in generating conversation around financial products and hopefully driving more sign-ups.
In addition to working with thoughtful, trusted influencer partners, creating clear, to-the-point content is also important, given the lack of understanding about what disability insurance is.
Also, with today’s shorter attention spans, short-form content and graphics tend to resonate best with social media users.
Clearing up common misconceptions about disability insurance, providing a graphic breakdown of who needs this type of coverage (usually more people need it than people assume), or simple narrated Q&A content are just a few examples of simple disability insurance content ideas agents can consider.
Use opportunities like the annual Disability Insurance Awareness Month campaign next May to spread awareness of the importance of disability insurance through social media as well.
In our industry, we need to emphasize the importance of protecting our clients’ ability to earn a paycheck, and partnerships with authentic influencers and easy-to-understand social media content are key to achieving this.
Insurance and financial professionals who want to further address their disability insurance gaps can review information and videos from Life Happens on disability insurance, including a free disability insurance needs calculator.
Brian Steiner is executive director of Life Happens, a national nonprofit that provides financial education and promotes consumer empowerment. The organization oversees the Life Lessons Scholarship program, which helps students facing financial hardship due to the loss of a parent who did not have life insurance.
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