SPSS - UK Customers

Natexis Assurances

Predictive Analytics software from SPSS Inc. hits marketing targets

The situation

Natexis Assurances, formerly known as Assurances Banque Populaire, is the insurance division of Groupe Banque Populaire. It is active in all areas of property and casualty insurance, as well as in life insurance, which includes individual savings life insurance, group savings life insurance, personal protection insurance, and property insurance. The company provides more than four million policies to its customers, representing total assets of $18 billion.

The challenge

Natexis had been spending significant amounts of money on direct mail campaigns that were followed up by local branches. The central marketing department defined the campaigns, contacted the local branches to determine if they were interested in participating, and then executed the campaigns. Since branch participation was discretionary, it was crucial that the marketing department demonstrate that its campaigns generated high-quality responses, to justify and reinforce the local branches' investments.

To further increase the quality of its direct marketing campaigns, Natexis Assurances set out to find an application that would allow it easily to create, optimise, and then execute targeted marketing campaigns, with a focus on securing high-quality leads for the branches and, ultimately, generating substantially more revenue per campaign.

The solution

After investigating various vendors, Natexis Assurances relies on predictive analytics software from SPSS Inc. This enabled the company’s marketers to efficiently create and execute their marketing campaigns. Using this application, they could better understand customers’ needs, and optimise campaign response rates by selecting those who would generate the highest value for the company.

Not only did the SPSS Inc. software offer the functionality that Natexis Assurances was seeking, it also fitted seamlessly with their existing marketing processes.

The software enables us to execute far more effective marketing campaigns, reduces our sales and marketing costs, and significantly increases the conversion rates we normally achieve. Implementing predictive analytics has already delivered substantial additional revenue, and we expect to gain much more in the near future.
Arthur Seck
Strategic Marketing Manager
Natexis Assurances

The results

Predictive analytics software enabled Natexis Assurances to precisely target its best customers for each campaign, and provided highly qualified leads to the branch offices for follow up. As a result, direct mail volumes were reduced by 50 percent, while revenues doubled.

In June 2003, the company implemented a life insurance campaign using its new SPSS Inc. software. Natexis used a direct mailing, followed up by phone calls by the local branches. Compared to similar campaigns that had been run earlier that year, the size of the campaign was reduced by 46 percent, while the number of policies sold was increased by 55 percent.

In addition, since the software selected only those customers who were most likely to make higher investments, actual returns generated by the campaign increased by 109 percent and resulted in $1.6 million in additional revenue.

The campaign also demonstrated the software's ability to precisely predict the response rate and results of the campaign. The number of policies sold within the group of customers selected by using predictive analytics proved to be three times higher than that within other groups. On top of that, the average revenue per customer investment was 92 percent higher.

"We are very satisfied using SPSS Inc. software, as it has proven to generate tangible business benefits very quickly," comments Arthur Seck, strategic marketing manager of Natexis Assurances. "The software enables us to execute far more effective marketing campaigns, reduces our sales and marketing costs, and significantly increases the conversion rates we normally achieve. Implementing predictive analytics has already delivered substantial additional revenue, and we expect to gain much more in the near future."

With help from SPSS Inc. predictive analytics software, Natexis Assurances' strategic marketing department is now in the driver's seat. The department can control the marketing approach for each client and, at the same time, optimise the cost and return of each campaign on behalf of their branch offices – a positive outcome for each group and for the company overall.

Interested in how SPSS Inc. Predictive Analytics software can improve marketing outcomes? Download the Natexis Assurances PDF here.