- Insurers have begun using social media but have yet to realize its full potential for customer engagement and business benefits. While most insurers are active on platforms like Facebook and Twitter, their interactions are often disjointed and not well-aligned with customer expectations. - To be more effective, insurers need a clear social media strategy and vision consisting of phased customer engagement. This involves first listening to understand customer needs, then engaging more directly through responses and content, and eventually influencing customers as advocates for the brand. - Key aspects of a strategy include defining target audiences, desired business objectives, allowable channels, and integration with back-end processes to optimize benefits like improved marketing, sales, and claims handling

1. • Cognizant 20-20 Insights
Realizing the Potential of Social Media:
A Strategy and Approach for Insurers
While insurers have ventured into social media, their efforts do not
seem to have borne fruit to the degree expected. A honing of insurers’
social media strategy is sorely needed.
Executive Summary
Insurers face daunting prospects in the digital
era where social media can either build customer
base and brand loyalty or erode them in no time
at all.
Insurers globally need to effectively leverage the
social media platform and the explosion of data
exchanged therein. The challenge for insurers
today is not a lack of awareness about social media
but how to extract valuable insights from all the
noise and clutter surrounding it. This paper aims
to help insurance carriers understand conversations, and perceive the underlying sentiments and
the buyer behaviors ensconced in them, in order
to develop an approach for engaging customers
and prospects better.
The paper draws on primary research into social
media activity linked to 15 insurers in the U.S. over
two months, on two separate occasions, in 2012
and 2013 across Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.
The response from their customers and prospects
was analyzed to derive these insights.
The key questions that insurers need to ask are:
• What
are the challenges that they face in
customer engagement, lead generation and
servicing in the digital age?
cognizant 20-20 insights | october 2013
• How can they clearly define a social plan that is
aligned to their vision, strategy and marketing
goals?
• Will
a step-wise social media blueprint and
strategy help to extract maximum benefits
in the form of improved brand awareness,
enhanced leads and better sales?
• What
are the key pitfalls they should avoid
when interacting in the social world?
Being Human Is Being Social
The world has always been a social place, and
people have always talked to each other about
the different aspects of their lives. However,
due to factors such as geographical diversity
and people’s propensity to interact mainly with
their friends and acquaintances, the degree
of separation between individuals historically
was high and information reach was limited
and localized. With the advent of the Internet in
general and social media in particular, there has
been a paradigm shift in interactivity among
people. The ability to chat, post and share information instantly across the globe, even with people
they might not have met, has slashed the degrees
of separation between any two people around the
world. Based on research by Twitter, that gap is
now approximately 3.435. Every minute, 510,000
new posts go up on Facebook and 100,000 tweets
are tweeted on Twitter.1

2. The proliferation of social media has had a significant impact on both buyers and sellers. Today’s
socially active buyer is “360-degree connected,”
“mobile,” “social,” “informed” and “influential” and, most importantly, tends to access and
share information on various social media. This
is even more prominent for financial instruments for wealth, savings and retirement, and for
protection products such as insurance. Customers
now shop for information first on social media
before shopping for the actual insurance product.
Insurance carriers, who have been traditionally publicity-averse, cannot afford to ignore
social media due to the wide reach and spread
of consumer opinion through platforms such as
social networking sites, blogs, wikis, discussion
forums and mash-ups.
Customers leverage different media for satisfying
different needs (see Figure 1).
From an insurance perspective, customer engagement on social media is driven by the following
needs:
• Give and receive feedback on specific insurance
products and coverage across insurance
carriers.
According to research by Pitney Bowes Software
in 2013, 5% of consumers will stop using a brand
that upset them as a result of its social media
behavior.2 Of the respondents, 68% avoided traditional sources of advice such as advisors and
agents and instead sought peer recommendations on social media, and 15% of them bought
insurance based on the peer recommendations.
In such a scenario, it has become imperative that
insurers invest in getting to know the customer
better and align themselves to customer expectations as well as formulate a strategy to leverage
the full potential of a social media presence.
The Value of Being Social
To make a staid topic like insurance gain traction
on social media, insurers need to think out of
the box and focus on areas such as customer
experience transformation, social conversation
for new product design and building strong differentiation using emotive attributes.
