Trade Me: We still back LifeDirect
Trade Me says it hasn’t given up on LifeDirect, despite a big fall in revenue.
Sunday, August 27th 2017, 7:54PM
The company has reported that, in the 2017 financial year, the direct-to-market life insurance sales platform experienced an 11.3% drop in revenue, to $5.3 million, due to lower traffic volumes.
A drop of revenue that size would require a much larger drop in sales, because insurance businesses’ renewals usually keep going up.
It may be that sales have dropped up to a fifth.
Overall, Trade Me’s revenue grew 7.7% to $235m.
LifeDirect allows consumers to compare quotes from insurers including AIA, AMP, Asteron Life, Cigna, Fidelity Life, OnePath, Partners Life and Sovereign online. It covers life, health, income protection, mortgage and funeral insurance.
It offers a 20% cashback in the first year on new policies taken out.
The online website company acquired LifeDirect in 2013.
Chief executive Jon Macdonald said Trade Me had diverted traffic away from LifeDirect over the last year in favour of giving its core businesses more prominence.
“But in more recent times we’ve worked on LifeDirect with renewed vigour. We certainly haven’t given up on the business and are looking forward to getting it back into growth.”
He said roboadvice would be a natural extension of the platform, to tailor a recommendation to clients' circumstances.
"Similar to successful online comparison models overseas, there is opportunity to expand the comparison platform into a wider range of products, including other financial services and utilities."
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