Managing a scheme can be pretty challenging particularly when trying to grow.
Why is that, why is it important and how can an insurer like Ecclesiastical provide support?
Simon McGill, Schemes Development Manager surveys the landscape and suggests practical ways for schemes brokers to kickstart business growth.
Businesses of all shapes and sizes compete across a variety of trading and digital platforms. You must work hard to get your message across in a crowded marketplace that is often changing and developing. Brokers recognise the potential and need for growth—to remain competitive and relevant to existing and new customer groups. They also recognise that they may shrink and struggle without change and growth.
But the rewards are high. Once you have a confident understanding of what your customer base wants and can match a product to support those needs, you can demonstrate how your scheme can add value.
This leads to a stronger relationship and trust between you and your customer, in turn helping retention and growth. Finding the right schemes insurer to support those ambitions is critical.
Managing and growing a scheme is hard. They can be big, complex beasts that require constant attention, time and energy. Brokers have a variety of headaches when trying to grow. Regulation (FVA and Consumer Duty) is constantly moving and time consuming to administer. Just trying to retain your renewal book can see challenges with insurer appetite narrowing and not supporting your ambitions. The constant threat of competition including from within your partner insurer is also not unheard of.
We’ve spoken with brokers who are unsure how to navigate some of these challenges and create a growth plan, including puzzlement about how to expand their policy offering and evolve covers. Others are clear on their offering but not so much on how to expand their marketing and how best to reach potential new customers.
Our research* shows the insurer plays a key role in equipping brokers for growth and we take this seriously. We take a long-term, collaborative approach. We’ll sit down with brokers to understand what they want, then pinpoint the opportunity, co-create a development plan, and provide the practical support and connections to deliver it.
We’ve been growing schemes with our partners for a long time. We are experienced, committed and can demonstrate to brokers that our people and processes can overcome these challenges. Our team cares about getting the right result.
Each partnership scheme and need is different and it’s important to bear that in mind. We employ a variety of tactics to support our schemes. Some are on a self-serve basis, other on a more bespoke level, and all are developed based on experience.
One of our most effective and popular webpages is Schemes Marketplace, which highlights a variety of schemes where our brokers will receive wholesale enquiries.
Our goal and ethos at Ecclesiastical is that by doing better business, we can better lives. Through supporting growth and providing a bursary, plus ‘charity giving’ campaigns, brokers are challenged to find methods of distributing funds within their sector group to encourage growth and trust.
Our tripartite approach is also to the fore in scheme growth as we regularly attend trade and exhibition fairs. Being around consumer groups enhances our long-term partnership message. One broker scheme has also benefited from our podcast expertise in both production and content, finding a new way to engage with a very specific consumer group.
Our current test and learn is providing full marketing consultancy. Three of our brokers with schemes in diverse areas such as retirement contents, leisure homes and hospitality are benefiting from access to Ecclesiastical Marketing experts. We aim to explore aspects of their online/offline marketing, drill down into the quality and quantity of their enquiries, and quote journey to ensure they are giving themselves the best chance of improved conversions.
*Ecclesiastical Insurance Schemes Study 2023
Simon is responsible for leading Ecclesiastical Schemes DA and MGA development and helping brokers to find solutions in the Schemes space across the United Kingdom. He is the focal point for all new enquiries, Schemes relationships and broker & MGA management.
Prior to joining the Schemes team, Simon worked as an open market Account Manager in the Northern Region for Ecclesiastical and had enjoyed a 30-year career within corporate broking and insurance recruitment.
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