Social media can be effectively leveraged to
support insurers’ key business strategies, as
identified by Gartner:3
• Customer-centricity: through user
engagement and improved product design
using social analytics.
• Feedback on insurance carriers’ services and
claims processing.
• Claims transformation: through fraud
• Seek information on insurance carriers’
analytics on social media.
products and services.
How Different Social Media Platforms Are Leveraged by Customers
Tweet to self-express
in a brief manner to
wider audience.
View brand and product
related videos and to
upload videos related to
their experiences.
Post to seek information
from and to inform
immediate circle of
friends.
Blog to share
experiences and
views in detail.
Customer/Prospect
Figure 1
cognizant 20-20 insights
2

3. • Improved underwriting profitability: through
social risk profiling.
• Improved
operational efficiency: through
improved sales process using social analytics.
• Enhanced
brand recall: through customer
engagement with relevant information and rich
content, etc.
Insurers need an evolving model that will
mature from listening on social media to actively
engaging and influencing buyers. The benefits
through the different phases of engagement are
outlined in Figure 2.
Benefit Realization Through Increasing Levels of User
Engagement on Social Media
Increasing Levels of Maturity
Phase 1: Observer
(Listening and
gathering)
Phase 2: Converser
(Engaging with the
users)
Phase 3: Influencer
(Being proactive
and influencing)
Phase 4: Optimizer
(Integrating with
processes)
Product
Design
• Product ideas and
innovations.
• Competitor products.
• Product feedback.
• More customer focused
and customized product
ideation.
• Increased speed-to-market.
Marketing
• Market research
(customers, other
products, competitors,
etc.).
• Analyze reach of
marketing efforts.
• Collect feedback.
• Ideation.
• Brand advocacy
• Customized branding
for different customer
segments.
• Improved inputs for
marketing.
• Opportunity management.
• Lead identification.
• Sentiment analysis to
identify dissatisfied
customers of competitors.
• Lead conversion through
improved engagement.
• Lead qualification
through social media
interaction.
• Product information.
• Sales referrals.
• Cultivate social
influencers.
• Automated lead generation
and integration with lead
management systems.
• Preemptive quoting
workflow integration.
• Social analytics for more
customized sales and
cross-sell and up-sell.
• Feedback on pricing
versus competitors.
• Supplement channel
for getting additional
quoting data and intimations.
• Increased risk reduction
awareness.
• Leverage social risk profile
of prospects for improved
underwriting.
• Feedback on claims
handling versus
competitors.
• Provide clarifications
reactively once claim
is filed.
• Proactively engage with
customer once claim
is filed for increasing
satisfaction.
• Provide claims update
through social media
manually.
• Fraud analytics with social
data.
• Integrated and automated
processes to engage.
customers on social media
when claim is filed.
• Claims system integration
with social media for real
updates.
• Understand pain points/
customer expectations.
• Sentiment analysis.
• Engage with customer
on a regular basis.
• Proactively engage
with the customers
for providing help and
guidance.
• Analyze customer
interests through social
analytics and provide
customized perks.
• Integrate with different
core processes and
systems and provide
relevant information.
• Monitor brand
reputation.
• Improved damage
control.
• Brand advocacy.
• Automated processes to
identify negative comments
about the brand and route it
to the appropriate team.
Sales
Underwriting
Claims
Customer
Servicing
Brand
Management
Figure 2
cognizant 20-20 insights
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4. Actively Social But Ineffective
Several insurers in the U.S. are actively investing
in social media, such as Progressive with its
branding-focused profiles on Facebook and
Liberty Mutual’s business-insurance-specific
Twitter handle. However, although several
insurers have forayed into social media, most of
them have yet to realize the full potential of their
investment.
have a customer-focused approach, they do
not effectively leverage the channel for partner or vendor interactions or have a consolidated platform for facilitating more collaborative interactions among employees, partners
and consumers for realizing greater benefits
(see Figure 3).
• Limited business focus: Insurers have yet to
explore all the different ways to leverage social media. Their vision is limited by some of
the more obvious benefits and their immediate
business focus. They must view social media
as having the potential to transform their business in terms of sales, policy and claims processing and servicing (see Figure 4).
