On Point with Peter van Aartrijk and Rick Morgan, Episode 16: Commercial Lines Is An Accommodation
March 29, 2010 by Charles Wasilewski · Leave a Comment
On Point with Peter van Aartrijk and Rick Morgan is an audio conversation with insurance industry leaders who champion change and challenge all of us to think.
Peter and Rick spoke with Steve Brooks, an independent agency owner in Westlake Village, Calif. who is a proponent of personal lines and social media as a marketing tool.
While many agencies sell a mix of commercial and personal lines, Steve is very focused on upscale personal lines accounts. He started his firm from scratch 20 years ago, and is 98% personal lines.
Personal lines is stable, with higher persistency than commercial, especially in an economy where businesses are moving their insurance, or going out of business altogether. And the personal lines book is worth more to an agency, Steve says.
Traditional media—such as TV ads and direct marketing—don’t work as well as they once did for personal lines, he maintains. He likes social media—like Facebook and Twitter—for reaching a higher-end clientele. “It’s hard to measure ROI on social media sites,” he says, “but the intangible references are priceless.”
And he likes to work relationships. Commercial lines agents refer preferred personal lines to Brooks because they take the line seriously and want it handled well. “You can’t wait until business slows to start doing this,” he says. “You need to be doing it all the time.”
The podcast was published Monday, March 29, 2010. Run time is 24 minutes 18 seconds.
Is It Personal? A Word About Leadership
March 18, 2010 by Charles Wasilewski · Leave a Comment
The personal lines property-casualty unit of American International Group Inc. (AIG) faced a crisis in late 2008 when the parent company was pulled back from the brink of bankruptcy by the U.S. government with a $182 billion bailout.
Earlier this year, former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said that the failure of AIG would have devastated the financial system, reported Barron’s.
Read more
Consumers Say Independent Agents Are “Okay”
February 26, 2010 by Charles Wasilewski · 2 Comments
Consumers rate independent insurance agents as “okay.”
That’s according to research with 4,600 consumers conducted in October 2009 by Forrester Research Inc. and reported by Mark Ruquet in an article in National Underwriter Property & Casualty.
This research scored independent agents at 74 percent, which Forrester dubs as “okay.”
“Okay” can have a couple of meanings: “pretty good” and “mediocre.” My sense is that the research points to the latter meaning.
The survey also asked consumers to rate insurance carriers for three aspects of service:
– “meets needs” … the rating was “good”
– “easy to work with” … the rating was “okay”
– “enjoyable” … the rating was “good”
Insurance carrier USAA was the highest rated of 13 insurers, leading the way with a score of 82 percent, nine points ahead of the next-best company in the research. No carrier reached Forrester’s standard for excellent of 85 percent.
The insurance business overall scored “okay” with a median percentage of 72 percent.
The National Underwriter article noted that the study’s researcher reported: “For agents, the customer experience is tied to how well the carrier treats its customers…. When the carrier is not committed, it reflects on the agent.”
Here’s more on the study from Laura Mazzucca Toops of insurance trade publication American Agent and Broker, who wonders why “independent insurance agents don’t get no respect.”
Is an “okay” rating good enough for the independent insurance agents out there? My sense is that independent agents work far too hard to settle for that. What do you think?
– Charles Wasilewski
On Point with Peter van Aartrijk and Rick Morgan, Episode 14: The Personal Lines Opportunity
February 16, 2010 by Charles Wasilewski · Leave a Comment
The Personal Lines Opportunity
On Point with Peter van Aartrijk and Rick Morgan is an audio conversation with insurance industry leaders who champion change and challenge all of us to think.
IIABA’s annual market share study compares the share of the property / casualty business on commercial and personal lines bases, and compares the aggregate of the independent agent to the captive agent.
Personal lines insurance is a tremendous source of revenue. Asa Pike and John McDonald of Agency Revenue Tools, a software company created to help agents go after personal lines insurance, explain the potential of the personal lines opportunity, and discuss the benefits of the Personal Lines Growth Alliance as a tool to capitalize on the potential.
The podcast was published Monday, February 15, 2010. Run time is 24 minutes 55 seconds.
On Point with Peter van Aartrijk and Rick Morgan, Episode 8: Personality Through Branding
October 30, 2009 by Charles Wasilewski · Leave a Comment
On Point with Peter van Aartrijk and Rick Morgan is an audio conversation with insurance industry leaders who champion change and challenge all of us to think.
