Sanjay Mehra of MetLife discussed how they used Net Promoter as a tool to help assess the effectiveness of new direct channels for purchasing life insurance, and how this program within one division has served as a proof point interally to support a broader rollout and adoption of Net Promoter across the MetLife organization.
As background, Sanjay explained the challenge facing his division. Historically, ownership of life insurance has been declining since the 1970's. MetLife set out to understand how to make the life insurance purchasing process more customer-centric to grow in a declining market. They built and launched a new direct product for term life insurance in late 2009, and have used Net Promoter to track their progress.
When they started this program using Net Promoter, there were a few other pockets of NPS experimentation within the company. But their story has received particular visibility because of the importance of this new initiative and success they have had. After starting in late 2009, the business quickly grew in 2010, their first full year of operation with the new product line. Then in 2011, they tripled sales over 2010.
How have they done with Net Promoter?
From a starting point of 5, they made a variety of improvements to move up to 25 and are continuing to focus on further improvement in an industry which typically garners quite low scores. In addition to feedback following specific interaction points during purchase, they also follow up for feedback 6 and 12 months later to understand the ongoing policy ownership experience.
Sanjay offered some perspective on how they used closed loop processes to identify improvement opportunities. In their first year, they focused primarily on detractors to identify process and customer experience improvements. Every single customer who comes in through the direct sales channel gets a survey within 2 weeks of purchasing the product. They survey by email with a completion rate around 15%. When they have detractor responses, they are routed directly to a customer retention representative who calls back within 24 hours.
But before calling, the rep does research in their CRM system on everything the customer has done throughout the purchasing process, combined with the feedback provided on the survey. In addition to the primary focus on resolving the customer issues, the representative also documents what was learned. This database gives them a rich catalog of learning to define and implement improvement opportunities to drive better experiences.
They have also focused the organization on creating more promoters, and leveraging the promoters to drive growth. Internally, they have run quarterly contests in the sales department to award agents who get the most 10's. And from the customer perspective, they have introduced the option for promoters to "like" them on facebook after completing a survey, and they have found that 65% of promoters click on it.
Finally, Sanjay described how the U.S. business is now rolling out this process across the business, with the following goals:
- to create a state-of-the art closed loop VoC process with Net Promoter as the key measure of success
- to identify and act on "quick hits" to enhance the current U.S. customer experience
The new system will include all customers and intermediaries at all touchpoints, moving way beyond the initial pilot in the life direct sales channel.
Thank you, Sanjay, for sharing your experiences with the group. We wish you continued success as Net Promoter rolls out across the U.S. business at MetLife.
