Value through combined offerings of bank and insurance

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how financial service providers cross‐sell combined bank and insurance service offerings in a business‐to‐business context with the aim of increasing understanding on the creation of corporate customer value through cross‐selling.

Design/methodology/approach

A qualitative study of eight providers, augmented with interviews among eight of their small and medium‐sized enterprise (SME) customers, form the empirical basis of the study.

Findings

Financial service providers anticipate a shift from separate sales events towards one‐stop shopping and from unilateral provision of non‐related products towards consideration of hybrid products in the SME segment. SME customers, who tend to acquire their banking and insurance services as non‐related products from separate providers, do not fully support these trends. The results are partly explained by the absence of customer loyalty programs and non‐existent provision of hybrid products in the business‐to‐business context.

Research limitations/implications

The research is focused on the financial industry within one country and bound to SME customers, limiting the generalizability of the findings.

Practical implications

The results imply that financial service providers should develop their one‐stop shopping concept in the SME segment by creating a customer loyalty program that would reward customer companies according to the use of multiple products in their total portfolio. Additionally, the possibilities of introducing hybrid products solely for business customer use should be further investigated.

Originality/value

This study is the first to show how business customers perceive the value of cross‐buying bank and insurance services, presenting a reminder to managers about the importance of recognizing their SME customers' value expectations.

Citation

Mäenpää, I. and Voutilainen, R. (2011), "Value through combined offerings of bank and insurance", International Journal of Bank Marketing, Vol. 29 No. 7, pp. 535-554. https://doi.org/10.1108/02652321111177812