According to a Phoenix Marketing Survey, only
7% of customers are interacting with their
auto insurers.4 This can be attributed to several
reasons:
• Disjointed target user focus: Insurers do not
have a uniform strategy for targeting different
users on social media. While several insurers
• Lack of alignment with consumer expecta-
tions: Insurers’ social media interactions tend
to be driven by their needs rather than by consumers’ needs. Based on our research of 15
leading auto insurers, we have outlined insurers’ activities on social media and the consumers’ response to these activities (see Figure 5,
following page).
User Groups Targeted by
Insurers on Social Media
80%
• Need
for a clear vision and social media
strategy: Although several insurers are
engaging with customers today both proactively and reactively, they lack a clear direction
and a robust strategy that will help them
deliver value in an engagement model with
increasing levels of maturity. They are also
unable to identify and address other necessary
enablers for an effective social media strategy,
such as efficient utilization of social media
tools, leveraging of social analytics and a
change management plan for improving user
engagement.
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
s
or
nd
Ve
Ag
en
ts
Bu
Pa sine
rtn ss
er
s
Co
ns
um
er
s
Em
plo
ye
es
0%
Source: “Usage of Social Media in Insurance,”
NAIC, 2012.
Figure 3
How Insurers Are Using Social Media
Collaborate with
Engage with agents
Innovation
Brand Management
Market Research
Recruitment
Customer Service
Sales
Marketing
0%
20%
40%
60%
Percent of insurers surveyed
Source: “Going social – How business is using social media,” KPMY, 2013
Figure 4
cognizant 20-20 insights
4
80%
100%

5. Alignment of U.S. Insurer Activities with Customer Expectations
Insurers on Social Media
Consumers on Social Media
Decreased customer satisfaction leading
to damaged brand reputation
Most insurers respond to user posts in
automated bot-like manner.
Consumers expect a more personalized,
apt and humane mode of interaction
with the insurer.
Most insurers appear to focus
on fun posts.
Consumers expect more engaging
and entertaining interactions on
social media.
Most of the insurers are seen taking
innovative engagement measures like
gamification, innovative networks, etc.
Consumers expect insurers to innovatively
engage with them.
Skewed brand evaluations by the users
Insurers’ response rate for general
conversations is low.
Consumers are also seen posting positive
feedback and other general conversations.
Missed target user population
Focus on Google+ is very low among
insurers – only 26% of the social budget.
Along with Facebook, Twitter and YouTube,
Google+ is an emerging channel which is used
and trusted by the consumers and influencers.
Lower influence on the users
Insurers are seen creating only
broad themed communities like
Progressive’s Flo, etc.
Consumers believe smaller the community,
greater the influence (56%).
Figure 5
Phased Approach for Customer Engagement on Social Media
First Step
Second Step
Third Step
Listen to your users
Engage with your users
Influence your users
To understand the user needs
and preferences for better
prospecting, product designs
and customized sales.
• Select channels based on the
consumers and competitors.
• Create a company level profile.
• Ensure maximum basic details
such as products, locations, etc.
• Listen to users’ sentiments as
against competitors.
• Ensure monitoring of the out-of-
loop negative feedback.
To improve branding, increase
customer satisfaction, mindshare, etc.
• Proactively engage with your users.
> Have fun based interactions –
highest priority.
> Educate on insurance.
> Timely company updates.
> Advertising.
• Reactively engage with your user.
> Respond to all the user posts with
specific focus and priority on negative complaints.
> Respond in an apt, personalized
and humane mode.
To create more sales and
increase brand advocacy.
• Identify, engage and work with
your influencers.
• Make influential posts like social-
cause initiatives, safety tips posts
during exigencies, etc.
• Provide prospecting enablers like
“Get a Quote” and “Locate Agent.“
Fourth Step
Integrate with processes
To improve efficiencies
and reduce costs.
• Integrate social media with
your back-end processes.
• Feedback monitoring.
• Campaign management.
• Internal collaborations.
• Social graph for underwriting
and claims, etc.
• Sentiment analysis.
Innovate across continuously
to ensure that both technology and social media’s innovative hinges are leveraged for operational efficiencies and reduced costs.
• Leveraging customer analytics.
• Social media monitoring tools.
• Gamification.
• Innovative communities.
• Payments mechanism through
social media.
