Customer Engagement Insurance

Bain & Company recently released its “Customer Behavior and Loyalty in Insurance: Global Edition 2023” report, examining what consumers want from insurers. The conclusion? 1) more risk-prevention services, and 2) more convenient digital channels:

Risk Prevention –  “Customers increasingly are looking for help from insurers to reduce and even prevent the risks that pervade their lives.” For life insurers, these risks include consumer “health and wellbeing.” In its survey of more than 28,500 consumers globally, the firm found 59% of respondents want life insurers to reward them for healthy living.

Digital Channels – The report goes on to define access to convenient digital tools as “the same old challenge” for insurers. “Over the past decade, consumers have embraced digital search and shopping for their insurance products. They want to handle simple transactions such as an address or status change, or a request for contract information, digitally, because of the anytime and anyplace convenience. This preference naturally intensified during the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdowns. Yet many in the industry haven’t made their digital tools and channels, especially self-service channels, simple enough for consumers to adopt with confidence and stick with them.”

Simply put, when it comes to customer service and ongoing engagement, insurance companies have been challenged to keep a relationship going outside of premium payments and claims payments. With our focus on delivering exceptional customer engagement insurance experiences, Zinnia supports its clients digital transformation initiatives with solutions to help our insurance customers exceed customer expectations.

What does engagement ultimately deliver?

The last paragraph of the executive summary describes why insurers should care:

“Done right, though, broader services and solutions can yield several benefits. They lead to more engagement with customers in an industry that traditionally has few customer interactions. They expand the market to new demographic or geographic segments. And they can improve a firm’s economics over time.”

Consumer engagement from the beginning of the relationship onward has a number of benefits that can positively impact revenue. Consumers tend to do more business with brands that are easy to work with, and today that means when and how the consumer wants to engage, with timely outcome expectations. Positive experiences drive customer retention and loyalty. As Fred Reichheld, Founder of the Net Promoter® system and Bain Fellow famously wrote:

“A 5% increase in customer retention produces more than a 25% increase in profit. Why? Return customers tend to buy more from a company over time.”

Traditionally the life insurance sector has not aggressively pursued return customers. However, over the course of a policyholder’s lifetime, there are many events that provide opportunities for insurers to check in and potentially increase coverage and/or offer additional products and services (.e.g., birth of child, new home purchase, etc.).

Without ongoing targeted digital engagement, life insurers are missing these opportunities to build relationships with new customers.

Moreover, the customer data collected from ongoing engagement can provide a goldmine of insights into cross and upsell opportunities, as well as new product, service, and market opportunities. And importantly from the consumer perspective, data can be used to personalize the user experience.

Reinventing the Customer Experience Through Engagement

Consumer expectations have changed dramatically in the last several years. Tech companies like Netflix, Amazon, and Apple have set a very high bar for customer experience, and today’s consumers want what they want, when and how they want it.

For example, when you want to check the status of an Amazon order, you simply go to Amazon.com and look it up. When you want to check the status of an insurance policy, it will likely take several touchpoints (4-5 emails, calls, and even faxes) before you get a definitive answer.

At Zinnia, we are focused on delivering exceptional insurance experiences to all stakeholders with our Open Insurance approach. We’re reducing the complexity of life insurance so it’s more accessible to the modern consumer, personalized to meet their needs, and available on their own terms.

The Zinnia Open›Consumer Experience is designed to be the personalized customer journey, combining relevant content about life and annuity products with a more intuitive buying experience, a simple account management portal, and on-going wellness education.

Key components of the Zinnia Open›Consumer Experience will include:

  • Seamless Onboarding – the ability to satisfy consumer demand in real-time with instant quotes and needs analysis, a faster and intuitive application process, and the ability to work with or without advisor assistance.
  • Self-Service Portal – 24/7 access for customers to make policy adjustments, change beneficiaries, update addresses, take loans and make withdrawals, schedule appointments, and save and track applications from any device.
  • Engagement & Loyalty – the leading digital customer engagement platform for insurance designed to extend the consumer relationship beyond the policy, encouraging consumers to set goals and get trusted advice for navigating life’s challenges.

The Zinnia Open›Consumer Experience results in deeper relationships between customers and insurers through meaningful interactions that ensure customers are better protected and can improve their wellbeing.

Zinnia Customer Engagement Solutions for Insurance

Digital customer engagement in insurance begins when the consumer starts researching life insurance products, and, as the saying goes, “you only get one chance to make a first impression.”

Today, consumers are increasingly conducting research, developing shortlists, and purchasing life insurance products online. This means the online customer experience needs to be easy to understand and navigate, to include options for getting questions answered quickly, and to establish trust.

