Tag: Annuities

Ensight™ Surges Past One Million Digital Life Sales Presentations

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The company’s cloud-based sales experience platform is now servicing over 250,000 financial professionals across the U.S.

 

SAN DIEGO, CA, March 17, 2021 — Ensight™, the market leading life, long-term care (LTC) and annuity digital sales acceleration platform for insurance carriers, distributors and financial professionals, today announced that over one million digital sales presentations have been generated on its insurtech platform. Ensight’s growth rate also continues to compound, driven by an increase in remote selling, the hybrid wholesaling transformation shift and emergence of the “digital agent” model. Today the platform works with over 250,000 financial professionals.

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“Every financial services sales experience today is digital, interactive, visual and easy to understand – whether that is the leading financial planning software used by advisors, or the investment management and 401K portals now experienced by the consumer. Life, annuities and long-term care are the only remaining financial product areas out of step with today’s digital experience expectations,” said Bill Unrue, CEO, Ensight.

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The COVID-19 pandemic has acted as a digital catalyst over the past year, as life and annuity insurance carriers and distributors have had to adapt to a virtual (remote) sales operation. This business response is also now accelerating a permanent transformation to a “hybrid wholesaling” and “digital agent” sales and service model. Wholesaling transformation, in particular, offers the sector an opportunity to achieve travel and entertainment (T&E) budgetary savings, while driving improved wholesaler productivity, more flexible advisor servicing, and better product marketing through digital education.

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The Ensight sales acceleration platform was launched in 2017 to help modernize and transform the sales experience for life and annuity insurance carriers, distributors, financial professionals and consumers. Ensight simplifies the complexity of the permanent life insurance (GUL, Whole, UL / IUL, and VUL), LTC and annuity sales engagement into an intuitive, consumer-friendly digital experience. The platform leverages data visualization and rich content to create a modern interactive sales discussion, which has underpinned the rapid shift to virtual (remote) selling during the COVID-19 pandemic. Over 250,000 financial professionals, including insurance agents and advisors, now use Ensight to better explain how a permanent life insurance or annuity product works and interactively demonstrate product features, such as cash value accumulation, rates of return and policy charges.

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“The life and annuity sales model is at a once-in-a-generation inflection point. From the internal sales desk and wholesaler-advisor channel to the client’s point of sale experience, the entire value chain of the traditional sales model is being structurally reorganized and digitally redefined,” said Nathan Jacobson, Executive Vice President (EVP), Life Insurance, Simplicity Financial Group. “Ensight is the clear market leader today, enabling modern, interactive sales presentations that simplify the wholesaler-advisor-client discussion of complex permanent life, LTC and annuity products.”

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To learn more about Ensight and its digital sales acceleration platform, visit www.ensightcloud.com.

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About Ensight™
Ensight™ is the leading cloud-based insurance sales acceleration platform for more than 500 Life and Annuity distributors, thousands of financial professionals, as well as many of the largest North American insurance carriers. Headquartered in San Diego, California, Ensight helps drive sales growth and productivity, while addressing the entire sales lifecycle experience – from prospect to policyholder, new business to inforce.

 

Explosive Shift to Hybrid Wholesaling & Agent Sales is Taking-Off

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The Life & Annuity “Pre-Covid” Sales Model Will Not Return

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This week’s LIMRA Distribution Conference only confirmed that the rapidly emerging Life and Annuity sales operation is going “hybrid”.

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If you missed the conference, you can read three wonderful articles debating the “Hybrid” trend in Insurance News Net, with reference to some fantastic research by LIMRA:

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– “Virtual Selling Might Be Here To Stay”

– “Hybrid Is The Future For Advisors, Says LIMRA Research”

– “Will Agents Ever Return To The Office”

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Of course, given our (Ensight) discussions with L&A senior executive sales leadership and digital transformation leaders over the past 18 months, this comes as no surprise.

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Indeed, I wrote about the coming transformation of the traditional life and annuity wholesaling model last year. Whether you call it “eWholesaling” or “Hybrid Wholesaling”, it makes no difference, digital sales enablement for wholesalers is the new English Longbow, changing the nature of ‘engagement’ in the sector.

