uSwitch your advertising …and your “expert”

One of the newest entrants to the online insurance aggregation game is uSwitch. Now, they’ve already come in for some criticism on this insurance blog, so I’m not going to dwell on their failings in that respect…however tempting that may be. What I am going to do is expose them for being so extremely amateur in their communications to customers. I’m not talking about text to image ratios, inline styles in html code or links hidden behind images. No, not that level of communications quality. I’m talking about the basics here. What does the customer see?

Firstly, they’re one step behind the game before they kick off. I tested their service a while back when I wrote about the uSwitch car insurance tool. Almost immediately after using their service, I waited for a couple of communications to get a feel for what they’re sending out and then unsubscribed. However, much like Swinton, they felt like spamming me months after I’ve asked not to be contacted is actually a good idea. uuuhhh-uuurrrr!

Then, I take a look through the actual email they sent …and I can’t believe my eyes. Firstly, take a look at their poll, halfway down the page on the right hand side. It uncovers the truth about the uSwitch advertising campaign which I wrote about just days after it launched:

…namely, it’s pants. Then again, it’s one thing to find out that nobody likes your absolutely appauling advertising campaign. It’s another thing entirely to send out a mass communication to your car insurance database, confirming to them that nobody likes your absolutely appauling advertising campaign. And don’t even try the argument that they’re trying to breed honesty. Martin Lewis tries that everyday with his shit budget website and I don’t trust him any further than an overdraft, loan, second mortgage, credit card, a large cheque from Moneysupermarket and all the change behind my sofa can afford to pay Geoff Capes to throw him. A big uuuhhh-uuurrr for uSwitch on this one!!

Finally, I look to see if there’s anything which can be salvaged from the rest of the communication …oh dear …he’s not going after the smug ‘Head of Insurance’ with all of his seven years experience in the insurance game? Oh yes he is!!

Come off it. An expert?! Pah! The expert advice held within smug man’s great tips include,

• get a different car
• have fewer named drivers
• decrease your cover and,
• (my personal favourite) increase your voluntary excess!

At what point during his illustrious seven year career in insurance did smug man start to believe that it is sound advice to increase your voluntary excess? Maybe – just maybe – if customers find the right insurer who actually wants their business (not achievable through the uSwitch comparison obviously), they wouldn’t need such expert advice. A huge uuurrr-uuuhhh for that!!!

So, all-in-all, a pretty poor effort from uSwitch. Smug man has got his work cut out. Still, a good brain sits upon those shoulders …uuuhhh-uuurrr!!!