One of my favorite TV shows is AMC’s Mad Men, that paeon to the advertising industry of the early 1960s, when (mostly) men smoked and drank and came up with concepts to brand businesses and sell products. Last season, several episodes revolved around Sterling Cooper’s launch of a television department. At first, they’re not sure what to do with it. The department head is overworked, underpaid and disrespected. When he can’t keep up the pace, agency brass tries to fob off script reviews to the curvaceous office manager. And top dog Don Draper sometimes has a tough sell persuading clients of the importance of adding television to their media mix. Sterling Cooper even makes a point of hiring a couple of young guys to keep up with the new cool medium.

This sounds familiar, if you replace “television department” with “social media.”

Throw away everything you know about customer outreach, time management and building a brand. Over the past year, social media (SM) has changed the landscape of all these areas of property-casualty insurance agency operation, from how you manage your employees to staying in touch with your customers.

And the dust hasn’t settled yet. Even the experts are unsure about how social media will shake out in the business world. One thing is certain, however: Ignoring it is not an option.

That much was evident at the first Aartrijk Brand Camp, held this week at the snazzy Hotel Sax in downtown Chicago. The day-and-a-half meeting, attended by a cross-section of agents, carriers and media types, is the premier event hosted by insurance branding guru Peter van Aartrijk (who I knew long before his guru days). Speakers and subjects ranged from the macro view (Brad Keown of Facebook) to the practical (Marcia Hansen of Allstate), and everything in between.

Some of the findings were startling.

• 29% of consumer consumption is digital, and that number is growing
• Facebook has 90 million U.S. users, and plenty of your customers are there
• When it comes to sheer number of users, “Social media is the new porn,” according to Daniel Honigman, digital communicatio9ns supervisor at Weber Shandwick
• 91% of B-to-B decisionmakers participate in social media, 69% for business purposes
• 70 million retiring baby boomers around the globe are being replaced with only 15 million Gen Xers, with 55 million Gen Yers waiting in the wings, according to Deloitte.

This adds up to nothing less than a quantum shift in how we do business. Statistically, the future face of business will be increasingly female, Hispanic, and very comfortable with all forms of Web 2.o technology. This is the demographic we need to attract and understand, both as employees and customers. Much of our communication with them boils down to authenticity, transparency and trust — words not typically associated with insurance.

Take employees, for example. Because much of social media blur the lines between the personal and professional, your employees can be your company’s goodwill ambassadors everywhere in the virtual world. The Brand Camp speakers agreed that instead of building firewalls between your employees and this online world, you should be training them on its use. The thinking is that they’re going to be popping onto Facebook and YouTube on company time, anyway; you might as well make sure they’re doing it right when it comes to representing your business.  Bottom line: If you hired them, you should be able to trust them to do right by you — radical thinking from what most of us are used to!

Social medial also mean instant and constant accessibility.  Not too long ago, I would have “covered” this event by writing up the proceedings for publication in a magazine, which readers would get more than a month later. Reporters covering the Brand Camp tweeted their comments for instant delivery throughout the event, updated their Facebook or LinkedIn pages, or blogged about it, with plenty of room for others to comment (feeedback is a key element of social media).

This doesn’t mean the “old” communication methods are dead. Press releases are alive and well as a way to stay on a publication’s radar, and in spite of the growth of “unofficial” sites, there is still plenty of cachet in being written about in a recognized publication (whew! Good news for us formerly ink-stained wretches!). But social media needs to be part of your branding arsenal, and like any other branding effort, must be thoughtfully integrated into the mix.

What is your agency doing with social media to promote your business?

Texting while driving (TWD) has been in the news a lot lately — most recently because of a new gone-viral video on YouTube that dramatizes its dangers. Although it’s frequently lumped into the category of “distracted driving,” TWD is a far cry from just talking on a cell phone. Talking basically translates to a phone and a crunched-up shoulder, leaving one hand free for steering. For the unskilled among us, TWD frequently requires the use of both hands — one to hold the device and the other to text. It also involves translating abstract thought into written language, no matter how truncated that language may be. Most importantly, TWD requires a driver to take his eyes off the road, making it both mentally and physically distracting. 

