battleface

A tech-enabled travel insurance company that gives travelers exactly what they need—nothing more, nothing less.

Recognizing the opportunity to provide relevant travel insurance products to US travelers, battleface teamed up with ZoCo to better understand perceptions and goals for travel insurance.

US travelers just don’t buy travel insurance like Brits.

battleface got its start providing insurance to UK travelers, where travel insurance is commonly purchased. But Americans are different—their frequency of buying travel insurance doesn’t correlate to the number of trips they take.

Staked bar chart with the question "How frequently do you purchase travel insurance?" The first bar chart is for US Travelers, who buy insurance much less than the second bar representing UK Travelers.

To understand differences among US travelers, we developed six psychographic personas.

These personas were based on travel behaviors and beliefs discovered in the qualitative interviews instead of demographic data—because how people think and what they do is more telling than their age, income, race, or gender.

Bubble chart showing different segment sizes: Flexible visitor, 23% with a quote "I don't remember traveling somewhere where I didn't know somebody." Experienced Traveler, 21%. Avid Luxury Traveler, 18%, Budget Traveler, 19%, Infrequent Traveler, 11% with a quote "I definitely spent a little too much time planning how I was going to get there." Avid Travel Hacker, 9% with a quote "It's the endless search of optimization to value."

Themes of safety, flexibility, and value had a defined nuance depending on which persona lens was used.

Because battleface has ambitions to grow and adapt their offering, we found additional customer needs and brainstormed product offerings or tangential services to help their customers.

Image of man checking into a hostel with a participant quote: "I could spend $500 a night or spend $200 a night and take a whole other trip." - Avid travel hacker from Virginia. Beside the photo is a series of descriptions for the Avid Travel Hacker including "Travel is my biggest hobby" and "I game the system to get the best prices."

In the US, “insurance” is a dirty word.

“It’s impossible to collect.”

“They’re just out to get your money.”

“Insurance is a necessary evil.”

The perception of other insurance industries are projected onto travel insurance—even though a larger majority of travel claims are successful.

Two quotes from participants. The first from a frequent traveler in Ohio reads “Insurance is a scam. It’s all a scam. I usually try to stay away from it. Health and car is a scam, so it’s just part of the infrastructure.” The second is from a participant who had a successful travel insurance claim and reads, “I used to think travel insurance never paid out until I had to make a claim. It was a very easy process. Submitted a claim online, uploaded a photo and they sent a check.”

So we developed a cheeky messaging strategy to take on these misconceptions.

Image shows a couple at a cafe and reads, "Wings in Buffalo? Or...crepes in Paris? You need travel coverage that can change as fast as your lunch plans do."
Image of woman relaxing with text, "Make the most of that PTO*, *Precious Time Off"
Image displaying lost hiker and reads, "Up shit creek? You'll wish you had more than a paddle."

As they continue to expand, this research helped battleface prioritize messaging and product offerings for the US.

Our experience with ZoCo transcended brand strategy and positioning. The ZoCo team became an extension of our obsession with providing relevant products to today’s travelers. Not only has their research helped refine our brand messaging, but their plethora of insights has also formed one of the pillars of our broader product strategy. As a start-up, the boost ZoCo gave to our own consumer and market research is invaluable.

Derek Dehart, Head of Product

After all that research, we’ll be buying battleface policies for the foreseeable future.

What we delivered to battleface:

Interviews

Surveys

Personas

Messaging Strategy