New Report Analyzes 446,597 Health Insurance Prospects To Reveal Online Shopping Trends You Need To Know

Have you noticed your online leads deliver more women than men? Does it seem that most of your prospects are in the 20 to 39 range? Or if you sell nationally, have you found yourself speaking with a lot of shoppers with southern accents?

According to a recent analysis of almost half a million online health insurance prospects, Norvax found that women aged 20 to 39 and living in the South made up about 1 out of every 3 online leads this summer. And that's just one of the important trends the free study uncovered.

This new report gives insurance professionals a better idea of how consumers are shopping for health insurance online - and from where. It analyzed the data from 446,597 Internet-generated leads collected from June through August by ProspectZone, Norvax's sister company.

How Will This Information Help You?

Top producers have known for years that consumers are going online to buy their individual health insurance. It happened to travel agents and real estate brokers. It's now happening to insurance producers. Celent Research estimates that in about two years, 9 out of every 10 insurance policy bought will involve the Internet.

Going online is no longer a choice. It's a necessity for any agent or broker who wants to succeed. But the web is an increasingly competitive and sometimes confusing marketplace - unless you know:

• Who you're looking for
• How to find them
• How to connect with them

In other words, understanding how consumers are shopping online for insurance will help you tailor your marketing so that it produces more prospects and better ROIs.

The large number of prospects studied gives the study a lot of weight. And this free report contains many surprising findings about online shopping behavior. We'll summarize three key findings here:

• Half the leads come from just 10 states
• Women are in the lead (pardon the pun)
• Seniors are surging

Half The Leads Come From Just 10 States

According to the U.S. Census, half of all Americans can be found in the top 10 most populous states. The report found a similar distribution of leads, with 10 states accounting for half of all online shoppers.

But they don't match! The top 10 lead-generating states are not all in the top 10 states in terms of population:

1. Florida
2. Texas
3. California
4. Pennsylvania
5. New York
6. Georgia
7. North Carolina
8. Washington
9. Ohio
10. Massachusetts

The biggest difference is that Washington and Massachusetts have bumped Illinois and Michigan out of the top 10 list. The 2000 census ranked Illinois and Michigan at 5th and 8th, respectively, in terms of population. But they're out of the top 10 when it comes to online health insurance shoppers.

And even though California is #1 and New York is #3 in terms of population, Florida and Texas produced more insurance leads. This coincides with a big geographic shift in online lead generation: nearly half of all the leads came from southern states.

Women Are In The Lead

The most glaring set of trends revealed by the study involves gender. Women account for almost two-thirds (2/3) of all primary applicants in the sample. But this was just the tip of the iceberg:

• Higher levels of uninsured status
  Whereas 28.2% of the men in the study currently have insurance, only 24.5% of the women are currently insured.
• Lower declared married status
  Only 13% of the women in the study declared themselves as married. By comparison, 28% of the male primary applicants identified themselves as married.
• Trending younger
  Women in their 20s and 30s together make up one-third (1/3) of the entire data sample. That "20 to 39" age group also accounts for more than half of all the female shoppers in the study.

These and other gender-based trends cut across all regions of the country. Taken together, they're a loud call to agents and carriers to keep women in mind as they develop and market their plans.

Seniors are surging

The U.S. census has been projecting it. Now the report's data provides more evidence of the coming senior boom in Medicare coverage.

One out of every 4 online health insurance shoppers in the study were in the 50-to-64 age range. These are the Baby Boomers. And they're entering retirement and Medicare with higher levels of education and greater computer literacy than their parents' generation.

The Pew Internet & American Life Project found that in 2000, only 45.8% of seniors aged 55 and over have used the Internet. By 2003, the percentage of people over 55 who used the Internet rose to more than 56.7%. And that figure has been gradually rising every year since.

Practical Tips

Although the report uncovered other findings, these three trends point to practical steps that agents, brokers and carriers can use to succeed in the new online marketplace:

• Expand your geography
  If you haven't already, consider expanding your business to other states - especially the states generating the most online shoppers. Keep in mind that half of all Internet-generated leads are consumers from just 10 states. So it pays to make those top states your priority.
• Using the Internet
  Today, an agent in Alaska can service all of Florida, while a broker in Maine can sell plans to consumers in Hawaii. With search engine leads, you can start contacting clients across the country the minute you've gotten your license in your target states. But you also need to have a strong website that can serve as your online storefront.
• Female marketing
  With women making up the overwhelming majority of online health insurance leads, make sure you're up to date on the programs that address women's issues, such as pre-natal, maternity, expanded gynecology networks and related prescription drugs.
• Understand Medicare
  With the expansion of Medicare-subsidized private carrier coverage (and the huge Boomer population), Medicare is on the verge of creating the biggest opportunity in years for agents. And most of these Boomers will be going online for their shopping. Top producers know that they have to be online to serve these seniors - and know how Medicare works.

But your very first step should be to download and read this free report so you have a better understanding of current online shopping trends. To do so, just go to www.norvax.com/datareport.html