Event Targeting: The Key To Life Sales

ORLANDO -- Fifty-one percent of consumers buy life insurance around a major life event -- marriage, childbirth, home purchase.

Yet, only 24 percent of insurers are doing life event targeting in an effort to grab that business. The reasons are many, said Patrick Culligan, assistant vice president of marketing for State Farm Life Insurance.

"There are challenges to implementation," added David W. Edington, senior vice president at Epsilon.

The pair spoke on life event marketing at a final-day session this morning at the 2017 Life Insurance Conference.

With the Beatles' "In My Life" blaring to start the session, Culligan and Edington shared personal details from their own lives. Neither purchased life insurance until well into adulthood.

"I didn't even know what life insurance was," Culligan said.

That changed when they had children, got divorced and bought homes. Life events are where agents need to be, Edington said. New marketing software is making it easier every day to track those life events.

There are two million marriages, four million births and 900,000 divorces annually in the U.S., the pair said.

Epsilon tracks the financial health markers, purchases and online activity of every adult in the United States. All of this is done anonymously and in adherence to all privacy laws, Edington assured attendees.

The potential to connect people with life insurance products they want to buy can't be ignored, he added.

"You can be smarter, you can be more timely, and I contend, you can spend less," he said.

InsuranceNewsNet Senior Editor John Hilton has covered business and other beats in more than 20 years of daily journalism. John may be reached at [email protected].

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