Description: This literature guide focuses on individual life insurance distribution, with an emphasis on marketing operations which use the agency distribution system - although much of the material is applicable to direct response marketing.

Description: Discusses new-product displacement of in-force policies, critical-resource management, agency considerations, and monitoring experience. From the 1987 Record of Society of Actuaries, Vol. 13, No. 2.

Description: Panelists discuss the purposes of life insurance sales illustrations – for participating and non-participating products – and what use they really are to potential customers. From the 1988 Record of Society of Actuaries, Vol. 14, No. 2.

Description: This article is a call to participate in industry mortality studies.

Description: The article is Part 1 of two articles that provide a case study for the development of a profitability and risk dashboard. The sample dashboard provides distilled information regarding actual to expected (A/E) ratios for key risks, agent quality scores and customer value scores. The dashboard would also provide the value of new business written, surplus strain, debit balances, and expected losses on debit balances at different levels, down to the agent level. A product mix index is provided, together with visual comparisons of key metrics to the company's business plan. The Part 2 article will add information to the dashboard regarding risk margins, target capital, and company value.

Description: Evan Borisenko looks at previous challenging environments for the life insurance industry, such as the a period of severe stagnation in the 1930s, the increased inflation in the 1980s and a catastrophe like the Spanish influenza after the World War I. Evan explains that "while each event described above challenged the life insurance industry in a unique way, each event stimulated an equally unique solution." The article concludes that we "fight to repeat history" in a way that we as actuaries should be able to propose unique solutions with when faced with crisis in the future.

Description: Compilation of articles that appeared in the December 1988 edition of the Product Development Section Newsletter.

Description: Survey for Life Insurance Utilization of Automated Underwriting systems.

Description: This is a report that summarizes a Survey of Life Insurance Utilization of Automated Underwriting Systems. It was sponsored by the Committee on Life Insurance Research, Marketing and Distribution and Product Development Sections of the Society of Actuaries and the research was conducted by Deloitte. The report covers many aspects of how much industry interest there is for automated underwriting systems, the goals life insurers seek to accomplish in using them, how the automated systems function, and how successfully they perform.

Description: Presented at May 1996 Spring Meeting. Discusses how marketers are pushing the distribution frontiers of insurance and financial services: technology utilized, what is successful, product and service implications.