In 2023, Edelweiss General Insurance – part of the Edelweiss Financial Group, which entered the cluttered nonlife insurance space in 2018 - rebranded itself to Zuno General Insurance (Zuno GI) as a new age digital insurer with an aspiration to reimagine and redefine insurance to make it “easy, friendly, and transparent”. This was based on using the three pillars of customer experience, innovation and digital delivery platform. Since its inception, the company was clear in its intent to approach insurance, with a contemporary consumer lens, in a category seen to be confusing and not needed till it was mandatory.
Ketan Mankikar, Vice President Marketing & Communications, Zuno General Insurance says, “We felt that buying an insurance should be a hassle- and stress-free experience. The Z in Zuno stands for the Zeal, energy and passion and UNO is the singular purpose of reimagining insurance. Our positioning line says ‘Easy, Breezy, Surely. While there are regulations and a format to be followed in terms of product structuring – we simplify insurance for consumers to understand and educate them about the need for insurance. Our communication is straightforward; that became our brand voice and gave the brand tonality for the conversations we have with our consumers and stakeholders, thereby humanizing the brand. That’s the Easy part of the positioning.”
He continues, “Coming to the Breezy part - Insurance is full of jargons and complicated, while we are educating consumers, we need to make the communication entertaining and engaging. So breezy for us is to make insurance a slice of life for consumers to understand at the point of time they require the insurance and the process for that. The last part - Surely is very important as this resonates with trust. Insurance is a business of promise - I'm promising you that if something happens, I'm there for you. That is the surely part, that Zuno GI will be always there with you. Whatever we do, we try and tick all these boxes.”
The Media Game
In line with Zuno GI’s positioning to reimagine the world of insurance, the brand associated with Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) women’s cricket team for the inaugural edition of the Women’s Premier League (WPL) in 2023 as the Official General Insurance for WPL 2023. The rationale – WPL was seen to be a game changer for women’s cricket with the women cricketers reimagining the world of cricket, just like Zuno GI reimagining the world of insurance, making the partnership a natural fit for Zuno GI. In addition to WPL, the brand is looking at other sporting events to build media presence.
Early this year, Zuno GI launched a road safety awareness initiative, ‘The Talking Zebra’ to educate motorists and pedestrians about the importance of following traffic rules in an engaging way. This yearly CSR initiative to promote responsible driving habits for safer roads is aligned with the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways’ (MoRTH) declaration of January as Road Safety Month. Through the Talking Zebra Campaign, Zuno aimed to amplify the national focus on reducing road accidents by promoting responsible road usage. The Talking Zebra campaign featured a witty and interactive Zebra that was brought to life at traffic signals. As part of the campaign, a promoter dressed as a zebra — an embodiment of zebra crossings — interacted with drivers and pedestrians at busy traffic signals in six major cities – Mumbai, Goa, Kolkata, Delhi, Hyderabad, and Bengaluru. The Talking Zebra used wit, and humor to make road safety an important and reminded everyone to “Keep your cool, follow traffic rules” while promoting essential practices like using zebra crossings, stopping at red lights, and avoiding jaywalking.
Looking at the brand’s marketing strategy, it following the industry practice where Digital plays the lead medium to build brand salience, with a presence throughout the year with traditional media used for product launches to build reach and brand recall.
The GenZ Change
While earlier health insurance was looked at from a tax perspective, the conversation has changed with GenZs realizing the importance of health insurance in their overall portfolio as part of financial planning. Mankikar highlights that GenZs today have multiple choices compared to the earlier generation and are not comparing the brand with the category competition. Instead, the comparison is with marketplaces, food delivery apps and quick commerce players, that provide instant service. This reflects GenZ mindset which prioritizes multiple choices, convenience and a control over their choices and this is what Zuno GI strives to offer its consumers.
Innovation In Use
Going ahead, Zuno GI is betting big on “innovation in use”, as he says, “If you ask me what is my marketing strategy, customer is at the core of everything we do. We listen to the customer and take insights from the customer. That's the basis on which are innovations take place.”
Citing an example in the motor insurance space, he explains that the insurance offered to EV/hybrid cars was similar to normal cars which have internal combustion engines. However, when it comes to EV/Hybrid cars, there are other parameters that need to be looked while taking out an insurance, such as battery, the battery life, battery charging stations, fire etc. To address this, Zuno GI was the first in the industry to offer motor insurance tailored for EV and electric vehicle products. Motor insurance is calculated as an asset base. i.e. the vehicle, and
does not take into account the driver and his/her driving skills.
Before Zuno GI’s rebranding, a consumer study titled ‘Usage Based Insurance: Decoding Awareness, Perception and Behaviour’ - to understand Millennial and GenZ’s awareness, understanding and consideration of the concept of usage-based insurance (UBI) in India. Backed by this study, Zuno GI brought in an innovation with the usage-based insurance/distance-based insurance, which worked on switch on and switch off mode, where the policyholder only pays for insurance based on the days, he/she drives the car and distance travelled. Another innovation looked at driving behaviour of the driver and rewarded drivers on the basis of how they drive, i.e. “the pay how you drive”, based on Zuno GI’s mobile telematic app, that calculates the score and based on the score a discount is passed on to a safe and a good driver.
Zuno GI’s innovation also extends to the Zuno Health Insurance policy clubbed with the Zuno Health 241 Add on, where a policyholder can get two years of cover for a single, affordable premium. This came from an insight that many people who take insurance and pay premium do not use it in the first year. In this case, if there are no claims in the first year, the premium for the second year is free.
Mapping The Road Ahead
Looking at Zuno GI’s overall portfolio business, 50% of its business comes from motor insurance (car and bike), 40% from health and the remaining 10% from fire and personal accidents. Mankikar says, “As a category, motor is important for us as we were the first movers in the usage-based insurance space. We will also be focusing on retail health for the next couple of years. In addition, we also do insurance for fire, surety bonds, engineering products which are important for the growth of infrastructure projects; however, the focus will remain on motor
and health insurance.”
Commenting on the past five years, Mankikar shares that Zuno GI’s growth rate has been between 40% to 50% with similar growth rates expected looking ahead. He says, “We will be maintaining the same growth rate, especially in motor insurance where we have seen significant growth. We saw 60% growth in H1 and there is a lot of potential to expand. What will further aid the motor business growth in H2 is that typically the motor sales see a big boost during the festive season in October. Similarly, health insurance sees a boost post-January.”
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