Maximiliano Flotta,

PRESIDENT, METLIFE COLOMBIA

How has the Colombian market developed in terms of digital adoption?

There is no natural demand or culture of life insurance in Colombia. People might consider a new car insurance policy but are unlikely to think about life insurance. Digital capabilities could help address this. For example, in Latin America we have implemented an end-to-end platform where one can buy a life policy without interacting with anyone. Having the platform is not the most complex part; the difficulty is in generating the traffic. Although we have the platform; we do not have the people looking to buy an insurance policy. For this reason, having end-to-end digital capabilities to sell life insurance is not working yet. The situation with property and casualty is different, where there is more demand for such a product, and people want or need to buy them because they are mandatory. There is room to improve in insurance, perhaps not in the distribution, but our digital customer experience. MetLife is working to improve the service after purchase. Our agency salesforce does not use paper forms, and MetLife has changed the physical signature to digital. Additionally, we are continuously adding new online services on our webpage. For example, customers can check their balance, request a transfer from one portfolio to another, request a tax certification, file a claim, or pay for a product without meeting anyone. Next year, we are working to implement a new customer portal to further improve our capabilities.

What are your strategies to expand nationally beyond Bogotá, and in general in terms of recruitment and training?

We have 50% of our production in Bogotá, 19% in Medellín, and 13% in Cali. However, we have other branches including Bucaramanga, Pereira, Manizales, and Barranquilla. All these cities are growing rapidly, and we are increasing our penetration. Months before the lockdown, we grew our Bucaramanga branch. However, COVID-19 changed the market conditions. While physical presence was important in the past, moving forward, virtual will be the focus of expansion. We will increase penetration in other cities and will likely not need a physical presence to that extent. We also employ virtual platforms to improve our training and recruitment campaigns. MetLife utilizes a digital platform called MetLife DAP to train its salesforce and a learning digital platform called MyLearning aimed to all employees who want to learn new skills or improve existing ones; both platforms are available with an Android and iOS app . These follow a format similar to those of Coursera or EdX; employees can access a video curriculum to enhance their knowledge and skills on various courses. Testament to the efficiencies and benefits of the digital transformation, the upcoming round of recruitment and training of MetLife’s salesforce will be handled remotely in its entirety.