Forging new branding irons: life insurers are trying different approaches to capture the attention of agents, brokers and even consumers.

Most people watching "Monday Night Football" on television aren't consciously thinking about life insurance--but they could be becoming familiar with a specific life insurance company's name.

So hopes Lincoln Financial Group, which has agreed to invest $139.6 million over 20 years for the naming rights to Lincoln Financial Field Stadium, home of the Philadelphia Eagles.

While Lincoln Financial joins companies including Safeco and Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. in purchasing the naming fights to professional sports stadiums, MetLife Inc. has leveraged its brand--and popular Snoopy character--by launching two blimps that provide aerial television coverage for sporting and special events.

Other companies have chosen to use their marketing dollars to build relationships with producers. By establishing "wholesaling" staffs, insurers can increase their personal contact and support of independent producers, reinforcing the company's image and products to those in the front lines of selling.

From targeting consumers directly to focusing on producers, life insurance companies are trying myriad ways to market their products, all with the ultimate goal of increasing their sales.

Going Direct

Allianz Life Insurance Company of North America recently changed its marketing strategy to focus more on advertising directly to the consumer, in addition to targeting producers, agents and financial planners.

"A lot of our agents and representatives thought it would be really helpful if the consumer were familiar with the company that had produced the product the agent was presenting," said Becky Malkerson, senior vice president of corporate marketing and communications for Allianz.

Allianz built its new advertising campaign on its reputation as being an innovative company, Malkerson said.

"There's a lot of advertising today, particularly in financial services, that is, shall we say, dry. We felt it would be important to have advertising that people could really resonate with," Malkerson said.

The company's new campaign, to be featured in both television spots and print advertisements, includes real seniors in adventurous or fast paced hobbies, such as running hurdles, rowing, parachuting, and jamming in a garage band.

Catch lines such as "70 isn't old. Thinking 70 is old is old." and "We're born. We live. We live." are meant to reflect what's happening today to the baby boomer generation, Malkerson said. "People aren't retiring today like our parents did. They are reinventing themselves, going back to school, taking up incredible avocations like skydiving and becoming stunt pilots," she said.

When the company developed the campaign, and its tag line, "The best at next," it intended to hire actors to illustrate its message, but found it didn't have to rely on actors. Many seniors who are actually active in the hobbies Allianz sought to highlight agreed to participate in the ads. Still, the ads aren't meant for the general public, Malkerson said.

"We don't target everybody, just the market segment that would be most naturally interested" Malkerson said. To reach that older market, Allianz sponsors Professional Golfers' Association of America events and National Public Radio.

"There's a real positive correlation between brand awareness and growth and sales," Malkerson said. She said the company's ultimate goal is "to have customers come into an independent agent's office and ask for Allianz by name."

Remember, Malkerson said, that producers are consumers, too.

"They're our customers. We want to sell to them on performance and innovation," she said.

Focus on the Producers

Advertising may be flashy, but it's not the only way to market life insurance.

By building "relationships one broker, one bank rep, one financial adviser at a time," Hartford Life Insurance Co. has become the No. 1 seller of life insurance through wirehouses and banks, and a major player among independent brokers, said John Vaccaro, chief marketing officer for Hartford Life.

Hartford's chief marketing tool is its network of 190 wholesaling "account executives" who help financial advisers sell Hartford's life insurance and other products. The executives run training seminars and hold conference calls to teach life insurance novices about the products. They also step in to help independent producers with specific cases, even joining the producer in conference calls and online presentations with clients.

"We segment our marketing programs based on producers' level of interest and understanding," Vaccaro said. "We don't typically do a lot of advertising. We put our money on feet on the street."

Corporate Hartford concentrates on advertising the company's brand name to the general public and often picks a particular product to highlight. This year, mutual funds are the focus of the corporate campaign, although it has featured life products in the past. When it comes to advertising Hartford Life specifically, the company buys advertising space in trade publications, but targets producers more than consumers, Vaccaro said.

"We spend our money on the people who are selling life insurance. We've never had anyone walk into one of our retail offices and say, 'I'd like to buy a VUL,'" Vaccaro said.

That modus operandi is followed by other companies, including Lincoln Financial Group, which has established Lincoln Financial Distributors to act as a wholesaling arm to reach independent agents, brokers, banks and wirehouses.

"The key to success in financial services marketing is working the triangle: the provider, Lincoln; the financial intermediary; and the public. Our job is to make the financial intermediary a hero," said Shipley Munson, vice president of campaign marketing for Lincoln Financial Distributors.

