New Opportunities for Benefits Carriers – 5 Key Areas of Focus

The group and voluntary benefits market is at an inflection point and insurers’ growth will depend on how well they manage emerging challenges. KPMG’s new report, ‘Stretch Benefits Boundaries,’ urges insurers to reevaluate their go to market strategies as employees, employers and brokers form new views as to what products and services fulfill their needs.

“Benefits carriers are realizing that their business and operating models must be in synch with the multitude of views on which benefits are critical, in order to maintain their future relevance and improve their growth prospects,” said Mike Adler, Principal, Finance Transformation, KPMG LLP. “Employers are turning to insurers for a wide array of products and services in order to retain and recruit an increasingly multi-generational workforce.”

According to the new report, there are five generations currently in the workplace and employers need to meet the demands of each workgroup. Employees want to merge their personal and work lives in more meaningful ways. Carriers and employers need to closely work together in order to meet the needs for personalization and diversification.

(Use U.S. Census population projection table)

These are five areas benefit providers need to focus on in order to remain relevant and grow:

Understand evolving customer needs and expectations – in order to understand the changes in the market, insurers need to leverage interactions, relationships and external data sources and draw actionable, targeted insights across customer groups.
Invest in pursuit of leading market positions – Make strategic and financial decisions to assume a leadership position and growth and investigate capability-specific acquisitions and divestitures that are aligned to specific goals.
Deliver products and experiences that meet emerging expectations – focus on services that enable employers to meet goals across employee attraction, retention and productivity.
Master an omnichannel approach to distribution – reach customers through digital platforms, traditional broker channers, and direct offerings.
Modernize operations across the value chain – use technology-enabled solutions and leverage data across operations.

“Carriers that align their benefit offerings to the future market environment, and successfully address the innovation imperative which has emerged since the onset of COVID-19, will set themselves apart from competition, capture a larger share of the market and, with a more efficient ‘digital first, digital now’ mindset, grow in new markets,” said Ed Chanda, National Sector Leader, Insurance.

To learn more about the future of the group and voluntary benefits market or to arrange an interview with KPMG’s Mike Adler, please contact Andreas Marathovouniotis.