In 1999, the Martin Agency changed the insurance company advertising game when they debuted the Geico gecko in a commercial. Prior to this, insurance agency’s commercials very often featured depressing reminders of how suddenly things could go awry, sad situations of a family being left without a dime after a parent’s death, or testimonials of an extremely satisfied customer or dedicated employee.
Nowadays, one would struggle to find an insurance company commercial that doesn’t use humor as their vehicle to empathize and communicate with their customers. As Geico went from being the 8th largest insurance agency in the country to the 2nd largest, other companies took note of some of their advertising strategies. Next came Progressive’s Flo, Allstate’s Mayhem, and Payton Manning with Nationwide. From comedy skits to catchy phrases such as “15 minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance”, insurance companies are doing everything they can to appeal to a younger target audience. I believe this strategy of using humor to appeal to the audience is smart, and is seeming to be quite successful. As stated in the article, the trend setters in this category are the market share leaders in their industry. Humor is a great way to get personal with the audience and allows the companies to “forge a bond with their customers” as said by Cat Kolodij, the leader of marketing strategy at Progressive. I was not old enough to appreciate the switch in marketing techniques 15 or more years ago but I can say that I have always been a huge fan of the comical insurance commercials I am so used to seeing these days. It is so common now that these companies seem to be directly competing with each other to have to silliest commercials, and I believe this is a win-win situation for both the consumers and the insurance companies. If you are interested and would like to read this article, please click here. Author - Tyler Tallos
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