CMO50

26 50

CMO50 2016 #26-50: John Moore, Bupa A/NZ

  • Name John Moore
  • Title Director of marketing
  • Company Bupa A/NZ
  • Commenced role June 2013
  • Reporting Line Managing director, A/NZ
  • Member of the Executive Team Yes
  • Marketing Function 140 staff, 8 direct reports
  • Industry Sector Insurance
  • 2015 ranking 26-50
  • Related

    Brand Post

    There’s a holistic change going on at Bupa to focus on customers’ health and care needs.

    “We’ve really seen a shift in our strategy over the last 12 months to position Bupa as a leader in health and care and to be loved by our customers,” marketing director, John Moore, says.

    One of the most significant and effective ways this is being done is through Bupa’s online health and care hub, The Blue Room. Within a 12-month period, The Blue Room has been recognised as one of the leading content sites in the sector, winning a series of awards.

    The most significant impact has been on engagement with customers. The site has had more than 1.5 million unique visitors to date, and is still growing at 20 per cent a month. This has driven a positive impact on sales, customer retention and the overall Bupa brand.

    Thanks to the great success with The Blue Room locally, the content approach is being extended globally.

    “This strategy has been led by marketing team because we know our connection with our customers grows when people understand the wide breadth of health and care services we offer and how we’re making a positive difference in health and care,” Moore states in his CMO50 submission.

    In fact, if Moore had to pick his proudest moment in the last 12 months, it would be galvanising the organisation behind the ‘Bupa value proposition’.

    “This brings the customer centred marketing/digital capabilities and techniques we use today with our customers to shaping and building our people experience,” he tells CMO.

    From the CMO50 submission:

    Empowered business thinking

    Outside of day-to-day marketing, Moore sits on a global digital and innovation leadership team at Bupa charged with driving digital innovation across the business.

    To do this, the organisation is seeking to build capability via startup partnerships in order to create more efficiency and opportunities to enhance the day-to-day business.

    An example Moore points to is establishing a physiotherapy online marketplace in London. In the space of six months, Bupa doubled the size of the previous leading startup that had been in the market for three years.

    Data- and technology-lead approach

    To ensure customers and employees have a positive experience with Bupa and therefore recommend its products and services externally, the organisation is rolling out the Net Promoter Score.

    Moore says it undertook a review to understand where the business could have the most positive impact, using NPS as a gauge. “What we saw was how this could also create a positive flow-on financial effect,” he says.

    “Out of this review, we’ve created a program called ‘A Perfect Start’ to target new customers and employees. We’d identified a drop in NPS in that first six-month window, which has enabled us to change areas of dissatisfaction very simply and to improve people’s experience of either working for, or doing business with Bupa.”

    Marketing led this strategy and looked at how to improve engagement across the whole organisation based on these insights. Moore says technology is playing a key role in its approach, not just in terms of collecting data, but also to help understand trends and deliver solutions that could make a real difference.

    Customer-led approach

    Through all of this, Bupa is working hard to bring its customer and people strategy together. That has seen marketing partnering closely with the HR team, and Moore says marketing is leading the customer/people experience conversation at the leadership table.

    “The question that drives my team is: ‘What would allow our customers and employees to love Bupa?’ We have a real focus on bringing our brand to life through health and care, rather than product,” he says.

    “We offer a breadth of health and care services that improve quality of life and can lead to happier, healthier and longer lives. And we know, people’s awareness of our range of health and care services correlates directly to how people positively view our company, so our focus is all about making a positive difference in our customers and employees’ lives.”

    Fostering capability

    Moore wants the marketing team to be best in business. To get there, he says the team must become as agile as possible. Embedding customer problem-solving has become a core tenet, and digital capabilities are another focus.

    “We are a large business and need to be flexible and more efficient, but also we need to be where our customers are,” Moore comments. “You can’t have a one-size-fits-all approach when it comes to your customer. Our way of working is taking advantage of what’s out there, making sure we’re accessible to our customers, and being agile.”

    Creativity

    With the emphasis on delivering positive experiences to customers, Moore says Bupa has to be creative in order to meaningfully engage.

    “There’s an art to bringing those positive experiences to life and demonstrate to our customers that we care and are there for them every step of the way. This is the essence and the beauty of the job; you’ve got to let your creativity shine through,” he adds.

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