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And, notably, the digital hybridization of the advisor-client discussion has already been underway for several years. It’s worth noting that the majority of financial advisors today already use some form of virtual meeting (Zoom; WebEx; Go To Meeting) in the client engagement repertoire.

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Whether you are a L&A carrier or distributor, if you are not putting a hybrid wholesaling and agent digital model into practice today – you simply won’t be able to catch-up tomorrow.

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But let’s also take a look at 7 additional dynamics at play in the panorama of market forces which are driving “The Shift”:

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1. Millennial “Digital Tools” Expectations – As a Gen Xer, it still shocks me that millennials now span up to 40 years old. As the first purely digital generation, millennial wholesalers, advisors and agents will expect digital tools to support a hybrid sales engagement model, if they are going to work for your company or sell your products.

2. The New Consumer Digital Expectation Bar – The client service model is in rapid transition. Informed by Vanguard, Robo-Advisors, new trading apps (Robinhood), and every VC-backed FinTech firm driving a simplified hybrid digital experience, the mandate now is to engage with clients both digitally and in a personal manner.

3. The “T&E” Transition – The old “Travel and Entertainment” cost centre is ripe for a rebranding exercise. I like to call it – “Technology & Education”. Given emerging Best Interest (BI) regulation and GenX / millennial advisor preferences, spending millions on travel and entertainment – while underfunding digital – is a recipe for disaster.

4. Growing Eyeballs on Sales Effectiveness – Every other sector in the modern economy focuses on sales effectiveness (funnel yield, productivity, efficiency and customer satisfaction) through a data-rich, digital approach. Carriers need to move fast to enable, empower and measure both wholesaling teams and agent channels. Winners and losers will be defined on this battleground.

5. The Rise of “Platform Distribution” – Today, digital “platforms” are the structure of the economy. And every platform is hybrid in nature. When was the last time you weren’t prompted to “chat” in your banking app. The emerging Life and Annuity distribution platforms are already driving the scale adoption of hybrid virtual selling. Many carrier wholesaling teams are at risk of falling far behind the norm.

6. The New “Hybrid” Workplace – The work-life balance trend has been underway for a decade now. And COVID-19 will permanently alter the vision and model of the “corporate office”. The new corporate office is “virtual”; and, the new internal sales desk wholesaler and captive agent is “Zoom-empowered”.

7. The New Power of Talent – As the Life and Annuity sector moves forward into the technology “Arms Race”, talent will define the winners and losers. And talent can demand how and where it works in today’s economy. Today’s emerging titans, upending Fortune 500 firms and sectors, at their heart, are built on talent alone. If you want to win in the life and annuity distribution game, recruit, retain and empower a hybrid top-talent sales force with empowering digital tools.

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We are now entering uncharted waters for the Life and Annuity sector. The “arms race” has begun. And the nature of this arms race is that the speed of digital change and competition will only increase with every passing year. It is Moore’s Law, now applied to the Life & Annuity sector.

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Whether you are a Life & Annuity carrier or distributor, if you are not putting a hybrid sales and service digital model into practice today – you simply won’t be able to catch-up tomorrow.

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Sail with the wind, not against it.

WINK UNVEILS EXTRAORDINARY SALES DATA PORTAL

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Wink, Inc. Puts the Power of 23 Years of Insurance Sales in their Users’ Hands

Des Moines, Iowa. September 18, 2020– Wink, Inc., the company behind the insurance industry’s #1 resource for annuity and life insurance sales data, since 1997, has given the Platinum subscribers of Wink’s Sales & Market Report an upgrade. Today the firm announced the addition of an enhanced web portal and dynamic sales data query for the use of their subscribers.

 

“Our flagship sales report continues to grow and change, and we’re developing technology to make it even more impressive,” proclaimed Sheryl J. Moore, president and CEO of Wink, Inc. She continued, “We are now providing the ability to access our reports with greater ease, as well as the opportunity to slice and dice our life insurance and annuity data- in any way you can imagine!”