• Community driven and aligned
promotions and discounts.
• Targeted advertising.
• Espousing marketing and
social cause initiatives.
• Package products specific
to consumer needs.
Figure 6
cognizant 20-20 insights
5
• Automated campaigns.
• Automated sentiment.
• Analysis and lead generation.
• Integration of social media
with other platforms like
mobile, analytics and cloud.

6. Insurers need a clear vision and a stepwise
engagement model for increased ROI. Outlined
in Figure 6 (preceding page) is a phased
customer engagement approach which would
help insurers gain clarity amidst the noise and
clutter on social media.
Embarking on a Social Media Journey
A comprehensive social media policy for an
insurer needs to consider target users, social
activities and social media monitoring tools.
However, formulating policies for these in
isolation without a clear vision or roadmap for
engagement can be a recipe for disaster. These
different aspects needs to be knitted together
into an approach that spans people, processes
and technology to achieve maximum revenue and
customer benefits. In Figure 8, we describe an
ideal roadmap for an insurer spanning the what,
why and how of a social media strategy.
Looking Beyond the Horizon
Some insurers in the U.S. are setting innovative
examples for unlocking the power of social
media to build brands, expand influence and
evangelize for their new product offerings.
Some good examples are the “Join the nation”
call by Nationwide to appeal to young and old
Americans, and the Hartford Center for Mature
Market Excellence for appealing to retired or
retiring customers/prospects using a compassionate approach to retirement policy promotion.
An alternative approach is providing tips on safe
motoring — e.g., the Allstate picture of a car mirror
reading “objects are actually closer than they
appear in the mirror” and showing a biker image,
which develops an affinity with biker groups. This
actually caused a spike in insurance demand
from bikers. Promoting a brand through gamification — with, for example, interesting games to
emphasize safety aspects in farming and risks
such as pest attacks — can capture the imagination of prospects and customers and ensure
better brand recall than multiple brand advertisements on traditional media, as evidenced by
Farmers’ Farmville and State Farms’ Car Town.
Pitfalls to Avoid
The proliferation of multiple channels and media
for interaction including social media platforms
has led to a fragmentation of customer touch
points. This fragmentation and the high velocity
of communications means brands can be made or
unmade in just a few hours. Across industries, the
manner of interaction between buyers and sellers
A Roadmap for Social Media Excellence
• Consideration of the key
social media aspects.
• Platforms and profiles.
• Business objectives
for going social.
• Alignment with
overall strategies?
• Target audience.
• Target base.
• Timelines.
Know your
intent/purpose
Identify your
destination
• Allowable social
media channels.
• Cater to all media or
media in a phased
approach.
Finalize your
route
• Building customer relationships.
• Insurer’s capacity.
• Targets.
• Social media policies/guidelines.
• Competitors’ adoption levels.
• Regulatory compliances.
Lay the road
Checkpoint
• Available technology tools
and widgets – selection,
integration, implementation.
• Underlying processes/
sub-processes.
Check your
wheels
Fill fuel
Have a first
aid kit
Maintain the
right speed
Have a GPS
• Metrics and measurements
• Social media risks.
• Initial rollout time.
• Disaster strategy.
• Break-even time.
• Influencer identification
and working with them.
• Social media team.
• Team composition
for effectiveness.
and role mapping.
• Metrics to sense negativity. • Training and
• Measures to identify the
development.
customer’s changing
• Interaction points
behaviors.
between teams.
Figure 8
cognizant 20-20 insights
Driver
6
• Content strategy.
• Response mechanisms.
• Latest social media
aesthetics.
• Industry best practices.

7. Quick Take
“Social-ite” Insurers
Our research focused on three popular social
media platforms — Facebook, Twitter and YouTube
— and collected data across 15 major North
American automobile insurers during June and
July 2013. Following are some of the key insights
derived from our research.
>> Banter.
Proactive content posted by the insurers was
found to follow a pattern best categorized as:
The insurers’ response time for a significant
number of negative and general conversations
was greater than 12 hours. In cases where they
responded within an hour, there was noticeable
user positivity and satisfaction — based on the
number of likes on the insurers’ responses and
also the tone of the users’ subsequent posts.
• Informational
• The
• Advertising content.