LFD employs about 400 people who help intermediators sell life insurance, Munson said. For instance, at a wirehouse, a stockbroker may not be as comfortable selling life insurance. "Sometimes a Lincoln wholesaler may be invited to participate in the conversations with clients to lend subject matter expertise," Munson said. "Increasingly, financial intermediators see themselves as the quarterback, the person in the center who coordinates many specialists."

LFD also gives producers marketing materials that educate consumers about wealth management strategies and reaches out to producers by advertising in trade publications.

Producers Are Consumers

Steve Holstein, senior vice president of market development for MassMutual Individual Insurance Group, said the company's corporate offices promote the MassMutual brand name, while he concentrates on supporting producers--MassMutual's 4,000 career agents plus outside banks, broker/dealers and other financial planning outlets.

"Our primary mission from the marketing side is to help producers be successful," Holstein said.

MassMutual targets producers by offering support products they can use with their prospects or customers, including tools that help producers identify potential clients, prospecting letters and statement stuffers.

On the corporate side, the company sponsors major national sporting events, in addition to advertising on television, and in consumer and trade print publications. While directed at consumers, that effort also helps reach producers, Holstein said.

"All producers are also consumers, and they are seeing and getting a possible feeling about corporate through that advertising, which helps them go back to clients and do prospecting," Holstein said.

Paying for Eyeballs

Lincoln Financial's Munson said the company wants to make it as easy as possible for producers to sell Lincoln Financial's products, and it's easier to do that if the client has already heard of Lincoln Financial. That's why advertising to the general public, as well as to producers, makes sense, he said.

"You pay for eyeballs, and there are fewer eyeballs in trade publications. In our total budget, we probably don't spend as much on trade as we spend on consumer advertising, but we need to do a good job with both, and we think we do," Munson said.

Reaching consumers and producers is one reason Lincoln Financial became the latest insurer--in addition to Nationwide and Safeco, among others--to pay for naming rights to a professional athletic team's stadium. It also sponsors the Lincoln Financial Battle at the Bridges golf tournament.

Both sponsorships put the company on national television during prime time, and are "extremely effective ways of reaching both of our target audiences," Munson said.

The events are also "a double whammy," Munson said, because in addition to reaching consumers, Lincoln Financial has the opportunity to invite important producers as guests to the events.

"It's also a terrific conversation starter," for producers and clients, Munson said.

Fresh Start

When White Mountain Insurance Group and Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway teamed up to purchase Safeco Corp.'s life and investments business, they had the rare opportunity to rename an insurance company.

After months of studying and research, it was declared that the new life insurance company would be called Symetra Financial Corp.

Symetra is a derivative of "symmetry" and was chosen to reflect the company's balance in its role as "invested partner" to its producers and consumers, said Allyn Close, senior vice president of marketing for Symetra.

The company, which sells through broker/dealers, insurance agents, financial planners and financial institutions, employs sales managers to promote the products to the various channels. The product lines include life insurance, annuities, retirement plans and group medical plans.

"It has been our strong belief that the consumer needs advice for the kinds of products that we sell, so the effective model is to have the consumer work through an adviser in one of those channels," Close said.

This fall, Symetra plans a small advertising outreach "not to prompt new business, but primarily to get the name out," Close said. Customers will be contacted during the normal course of doing business with information about the new name, he said.

In the third quarter, a third of Symetra's advertising dollars will go to consumers and two-thirds to producers.

Except for the additional advertising to promote its new name, Symetra plans to spend its advertising dollars to target producers through trade publications and to cooperate with producers in placing joint advertisements in the producers' local areas.

For instance, the company will team up and split the cost of a mailer or newspaper ad with a producer, and feature the producer's name in the advertisement.

"The best way to advertise for a consumer is through an adviser," Close said.

Companies that more aggressively advertise directly to consumers are not viewed as a threat to Symetra, Close said. "That's just not our strategy. The consumer doesn't come in and say, please sell me Company X, but asks the adviser: 'What is the best company for me?'," Close said.

By Any Other Name

Branding is becoming increasingly important, said Richard K. Berry, a Towers Perrin principal and consultant for the firm's Tillinghast business." Insurers are getting more sophisticated when it comes to branding, but there's a distinction between companies looking to brand themselves to producers vs. those trying to do it with customers," Berry said.