Life insurance products can be complex, and many consumers want the support of an advisor. They don’t necessarily want an advisor knocking on their door, but they want to reach and interact with an advisor on their own terms.

Today’s life Insurance buyer’s journey is hybrid, and it’s a win-win for carriers, advisors, and consumers alike.

Zinnia Hybrid Origination

Zinnia Hybrid Origination brings an exceptional digital buying experience to consumers, advisors, and carriers. For carriers, Zinnia Hybrid Origination improves conversion, placement, and, ultimately, accelerates sales. Advisors get a 360-degree view of application progress so they can support leads from prospect to customer. Consumers get the modern buying experience that meets them when and where they are.

The Hybrid Origination platform addresses the end-to-end buying lifecycle from lead to in force policy thanks to an innovative suite of tools:

  • Quote & Needs Analysis: on the front end, potential insurance buyers can get product recommendations tailored to their specific needs including single, multi-product, or multi-insured quotes. When a quote is selected, it is then converted into the E-app, so the customer doesn’t need to re-enter information.
  • Advisor Tools: advisors can easily create customized landing pages for lead generation that enable them to track progress, engage directly with prospects, and identify potential upsell and cross sell opportunities.
  • E-app: Zinnia Hybrid Origination includes a sophisticated e-app to streamline and accelerate the application process. Customers can start, edit, and complete life insurance applications with advisor support or on their own – including payment options and eSignatures.
  • Data Dashboard: all data collected and third-party data sources are secure and compliant with privacy and governance laws and regulations. State-of-the-art marketing analytics deliver insights into segmentation, conversion, funnel optimizations and more.

But the relationship between customers and carriers shouldn’t end here.

After the First Impression: What’s Next?

Historically, most policyholders don’t have a relationship with their insurance carrier. Outside of paying premiums, the only significant interaction starts and ends with applying for a policy. Unfortunately for carriers, the absence of ongoing touchpoints means a whole lot of missed opportunities. Nor is it what consumers want from their insurer.

AiteNovarica conducted a consumer survey of recent life insurance buyers and reported:

  • 45% would like to receive rewards programs related to activity and health
  • 43% would like information on other, related insurance products (e.g., disability, long-term care, etc.)
  • 42% are interested in tools to help manage financial needs
  • 40% would like guidance on retirement planning
  • 34% would be interested in financial education and advice
  • 32% would like education and advice on how to maintain a healthy lifestyle

To begin building long-term relationships, carriers need to deliver more value through ongoing touchpoints and messaging. And building a deeper, ongoing relationship between carriers and policyholders is the key focus of Zinnia Engagement & Loyalty.

Zinnia Engagement & Loyalty

At Zinnia, we take a Dual Lens approach that elevates the policyholder experience while also impacting the key metrics carriers need. Zinnia Engagement & Loyalty is designed to deliver measurable ROI for carriers by first providing frequent valuable and engaging experiences to policyholders.

The Policyholder Lens: Through our research we have found that a holistic approach to customer engagement offers greater appeal and helps build deeper connections with customers. Our extensive library of content and classes focuses on financial, physical, and emotional wellbeing to fit the needs of all types of customers at different phases of their lives. Built on positive psychology and behavioral science, our content helps consumers create real change and behavior modifications. And by creating highly appealing, gamified user experiences, carriers begin to see repeat visits from customers and build more personal and positive relationships with their customers over time.

The Insurer Lens: On the other side of the lens, these engagement-driven interactions are the foundation for improved carrier metrics. Over time this brings opportunities not only for increased customer retention, but it also drives lead generation, cross-sell and upsell results. With our dual lens approach, carriers can build their engagement strategy around how their customers best respond. The personal relationship that’s built with the consumer helps the insurer recognize trends and learn more about their customers by identifying key events in their lives based on their content interactions. This leads to a better understanding of the type of insurance coverage they may need and allows the carrier to reduce risk and provide the right coverage to each of their customers.

Zinnia Customer Engagement Solutions for Insurance

There are many factors that impact an insurer’s profitability that cannot be controlled: economic uncertainty, interest rates, global pandemics, etc.

Benefiting from an ongoing relationship with an existing client, building the loyalty and trust that leads to referrals and new revenue streams is, on many levels, a choice. Zinnia helps savvy carriers that choose to deliver exceptional experiences and new profit opportunities today, when delivering real value is more important than ever for insurers.

For more information about the Zinnia Open›Consumer Experience, Zinnia Engagement & Loyalty, and Zinnia Hybrid Origination, please visit the following resources: