Strategy season is here: Time think ahead for open enrollment

Benefit advisors know that their heaviest technical season is the fourth quarter of the year. That’s because most employers have at least some, if not most, of their benefits tied to a calendar year. As a result, there’s very little time for strategic thinking until the dust clears from the enrollment and implementation campaigns.

Since every year begins a new cycle of planning, now is the perfect time for advisors to revisit their strategy. The formula for greatest success is to plan strategically so it’s easier to execute flawlessly when the busy season hits. Here are tips for building the right strategy, specifically focusing on voluntary benefits, which has been the greatest growth opportunity for the past several years.

1. Develop a clear and focused strategy. Analyze what went right and what could’ve been done better in the preceding enrollment. I recommend a dialogue with your customers; don’t just rely on your internal team, because it’s easy to miss what’s most important to customers without their input. Strategic planning is a place to leave titles and functions behind and gather as much input as possible. Once you have areas to focus on, your team can develop strategies to address issues.

2. Maintain a broad palette of products and services. The trend has clearly moved towards satisfying the needs of small constituencies within the employee base. Voluntary benefits can be a perfect reflection of employee diversity; that’s why products and services answering needs like the mental and physical wellbeing of employees are important to consider, as are pet insurance, financial wellness, and ID theft/cybersecurity products. These products have seen growing interest from employers, who are facing unprecedented challenges in recruiting and retaining talent. But don’t neglect traditional products like medical, life, supplemental, and income protection. You should also consider innovative ways to market non-traditional products because they do not involve underwriting or plan year related enrollment.

3. Find ways to take work away from employers. Employers recognize the importance of benefit programs, but their staff appreciates easier processes and less work. Making their life easier helps retain employer relationships.

4. Reimagine, simplify, and personalize the employee experience. Employees don’t like difficult processes either. Work with benefit administration and carrier partners to identify touch points for employees and ask how they could be simplified. Employees want to be educated, but they don’t want to spend too much time on the process. Work on clever ways to get education across and make it fun. Think of Tom Sawyer and the whitewashed fence.

5. Give employees access to 24/7/365 communications whenever possible. Some products and services should be available for enrollment on-demand. This can extend to other products when immediate response underwriting is available.

Read more: Employees often dread open enrollment, misunderstand benefit options, survey finds

Finally, be sure customers understand that the products and services you offer follow a strategy. It should be easy for the employee to understand why they are relevant. Easy for the employee to afford. Easy for the employee to enroll. And easy for the employer to administer.