Text丨Guowei Half comb
As one of the fastest-growing mainstream insurance types in the past decade, the scale of health insurance premiums has increased from the 100 billion platform in 2014 to the 900 billion platform in 2023, 9 times in ten years.
In particular, under the national policy of building a multi-level security system, a number of ministries and commissions have jointly issued a document to set a development target of 2 trillion yuan in domestic health insurance premiums in 2025. If we add to the population base of 1.4 billion, the rise of medical and health security, the integration of the big health industry chain and the people's livelihood orientation emphasized by the superstructure...... All of them bode well for the prospect of China's health insurance market.
In addition, we have also seen that in the past seven or eight years, whether it is high-average critical illness insurance, or high-frequency Internet celebrity products such as Million Medical Care and Huimin Insurance, or long-term care insurance, long-term medical insurance, and various innovations based on services, responsibilities, scenarios, channels, etc., have emerged one after another, ushering in a prosperous period of the industry.
In particular, the emergence of Million Medical can be said to be a landmark product in China's health insurance market, and it has become an Internet celebrity product in China's insurance industry that truly benefits hundreds of millions of people and successfully goes out of the circle, and it can even be said to be the only one.
This has also pushed medical insurance, which should be a mainstream health insurance product, to the center of the stage, from an almost negligible premium scale to a platform of two or three hundred billion yuan.
However, in the past two years, the health insurance market has encountered development bottlenecks, and the growth rate has slowed down significantly. In 2022 and 2023, the growth rate will be only 2 percentage points and 4 percentage points. That's a far cry from nine times in ten years.
During this period, there were certainly channel problems, such as the weak sales of critical illness insurance caused by the decline of agents, the inefficiency of bancassurance in selling health insurance, and the inability of the job to spend money in health insurance, but also product problems, such as the impact of Huimin Insurance on medical insurance, the type of product supply has not changed greatly, and the supply of nursing insurance and disability insurance is seriously insufficient.
In essence, this all points to a problem: there are channels with customers but no health insurance distribution capabilities, or capable channels lack new customers and suitable product support.
This also means that in the face of the above-mentioned broad market prospects, the current bottleneck is only a temporary problem. In fact, the industry still has enough attention and investment in this, and its exploration and innovation has never stopped.
For example, a few days ago, at a new product launch conference of long-term medical insurance held by Shuidi Bao and Ping An Health, a professional health insurance subsidiary of Ping An Group, a Chinese insurance giant, two innovative institutions launched a "heart medical insurance" long-term medical insurance (women's version) product.
Compared with the product benefits that consumers pay attention to, such as facing women, guaranteeing renewal for 20 years, up to 8 million yuan, adding 13 kinds of women's special illness protection, and achieving 0 deductible for 133 critical illnesses, as industry practitioners, we pay more attention to the story behind this product and see how they can break through the current bottleneck of healthy growth.
1 Why this product was launched: The innovation of medical insurance has entered a higher stage of competition, not only to have good cost performance, but also to have deep insight into customer segments to meet their needs
It is undeniable that Million Healthcare is facing a growth bottleneck.
Before 2020, the number of medical insurance policies accumulated rapidly, but this increase gradually slowed down in 2020. In addition to the changes in the development stage of the industry and the failure of the model of agents to increase the number of employees to develop channels, Internet channels are also facing the practical problems of serious product homogenization and traffic depletion.
With the development of the medical insurance market today, the products and services aimed at traditional customer groups can be said to be inexhaustible, whether it is product liability, health notice, payment method, renewal period, or deductible amount and coverage, all of which have been continuously refreshed in iterations, bringing tangible benefits and experience to consumers.
This also determines that on the road of medical insurance, it is necessary to make greater innovations in product liability, product form, medical resource aggregation, channels, customers, etc., so as to meet the current needs of national health security.
This also explains why Shuidi Bao launched this women-only long-term medical insurance product.
In fact, this is not the first time that Shuidi Bao has launched insurance for subdivided groups, in addition to specific female groups, in recent years, Shuidi Bao has also had a certain amount of business accumulation in the insurance products of subdivided customer groups such as maternal and infant groups, elderly groups, and sick groups.