In the eighth episode, Peter and Rick talk with Anson Thompson of The Thompson Group of Parker City, Indiana about branding and the importance of personality on the web. He also talks about where he gets his ideas and why he’s not afraid to share them.
The podcast was published Thursday, October 29, 2009. Run time is 19 minutes 44 seconds.
Opportunities, Doubts Abound in Social Media for Insurance, Aartrijk Brand Camp Survey Finds
October 23, 2009 by Charles Wasilewski · 4 Comments
Six Key Issues Uncovered in Research of Brand Decision-Makers
SPRINGFIELD, VA (October 23, 2009)—Insurance brand decision-makers are intrigued by increasing opportunities to use social networking, but they face internal pressure about these new rules of customer and prospect engagement, according to a recent survey conducted by leading industry branding firm Aartrijk.
The survey of attendees at Aartrijk Brand Camp 2009, an interactive conference for insurance and financial services brand managers in the age of the social Web, found that caution and doubts about managing social media are holding back many insurance brands from experimenting and implementing social media initiatives. Brand Camp attendees work at agencies, brokers, trade associations, carriers, technology firms, and other industry partners.
“Insurance brands that already have begun to work in social media have a lot of passion for it,” says Maureen Wall Bentley, vice president of brand strategy for Aartrijk. “But those who are in the exploration stage have real uncertainty about the potential impact and application of social media. They are curious but cautious, and many are not sure where to start.”
The survey was completed by most of the conference attendees prior to Aartrijk Brand Camp, held last month in Chicago. It found that the top six issues are:
1. Social networking is viewed more as a risk than an opportunity by many insurance executives outside the areas of marketing and branding. Brand managers face internal struggles in convincing management to implement social media. Concerns about security, productivity, reputation, privacy, disclosure, workflow, technology and legal issues have held up even experimental efforts. “The conversational, interactive nature of social networking conflicts with the traditional one-to-many marketing efforts, which lack an online feedback loop,” Bentley points out.
2. How do professionals and businesses manage the time and people involved in social media efforts?
3. Brand decision-makers are unsure where or how to start with social media—they are looking for a plan, budget and agreement on corporate leadership on the issue. They’re not certain if and when those resources will come.
4. Insurance brands see social networking opportunities in agent or member communications as well as the business-to-consumer realm. The dual opportunities, however, split resources and focus.
5. Brand decision-makers are seeking ways to measure activity and success in social media.
6. Insurance brands are looking for best practices and success stories for building brand awareness and customer service through social media.
Despite these issues, Bentley notes attendees at Aartrijk Brand Camp heard from a cross-section of insurance professionals who are writing new business, servicing existing business, listening to customers, engaging prospects and building their brands—all with a variety of social media tools such as blogs, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. Web sites, too, are evolving rapidly as corporate online “brochure-ware” becomes less interesting to customers and prospects.
The Aartrijk Brand Camp community, which includes “campers” attending the first event and “counselors” from Aartrijk, are continuing a dialogue online, and a Webinar is planned for this winter to address some of the issues raised in the survey as well as present case studies.
“Some people in our industry still question whether social media should play any role at all in insurance and financial services,” says Bentley. “They’re not convinced that consumers want to engage with their agent or carrier in the same way that they follow their personal interests online.
“And, frankly, insurance probably doesn’t have the same pull as entertainment, politics or sports,” continues Bentley. “But smart insurance professionals are touching customers and prospects through online social networks much in the same way they’ve always done offline—by demonstrating their expertise, their relationship to the community, and their understanding of the challenges families and businesses face each day. The social Web is simply a new vehicle for expressing those qualities.”
About Aartrijk: Aartrijk is a boutique branding firm serving clients from insurance and financial services firms and member organizations. Aartrijk’s experienced team offers business-to-business and business-to-consumer brand auditing; brand identity development; Web and social media; advertising, marketing-communications and public relations; publishing and editorial; and customer and marketing channel research. Visit www.Aartrijk.com; find Aartrijk on Facebook, Linked In, and Twitter (@Aartrijk), and follow Brand Camp and social media topics on Twitter: #ABC09. For camp information, visit www.aartrijk.com/brandcamp/agenda-2009.
CONTACT:
Charles Wasilewski
(908) 647-2216; charles@Aartrijk.com
###