Some insurers, like Allianz, are following the steps of the pharmaceutical industry, which advertises directly to consumers, even though consumers have to go through an intermediator--a doctor--to purchase the products. Like pharmaceuticals, life insurers are often two to three steps away from consumers in the sales process.

"Only a handful of companies have a shot at creating a consumer-recognized brand, because you have to be really big to spend the money needed to do it,' Berry said. If a company does create a successful consumer brand, however, it can give the company a significant lift, both with producers and consumers, he said.

Large companies that write both property/casualty and life insurance, as well as other financial services, may have an edge over their life-only competitors in establishing a consumer-recognized brand, he said.

Mike Hail, CEO of Yankelovich Partners, a marketing consultancy, said, "We think brand is a big, big piece. But it's not necessarily the critical piece of the puzzle."

For instance, consumers will often follow the advice of a trusted agent in buying a life insurance policy, regardless of whether they're familiar with the insurance company that wrote it.

Consumers are so inundated with marketing that they actively resist it. For instance, consumers use TiVo to zap commercials from their favorite television shows and rush to join "do not call" lists. Insurers need to target their products to specific markets, Hail said, and support agents, who may not be well versed in marketing.

"If you look at Budweiser's advertising campaign, how many segments do they market to? They market the same product to people of different ages and demographics--they create a different message for each demographic they are trying to reach. Insurers don't seem to think that way" Hail said. "We don't tend to focus on a target; it's just 'well, here's a product.'"

Insurers could also take a lesson from Amazon.com, Hail said. "When a consumer purchases a product from Amazon, the company automatically suggests 'here's another book you might be interested in. And by the way, people who bought this book were also interested in these books.'"

But insurers do need to reach both consumers and producers, he said.

"They should be reaching both, but they'd be better off doing it in bite-sized pieces. There is no mass market. If they haven't studied the populations they're trying to reach, then they haven't calculated the marketing return on the investment they just made," Hail said.

Key Points

* About half of independent agents changed their primary carrier in the past three years, prompting many life insurers to focus their marketing efforts on getting, and keeping, producers' attention.

* Some insurers are also vying for the hearts and minds of the consumer, even though the consumer still needs to go through an intermediary to purchase a policy.

* Insurers may promote the brand to the general public, but leave the promotion of specific products in the hands of producers.

Learn More

Allianz Life Insurance Company of North America (member of Allianz Insurance Group)

A.M. Best Company # 06830

Distribution: Independent agents

Hartford Life Insurance Co. (member of Hartford Life Group)

A.M. Best Company # 06518

Distribution: Independent agents, brokers, banks and wirehouses

Lincoln National Life Insurance Co. (member of Lincoln National Corp.)

A.M. Best Company # 06664

Distribution: Independent agents, brokers, banks and wirehouses

Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co. (Member of MassMutual Financial Group)

A.M. Best Company # 06695

Distribution: Career agents, banks, broker/dealers, banks and wirehouses

Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. (Member of MetLife Inc.)

A.M. Best Company # 06704

Distribution: Independent agents, brokers/dealers, banks and wirehouses

Safeco Life Insurance Co. (member of Symetra Life Group)

A.M. Best Company # 07017

Distribution: Independent producers, including agents, broker/dealers, banks and third-party agencies

For ratings and other financial strength information about these companies, visit www.ambest.com

A Hard Sell

It's not easy marketing life insurance, experts said. As the old saw goes, life insurance is sold, not bought. "Very seldom do we have people showing up at a MetLife office with a bag of money, looking for life insurance or an annuity:' said Robert E. Dehais, vice president of individual business for Metropolitan Life.

It's difficult to make life insurance appealing to a mass market. It's a complex product--whole life, term life, universal life, variable life, not to mention hybrids and riders, each with its own advantages or disadvantages. Further complicating the sale is the nature of the product: It's impossible to talk about life insurance without talking about death, a topic few people are eager to discuss.

"All normal, well-adjusted human beings are in denial of their own mortality," Dehais said." No one can walk around all day and think about their mortality. They'd be a bummer to be around. Dying is something that happens to old people. Life insurance is not a demand-driven product."

So the key to selling life insurance is in the hands of the producers, who must talk to clients about what's important, not what's popular, Dehais said. "Sometimes the conversations are difficult. Our producers have to be advocates for the spouse, or children, or business partner, or employees--most likely, people not buying the life insurance policy--and address the importance of protecting assets."