• Company-related information (such as service
• Insurers
content (insurance regulations,
risk management tips, industry trends, etc.).
updates, management statements, annual
reports, etc.).
insurers seemed ill-equipped to handle
escalating negativity. In 44% of such instances,
they did not respond and in some cases deleted
such posts which led to increased grievances.
appeared to respond to posts that
were in their interest, and left many positive
and neutral moments of truth unattended; this
could lead to skewed brand evaluations among
users over time.
• Fun
content (such as seasons greetings,
updates related to sporting events, games,
contests, voting, etc.).
• Insurers
did not seem to have methods to
tackle out-of-loop feedback (outside their social
presence), which was about 69% negative
overall for all the insurers.
Users’ posts on the insurers’ walls were predominantly of two types:
• Negative feedback:
>> On core insurance service of claims, billing
• On
Twitter, insurers deployed social media
management tools to track tweets but tracking
out-of-loop feedback on Facebook remains a
challenge.
and service.
>> Noncore insurance services such as marketing, sales, etc.
• Even
when insurers respond to out-of-loop
feedback posts on Twitter, the responses, which
are driven through social media management
tools, are automated and very generic and
hence not very effective.
• General conversations:
>> Positive feedback.
>> Enquiries.
Proactive Content
Negative Feedback
General Conversations
70%
70%
70%
60%
60%
60%
50%
50%
50%
40%
40%
40%
30%
30%
30%
20%
20%
20%
10%
10%
10%
0%
0%
Information
Content
Facebook
Ads
Company Merriment
Related
Content
Content
Claims
0%
Bill/
Payment
Service
Sales
Twitter
cognizant 20-20 insights
7
Marketing
Misc.
Complaints
Enquiries
Pos.
Banter

8. has the potential to have a significant impact on
the brand, spreading far beyond the concerned
parties. The case Progressive vs. Matt Fischer5 is
a prime example of this in the insurance industry.
Even outside the insurance industry, a big brand
such as Thomas Cook could not escape the
scrutiny of social media when it failed to respond
effectively to an enquiry from a fan whereas
another travel agency, “lowcostholidays.com,”
jumped into the fray and with its excellent PR
steps, managed to put Thomas Cook on the
defensive. This went viral, resulting in very high
brand visibility for “lowcostholidays.com.” On the
other hand, a humane and innovative response
from the sellers has the potential to tilt the
scale in their favor even in the face of negative
feedback. Bodyform, for example, in response to
a male FaceBook fan’s post, created a simple yet
creative retort on YouTube which quickly went
viral and received more than 1,000,000 views in
two days. Another example is when Samsung last
year rejected the request of a fan for a free S3 in
a very kind and humorous way, which impressed
the fan and led him to create a buzz about the
story. After the viral reaction to the story,
Samsung thanked the fan with a S3, resulting in a
happy ending for both.
Insurers should realize that comments and
complaints are inevitable in social media but
they should be treated as valuable feedback
that needs to be dealt with quickly and appropriately. Insurers should learn to leverage social
media not to sell but improve engagement with
customers and the larger communities, which in
turn will yield the benefit of improved business.
Also, the messages should be expressed in a
manner that will position the insurers as firms
interested in community welfare and in running
their businesses ethically with appropriate transparency. This will bring the right accolades and
positive “vibes” in the “social communities.”
Measuring Social ROI for Insurers
Everyone likes to be “liked.” However, for insurers
using social media to achieve real, tangible,
measurable results, the real question is, “How
does this grow my business?” They need to find
ways to turn eyeballs into profits online and
measure and learn from their results. Insurers
should efficiently leverage their social media
presence to procure top-line and bottom-line
benefits such as increased lead generation, brand
equity, organizational image-building, reduced
market research costs and improved customer
service (see Figure 9).
Social Media “Chemistry” for Insurers
Facebook:
Posts, Fans, Followers,
Friends of Fans, Total
Likes, Shares, Comments,
Number of people talking
about you,Mentions.
Blogs:
Twitter:
Comments, Likes,
Dislikes, Ratings.
Re-tweets, Mentions,
Favorites, Followers,
Following, Posts,
Clicks.
YouTube:
Likes, Dislikes Shares,
Comments, Ratings,
Favorites, Views.
