Technology, User Experience Keys to Grange Rebranding
In many ways Grange Insurance's recent rebranding initiative, announced in February 2009, was simply a matter of the Columbus, Ohio-based carrier's public image playing catch-up with its evolving business. After all, as Grange VP of marketing Carol Drake points out, the insurer last updated its brand in 1988, when the company had annual written premiums around $250 million and operated in only five states. Over the ensuing 20 years, the company has experienced tremendous growth, booming into a $1.3 billion organization that operates across 13 states.
In many other ways, though, the rebranding represented much more than just a change in window dressing. New logos and marketing campaigns aside, the initiative refocused the company on its core independent agent distribution model and the creation of customer-focused products -- all while reinforcing the value the company places on technology.
"If you think back to 1988, there wasn't a lot of interaction, with regard to technology, between carriers and agents," relates Drake, who adds that issues such as connectivity and ease of doing business have become more important. Part of the rebranding, she adds, was to align Grange with key initiatives to bring a high level of connectivity and technology to the end-consumer through the independent agent channel.
As a result, it could be said that Grange Insurance, particularly from a technology point of view, is serving two different masters: By remaining true to its independent agent distribution model, the carrier must focus on delivering ease-of-doing-business enhancements to its producers. On the other hand, regardless of the distribution channel through which they purchase products, end consumers are demanding more capabilities from their carriers. To grow in today's market, Grange understands, it must strengthen its relationship with the end consumer without losing focus on improving connectivity and enhancing ease of doing business with its agents.
Grange Insurance, based in Columbus, Ohio, recently refocused on its core independent agent distribution model and the creation of custormer-focused products.
"For many years our focus was just on the agent. Now we've expanded that focus to include the customer and the agent," Sherri Rarey, assistant vice president of agency interface, says. "We've made a special effort to make sure that everything we develop does not exclude the independent agent. We are doing everything we can to better network the agent and the customer."
According to Grange vice president and chief information officer Michael Fergang, there were 10 or 11 IT projects specifically associated with the rebranding initiative, including projects related to the company's Internet and portal sites, agent-facing transaction applications, forms and filing, and quoting and issuance systems. "All of those needed to be rebranded and [updated with] new content," Fergang says.
"On the new public Web site, we also introduced the Customer Care Center for the first time," he adds. The Customer Care Center, Fergang explains, is a new consumer-facing section of the company's Web site, www.grangeinsurance.com, that includes an enhanced set of online tools with functionality around printing new member ID cards, paying bills and looking up the status of a claim.
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