Chennai: “The trend of need-based-selling of insurance that first emerged in Tamilnadu market, has now been adopted nationally. Tamilnadu is one of the most mature insurance market in the country,” said managing director and CEO of SBI Life Insurance, Sanjeev Nautiyal today.
He was speaking at the inauguration of SBI Life Insurance’s 71st regional office in Chennai at Dr Ambedkar Road in Kodambakkam.
Talking about the reason for the company’s strong presence in Tamilnadu, Sanjeev said, “Consumer centric approaches like need-based selling have been the key to our success here. Tamilnadu is also one of the States where both Agency channels and Banca (bank insurance model) channels have been outperforming.”
The State capital Chennai region also remains one of SBI’s strongest market where it has a 22.4 per cent market share among all private life insurers.
“SBI Life has been growing at a rapid pace in Chennai Region, which reported a growth of 37 per cent in its individual new business premium in FY 17-18, at Rs 621 crore when compared to Rs 451.7 crores during FY 16-17. The total new business premium also saw a spike by 56 per cent in FY 17-18, at Rs 871 crore compared to Rs 557.7 crore in FY 16-17,” a statement from the company said.
Commenting on the Chennai market, president of marketing in the relevant zone, M Anand said SBI Life is continuously working towards establishing a deeper presence here.
“By strengthening the market share in this region, we have achieved 15.3 per cent growth in new business premium for Financial Year to date June 17-18, when compared to the same period the previous year,” he said.
In the Chennai region, SBI life has a workforce of 1,000 employees. The insurance services are distributed through a network of around 11,500 trained insurance advisors, 3,221 CIFs with the aid of 1,275 State Bank of India Branches, the company said.