Seth’s Blog on Finance

Strange Marketing

Just a while after I blogged about professionalism in the financial industry, I read about this marketing campaign allegedly started by an insurance company to spread the message of life’s uncertainty (and naturally the accompanying importance of insurance). While the underlying message is rather meaningful if not cliché, the marketing campaign itself was strange to say the least.

It started off with a couple, “Mark and Audrey”, aged 23 and 47 respectively turning to the Internet for support of their marriage. There was a Facebook page, a video of them explaining about their predicament, and it finally culminated in their “big day” where a website supposedly streamed live footage of the groom going to fetch his bride. In the video, the groom is implied to be hit by a car off-screen, before a message reveals that the story was fictional and stated its intended purpose.

It has proven to be a PR disaster as many people online took offence with the dubious nature of the campaign. Personally, I feel that there are better ways of promoting the importance of insurance. In the first place, I believe that insurers should focus more on delivering value to their clients instead of wasting unnecessarily on marketing.

One of the top most reasons why people do not buy insurance is because of the perceived cost. Actually, if one does a bit of research and/or engage the services of an ethical Independent Financial Adviser, affordable insurance of good value can be found. The best policies I’ve seen tend to come from companies that hardly do marketing. Interestingly enough, the reverse is also true. Bad policies probably require a lot of marketing, big tied sales forces and roadshows to promote. Such is the sad state of the industry as further shown by this strange, strange marketing campaign.