While drunk driving is being driven into oblivion by a convergence of tougher policing and DUI laws and social pressure from groups like MADD and the general public, TWD doesn’t seem to have the same stigma. Drunk driving is bad in part because it suggests a lack of a self-control. Texting while driving frequently involves work — and in today’s neo-Puritanical society where people are working longer and harder than ever, what could possibly be wrong with working constantly, even behind the wheel?

And guess what? Your peers are not only doing it, but admitting to it.  We conduct a weekly “quick poll” on the AA&B Web site, with questions ranging from the silly (name your favorite fast food) to the serious (weighing in on the health insurance reform debate). The question that has gotten the biggest response so far was, “Have you ever texted while driving?” — and almost a third of the respondents admitted that they had. If TWD levels are that significant among insurance people – who should really know better – the numbers are probably much higher in the general population.

While unscientific, our survey suggests that TWD isn’t the exclusive domain of Gen Y-ers, who I don’t think comprise much of AA&B’s readership. Text-intensive social networks like Twitter are peopled primarily by the 35-and-up demographic. Maybe it’s just me, but the thought of a horde of aging drivers texting and hurtling down the expressway at 85 mph in their 5,000-pound SUVs beats the hell out of any Stephen King novel for scare value.

But the tide may be turning. Some states are passing laws prohibiting TWD, and federal legislation is on the table as well. A recent survey by Nationwide Insurance found that 80 percent of Americans favor a ban on texting while driving, while two thirds favor a ban on cell phone calls, and more than half say they would support a ban on cell phone use altogether.

It’s unclear whether any laws will really stop the hard-core from texting while driving, but at least it might make them stop and think — even if they’re only thinking about avoiding a costly ticket or better yet, a jail sentence.

And for those of you who are proud of your TWD ways — please let me know when you plan on being on the road so I can stay home.

 The ballots have been counted, they’ve cleaned up Grant Park, and the 2008 presidential election is finally history — literally.

Whether you’re ecstatic or disgruntled about the outcome, you have to agree that what happened is unique, in more ways than the obvious (our first black president). The fact that more than 130 million Americans turned out to vote (the biggest number in 44 years!) flies in the face of conventional wisdom about voter apathy, political burnout, voting along racial/regional lines, and just about everything else we’ve come to expect.

So what was different this time around? Obviously, the economic disaster and two wars dragging on were major factors in turning the tide against the incumbent administration. But there was much more at work here than simple backlash. I think the real story lies at least in part with the number of young voters and how they communicate and relate with each other and the world.

According to CNN’s numbers, 18 percent of the voters were between the ages of 18 and 29, and 66 percent of them voted for Obama. The Gen Y voter trend began in 2004, when 20 million of them cast a ballot, the largest young-voter turnout since 1972 (remember “get clean for Gene”?), according to the Young Democrats of America (www.yda.org).

And as AA&B tech writer Tom Baker so often reminds us, the Millennial Generation is characterized by its technological sophistication and constant connection to each other and the world via social networks, blogs, Twitter, IM and text.

The Obama campaign knew this demographic well, and tapped into the youthful zeitgeist by making it as easy as possible for its supporters to get out the vote. Volunteers could canvass door to door or call registered voters from online lists at the Obama Web site, then click an online checklist to record their responses. The campaign was in constant communication with its supporters; if the sheer volume of e-mail is any indication, I’m now on a first-name basis not only with Barack and Michelle, but with Dave (Plouffe, Obama’s campaign manager) and occasionally Joe (Biden).

What does any of this have to do with insurance agents? Plenty. The Obama campaign used every form of technology and communication at its disposal to reach a new generation of voters, just as our industry must come to terms with this emerging market demographic, both as employees and as customers.

But I’m not paraphrasing good old Marshall McLuhen here; I don’t believe the medium alone is the message. Young people have been marketed to virtually from infancy onward. They’re savvy about being sold a bill of goods. It’s not enough to reach them by Twitter, e-mail or YouTube. Your message has to be authentic and succinct to grab them.

I’ll be ruminating more on this topic over the next month as we gear up for our January issue on talent management. Meanwhile, I’d love to get your thoughts on reaching Gen Y. Can we reach them? Yes, we should!