When MetLife clients were asked what considerations led them to buy specific financial products, the top response was the advice of the producer, followed by the producer's trustworthiness, the cost or value of the product, the company's financial strength and the company's reputation.

"Four of the top five reasons that people suggested they purchased the products had nothing to do with the products themselves," Dehais said. "Customers are looking for relationships with producers, and secondarily, relationships with companies."

Two Sales

With insurers often competing with each other for the attention of independent agents, brokers, wirehouses and banks, they have to make two sales for every new policy written: First, they have to sell to the producer, then, to the producer's client.

"We have to make sure that our products are competitive" Dehais said.

Producers will walk if the products aren't competitive. Almost half of independent producers surveyed by LIMRA changed their primary carrier in the past three years. For 62% of those who changed, their decision was based on their dissatisfaction with their current carrier, as opposed to being attracted to the new one.

In addition to offering competitive products, producers are concerned about how financially secure insurers are.

In MetLife's survey of producers, Dehais said the two top reasons producers chose to represent a certain insurance company were the company's financial strength and reputation.

To motivate independent producers, some insurers, including MetLife, have established a wholesaling arm. While corporate MetLife promotes the MetLife brand through traditional advertising and the MetLife blimp--with the goal of reaching the consumer population--the company concentrates its life insurance marketing specifically on reaching producers through its wholesale arm.

"We spent a considerable amount of resources supporting our producers," Dehais said. In fact, MetLife spends more on wholesaling than it does on its overall advertising campaign, he said. The company's wholesaling arm includes about 200 people who visit independent producers and provide tools to support their sales.

What Producers Want

Competitive product lines and the financial strength of the insurer are the two top things producers value, according to a LIMRA survey of 300 independent agents and 250 affiliated agents who place some business with other companies.

                                          % of Respondents

Competitive product Line                                70
Financial strength of the carrier                       33
Consistent underwriting                                 30
Compensation package                                    29
Effectively using technology
  to service the customer and producer                  16
Carrier communication strategy
  for customers and producers                           13
Carrier advertising/brand development                    9

Source: "Insights Into Strengthening Producer
Relationships" by LIMRA International, 2004

Why Producers Stray

Almost half of producers changed their primary carder in the past three years, and 62% of those who switched said the change was prompted by dissatisfaction with their current carrier, as opposed to being attracted to a new one. In a survey of 300 independent agents and 250 affiliated agents who broker some business with other companies, this is what the producers disliked about their carriers:

                         % of Respondents

Product selection                      34
Service and support                    28
Compensation                           14
Underwriting                           14
Financial performance                   6
Other                                  19

Source: "Insights Into Strengthening Producer
Relationships" by LIMRA International, 2004

Life Insurers Launch Awareness Campaign

For the first time ever, about 70 life insurance companies and associations have banded together to launch an advertising campaign intended to increase the public's awareness about life insurance.

The nonprofit Life and Health Insurance Foundation for Education and its members sponsored the $2.5 million print and radio advertising campaign for September 2004 Life Insurance Awareness Month.

"Our hope is to get the American people aware of the essential role that life insurance plays in their financial plans," said David F.Woods, president of the foundation and the chief executive officer of the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors.

Only 41% of adult Americans have individual life insurance, according to LIMRA International. Many rely on group insurance through their employers, but that leaves them vulnerable if they lose their job. About 50 million Americans do not have life insurance, the association said.

The campaign featured spokesman Kwame Jackson, a star from the reality television show The Apprentice, who used the proceeds from his mother's life insurance policy to attend college after her death. He appeared on a number of television stations across the country. During his interviews, Jackson discussed how his family's financial planning allowed him to attend the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and then earn a master's degree from Harvard University before becoming an investment manager at Goldman Sachs.

"Kwame's story is a perfect illustration of the necessity of life insurance," Woods said. "He is part of the education."

The campaign also includes an eight-page supplement in Newsweek and a 12-page supplement in Time magazine, both filled with real-life stories about how people's lives have been impacted by life insurance.

Several insurers, including State Farm Life Insurance, are also participating in the campaign by starting their own life insurance awareness campaigns.

"We were one of the first life insurance companies to sign on. As an industry, instead of as an individual company, our message could be more powerful," said Nancy Behrens, vice president of risk management for State Farm Insurance.

State Farm has sponsored an essay-writing contest with stories of how life insurance played a vital role in someone's life.

State Farm's "Embrace Life" program will honor women who have lost a spouse, but went on to accomplish great things.