Insurers and Customer Relationship Management: How You Should Communicate (and what you should say)

Fact of life: communicating with customers — whether they are individual policyholders or a small group — makes sense (and that means before your base becomes vulnerable to a competitor’s market attack or lower-priced offerings)

Does that mean a multimillion dollar data and modeling project to determine who’s “worth it”? No. But it does mean laying down some low-cost communications as part of an overall customer relationship management strategy. Remember that most customers/members never hear from their insurer. This is what needs to change…IMMEDIATELY

Start with your customer database. Are you collecting and keeping member email addresses? If not, start gathering them during the application process. Have your brokers and agents do the same. And then, once a sample is gathered, begin with a low-cost email campaign of a few contacts per year with  live links to your website.

But what should you say? The first and most obvious opportunity is the “Thank You/Welcome”. Get new members used to this channel as a form of regular communication. Include an invitation to manage their account online (again, with a link to your website). Don’t forget, a member who is contacting you with questions is a member who is more likely to stay with you. Can you provide new members with their own Customer Service Representative? Divvy up onboarding members with your most friendly CSRs for live chat/email contact. After all, we all like to know there is someone there for us.

What’s next? Build out your communications plan during the first 6 months and add one or two more contact points with your new members. Direct mail fulfillment of the member card and policy materials is a good follow-up to the initial contact and a good channel to continue to build engagement opportunities. An email reminder of an often-overlooked benefit—such as dental or vision discounts, or wellness coverage—can provide value-driven content for that one additional contact at low cost.

Again, the point is to provide relevant engagements, not meaningless, pesky contact.

Does a new member have a pre-existing condition or disease to manage, such as diabetes or obesity? Helping those members sign up for additional support and management tools/programs from the start can build strong relationships and increase member stick power. Perhaps an outbound call or email is not only good medical business, but it can be a comfort if handled well.

So now you’ve welcomed them, handed out new member materials, and successfully engaged those needing support. What about the rest of the year? How much is enough, vs. too much, Customer Relationship Management? The answer is based on a simple question: how much can you afford to invest to keep this member?

In our final post of the series, we will help you figure out that answer.

—-

Direct Choice Inc. is a full-service direct marketing agency that has worked with national and regional brands in a wide variety of vertical markets. In addition to this blog, you can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn.