Erie Insurance: Identifying a powerful position to overcome being vastly overspent by competitors

Erie Insurance may be a Fortune 500 company, but it’s all relative: its biggest competitors — the likes of Geico, Progressive, Allstate, State Farm, and Nationwide — spend a combined six billion dollars on marketing. Erie Insurance — a brand that grew up on the back of word of mouth and its independent agent relationships — has a marketing budget that pales in comparison.

The strategy to counter this focused on hyper-targeting, local marketing, and a creative strategy that worked to turn its spending disadvantage into an advantage. By calling its competitors’ advertising/marketing excesses into question, consumers were given a contrasting alternative: “Seriously Good Insurance.” And because the company does an exceptional job at converting leads, getting onto prospects’ consideration “short list” became a focused call to action.

For Phase 2, after extensive research, an evolutionary position was developed to contrast discount providers and pivot to our more protection-minded prospects: insurance for grown-ups. Result? Despite being out-spent by its largest competitors on the order of 300-1 and more, the company has enjoyed steady year-over-year growth and enviable profitability.

Brand manifesto

Home and Auto Insurance Pre-Roll

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Segment-specific acquisition

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Digital acquisition flow

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A primary barrier to selling-in the proposition of “insurance for grownups” is the significant hurdle many couples face in having meaningful conversations with each other about financial priorities, the value of something like life insurance, and so on.

The “That Talk” engagement device was created to help them get over that hump by adding an element of gamification to make financial conversations easier to start.

That Talk is a tool for ERIE’s independent agents, as well as an engagement device for direct targeting.

This campaign shattered previous results – and also created a stir among the agent community – the talk value of which was invaluable

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Small business DM (die-cut postcard)

CREDITS — AGENCY: SOURCE MARKETING/DONER CX. RICH FELDMAN: BUSINESS STRATEGY, CAMPAIGN STRATEGY, RESEARCH DESIGN EXECUTION AND ANALYSIS, CREATIVE STRATEGY, CREATIVE DIRECTION, COPYWRITING ON SELECT ELEMENTS. SHOUTOUTS: BEN APPLEBAUM, CREATIVE DIRECTOR; MICHAEL NEWMAN, DATA ANALYTICS, ASHLEY MARCIANO, ACCOUNT DIRECTOR.