How can Insurers Build a Network of Loyal Customers?

What is a business? Every business can be defined as a company that is looking to make profits by selling its products and services to its customers. For making profits, selling is essential, and for selling, having, or acquiring customers is imperative in the first place. So, it all comes down to retaining and acquiring customers.

If we talk about the insurance business in general, the same rule applies to it. An example of an efficient insurance agency management can be seen in the form of retaining customers by working on their loyalty towards the brand. So, let’s get started and figure out how insurers can turn this dream of theirs into a reality.

Interesting Statistics

• According to the CallMiner report, consumer switching accounts to $136.8 billion/year in the US.
• As per the Bain & Company’s survey covering 20 nations and 172,000 life insurance and property and casualty customers, 80% of them are open to or interested in the ecosystem services (Customer Behavior and Loyalty in Insurance: Global Edition 2017).
• The PWC report states that 32% of customers switched brands upon a single bad experience.
• Predictive analysis and big data will help enhance client relationships, management of internal performance, and value proposition of clients by 20-30%, explains a Willis Towers Watson survey.
• According to a Forbes article, 42% of customers of home insurance in the US will look for insurance brands if their present insurer does not provide them with ecosystem services.
• The McKinsey report explains that carriers of the US auto insurance were able to witness 30% enhanced profitability and 4 times growth owing to the excellent experience provided by them to the customers.

Top Ways to Build a Network of Loyal Customers

1. Leverage Social Media Platforms

This is the age of digitization, and the sooner insurers realize this and start making complete use of the digital platforms, they will be able to communicate with their customers. Today, social media is such a powerful tool that it can help you stay ahead of your competitors in a big way, especially by informing your customers regarding the better options you have than your competitors. Also, these platforms help you offer personalized services to your customers, leading to enhanced loyalty.

Devising insurance marketing strategies using social media platforms is a great way to cure and retain customers since most of the customers are heavily active on such platforms. In short, such digital platforms help you with brand building, customer acquisition & retention, quick responses to online queries, personalized customer service, and more.

2. Reward Customers Timely

One of the best ways to retain customers is by rewarding them time for their loyalty towards your insurance brand. This can be done in a variety of ways, including discounts, offers, gifts, couchers, and more. When you reward your customers with such benefits, they automatically come to know that their insurer cares for them.

However, it is imperative that such rewards should aid your customer service and not be a substitute for it. When you pass on all such customer satisfaction criteria, you win the loyalty of your customers automatically in the long run.

3. Adopt a Personalized Approach

If you want to win the hearts of your insurance customers, it is imperative that your customer service comprises of a personalized approach. Traditional customer service can be found in almost every insurance service provider, so if you follow the same approach, the chances of customer retention become minimal.

On the other hand, when you provide personalized services to your customers by understanding their lifestyle, nature, requirements, etc., and offer an insurance product that best fits their individuality, you will see yourself emerging on the top of the insurer list, paving the way for customer retention eventually.

4. Offer Services for Emerging Customer Needs

Needs change with time, and this holds equally true for your insurance customers as well. Every customer expects something more and new with the changing times. If you are able to understand the same in advance and also offer it, you will be able to retain your customers in the long run and not give them any chance of thinking about other service providers.

For instance, offering security and maintenance products to customers of business and home insurance, respectively. If you offer every solution to their problem in one place, especially the ones which are likely to emerge with the changing trends, your customers will never leave your hand.

5. Be Transparent

Customers always leave those companies who make them confused with their pricing and appreciate the ones who are very clear with their pricing right from the word go. So, it is imperative that you, as an insurer, are transparent to your customers regarding the costs. If they want to know how much commission you are making or the price of other policies, just be transparent with them.

They do understand that you are running a business and will work towards making maximum profits, and by being honest with your price structure and hidden costs, if any, you will win the confidence of your customers easily, aiding retention eventually.

6. Leverage Technology

Competition in the insurance domain is at the peak, and insurers who have incorporated the latest use of technology into their processes have been extremely successful in streamlining their in-house operations, resulting in enhanced customer service and proficient insurance policy management, eventually.

Today, technologies like blockchain, automation, artificial intelligence, etc., have revolutionized the insurance industry. Customers are seeking an improved experience when it comes to buying policies, processing claims, clearing policy doubts, and more.

Manually dealing with such a heavy rush of customers and providing them with personalized and quick services is not possible. However, it is easily achievable with the use of such technology, and insurers who understand and leverage technology at the earliest will be the ones with maximum customer acquisition and retention.

Conclusion

This concludes the fact that insurers have to revise their existing customer service models as the demand of customers has changed from merely wanting an insurance policy to have an exceptional experience at each and every step.

This is only possible when insurers value their customers in the true sense and adopt faithful business practices, along with incorporating the use of technology into their processes to enable themselves to serve their customers in a timely and satisfactory manner.

As an insurer, do you often lose out on your potential customers owing to the excessive back-office insurance workload? Is this the very reason you are failing to focus on customer retention strategies?

If yes, consider outsourcing your insurance back-office management workload burden to Cogneesol’s 16-year old experienced team of professionals who have the right skills and technology in place to provide you with seamless back-office solutions. Contact us at +1 646 688 2821 or at [email protected] to get a free quote now!

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