Health Insurance Market Intelligence Tips – Part 1

Know Your Competition

Health insurance market intelligence efforts start with obtaining basic information about your competition:

• Which insurers compete for subscribers in your statistical market areas?
• How are insurer product portfolios changing with the changes in the market?
• How do other insurer plan offerings compare to your plans?
• What does the competitive health insurance plan landscape look like in your target statistical area markets?
• How are the new State Health Exchanges affecting your relevant markets?

If you are unable to answer those questions in whole or in part, you should probably be spending resources on gaining the entire picture if you want to gain market share and increase the value of your organization.

Which insurers are competing for subscribers in your statistical market areas? Health Insurance companies are entering and exiting markets every month. Competitor market volatility has increased with the changes in federal, state, and local legislatures. Keeping up with which insurers are entering and exiting which markets is becoming an incredibly difficult challenge.

Consequently, you have to keep up with these changes to stay competitive. The sooner you know what is going on, the better positioned you will be in reacting to any changes. Furthermore, if you monitor changes over time you can trend those changes to get an even deeper understanding of how a competitor strategy is playing out in the market.

How are insurers' product portfolios changing with the changes in the market? Knowing how your competition is reacting will give you a great deal of insight into how they operate, and what market fluctuations they are more susceptible to. Knowing your competitors as well as you know yourself will grant you the versatility necessary to react more quickly and more intelligently than your competitors.

How do other insurer plan offerings compare to your plans?  Most companies in the health insurance market design their plans and coverage specifically so that they are difficult to compare against other companies. It is a monumental task to sift through the data to figure out how they compare to your products and services directly. However, if your health insurance market intelligence efforts can overcome this hurdle, you will have the insight that will put you in an incredible position to own the markets in which you compete.

What does the competitive health insurance plan landscape look like in your target statistical area markets? If you are gaining success in one market and looking to expand, it will be of the utmost importance to understand the market in which you are headed. Expansion can be very risky business.  Maximizing your knowledge of a new area before going there can be tricky and rather costly.  Obtaining complete information of a potential market in a timely and cost effective manner will add a great deal of value for your company.

How are the new State Health Exchanges affecting your relevant markets? With the passing of the greatly publicized health care bill, many states are creating health exchanges to try to assist in the affordability of health insurance. So far, they are having a minimal impact. However, they are still in their infancy and the end game of these exchanges is yet to be fully realized. Keeping an eye on what services they are offering, and how far that service reaches will be paramount to succeeding in the future.

For more information on how you can gather this data and process it into information please continue on to 3 Health Insurance Market Intelligence Tips - Part 2