Only 5% of car owners claim not to have visited one in the last 12 months according to EMB’s latest tracking research into the impact of price comparison sites (PCS) on UK consumers’ motor insurance buying habits
This is a marked drop from the figure of 29% six months ago. Similarly, those who say they would never use a PCS dropped from 6% of the total to less than 1%.
Competition amongst the main sites is tightening with Comparethemarket forcing its way into the reckoning on the back of its meerkat adverts. Confused.com overtook Money Supermarket as the most visited site with 72% of respondents saying they had been onto the site in the previous 12 months.
Ian Liddicoat, Managing Director of EMB Marketing Sciences, commented: “What is notable about Comparethemarket’s rise is that it has been achieved with about half of the share of media voice of the main competitors. This shows the impact of the TV adverts which have spun off into social media and viral marketing.”
Despite the preponderance of TV advertising in attracting potential customers to the sites, on-line visibility remains important to the success of aggregators. A third of people said they had chosen a PCS to visit by using an Internet search engine, up from 21%. However, this may include people who input a company name into a search engine having seen an advertisement.
The research was carried out by CCB fast.MAP through its Consumer Voice Panel service. 2,298 people participated and non-drivers were excluded from the sample prior to analysis.
