notes version: responding in real time & other winning strategies for insurance marketers

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Responding in Real-time & Other Winning Strategies for

Insurance Marketers

Presenters:

Tim Hendricks, Vertis Communications

Jeff Rodis, Mutual of Omaha

2 September 30, 2011

Jeff RodisManager – Marketing Operations, Mutual of Omaha

• Over 25 years of experience in insurance operations and consumer marketing

• Experience includes two of the nation’s largest direct mail insurance marketers

• Annual mailing volumes in the nine figure range

• Leader in using advanced technology to improve cycle time, efficiency and workflow

• Procurement and strategic sourcing background –sourced over $750mm in print and mail services


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Tim HendricksSVP Regional Sales, Vertis Communications

• Over 25 years of experience w/insurance and financial marketers

• BS Business Administration from St. John’s University

• MBA with a Marketing Concentration from Benedictine University

• Adjunct Professor of Marketing at Benedictine University

• Featured University Speaker on Direct Marketing

• Published articles on the use of marketing workflow, digital technologies and multichannel marketing in: PIMA (Professional Insurance Marketing Association); Target Marketing Magazine (online); Insurance Advocate Magazine and Idea Alliance’s IPA Bulletin


Improve Agent Response to New Leads

Go Green to Save Green

Connect Across Language and Cultural Barriers

Drive Consumers Online with pURLs and QR Codes

Create Brand Awareness in Multiple Channels


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Improve Agent Response to New Leads

Help agents respond in real time through digital workflow and fulfillment tools that increase response

and customer engagement.

How can a national insurer reduce the amount of time between when an agent receives a lead to the

prospect’s actual receipt of thedesired information?

THE CHALLENGE:

THE SOLUTION:


Case Study:Improve Agents’ Response to New Leads

• Heavily regulated industry requires highly versioned customer communications

• Real-time response to consumer requests is critical to converting leads into policies

• Agents faced with cumbersome and challenging fulfillment process of manual forms, faxes, emails and phone calls

• Agents are competing with consumer’s accelerated access to technology and time for conversion


Solution:Improve Agents’ Response to New Leads

• Proprietary targeted marketing asset database with digital workflow allowing agents to respond to requests immediately

• Flexible and creative marketing workflow for ordering, customizing materials the agents create and deploy on their own


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How does a workflow solution work?


Digital Images Incentives

Standard Templates

SegmentedConsumer Info

Data Driven, Automated Marketing Solution

Insurance Company Creative

Variable Text

Direct Mail

Inserts

Text Messaging

e-mail marketing

Microsite/PURL

Rich media, etc

BIZ

RULES

CONTENT

MGMT

Insurance CompanyContent

Management

Multi-channel Communication Platform

Channel Delivery

Closed-loop measurement

React to consumer interactions with relevant and timely communications – then output to the channel of consumer

preference from a common platform

Insurance Company Data

Warehouse

Lead Source

•CRM

• Web

•Telephone

•Transactional

•Trigger



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Results:Improve Agents’ Response to New Leads

• Reduced cycle time from weeks to 3 days

• Dynamic kitting capabilities along with multi-component matching

• Changes that typically required weeks to implement are now executed in days

• Web-based solution offers visibility of entire process

• Limitless personalization and targeted message capabilities

• Elimination of pre-printed materials, digital library and print-on-demand

• Robust content management system supports image, text content and versioning


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Creative redesign, digital workflow and the right delivery strategy

THE CHALLENGE: How can a leading health care insurer improve their carbon

footprint and reduce costs, eliminate obsolescence and deliver relevant communications to their customers?

THE SOLUTION:

Go Green to Save Green


Why do companies adopt“go green” initiatives?

1.Meeting corporate citizenship goals?

2.Appealing to consumer social values?

3.Reduce production and deployment costs?

4.All of the above!

73%believe it is

important to buy from green companies

55%are willing topay more for

green products

Source: Cohn & Wolfe, Esty Environmental Partners, Landor Associates, Penn Schoen Berland, "2010 ImagePowerGlobal Green Brands Survey," June 2010 (U.S. Adults)

Case Study:Go Green to Save Green

• A leading U.S. health insurance provider wanted to identify “green” solutions that would substantially reduce production and deployment costs across its customer marketing initiatives


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• Audited existing marketing practices and program elements

• What are they doing? How and why?

