The document discusses findings from a UK home insurance survey. Key findings include: 1) Younger consumers aged 18-35 want tools to help choose coverage and manage their policy online. 2) Insurers need to work harder to acquire first-time homeowner customers in this age group. 3) Older consumers still want easy-to-understand information when researching options. The survey found the industry makes it difficult for customers to evaluate and purchase policies online. Admiral in particular needs improvements to its value proposition and building trust with customers. Direct Line's website design is more appealing and intuitive for customers.

2. http://www.smartinsights.com/marketplace-
analysis/consumer-buying-behaviour/digital-
sales-effectiveness-survey-for-the-uk-
insurance-sector/

3. Here are six key findings from the UK Home Insurance Survey
1. Generation Y want different things from their home insurance provider
online
As part of our analysis we segmented the sample into three different age
groups: 18 – 35, 36 – 55 and 56+ year olds.
Fig 1: Age differences driving preferences

4. In general those in the 18 to 35 age group are more demanding and are more likely to
want:
tools that assist them in understanding which home insurance cover that is right for
them.
the ability to view and manage their account online.
general information about home insurance
customer ratings and reviews.

5. 2. Home insurance providers need to work harder to acquire first time customers
This group 'Generation Y' is the future and the acquisition territory for most insurance
providers. They are more demanding and expect more which gives a good indication of
where the industry needs to be playing in order to attract these younger customers.
It’s probably safe to assume that the majority of customers in the 18-35 age group are
buying their first house and looking to take out home insurance for the first time. The
insurers that are seen to be working harder for them are more likely to succeed in
acquiring their entry-level business.

6. 3. Older customers still want easy to understand information
You might imagine that consumers over the age of 36 have bought
home insurance many times and are more familiar with the
language and insurance options. While that may indeed be the
case, age and experience doesn’t necessarily translate into a lower
propensity to want information that is easy to understand, in fact it
is quite the opposite.
Older consumers want easy to understand information and the
ability to save a quote when they are researching options. To
optimise online conversion for this segment, insurance providers
need to implement UX best practice to provide simple attractive
design which is utterly utilitarian in nature

7. 4. The home insurance industry as a whole is making it difficult for customers to
buy from them online
The industry as a whole is particularly weak at helping customers to evaluate
the different home insurance policies and choose which option best suit their
needs.
The poorer performers across the online customer journey are Tesco Bank and
AXA, with Admiral coming out weakest in four of the six stages of the online
customer journey.
Fig 1 DSE benchmark scores

8. 5. What’s driving Admiral’s score down?
Drilling down into the sub sections (Fig 2) you can see that there is a lot of work for Admiral
(and indeed the industry as a whole) to do. Admiral needs to improve their value proposition
(scoring just 17%), their differentiation message and explaining why a customer should
choose Admiral over other providers.
'Returning prospects' scores 0% for Admiral, which clearly means that is not something
Admiral currently incorporates on their site. Admiral also has quite a bit of work to do in the
area of building trust.
Fig 2 'Meeting expectations and building trust' sub section of the initial engagement stage

9. 6. What Admiral can learn from Direct Line
When we asked consumers to rate the home pages of the insurance providers, Direct Line’s
homepage ranked much higher than Admiral’s because it displayed all the information they
would expect to find when looking for home insurance. Plus consumers found that Direct
Line’s homepage had a visual design that was appealing.
In contrast to this, consumers thought that the visual appeal of Admiral’s website was
somewhat lacking as it looks a little 'child-like with its cartoonish characters' and quite a
number of consumers found that the website was only geared towards car insurance.
Direct Line’s website uses both a lexical and icon based menu which increases the possibility
of the consumer understanding the message which is being communicated. The website has
clear signposting with a funnel process, which means that consumers intuitively know where
they will be taken when they click a particular button.
The multiple use of the 'get a quote' call to action on the Direct Line homepage with clever
placement of use of colour also increases success. As does the simple and clean design of
the page which allow customers to understand very quickly what it going on and where to
find what they need in order to move on.
If you would like to listen to my colleague Gerard Farrell, our Senior Client Advisor, walk you
through both homepages listen to our recorded webinar from the 22:35 minute mark.

11. https://econsultancy.com/blog/66324-admiral-com-s-excellent-customer-focused-
redesign-review/

12. Admiral has been doing commendable work in digital recently.
Its TV ads are some of the few that manage to successfully join TV advertising up with
online, it’s Twitter account is a laudable example of social customer service and last
week Admiral
launched phase one of a responsive overhaul to Admiral.com.
A redesign that notably puts it ahead of other insurance companies in terms of
accessibility and user friendliness.
So while high on the success of avoiding using the word admiral as an adjective in the
opening four paragraphs of this article, let’s take a look at the new site and see where
other insurance companies could learn a few lessons.

14. • The guidance seems clear then:
• Keep form size to a minimum
• Keep number of pages to a number
• Use progress indicators
• Avoid unnecessary questions
• Avoid repeat entry issues
• Make address entry as easy as possible
• Let's see how the new Admiral site copes with the above
criteria.

15. Brand &
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Claims
Management
Product & Pricing Post Sales ServiceSales & Distribution

16. Brand &
Marketing
Sales & Distribution

18. Slightly stuffy in design, The off white does not
helps also the use of such a heavy blue makes
it look drab.
The Russian Dolls taken from the Ad gives a
safe feeling….sorta ( could be better )

19. A weird mixture between flat design and gloss
gives the site an uniform feel.

20. No one cares about this except Admiral
( needs to be taken off the home page )

21. This needs to be featured
better on the home screen.
Its so far down the screen
above the bloody about!!!!

22. Brand &
Marketing
Claims
Management
Product & Pricing Post Sales ServiceSales & Distribution

24. Clean get a quote
Terminology is confusing as
you can retrieve a quote for
the first time.

25. Nice breakdown but a little
heavy on the text

26. Icons are a little too
busy!
These icons should be
along the top not at the
side

27. Why the change in cons. Its
a mish-mash!
Text why you so small?

28. By this stage the customer
does not know what they
are looking at! There is no
flow
The customer needs it to
be like a maths question.
A+B+C = D

29. This have been broken for 3
days!
Why didn’t they use Wistia
for video!

30. Love this but too far down
Needs to be the 2 or 3rd
item

31. Love that this button is
here. Fits ion the sales
cycle!

32. Brand &
Marketing
Claims
Management
Product & Pricing Post Sales ServiceSales & Distribution