Health insurance brokers should understand their clients’ concerns and how to address them through effective communication.
Key takeaways:
- Common client concerns during open enrollment include renewal percentage, budgeting, selecting the right plans, compliance and employee education.
- Improve communication by being proactive, clear and personal, and focus on educating clients and collecting feedback.
- Partnering with a PEO can improve the way you help your business clients with expertise and technology. It can also help mitigate high renewal increases through its ongoing relationships with carrier and technology assets.
A business’ processes can make or break its annual open enrollment period. As a benefits broker, you can help your clients immensely by addressing their concerns proactively and providing the support they need to navigate it.
This is easier said than done, but working with a professional employer organization (PEO) can help. Find out the most common client concerns and strategies to improve open enrollment for your clients.
Common Client Concerns About Open Enrollment
Open enrollment is the annual period when employees can select or renew their benefits coverage. For employers, this means they must prepare well in advance and revisit their budget and benefits selections to ensure ongoing competitiveness and employee utilization.
Here are common concerns for your business clients when it comes to open enrollment:
Cost and Budgeting
One of the biggest concerns is the budget. If your client is adding new employee benefits or updating packages, they’ll want to know how those changes will impact their bottom line.
This includes keeping renewal rates from increasing too sharply. A PEO helps by working directly with insurance providers to secure longer-term rate agreements. This reduces the amount – and frequency – of rate hikes, keeping costs in check for your clients and their staff.
You can help businesses navigate budget changes, prioritize the most important employee benefits and understand the most cost-effective options. In addition, a PEO can help you accomplish each of these steps for your clients through purchasing power, allowing smaller businesses to access better benefits at affordable prices.
Selecting Employee Benefits
Each year, employers may not know if they’re finding the right options or making the right choices for their employees. This is why they need to offer tailored benefits packages that meet the needs of a diverse pool of employees.
Compliance
Employers must also carefully comply with regulations, both during open enrollment and throughout the rest of the year. Labor laws and employment regulations are always changing, so working with a PEO helps you help your clients with the latest updates and best practices to implement in periods of change. This assists clients in reducing risks and administrative burden.
Employee Education and Engagement
A major consideration for employers is whether their employees will use the benefits. Increased utilization requires understanding exactly what their employee benefits are and why they’re important.
Brokers can help businesses gain access to all relevant information by prioritizing education during open enrollment. The more knowledge employees have, the more engaged they’ll be with their benefits and organization.
Employers should do everything they can to stay competitive, especially in a job market like ours, where top talent increases its expectations and requirements each year. Providing legal insurance helps you show a new level of employee support, offering a benefit that other companies aren’t offering.
Brokers play a unique role in the world of employee benefits for businesses. When it’s time to prepare for or launch open enrollment, what can you do to make it a smoother process for your clients? Here are 5 Open Enrollment Communication Strategies for Benefits Brokers.
1. Be Proactive
Instead of waiting to provide assistance until a client asks a question, think proactively. Answer business’ questions – and their employees’ questions – before they have to ask them. This takes understanding your specific audience and their pain points.
Show them you understand their concerns about open enrollment. Implement a plan for communicating across your channels, from email to newsletters to printouts to informational sessions.
2. Keep Communication Clear and Concise
Remember that the average business leader and employee don’t necessarily understand the complicated ins and outs of the employee benefits world. Focus on being clear and to the point.
Use materials like infographics, FAQ sheets and comparison charts to explain benefits options, price breakdowns and pros and cons. Make sure information is easy to grasp.
3. Prioritize Personalization
Show that you value each unique business client. Their needs will be different from those of the next business.
Prioritize personalization through consultations, one-on-one meetings or webinars with the business’ team to talk about specific needs and priorities. This level of support also leaves room for customized answers to client questions.
4. Provide Educational Resources
One of your goals should be ensuring that clients have all the resources they need to make informed benefits decisions. You can play a major role in this process by:
- Developing how-to guides
- Providing tutorials for any new tools
- Recording videos to explain benefits options
Benefits, alongside the enrollment process, can be hard to navigate. Make it easier for your clients by providing tailored educational resources.
5. Collect Feedback
You’ll never properly measure your effectiveness without hearing from your clients directly. Set up a system to gather and respond to client feedback regularly. Try implementing surveys or simple forms to uncover areas that need improvement.
Employers should do everything they can to stay competitive, especially in a job market like ours, where top talent increases its expectations and requirements each year. Providing legal insurance helps you show a new level of employee support, offering a benefit that other companies aren’t offering.
How PrestigePEO Supports Brokers During Open Enrollment
Open enrollment doesn’t have to be a stressful time for your business clients. Working with a PEO gives them access to many additional resources that will improve their process and enhance their benefits options.
PrestigePEO provides comprehensive benefits options, including health insurance, retirement plans, wellness programs, supplemental insurance plans and more. Our dedicated support team provides personalized support to you and your clients, ensuring you have access to benefits experts and compliance advisors throughout open enrollment.
A main SMB concern during open enrollment is renewal percentage; how much will insurance rates and other costs increase in the next year? Partnering with PrestigePEO limits these high renewal increases by leveraging its relationships with carriers that lead to reduced rates.
Additionally, PrestigePEO offers advanced technological platforms that further improve processes around employee benefits – including open enrollment. Tools like the mobile app PrestigeGO and our PrestigePRO platform can simplify how your clients administer employee benefits and communicate with their staff about taking full advantage of them.
Partner with PrestigePEO Today
The right solutions are a must to support your clients through open enrollment. Clients may have many concerns about the process, from budgeting to communication.
Improve how you help your clients with educational materials, clear communication and a proactive mindset. Collect feedback so you know exactly what needs to improve within the client experience.
One way to level up your services is a PEO partnership. At PrestigePEO, we help you address client concerns and improve the open enrollment process.
Set up a consultation with PrestigePEO now to learn more.
