The COVID Era

Customers do not want to let agents into their homes or offices. Agents do not want to go to the field. Both are right. There is no point taking risks in the current COVID 19 situation.

But at the same time customers are realizing more and more that they need life insurance.

We are faced with a BIG QUESTION in life insurance sales. How is this situation to be handled?

Is Selling Online the Answer?

The most repeated advice is to sell online. You are advised to canvas through Facebook, Whats App, Instagram, Telegram, etc. The more adventurous suggestions are to set up your own You Tube Channel, develop your own blog, and also may be a website. All this advice is based on the notion that the COVID-19 Era (it is being referred to as CE, similar short form as in history, where CE means Current Era) has changed everything. It has changed the way people will will buy life insurance. Has it? You all have enough experience to answer that question. So do not get confused.

Lets take a look at the intrinsic characteristics of life insurance markets. These characteristics are unique to life insurance markets, therefore the general understanding of all other markets does not apply here.

The Unique Characteristic of Life Insurance Markets

Life insurance is largely sold through face to face meetings. In USA it was reported by the Insurance Information Institute (iii.org), that in 2017, 89 % of all life insurance policies were sold through face-to-face meetings. In India, since 2002 attempts have been made to sell online, and in 2018, it was reported by CARE Ratings that less than 0.03 % of NB premium is from online sources. These statistics are not surprising. This is the nature of life insurance business.

Customers need to be met because long term planning is not a priority and people do not take long term financial decisions easily. A number of face-to-face meetings helps the customer to come to an informed decision.

The Market has woken up

In the current scenario, there is a latent (sleeping) demand for life insurance. This lying demand is building up, as the number of COVID cases continue to rise. More and more customers are beginning to feel the need for and the importance of life insurance.

The Market Dilemma

Customers do not want to buy online and do not want agents to visit their homes. Selling through social media and other online sources will not give the desired results. So what is the solution?

What do Customers Currently Want

Customers want to be engaged. The need for engagement has surfaced in the last few months because of the virus. As a result customers have many questions they need to discuss. The questions exist because they are seriously considering the option to buy life insurance. They want to be engaged by an expert during this period of isolation to clear their doubts. They want the engagement to be non-physical. The need of the hour is therefore customer engagement, not selling policies.

The Many Benefits of Customer Engagement

Engaging a customer during this period of isolation will produce many benefits to the agents. It will produce a higher degree of loyalty, a better brand value, a greater professional trust and a lasting feeling in the customer’s mind that the agent was by his or her side when needed.

How do you engage? Challenges of Online Engagement

The next question is how to engage? You can use social media and other digital platforms for customer engagement. The main issue in doing this is not the technology, but the content of the engagement. The technology can be mastered or sub-contracted to some one to deliver. But what are you going to communicate day-in and day-out?

The content has to be of interest to the customer for him or her to be interested in reading your social media and developing trust in you. The content cannot be your products, because interest for products has not been generated. That interest has to be built brick by brick with interesting content. Developing appropriate content is the real challenge.

Some agents may be able to engage online, but not all

There may be some agents who are posses this skill and they should be encouraged to channelize their talents productively. For the vast majority however it may not be possible to develop good content that can be posted daily/ weekly for a prolonged period of time. Hence while agents should make their presence felt in the social media, the social media itself may not result in higher levels of customer engagement.

The Solution – Video calling

The answer to this problem is to guide agents to what they are comfortable with. They are comfortable with their phones. They are comfortable with policy servicing, claims, greetings, etc. Video calling should be encouraged as a first step before more complicated digital methods are suggested. An Action Plan should be made by every sales team leader to facilitate agents to mass-contact their existing customers (and others, if they have the contact details) in a structured Customer Engagement Program.

The Customer Engagement Program (CEP) should broadly be on the following lines

Technology: As far as possible, only video calls to be made, so that rapport building is better. Best to avoid audio calls.

Mass contact: 20 to 30 video calls should be made every day

The first few words: The video call should start with a display of empathy to the customer for the difficulties he or she is facing, including the difficulties being faced by his or her family

Purpose of the call: The purpose of the video calls should be stated as “to understand if there are any issues the customer needs settled with respect to renewal premium, bank account change, nomination, policy revival, etc.” The need to maintain the policy in force, and with updated information, in the current situation should be emphasized in this call.

Alternative Purpose of Call for those who can handle: One more possible content for the video call can be to show empathy to customers who have lost money in the current market crash. All experts are of the opinion that a bigger crash is coming in the months ahead, as most of the world experiences a recession in the near future. Customers are likely to lose more money, in the near future, in mutual funds, debt and share markets.

Ending the Call: Assure the customer that the issues raised by him or her during the video call will be attended to immediately. Also as soon as the situation permits (or the customer seeks a meeting), the agent should assure the customer that he or she will come personally and meet the customer.

Repeated Calling: Once one round of policy servicing issues are completed, another topic, such as claims can be taken up as the content. In between, a list of customers whose birthdays or anniversaries fall in the near future should be made and video calls should also be made for the same.

Be Professional and Disciplined

The video call should be made in a disciplined manner everyday. The script for calling should be practiced in advance. This will give a professional image. Who knows you may even end up selling on the phone. But more importantly when the situation improves, you will have a ready market to sell to without much difficulty.

Customer Retention is very important in a competitive environment

Continuous engagement of the customer in this manner will ensure that the customer remains with you and does not look elsewhere for solutions, especially since customers are thinking of the importance of life insurance.

Sell Risks Not Returns

Because Risks are Certain, Returns are Uncertain

Because we sell risks and not returns, in a high risk market conditioned by the virus, we understand the risks and accordingly adjust our sales process.

Happy Selling!