• Uncovered process and output duplication



• Re-engineer workflow

• Redesign creative templates

• Enable one-to-one marketing


Benefits to who:Go Green to Save Green

• Re-engineering marketing workflow and centralizing assets helped achieve the health insurance provider’s “go green” goals with significant results:

27% less paper consumption

18% inventory reduction

15% lower electricity usage


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Results:Go Green to Save Green

• Least possible ecological footprint

• Branding standardization

• Highly personalized and customized documentation: true 1:1

• Lower cost per page

• Just-in-time document delivery

• Inventory reduction and elimination of obsolescence waste

• Costs to comply with regulatory requirements are minimized

• Reduced cycle time and streamlined workflows

• Elimination of print platesand films

• No ink use, so no ink waste

• Process water is eliminated

• Paper usage and paper waste is greatly reduced

• Air pollution control devices are eliminated

• Flammable chemicals are eliminated, no VOC emissions


Personalized URLs and QR Codes

Provide consumers with easy access through personalized URLs or QR Codes

THE CHALLENGE:

How do you make it easy for consumers to respond to your offer and interact with the

brand, while tracking and improving campaign responses?

THE SOLUTION:


Case Study:Personalized URLs and QR Codes

• A health care benefits company felt a print-only marketing campaign had grown stagnant and was no longer attaining their acquisition goals


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Program Goals:Personalized URLs and QR Codes

• Open new communications channels with current and prospective customers

• Increase response rates over traditional direct mail-only marketing efforts

• Increase sales by engaging in more relevant conversations with customers and prospects


Solution:Personalized URLs and QR Codes

• Increase sales through better consumer engagement using a multichannel approach:

| Direct mail incorporating personalized URLs (pURLS)

| Personalized website landing pages to provide a customized online consumer experience

www.VertisPIMA.com/Johnsmith


How does it work? Personalized URLs and QR Codes

• Consumers receive direct mail, email or other personal communication with a unique identification code

• Call-to-action directs consumers to their own personal website: www.VertisPIMA.com/Johnsmith

• Consumers enter identification code, then complete user profiles

• Marketer uses the newly gained consumer insights to tailor future messages to customer likes and preferences


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Example ofa pURL

on a mail piece

Personalized URLs


Customer is greeted by personalized landing page

Personalized URLs

Page 2 of landing page requesting additional information

Personalized URLs


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Personalized QR Codes

QR Code





Landing page requesting additional information


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Benefits to the consumer:Personalized URLs and QR Codes

• A uniquely tailored online experience

• In exchange for information, consumers receive future content tailored to their needs

• Product and service offers become highly relevant



1. Welcome Screen

2. Involvement

2. Gather Data

3. Thank You - we will be sending you info

5. Viral Component –Refer-a-Friend

4. Email confirmation to consumer – Begin

Relationship

Personalized URL Workflow Overview

Benefits to the consumer:Personalized URLs and QR Codes

• Analyze and model the newly captured data; provides valuable insights into consumers’ needs, interests and preferences

• Use these insights to add value to the consumer by engaging them through meaningful online experiences and follow-up communications

122% 122% ROI

on every dollar


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Results:Personalized URLs and QR Codes

• According to the DMA, 42% of all direct mail respondents prefer to respond online (DMA 11/2009)

• Based on statistics, businesses enjoy a 122% ROI on every dollar invested in a pURL program; behavior data shows that customers respond to pURL communications across generations

• *41% of consumers polled prefer to respond to an insurance direct mail offer at the sender’s website

• In a 27 vertical market print-to-pURL test, the pURL drew a 5.1% visit rate and a 3.28% response rate. The insurance industry saw the highest number of pURLvisitors/responses



Visit RateResponse

Rate

33.00%

Consumer response on a cross-media to pURL test sampling

Response by Industry

13.80% 10.70%

Non-profit 7.69% 7.45%

Manufacturing 11.85%

7.08% 4.18%

Other trades and services

Average response rate across all industries with 10 or more

campaigns

30.00%

Retail

13.20%

Insurance

The test included a random selection of 670 cross-media campaigns across 27 vertical markets. The test was

conducted by MindFireInc® in 2009 by Author: Dr. Marnie Brow, University of California, Irvine.

Average rates for all Industries 5.10% 3.35%

8.40% 6.74%

Multichannel Brand-Building

How do you attract the right customers in a crowded, wary regional market

THE CHALLENGE:

Channel surf! Mass outreach builds awareness,

and targeted marketing brings your desired consumers to your door

THE SOLUTION:


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Case Study:Multichannel Brand-Building

• A new-to-the-regional-market homeowners insurance company faced considerable odds launching into an established market


• Conduct in-depth focus groups with consumers

• Overhaul the brand platform

| Create an emotional connection with “live here, work here” ethic

| Promote the insurer’s “A” financial stability rating

| Showcase their team of responders

• Initiate multichannel marketing to increase the need and brand awareness

Solution:Multichannel Brand-Building


• Consumer: convenience/education and control

• Marketer:

| Better consumer connectivity

| Average campaign improvement of 35%

| Add more personalization = an average improvement of close to 50%

Benefits:Multichannel Brand-Building


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• Targeted newspaper inserts and ROP had call center phones ringing off the hook

• Unique 800 #s enabled tracking of lead source

• Heightened attention resulted in a15% increase in responses to targeted direct mail

• Volume of qualified leads was so dramatic, the insurer reached state-mandated limit and didn’t seek new policyholders for 6 months

Results: Multichannel Brand-Building


Hispanic Marketing

How do you connect across language and cultural barriers with the fastest-growing consumer segment?

THE CHALLENGE:

A multilingual campaign that addresses key cultural needs and values, in a format proven to

attract the target group

THE SOLUTION:


Hispanic Marketing:


•By 2014, one person out of every six living in the U.S. will be of Hispanic origin*

•Now the Nations 2nd largest consumer market

•Hispanic disposable income is expected to grow to $1.3 trillion in 2014*

•Most favor culturally relevant communication

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•One of the largest U.S. auto insurers had a goal of becoming the premier direct-to-consumer auto insurance company in the nation for first-generation Hispanics

Case Study:Hispanic Marketing


•Take a Specialized Marketing Approach, leveraging proprietary research providing insights into the buying behaviors and media usage habits of multigenerational U.S. Hispanics

Solution:Hispanic Marketing



Benefits:Hispanic Marketing

• Hispanic Consumer

• Built trust and loyalty – re-branding gave them the comfort they needed

• Provide them with relevant information on their terms

• Marketer

• Improved relationship with Hispanic consumer and market

• Became a trusted provider

• Improved Brand position

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•Launched bilingual efforts for greater relevance and brand authenticity

•Featured family-based imagery to build emotional connection

•Used direct mail as backbone of marketing mix

•Tested incentive-based direct mail referral programs

Campaigns Leveraged with Cultural Insights


•Developed sponsorship featuring soccer superstar Cuauhtémoc Blanco to deepen credibility and roots within the community

Campaigns Leveraged with Cultural Insights


•Direct mail delivered lower cost-per-lead than previous benchmarks

• Incentive-based referral programs outperformed all other lead types by over 100%

• Incremental revenue convinced Insurer to devote significant budget to Hispanic marketing

Results: Hispanic Marketing


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“To get a result youdon’t get now…

you have to do somethingyou don’t already do.”

Albert Einstein


• Insurance marketers are faced with unique challenges

• Understanding how the consumer wants to be marketed to is key

• Responding to customers and prospects with relevant and timely communications increases response rates

• Leverage the multi-channel strategies that have proven to be successful by your peers

Key Take Aways


Tim HendricksSVP Regional SalesVertis Communications630-571-7575 X [email protected]

Jeffrey RodisManager-Marketing OperationsDirect to Consumer MarketingMutual of [email protected]

Questions?