 

This new Wink’s Sales & Market Report portal provides an easily-accessible query for locating specific Adobe PDF or Microsoft Excel editions of sales reports; whether searching for sales at industry, company, or product level- for both life insurance and annuity data. Supplemental reports can be quickly identified in a like manner.

 

The enhanced Sales Data Query delivers HTML or Microsoft Excel results, based upon every query option mentioned above. In addition, subscribers can search using additional options which include: sales by distribution channel, sales based upon company ratings, sales of products with specific product features, or even sales of products with select rider features.

 

Moore commented, “Essentially our Sales Data Query gives subscribers the ability to combine product features from our AnnuitySpecs and LifeSpecs Tools, with our Product Level, Company Level, and Industry Level sales data. So, if you ever wondered how much sales there were in the second quarter, of variable annuities with bonuses, offered by A-rated companies- we’ll give you that result in just a couple of clicks!” She continued, “Plus, our Platinum subscribers now have 23 years of data included as a part of their subscription.”

 

Future enhancements of Wink’s Sales & Market Report will provide subscribers with data on every data point reported by Wink, for each participating peer, on a quid pro quo basis. Also, subscribers using both Wink’s Sales & Market Report, in conjunction with the AnnuitySpecs and/or LifeSpecs Tools, will soon have the ability to see sales rankings and market share data in their quest for product information.

 

The Sales Reports and Sales Data Query are available NOW for subscribers of Wink’s Sales & Market Report.

 

Those interested in a subscription can contact Wink’s support team at (855) ASK-WINK, or support@winkintel.com.

 

 

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For more information, go to www.WinkIntel.com.

 

Wink, Inc. is the company behind the most comprehensive life insurance and annuity due-diligence tools, AnnuitySpecs and LifeSpecs at www.WinkIntel.com. Wink, Inc. is the distributor of the quarterly Wink’s Sales & Market Report. Serving as the insurance industry’s #1 resource of indexed insurance product sales since 1997, this report provides sales by product, company, crediting method, index, distribution, surrender charge period, and more. Wink’s Sales & Market Report expanded to cover all deferred annuity products in 2015, all deferred variable annuity products in 2019, and all non-variable cash value life insurance products in 2017.

 

The staff of Wink, Inc. has the combined experience of more than 175 years working with insurance products, more than a decade of which is specific to competitive intelligence. Based in Des Moines, Iowa, the firm offers competitive intelligence and market research in the life insurance and annuity industries; serving financial services professionals, distributors, manufacturers, regulators, and consultants on both a domestic and global basis.

 

Sheryl J. Moore is president and CEO is the guiding force behind Wink, Inc. Ms. Moore previously worked as a market research analyst for top carriers in the life insurance and annuity industries. Her views on the direction of the market are frequently heard in seminars and quoted by industry trade journals.

 

September 18, 2020

Des Moines, IA

(855) ASK-WINK

 

Indexed Annuities and Structured Annuities Have a Record-Setting Year!

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Wink, Inc. Releases 4th Quarter, 2019 Deferred Annuity Sales Results

Des Moines, Iowa. March 17, 2020– Wink’s Sales & Market Report is the insurance industry’s #1 resource for annuity sales data since 1997. Sixty-two indexed annuity providers, 50 fixed annuity providers, 68 multi-year guaranteed annuity (MYGA) providers, 11 structured annuity providers, and 47 variable annuity providers participated in the 90th edition of Wink’s Sales & Market Report for 4th Quarter, 2019.

 

Total fourth quarter sales for all deferred annuity sales were $53.3 billion; a decline of 3.3% when compared to the previous quarter. Total 2019 deferred annuity sales were $221.8 billion.

 

Noteworthy highlights for all deferred annuity sales in the fourth quarter include Jackson National Life ranking as the #1 carrier overall for deferred annuity sales, with a market share of 9.8%. Lincoln National Life followed in second place, while AIG, Equitable Financial and Allianz Life rounded-out the top five carriers in the market, respectively. Jackson National’s Perspective II Flexible Premium Variable & Fixed Deferred Annuity, a variable annuity, was the #1 selling deferred annuity, for all channels combined in overall sales for the fourth consecutive quarter.

 

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