When cultural groups with a strong tradition of networking move to a foreign country, they tend to put more faith in each other than, for example, in an insurance company. The insurance company reflects nothing of their values in the brand mirror – they don’t speak the same language, they don’t have the same world view and have no multicultural focus. Some insurance companies are starting to see the opportunity – they have started placing customer service switchboards in multicultural environments with offerings in dozens of languages. Yet, they are still locked into a traditional insurance company mindset by letting the phone ring and putting customers and future customers on hold. The question is how the insurance industry can become one with the customer when the customer is becoming ever more diverse.
Storytelling is one key element; ONE feeds the story. Ever notice that you never hear any good stories about insurance companies? With such a potential for acting as a positive force in the community, helping people back on their feet, turning around bad situations you would expect something. Yet, instead of buzz you get static – a few “we really care” commercials which ring very false with all the word of mouth horror stories we’ve heard over the years. The little positive symbolism that we see is the name of insurance companies on life-preserver and life vests. The time is right to put a few logos on consumers’ psyches. Let’s start with insurance logos on air bags and work our way up to real involvement.
We tend to forget what we have when we are to close to the source of opportunities.
A way to see opportunities is to get out of the box and look inside the box.