Influencer Marketing Works in Ways You Wouldn’t Expect

Content marketing is (for lack of a better idiom) “all the rage now,” thanks to the increasing ineffectiveness of traditional advertising. Yet a few of the industries that would benefit most from this strategy have been reluctant to participate. They are the healthcare, insurance, tax, and even finance industries.

On the surface, content marketing does not seem like a logical tool for these information-heavy, technical, complicated, and quite frankly, unsexy industries. Yes, there are blogs about everything these days, but the majority of attention falls on those more picture-centric, easily digestible, and light — fashion, beauty, and lifestyle — thus making content marketing a cinch for those categories. The average Joe most likely doesn’t want to read about copayments and adjustable rates, much less blog about them.

But you’re not using your imagination; if there was any industry that could use an honest, uncomplicated forum with real-life solutions — it is these.

“But no one would read it.”

Want to bet? Do me a favor: go to Reddit and find the subreddit “PersonalFinance.” On the right-hand side, you’ll see another subcategory for Insurance. This tiny section of a subreddit has 4,450,679 readers. That’s right, over four million people subscribe to a feed on insurance alone. Over 4,000 people “upvoted” (equivalent to Facebook “likes”) a post titled “I negotiated a $12,000 hospital bill to $1,500.” Don’t tell me no one wants to read or write about this “boring” subject — it could very well save you $10,500 one day.

Also, give people some credit. Who would have thought that a blog filled with long stories on parenting would take off? Well, we happen to power the TODAY Show Parenting Team, which averages millions of pageviews per month (#humblebrag).

And then there’s The Points Guy, a blog dedicated to the riveting topic of… strategically redeeming credit card travel points? That’s right, this independent blog boasts almost one million social followers, and even earned a write-up on the youth-centric VICE.

I rest my case.  

Speaking of boring…

You know what else is boring? Doing your taxes. And yet somehow TurboTax found a way to make that less so. Even their blog is mildly entertaining with infographics and relevant tips like “ways to save money while travelling.” The fact of the matter is, these are complicated, messy, and oh-so-necessary parts of life. But they’re also multifaceted and encompass areas of our lives we sometimes do not recognize.

A blog for health insurance could be technical and informative, but it could also be fun and interactive—Healthy eating challenges, question and answer forums, and other lifestyle tips and tricks to keep people coming back for more. A blog about car insurance does not have to be all about cars – throw in a few travel stories, some funny family car trip photos, and voila, you’ve got a fun place to hang out on the internet.

It’s a surprisingly competitive field.

Even without considering competition for creativity, the insurance industry is crowded. At $54.91, “insurance” is the most expensive Google AdWord to advertise for. Clearly, good SEO for these industries is going to be very expensive. Now, it’s time to get creative!

One of the greatest benefits of having a blog that keeps people coming back is — drumroll please — better SEO. For example, REI has a very high Domain Authority (the defining SEO metric) of 79 because people are constantly turning to the site, not only for shopping, but for how-to videos, articles, and beautiful pictures. They built a community out of their business and in turn, their community helped them build a great brand.