Root Home
Root launched homeowners insurance in May of 2020, giving Root auto policyholders in select markets an opportunity to bundle their home and auto policies in the Root app.
I wrote or edited all copy within the entire quote to bind (purchase) flow for the app and web.
Challenge
Insurance customers want to bundle policies for ease and savings. Root only offered auto and renters insurance, leaving homeowners behind. Starting a new line of business is a heavy lift—risky, costly, and labor intensive.
We knew that offering a homeowners product would enhance our relationship with our auto customers, improve retention, and attract higher LTV customers who want to bundle policies.
Solution
To quickly learn about this new line of insurance and how to best serve customers, we created an MVP with a partnership through Homesite Insurance. Our focus was creating a best-in-class customer experience through Homesite’s coverage, with Root’s human, casual, and friendly voice.
Through a partnership, we could lean on Homesite to provide underwriting, claims, and customer support while we gather data, increase industry knowledge, and support our home-owning customers.
Initial results
16% improvement for auto policyholder retention for those who bundled with home
2X LTV for those who have bundled polices
How I helped
I wrote or edited all copy within the entire flow for the app (and later web), from the entry point, through onboarding, quote and customization, to bind and payment. I closely collaborated with the designer, product owner, engineers, and other stakeholders through an agile framework of scrum.
My biggest task was to make home insurance approachable—to demystify its complexities by using common words and concepts, omitting jargon where legally possible, and chunking content to be digestible. I chose the words “Your house, your stuff, your safety” as headers since nobody talks about having dwelling parties or upgrading personal property. Just because insurance is necessary doesn’t mean it should be dull.
I also wrote all emails for cross-sell promotion with our Product Marketing team.
Over the months after launch, we evaluated pain points by analyzing data and conducting interviews. From that, we refined features and A/B tested variants, incrementally delivering value and improving the product for our customers.
For example, we found that people who wanted to pay for their homeowners policy through their escrow were confused about how it works and worried they’d have to do a lot of work themselves. By adding guidance in the payment flow about the setup process, we reduced customer anxiety, resulting in a median lift of 2% in bind rates.
New product launch
Email campaigns
When we launched homeowners insurance, we ran three email campaigns:
Current auto policyholders — announce the new product
New auto policyholders — cross-sell (seen below)
Abandoned cart — complete purchase
This work was not done alone. Thank you to my collaborators—designers, project managers, scrum masters, supervisors, and everyone else—for your talent, guidance, and hearts. I appreciate you.