General:
User Profiles,
Types of Users
Web Traffic, Visits,
Response Time,
Response Rates,
Replies, etc.
VALUE BENEFITS
New Leads
Brand Recognition
What was your reach?
What is my mindshare as
compared to my
competitors?
How many prospects did
you identify?
What is the no. of
connections of my
competitor vis-à-vis
mine?
What is the reach of my
brand when compared to
my competitors?
Improved Customer
Service
Relationship Building
Customer Insights
What is the breadth of
your user community
engagement – i.e.,
number of participating
users?
How many new product
ideas did you generate?
How many posts does a
user make on your profile?
What is the depth of the
engagement – i.e., the
number of posts made by
the user per month?
What is the cost and
time saved in terms of
R&D?
How effectively were
you able to use this
data for your business
processes such as
underwriting and
claims?
Out of them, how many are
enquiries, negative
feedback, positive feedback
and banter?
What is the increase in
your community fans and
followers over a month?
Figure 9
cognizant 20-20 insights
8
How many of these
conversations have you
closed successfully?
Was your response quick
enough?

9. Social Media for Digital Transformation
Insurers are looking to stay abreast of what
customers and prospects are talking about in
the turbocharged social world. A structured
framework based on a robust social media
strategy for customer engagement can enable
insurers to cut through the clutter and listen
to the sentiments behind the conversations. A
good strategy would ideally enable listening,
engaging, analyzing, measuring and integrating
with customers, producers, prospects and the
community at large.
Any reluctance to embrace social media will
prove costly in the long run — consumers increas-
ingly look for information and community/friend
recommendations on Web sites. Social media is
already their preferred mode of engagement and
looks to remain so for the foreseeable future.
Social media is not about immediate sales but
forming a bond with relevant audiences.
While social media has the potential to effectively redefine the customer engagement model,
insurers should tread carefully to realize full
benefits while avoiding the possible pitfalls on this
journey. Leveraged correctly, social media can be
the ideal interactive means for brand promotion,
converting loyal customers to brand advocates
and enhancing reach in today’s technology-savvy
environment.
Footnotes
1
“100 social media statistics for 2012,” socialskinny.com, http://thesocialskinny.com/100-social-mediastatistics-for-2012/.
2
“Social media: contrasting the marketing and consumer perspectives,” 2013, Pitney Bowes Software,
http://slp.pbinsight.com/downloads/slp_success_downloads/Social_Media-WP_Pitney_Bowes_
Software_2012.pdf.
3
“Hype Cycle for P&C Insurance,” 2012, Gartner, http://www.gartner.com/id=2569319.
4
According to a 2013 survey conducted by Phoenix Marketing International on 2,000 auto insurance
customers, http://www.prweb.com/releases/2013/5/prweb10775136.htm.
5
As obtained in the “theblaze.com” site, this case revolved around an instance where Progressive failed
to respond appropriately to a consumer in a claim situation which involved a highly emotional note.
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2012/08/20/progressive-reaches-settlement-with-gbtvs-matt-fisherafter-defending-sisters-killer/.
References
• 2013
Digital Influence Report, TechnoratiMedia, 2013, http://technorati.com/business/article/technorati-medias-2013-digital-influence-report/.
• “Taking
Social Media from Talk to Action,” Harvard Business Review, 2012, http://www.sas.com/
resources/whitepaper/wp_23348.pdf.
• “Usage of Social Media in Insurance,” NAIC, 2012, http://www.naic.org/store/free/USM-OP.pdf.
• “Going social – How business is using social media,” KPMG 2013, http://www.kpmg.com/ES/es/ActualidadyNovedades/ArticulosyPublicaciones/Documents/Going-Social.pdf.
• “Demystifying Social Media Trends for the Insurance Industry,” Cognizant, 2012, http://www.cognizant.
com/InsightsWhitepapers/Demystifying-Social-Business-Trends-for-the-Insurance-Industry.pdf.
• Degrees of Separation – Wikipedia , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Degrees_of_separation.
• “The Auto Insurance Case That Blew Up on the Internet,” New York Times, August
17, 2012,
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/18/your-money/progressives-side-of-the-insurance-case-thatblew-up-on-the-internet.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0.