With a population of 1.4 billion, there are too many subdivisions, and any subdivision of the population is tens of millions or even larger, which also means that the number of people looking at the "subdivision" is actually not small, and a subdivision of the population in China may also be hundreds of millions of people.
This also means that there is still a large gap in the segmentation of insurance products and service supply in the mainland, and it is difficult to fully meet their needs for more clear and specific insurance protection.
Or take the female group as an example, why launch women-only products?
According to the first white paper on China's female pension and risk management released by the Fudan Development Research Institute in 2020, the proportion of women in the elderly population aged 65 and above is increasing day by day. Women have a longer life expectancy, and due to special physiological differences, women face more specific diseases and risks than men. Therefore, they have a stronger demand for commercial insurance, and they also need more comprehensive, professional and exclusive insurance protection. And the reality is often that they struggle to find an insurance product that takes into account a woman's specific illness.
Through the above logic, it is also clear why Shuidi Bao continues to make efforts to segment the internal drive of the customer group. It can not only meet the insurance demand gap of the subdivided population, but also open up a new growth space for health insurance.
2 How to overcome the traditional customer acquisition problem? This is the sharpest spear to solve the bottleneck of growth, and the integrated delivery capability may give a certain answer
If excellent products are the foundation and confidence of development, and a solid shield, then customer acquisition channel sales is the sharpest spear. Only the organic combination of contradictions can move forward.
In other words, whether it is the transformation of traditional products, or the exploration of new products and new models, it is not enough for health insurance in market segments to only have innovation in product protection design, but also need to break through traditional channels, with the ability to reach customers through innovative channels, tap niche customer groups under sales scenarios, achieve a high degree of matching in the three dimensions of people, goods and places, and leverage the market segment market demand through personalized and characteristic operation methods.
Let's look at the current status of health insurance sales channels:
The number of agents continues to decline, and the remaining agents are converging on the mid-to-high-end customer base, and it is difficult for the internationally developed BBC group insurance sales to land in China, and it is almost impossible for the bancassurance channel to sell health insurance products.
The same is true for Internet channels, where major platforms have formed their own unique "big databases", which are regarded as exclusive resources and are no longer open to the outside world, resulting in a sharp rise in the cost of obtaining traffic. For the insurance industry, how to obtain and manage traffic has become the core link of competition among various entities to a certain extent.
The same is true for Shuidi Bao, how to break through the trap of traditional Internet insurance? How to undertake this transformation from "simple to complex" and "from short-term to long-term" product form from the Internet channel that mainly sells short-term insurance?
The answer to Shuidi Insurance lies in the advantages that have grown up under the big wave of Internet insurance for many years, that is, the integrated operation ability of "planting-acquiring-conversion".
To this end, on the one hand, Shuidibao has built a diversified online customer contact channel, and built a "private domain + public domain" user management platform including WeChat service account matrix, Xiaohongshu/Douyin/video account and other content platform matrix, enterprise WeChat, small programs, APP, etc. While using multiple channels and methods to reach customers, it can also understand the different insurance service needs of subdivided groups more efficiently and with more granularity, realize the supply-side innovation of promoting product upgrades from user needs, and precipitate accurate online operations and content customer acquisition capabilities for complex product types such as long-term insurance, sick insurance, and silver insurance.
On the other hand, Shuidibao has increased investment in scientific and technological innovation, and it is reported that its annual investment in technology research and development has reached 300 million yuan, and dozens of AI technology patents have been applied for. With the help of AI technology, the platform can have a deeper insight into users' insurance needs, providing more diverse possibilities for innovative customization of insurance products.
Today's Shuidi Bao can accurately understand the protection needs of various groups and efficiently calculate medical and health risks through big data, scenario actuarial and other capabilities, so as to launch a variety of innovative insurance products for different segments, promote product supply innovation, and maximize the protection efficiency.
Previously, in response to the protection needs of maternal and infant groups, Shuidi Bao also cooperated with JD Allianz to launch the industry's first insurance product covering the whole process of pregnancy, which can protect the risk of illness and accident in the whole process of pregnancy, pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum, and in the latest upgrade of version 2.0, the protection responsibility has been greatly upgraded, and the breakthrough has added fetal protection and postpartum rehabilitation protection, and the insurance threshold has also been greatly relaxed.
