The Advice Challenge: Understanding what clients value

The findings revealed that the population of insurance clients includes three distinct client groups with different needs: Value Seekers (59%); Personalised Advice Seekers (27%); and Purists (14%). The study showed that leveraging the unique needs of each segment produces numerous benefits for both the client and advice businesses.

In addition to evaluating the value drivers of the adviser-client relationship, this research also set out to determine key value drivers of the insurer-end client relationship. A list of twelve touch-points between insurers and the end-client were developed. Insurance clients were asked to indicate which touch-points with their insurer they valued and had themselves experienced. Taken together, we learn which touch-points are more valued and what proportion of policy holders are affected by optimising performance and in delivering well on these.

The findings of The Advice Challenge study add to the ‘Value of Protection’ study, a qualitative study undertaken by Beddoes Institute for the Association of Financial Advisers in 2013. In that study, insurers were encouraged to adopt a consumer centric framework in the management of claims because it was found that consumers generally lacked trust in insurers and had a poor understanding of insurance products and policies. Furthermore, it was established that this preconception was multi-faceted and complex, was fuelled by ongoing negative media coverage and was long-standing in nature.

Table of Contents:

Foreword 4

Executive Summary 5

Background 9

Method 9

Insurance client segments 11

Segment 1: Value Seekers 11

Segment 2: Personalised Advice Seekers 16

Segment 3: Purists 19

Putting insights into practice 23

Insurer-end customer value drivers 24

Bibliography 25

Appendices 26

Appendix A: Adviser-client and insurer-client relationship value drivers 26

Appendix B: Respondent profile 28

Appendix C: Research Design and Analysis Technique 29