by Angela Adamson. With all the signs that the country could be headed into a recession in the next 18 months, South Africans will be tightening their household-spending belts even further. That could mean dropping monthly payments consumers think they can do without, and grudge purchases such as short-term insurance could be first in the firing line. So how will insurers maintain their market share during this rough patch?
They could come up with more creative, emotive communications that stand out in this heavily cluttered sector, for starters.
Between April and June 2015, we surveyed the short-term insurance industry’s ad landscape, and found almost every insurer focused upon one of three core objectives: informing consumers, explaining their service offerings, and low premiums.
What about trust?
None of these are particularly inspiring themes around which to create engaging advertising. What about trust and nurturing meaningful relationships, where customers trust their money is well-spent, and that their insurers will uphold their end of the bargain and pay out what they promised when they said they would? After all, a financial safety net during an economic recession is a powerful motivator.
Interestingly, our research has revealed trust is a communications objective in less than 8% of advertising among short-term insurers. Granted, lower premiums are an attractive lure, and a communications objective likely to maintain in the cash-scarce future as insurers scramble for customers and consumers continue to count their rands. But instead of ads that scream ‘cheap premiums’ — and put their brands at risk of significant damage — what about combining the prospect of more-affordable insurance cover with the element of trust?
This moves short-term insurance communications out of the over-populated messaging field of low-premium offers into a more compelling space — one that not only has the potential to reinforce brand loyalty at a critical time, but also to tap into Forbes.com’s no.1 current marketing trend: transparency.
“Radical transparency”
“The idea of radical transparency is something that few brands are taking advantage of now, and most brands fight it. Next year the best brands won’t be those with the best stories, or sort of made up fictional stories, but those that will give an accurate and real time picture of what they are doing in the interest of the consumer, at any given time,” the site proclaimed in its November 2014 piece, 11 marketing trends to watch for in 2015.
Believable advertising, created around trustworthy brands using the facts of how short-term insurers are truly helping their customers, is going to be the order of the day.
Added to this, quality advertising will remain important; just because the economy is slowing down, that doesn’t mean we have to scrape the bottom of the creative barrel with bargain-basement advertising. There’s an opportunity here to create memorable ads that truly connect with consumers.
And, given that the SA Customer Satisfaction Index (SAcsi) showed that customer satisfaction in the short-term insurance industry declined this year for a second consecutive year, brands in this sector would do well to do just that.
Angela Adamson is director at advertising monitoring and analysis company, Adcheck. She has over 10 years’ experience in the monitoring industry and 20 years within advertising and media, and is passionate about providing clients with actionable data and insights into their competitors’ advertising strategies.
“Motive” is a by-invitation-only column on MarkLives.com. Contributors are picked by the editors but generally don’t form part of our regular columnist lineup, unless the topic is off-column.
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