Insurance brands are some of the top marketing spenders in the country. And they all have resorted to the same, tired game. They convince policyholders to quote, switch and save through frenetic ads, charming mascots and empty promises.
The outcome? 39% of Liberty Mutual’s customers were shopping for a different insurance carrier. This is the story of how we helped changed that.
Along the way, the work has received a variety of honors, including:
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Gold, Relationship & Loyalty Program | ANA Reggie Awards
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Best Use of Content Marketing | Pro Awards
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Best Content Marketing Program, Best Content Strategy, Best Content-Driven Website, Best Content Marketing ROI/Measurement Program | Content Marketing Awards
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Best Use of Content Marketing | MITX
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Presented at Marketing Sciences Institute's Board of Trustees Meeting: "Customer Experience: Beyond the Hype" with Jenna Lebel, VP of Brand & Integrated Marketing
The Challenge
It’s no secret consumers hate paying for insurance. It’s one of the only products or services that’s a need, not a want (after all, it’s a legally mandated requirement).
And customers are always shopping. In fact, 39% of Liberty Mutual customers were shopping for a different insurance carrier. Why? Insurance policies are often paid for, then never actually used. The true value of insurance is only on display during the worst moments in people’s lives – when something has gone wrong and they’re fighting to be made whole again.
Our challenge was simple: Stop customers from switching by increasing their loyalty.
The Insight
Customer research showed where Liberty Mutual had an immense amount of credibility and where consumers had an immense amount of pain: worrying about what they can’t control.
Psychographic analysis of customers revealed why they carry around so much worry. When it comes to life’s biggest worries, Liberty Mutual’s over-achiever customers only trust one person to get the job done: themselves.
The Idea
"We believe that you worry less when you know more. So the next time you encounter a challenge, don’t just solve it. You can MasterThis."
MasterThis is a unique content marketing brand dedicated to resolving customers’ worries by making them the masters on all of life’s biggest worries, because “you worry less when you know more.” MasterKits, which are collections of content on a given worry, are sequential guides to take the user from worry to mastery.
To ensure the MasterThis brand didn’t appear as biased or boring information from “another insurance company,” we partnered with prominent digital and podcasting brand HowStuffWorks, lending our content credibility, a cool factor and important editorial expertise.
The Experience
Liberty Mutual's policy holders aren’t satisfied with tactical “how-tos” or unproven internet “experts.” They need the best-in-class information so they can claim expert status – mastery – themselves.
We went before and beyond the claim to show customers “Liberty Stands With You,” across Liberty Mutual’s customer touchpoints. Content is served based on a combination of first, second and third-party data to get customers the right content, in the right context, at the right time.
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Email: Highly data-driven, scalable, efficient and measurable, email is one of our lead touchpoints with customers.
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Social Media: Most social followers are existing customers and these channels have the ability to react to data triggers in a context native to content.
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Direct Mail: Targetable to customers with a great level of accuracy, direct mail that as previously functional – about bills, savings or new offers – can now be about eliminating worry and re-enforcing the brand promise too.
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Sponsorship Integrations: Sponsorships of Antiques Roadshow, US Winter Olympics Teams and HowStuffWorks are paired with relevant MasterKits.
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Innovation: MasterThis is available as a voice-activated Amazon Alexa Skill (the first in the category). This gained notoriety through the press and reinforced brand relevance among customers.
Results
By empowering customers through MasterThis, Liberty Mutual increased the quantity and duration of positive brand engagements with customers, along with their brand affinity:
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75% of customers would recommend MasterThis content to a family member or friend
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8x time on site over previous content portal
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50% reduction in bounce rate versus previous content efforts
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90% of Liberty Mutual’s customers reached with a positive, brand affinity-building initiative