Leveling Up Your Member Experience
There are a lot of reasons health plans focus on the member experience – to boost member engagement, satisfaction, healthcare outcomes and member loyalty – but what’s the best way to do this, and where should plans start?
We asked our health plan experts a few key questions about how to level up your member experience. Here are their answers.
What’s the relationship between member experience and member engagement?
Great question because a lot of time it feels like the chicken and egg—which comes first? Here’s one way to look at the relationship between member experience and member engagement.
- Member experience is a vehicle to drive engagement – what is the impression a member has interacting with your plan? The more personalized and positive, the more likely they will engage. For example, did a long wait to connect with your call center about a benefits question create a negative experience, and a dissatisfied member who is less likely to engage in the future?
- Member engagement refers to the interactions a member has with a plan, and the actions taken as a result. For example, reaching out with a reminder to refill a medication in advance of it running out makes the member feel cared for and motivated to refill the prescription. It also builds loyalty because the member views the plan as a valued partner in health.
The more positive the member experience, the more likely a member is to engage, now and in the future.
Got it: member experience and member engagement are intimately related. What are 3 things a plan should do to boost member engagement?
Reaching and engaging members in a personalized way can do a lot to boost the member experience. Here are 3 things to do to improve your member engagement strategies:
- Put yourself in the member’s shoes. Think about the type of experience you want as a health consumer. Personal, easy, convenient, reliable – then consider how you can work these traits into your member engagement strategies.
- Make each member feel like the individual they are. It’s easy to generalize population needs (women over 40 need a mammogram) and conduct outreach based on those generalizations. But members are made up of more than one or two variables. Acknowledge this and find new ways to get to know your members, so you can offer them relevant resources that will grab their attention and drive action.
- Focus on more than a single touchpoint. This one can be hard because of limited time and resources. But think about your own life – getting all the reminders at one time for your annual wellness exam, cancer screening, flu shot, dental visit, etc., is overwhelming! Instead, create a more coordinated, strategic approach that spans the length of the benefit year, and connects with consumers in ways they want (email, text messages, phone calls, etc.).
How can I improve the member experience faster?
With technology like what Virgin Pulse offers, plans can quickly launch and conduct personalized outreach at scale, driving higher engagement and boosting member satisfaction. We do this in several ways:
- Using all available data, including consumer data with SDOH insights, and predictive analytics to identify individual member risks, preferences and likelihood to take action.
- Proactively conducting targeted, multi-channel outreach based on these targeted lists (like who’s at risk for missing a diabetes screening) to engage members and get them back in for care.
- Coordinating communications across the calendar year to reduce member abrasion and boost the member experience.
Ready to get started?
Virgin Pulse helps health plans of all sizes create a meaningful member experience by providing personalized support and engaging messaging with members through multi-channel communications. Our proactive and innovative approach to member experience nails the key touchpoints that drive stickiness and member loyalty, with up to 90% accuracy.
Let’s talk about how we can help you level up your member experience too!