• “Using social media to engage, listen and learn,” NHS Networks, 2010, http://www.networks.nhs.
uk/nhs-networks/smart-guides/documents/Using%20social%20media%20to%20engage-%20
listen%20and%20learn.pdf.
• Insights taken from http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/tag/social-media-strategy/.
• Insights taken from http://www.openvalley.info/global-social-media/international-social-networkingstrategies/.
• Insights taken from http://www.information-management.com/blogs/business_analytics_data_integration_social_crm-10017989-1.htm.
cognizant 20-20 insights
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10. About the Authors
Vijai S Raghunathan, AVP, Consulting, heads Cognizant Business Consulting’s Insurance Practice. He
comes with over two decades of experience in insurance consulting, advisory services, CoE setup and
building a global consulting practice. Vijai has lived in the U.S., UK, Europe and APAC, and has delivered
transformation projects for large insurers in these regions before relocating to India. He is now based
out of Bangalore and drives consulting engagements across geographies. He holds a postgraduate degree from Delhi School of Economics, AICWA, FIII and AIRM from UK. Additionally, he is a LOMA
Level 1 (U.S.) and INS (Insurance Institute of America) and is pursuing CPCU (U.S.). He can be reached at
Vijai.Raghunathan@cognizant.com.
Kinhekar Sagar is a Senior Manager of Consulting with Cognizant Business Consulting, with a focus on
the insurance industry. He has more than a decade of extensive experience in various leadership positions
in the Indian insurance industry as an industry insider and as a management consultant. His industry
skills range across sales and distribution, underwriting and claims. While working as a management
consultant, Sagar helped several insurance clients in the life and non-life domain in the areas of market
entry strategy, customer experience-based distribution and services, business planning and operational
effectiveness across geographies including North and Latin America, UK, APAC and Europe. Sagar is a
chemical engineer by training who has done his executive postgraduation studies at IIM Calcutta. He can
be reached at Sagar.Kinhekar@cognizant.com.
Abhishek Mishra is a Consulting Manager with Cognizant Business Consulting with a focus on the
insurance industry. He has executed several consulting engagements across different process areas for
insurers across multiple geographies. Abhishek has also pursued primary research in leveraging mobility
and social media enterprise-wide. He has a master’s degree in management from the Xavier Institute of
Management, Bhubaneswar (XIMB). Abhishek also holds certifications from AICPCU. He can be reached at
Abhishek.Mishra3@cognizant.com.
Vinodh Stanley Stephen is a Consultant with Cognizant Business Consulting with a focus on the insurance
industry. He has extensively researched strategies for insurance carriers in developing markets. Vinodh
has a master’s degree in management from the Institute for Financial Management and Research (IFMR)
and a bachelor of engineering degree from Anna University. He also holds certifications from AICPCU and
CII. He can be reached at Vinodhstanley.Stephen@cognizant.com.
Jagannathan G is a Business Analyst with Cognizant Business Consulting with a focus on the insurance
industry. His other interests include Enterprise 2.0 deployments in organizations. He has a postgraduate diploma in management from the T.A. Pai Management Institute (TAPMI) and a bachelor’s degree
in technology from Government College of Technology, Coimbatore. He also holds certifications from
AICPCU. He can be reached at Jagannathan.Govindarajan@cognizant.com.
About Cognizant
Cognizant (NASDAQ: CTSH) is a leading provider of information technology, consulting, and business process outsourcing services, dedicated to helping the world’s leading companies build stronger businesses. Headquartered in
Teaneck, New Jersey (U.S.), Cognizant combines a passion for client satisfaction, technology innovation, deep industry
and business process expertise, and a global, collaborative workforce that embodies the future of work. With over 50
delivery centers worldwide and approximately 164,300 employees as of June 30, 2013, Cognizant is a member of the
NASDAQ-100, the S&P 500, the Forbes Global 2000, and the Fortune 500 and is ranked among the top performing
and fastest growing companies in the world. Visit us online at www.cognizant.com or follow us on Twitter: Cognizant.
World Headquarters
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Phone: +1 201 801 0233
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Email: inquiry@cognizant.com
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Phone: +44 (0) 20 7297 7600
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Phone: +91 (0) 44 4209 6000
Fax: +91 (0) 44 4209 6060
Email: inquiryindia@cognizant.com
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