Using Consumer Analytics to Market to the Retail Market Place Technologies to Prepare us for Health Care Reform

Tyler Cox - Manager of Consumer Analytics, Regence BlueCross BlueShield Jim Schoebel - Director of Member Information Solutions, Health Care Services Corporation Tim Yaeger - Web Data Analyst, BlueCross BlueShield of Alabama Stephen Jones, PhD – Senior Research Scientist, BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee

Using Consumer Analytics to Market to the Retail Market Place With health care reform on the horizon many changes are coming that will directly influence how health insurance companies currently do business. Much is still unknown; however, a shift from traditional Business-to-Business (B2B) to Business-to-Consumer (B2C) purchasing is a strong possibility. This shift has potentially wide-reaching implications, including new marketing strategies, technology and data enhancements, and improved analytical expertise. The purpose of this forum is to discuss different areas of focus various health plans are considering in order to prepare for these changes. We will cover how Health Care Service Corporation (HCSC includes BCBS Illinois, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas) is building predictive models to better understand consumer behaviors and preferences, how BCBS Tennessee is employing advanced geo-spatial techniques along with internal and external data sources to determine areas most suitable for retail store locations, how Regence BCBS is leveraging consumer analytics to understand and best meet shopper and member needs online, and lastly how BCBS Alabama is leveraging online behavior and segmentation data to reach the right consumers at the right time in the right digital marketplace.

Using Consumer Analytics to Market to the Retail Market Place How is HCSC leveraging existing and new data to support success in the retail market place, both pre- and post-October 2013? Online retail consumers are demanding convenient features and preferences of how and when they want to get information. BCBS of Alabama is addressing this through online behavior analysis, consumer segmentation and an integrated digital strategy. What does an integrated digital strategy mean for Alabama and how does that support using online behavior data and consumer segmentation to reach consumers in the digital marketplace? With more and more consumers accessing health and wellness related information online, it is essential that health plans are able to track, understand and respond to consumers’ needs and desires in a way that is impactful to them. As a result, Regence is dedicated to leveraging consumer analytics to understand and meet shopper and member needs online. What data and techniques does Regence leverage to accomplish this, what insights have they gained and what actions have they taken to meet online and mobile needs? Because of the need to better reach current and future customers, one of the many changes on the horizon is how health plans will physically conduct business with the public. One such change under consideration at BCBS TN is to open retail stores throughout the state. First, what is geo-spatial analytics and how can it be used to help determine optimal site locations for these potential store sites?

Manager of Consumer Analytics, Regence BlueCross BlueShield Tyler Cox Manager of Consumer Analytics, Regence BlueCross BlueShield Tyler Cox is the Manager of Consumer Analytics for the eBusiness Strategies and Services department at Regence BlueCross BlueShield in Portland, OR. His team is responsible for using quantitative and qualitative data and research to discover key consumer insights to be leveraged across a variety of online and offline channels to provide the ideal customer experience. This includes: driving e-channel analytics, KPIs and reporting strategy for all Regence web portals; streamlining processes for tagging and tracking use of website tools in order to measure ROI; forecasting growth and engagement of web properties; and conducting user experience research to uncover consumer needs and wants. Tyler earned a Bachelor of Arts in Business and Communications from the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, Washington and a Masters in Integrated Marketing Communications from the Medill school at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.

Director of Member Information Solutions, Jim Schoebel Director of Member Information Solutions, Health Care Services Corporation Jim Schoebel is Director of the Member Information Solutions domain in Health Care Services Corporation's Analytics and Information Management Division. Jim leads a team tasked with identifying business information needs centered around consumers, and developing solutions to deliver information to meet those needs through an iterative prototyping approach. These solutions may take the form of data integration and reporting, or analytic models built through the team's partnership with a dedicated analytics team. Jim's career at HCSC spans 20 years, and has included roles in customer service, application development and support, and  information  management.

BlueCross BlueShield of Alabama Tim Yaeger Web Data Analyst, BlueCross BlueShield of Alabama Tim Yaeger is the Web Data Analyst in Marketing for BlueCross and BlueShield of Alabama.  Tim co-developed the first web analytics program for BCBS AL in 2009. Through this process he established relevancy among several operational areas within BCBS AL, created metric  standards, dashboard styles, and led the project to select then implement IBM NetInsight On-Premise. He is responsible for maintaining the overall  structure and strategy that support digital initiatives and ensure information is used to improve the online customer experience. Tim’s past experience includes search engine optimization, web development and raising four homeschooling children with his marvelous wife of 9 years, but we’ll save that topic for another day.

Senior Research Scientist BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee Stephen Jones, PhD Senior Research Scientist BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee Dr. Stephen Jones is the senior research scientist for predictive analytics at BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee, focusing on research and analytic efforts in population health management. Some of his work includes spatio-temporal modeling of infectious diseases, building proactive disease identification and decision support models for care management programs, enhancing disease surveillance activities through the use of administrative data, assessing the long-term impacts of food and water borne enteric infections, and utilizing geo-spatial analytics to strategically prioritize outreach efforts to support improved health outcomes. He received a BS in biology and art history from Wofford College, and a MS and PhD in biology from Clemson University. His post-doctoral research was in spatial epidemiology with the Department of Population Medicine at Harvard Medical School.