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Mr Venkatesh S. Mysore

CHENNAI, Feb. 15

METLIFE India hopes to make use of the 2.2 million customers of Jammu & Kashmir Bank, which is one of the principal shareholders of the insurance company.

MetLife India began selling insurance products on January 4, and has so far sold around 550 policies. This, according to the company's Managing Director, Mr Venkatesh Mysore, "is very encouraging".

Mr Mysore was here in connection with the launch of the company's Chennai operations. He told presspersons that his company was building the foundation for long-term business, rather than chasing numbers from the beginning.

The company has 350 agents, whom it calls financial advisers, and plans to increase the number to around 1,000 in a year.

Mr Mysore agreed that there was not much scope for product differentiation in the insurance business, or for that matter, in strategies for selling insurance. Therefore, a company had to distinguish necessarily by the way it serviced its customers, he said.

MetLife India's `financial advisers' are trained to do "need-based selling." Thus, they find out what exactly the customer needs, before suggesting a policy — more like a doctor making a diagnoses before prescribing medicines.

Mr Mysore said the insurance market was "not price sensitive, but feature sensitive".

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