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o not get high value out of the products and services. These customers are newly acquired and are unsure of the kind of products they want in their portfolio and may steer themselves to a competitor if unsatisfied with the product or service.

The strategy should mainly focus on improving the services and products offerings for these customers and providing priority service to help them become star customers.

Free Riders - These customers are opposite of vulnerable customers, they get high value from the product offering and services but are not profitable.

The strategy should be aimed at reducing the services to such customers or try to raise the price levels of the products associated with them; essentially the insurer should also try to move these customers to star customers.

Segmentation
Research in the insurance industry has segmented insurance customers into various types or categories based on the customer lifetime values generated from the lifetime value model and attitudes that drive those most. While there are customers that seek minimum to no contact with the insurer others constantly seek their insurer's advice and place a great deal of trust in the people of the organization. The IBM insurance survey on European customers mentioned in Figure 15 has categorized customers into five segments:

Relationship-oriented Individuals: These individuals consider the relationship with their insurer as the single biggest motivator while doing business with them. They expect the insurer to be transparent and provide complicated insurance products and jargon in simple lay-man terms. Rather than buying different insurance policies from multiple insurers, this customer segment prefers to do all their business with one insurer. This type of customer relies on advice from the insurance agent as much as he/she relies on advice from family and friends. Traditionalists account for 27.1%[28] of insurance customers and are the most popular customer type in Europe.

Insurers should ensure that this customer is given personalized attention by a team of employees who are experts at relationship management. Once the insurer is able to create and maintain the trust of the customer, there is tremendous potential for cross and up selling opportunities.

Support Seeking Individuals: These customers constantly seek the advice of external parties such as family, friends, and the insurance agent and place a great deal of trust and confidence in their expertise and advice. Though these customers desire uncomplicated and personalized products and services they also shop around and compare prices on the Internet. In Europe individualists make up 20.3%[29] of the insurance customer base.

Insurers looking for a slice of this pie need to market and capitalize on their employees' know-how and expertise and position itself as the market leader providing exceptional pre and post sales service to their customers.

Product Optimizers: As the name suggests, these customers seek the best product and not the service as the case with support seeking individualists. For the ideal and most convenient life insurance product, optimizers are willing to pay extra and also share confidential information with the insurer. These customers seek a strong brand name backing the product rather than just the people. In Europe, optimizers make up 26.7%[