The confidential information in this case study has been altered.
“ How to pick up the right insights and know they’re the valuable ones during exploration? ”
Background
The reason why insurance companies sought out partnerships from representatives was mostly for business expansion or market test of new products as insurance brokers and agencies had advantages to access customers in certain regions.
Insurance companies rewarded their representatives for achieving certain goals (indicators). However, goal indicators could be totally subjective and were based on the needs of different companies, which led to a question: “What would be used to set up goals for channels?”.
Since the insights on traditional channels were way easier to find than digital channels, I was misled by traditional ones’ indicators when I hadn’t had clear ideas of digital channels, such as retention rates required teams maintaining customer relations while digital ones had no teams.
Interview
“ So, goals are bound to periods and targets? “
Through interviews with clients who have their in-house sales, I learnt that goals would be set within a certain period for performance review. Therefore, goals would be adjusted as frequently as review was taken place, such as weekly, monthly, quarterly.
Also, in the module, channel managers would apply incentive schedules along with goals such as bonus and override to a specific target (channels/teams/agents) since different roles earned their bonus with different rules.
Research
“ Every level in the hierarchy had their own goals and own mechanisms to earn bonus!? “
The goals for hierarchical sales to earn incentive compensation were highly customized in different sale agencies or insurance brokers, such as the gamification to compete with colleagues in generating product sales.
Therefore, with complex mechanisms of goals for sales in different levels, I realized that the process to match targets (channels/teams/agents) and their goals would significantly complicate the design. Later I gathered my findings and checked them with consultants.
Consultation
“ Are goals frequently changed, or fixed? They were based on perspectives. ”
The goals that were initially set up by insurance companies for their channels were mostly fixed, such as achieving 1.1% of yearly gross premium growth or guaranteeing quarterly selling of promoted products for channels to get profit sharing.
On the contrary, once overall goals were assigned to agencies or brokers’ channels, they would be broken down flexibly into separate goals for their own sales, leaders, teams, and divisions with their internally complex mechanisms of bonus earning.
From channels’ perspective, that was why goals seemed frequently changed. But from insurance companies’ perspectives, the bonus rules from external representatives won’t concern the goal indicators set up by insurance companies themselves in the distribution.
Scope
During the discussion of not supporting traditional channels, I learnt that there won’t be further customer service from e-commerce channels after the purchases of products.
In-house Channels | Traditional Channels Insurance companies’ own channels with their own hierarchical sales to sell products exclusively for the companies. Broker & Agency Channels | Traditional Channels With agents, marketers, finances, and other roles, they could represent multiple insurance companies to match different customer pools they have. E-commerce Channels | Digital Channels Different e-commerce platforms used to launch sellers’ merchandises by channel managers in insurance companies or channels.
As a result, the goal indicators in categories that were involved in customers’ service would no longer applicable in the design, scope would be narrowed down to product-related ones, such as premium growth and selling numbers of products.
Ideation
“ What product sets may be used in goal settings?”
As I learnt from the beginning, the purpose of goals was to grow business through testing new markets wether or not newly designed products were good fits, which meant certain packages of products would be used to set up goals. So I organized the findings of product packages from our clients and consultants, the contexts were:
To generate product selling in certain types of products regardless of categories.
Client — We let representatives sell all our motor (type) products, we have packages for the public who own personal vehicles (Individual), or private sectors (commercial) that look for group coverage, such as taxi or lorry companies.
To generate premium of a specific product or a specific set of plans.
Client — The goal for our channels are always the same one, to generate a certain percentage of yearly premium of our pet insurance. We provides coverage (product) and service for different breeds of pets, but we want to promote X-ray (plan) riders this year.
To test a certain products or plans in new markets to see if it reached a selling amount
Client — Due to Covid, we aim to launch multiple new products to xxx regions, these products were particularly designed for junior customers. We want to see if we may expand this new market and how much selling it would be generated.
Therefore, the combination of goal settings would be either product selling or gross premium to go along with certain sets of products or plans.
Mockup
After the final checking with consultants and clients, they would require a further settings for the range of premium achieved since insurance companies were often willing to share more percentage of profit with over achievers.
Reflection
It was challenging to gain an eagle sight and see an overall picture on contexts sooner when available interviewees were specifically responsible for a certain area in the operations. It would be more ideal to cross-check the findings with roles in different levels and areas given that the cost of fixing mistakes mostly got higher in the later phases.
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