In addition, for the elderly and the sick, since 2019, Shuidi Bao has also cooperated with a number of insurance companies to launch more than 40 innovative products for the sick, through the combination of long-term insurance and short-term insurance, medical, critical illness, accident, life insurance, annuity and other types of personal health insurance and the matrix of innovative products for specific groups, covering the differentiated protection needs of users in an all-round way.
From this logic, it is also understood why Shuidi Bao can be a subdivision of the population and why it can be a subdivision of the population. Because it has successfully built an integrated service closed-loop capability from product customization to marketing delivery, it has solved the "instrument" that workers must first sharpen their tools if they want to do their jobs well.
In the end, it all went smoothly.
3 The second half of the competition: there is still a huge space for imagination, and the attempt of the two companies is also an attempt of the industry
As mentioned earlier, 2020 was a watershed year for the health insurance industry, with premium growth slowing significantly after 2020.
Before 2020, the industry has pushed critical illness insurance to the status of a "top stream" product through the realization of sales manpower dividends from the increase in agents, whether it is the number of agents engaged or the number of critical illness insurance units sold, once it reaches a certain bottleneck, it marks the arrival of the post-traffic stage.
Then in the post-traffic era, the era of short-term and fast, extensive and single-product operation in the past is over, and the real needs of customers who have been covered and ignored in the past growth model have begun to be revealed in front of the industry, and the industry has entered a high-quality development stage that requires hard power, long cycle, substance, patience and perseverance.
For health insurance, medical insurance is destined to enter the era of "long", in-depth management, and segmentation, and the three complement each other.
According to data released by the Office of the National Commission on Ageing, the cost of medical care for people over 65 years old is 3-5 times that of people under 65 years old. At present, most of the domestic commercial medical insurance insurance can only be insured to about 60 years old, and most of them are one-year short-term insurance products, and many users cannot have a continuous and certain long-term protection.
In the context of an aging society, consumers have an urgent need for medical insurance products that can extend the insurance age and guarantee renewal for 20 years or more. However, for insurance companies, short-term medical insurance can better control risks from a business logic, and the development of long-term medical insurance with 20-year guaranteed renewal or lifetime guaranteed renewal means that consumers may enjoy protection at the same rate, and in the context of medical inflation, insurance companies are facing greater challenges in their operations.
In 2019, the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission (CBIRC) revised the Measures for the Administration of Health Insurance, stipulating that insurance companies may agree on rate adjustments for long-term medical insurance products in insurance products, urging the industry to develop long-term medical insurance products.
In fact, this is also a major background of the "Heart Medical Insurance" long-term medical insurance (women's version) jointly launched by Shuidi Bao and Ping An Health Insurance, which is the trend of the times.
It is understood that this product expands the maximum insurance age to 70 years old, and can be protected up to 90 years old, including polycystic ovary syndrome, adenomyosis, severe depression, etc., 13 women-specific diseases and 120 major diseases are included in the scope of 0 deductible protection.
In addition, it also sets up a specific surgery allowance for women, as well as a maximum of 100,000 yuan of breast reconstruction prosthesis medical equipment guarantee after breast cancer surgery. In the next product iteration, we will continue to expand the types of covered diseases, lower the threshold for claims, include more responsibilities and more treatment methods for women, and strive to provide more comprehensive protection for women.
According to the public statement of Shuidi Bao, the launch of long-term medical insurance for women is just the beginning, and the "Heart Medical Insurance" series of Shuidi Bao will also customize more cost-effective long-term medical insurance products for children, silver-haired groups, sick groups, etc.
In fact, we've always seen the health insurance market as an area to watch.
Especially in the life insurance market, where the life insurance market has undergone drastic changes, increased whole life continues to become the main type of insurance, and traditional health insurance such as critical illness insurance and medical insurance are facing downward pressure, in addition to the scale market, it is necessary to find a large market to undertake the market gap.
During this period, there are bound to be many marginal or niche products rising. Considering China's population base, the niche will gradually be valued by the industry, and many new sales scenarios and security models have been born. This attempt by Shuidi Bao and Ping An Health should be an industry attempt in the above context.