4 ms·

I think your hypothesis is quite far off. Can you give an example of an auto insurance company that is a non-profit? I couldn't find any. Perhaps you mean a mut

I think your hypothesis is quite far off. Can you give an example of an auto insurance company that is a non-profit? I couldn't find any. Perhaps you mean a mutual insurance company? Furthermore, when I bought car insurance last month, Geico gave me the most coverage for the least amount of money (after quite a bit of research), so I also don't agree with your assertation that Google is no help in that regard. While I agree with the concept, as I work for a non-profit and belong to a credit union instead of a bank, I don't think your hypothesis holds without some data to back it up.

michaelhoffman 13y ago
USAA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USAA#Returning_profits_to_the_insured http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USAA#Returning_profits_to_the_i...), although most people aren't eligible (https://www.usaa.com/inet/pages/pub_eligibility_task_entry https://www.usaa.com/inet/pages/pub_eligibility_task_entry).
- ActVen 13y ago
  This is hands down the best company with which I have ever done business. Their technology is amazingly far ahead of others in the banking and insurance space. I was taking a photo of a check with my smartphone to deposit it years before it became mainstream. It is a great example of how constraints build value. By constraints I mean, they have had to deal with military customers stationed in far flung places for years. This built their capability to conduct business virtually.
  - thecoffman 13y ago
    I will second pretty much everything you just said. I have renter's and auto insurance, checking, savings and a credit card all through USAA and they are fantastic. Many banks are just beginning to catch up with their technology and none can match their customer service.
- chii 13y ago
  i like the business model of USAA, where it isn't a corporation, but that everyone who becomes a member gets some sort of benefit. its almost like voluntary communism. I wonder if this model would work for other sorts of institutions.
austenallred 13y ago
As someone who sells car insurance leads for a living, this is an interesting discussion. First, Geicko isn't ranked number 1, affiliates who mask themselves as Geicko are. In high rewards markets like insurance (where 30% of the overall price of insurance goes to affiliates) it's actually about which affiliates convert the best and have the best payout. Those SERPs are dominated by black hat SEO. None of that is organic. The larger issue (percentage of the page dedicated to SERPs vs ads aside) is that Google's formula worked best in a world where people weren't trying to game it. In the end it breaks down to relevance and links. Relevance is based on tags and keywords, which everyone can get a perfect score on. So in the end it comes down to links. Is a link there because someone just loves the site, or because some SEO schmuck built it? There are correlations, but there's really no way of knowing. The key to spam is mimicking a human process closely enough that a computer (or algorithm) can't tell the difference, then making that scale. Google does manually review the SERPs for the highest grossing terms basically daily to try and find foul play, but those can be beat, too. So why doesn't Google just manually find and serve up the best pages of content? Because you just described Yahoo. So it's a very complex game that evolves every day as both parties advance and become more sophisticated, often in response to each other. If you think you can do better you either have to out-engineer Google or find a way to rank sites based on something other than links.
- webjprgm 13y ago
  Could Google Analytics data be used as "something other than links"? They can track traffic, bounce rates, how long people stay, how often the same people return. Would that provide a better indicator of quality pages? It would only apply to sites that opt-in by using Google Analytics, but if it made them rank higher than everyone would do it. (How many don't already?)
  - josephlord 13y ago
    No Google already know too much about all of us.
  - austenallred 13y ago
    Just because blackhat SEO ranked it doesn't mean it's not a page people will use or stay on. That would also require every site to have Google analytical installed. Google is a big company for sure, but not quite that ubiquitous.
Terretta 13y ago
> Can you give an example of an auto insurance company that is a non-profit? Privilege Underwriters Reciprocal Exchange (PURE) is not "non-profit" but theoretically "policy holder owned" with surpluses to the benefit of subscribers. To your point about credit unions, insurance 'unions' are interesting: Overview: http://www.pureinsurance.com/about/index http://www.pureinsurance.com/about/index That said, there is a marketing arm that extracts value as fees for marketing and management, and a financial stakeholder umbrella seeking return on capital. It's an interesting structure: Structure: http://www.pureinsurance.com/about/pure_group http://www.pureinsurance.com/about/pure_group In any case, my experience with PURE has been superior to my experience with other insurers (except Met-Life who was excellent but unable to competitively insure my property), and my costs have been 30% less than the most competitively priced usual players.
rogerbinns 13y ago
> Can you give an example of an auto insurance company that is a non-profit? AAA who do my insurance: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Automobile_Association http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Automobile_Association
jrochkind1 13y ago
> Can you give an example of an auto insurance company that is a non-profit? I couldn't find any. Perhaps you mean a mutual insurance company? Aren't mutual's non-profit? They aren't trying to extract a profit for investors or other owners, but just need to charge enough to pay business expenses (including salaries, as well as the main expense of an insurance company, paying out claims and funding reserves to pay out claims, etc.) USAA mentioned in some other followups is... even weirder than a mutual insurance company, but it's legal structure is effectively the same as a mutual insurance company.
- leephillips 13y ago
  "Aren't mutual's non-profit?" No, they distribute the profit to policyholders, who are effectively shareholders of the corporation. I belong to one, for auto and home. I get a dividend each year of 20 - 25% of the yearly premium, which is competitive even without considering the dividend. It's not open to the public.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

michaelhoffman 13y ago

USAA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USAA#Returning_profits_to_the_insured http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USAA#Returning_profits_to_the_i...), although most people aren't eligible (https://www.usaa.com/inet/pages/pub_eligibility_task_entry https://www.usaa.com/inet/pages/pub_eligibility_task_entry).

ActVen 13y ago
This is hands down the best company with which I have ever done business. Their technology is amazingly far ahead of others in the banking and insurance space. I was taking a photo of a check with my smartphone to deposit it years before it became mainstream. It is a great example of how constraints build value. By constraints I mean, they have had to deal with military customers stationed in far flung places for years. This built their capability to conduct business virtually.
- thecoffman 13y ago
  I will second pretty much everything you just said. I have renter's and auto insurance, checking, savings and a credit card all through USAA and they are fantastic. Many banks are just beginning to catch up with their technology and none can match their customer service.
chii 13y ago
i like the business model of USAA, where it isn't a corporation, but that everyone who becomes a member gets some sort of benefit. its almost like voluntary communism. I wonder if this model would work for other sorts of institutions.

austenallred 13y ago

As someone who sells car insurance leads for a living, this is an interesting discussion. First, Geicko isn't ranked number 1, affiliates who mask themselves as Geicko are. In high rewards markets like insurance (where 30% of the overall price of insurance goes to affiliates) it's actually about which affiliates convert the best and have the best payout. Those SERPs are dominated by black hat SEO. None of that is organic. The larger issue (percentage of the page dedicated to SERPs vs ads aside) is that Google's formula worked best in a world where people weren't trying to game it. In the end it breaks down to relevance and links. Relevance is based on tags and keywords, which everyone can get a perfect score on. So in the end it comes down to links. Is a link there because someone just loves the site, or because some SEO schmuck built it? There are correlations, but there's really no way of knowing. The key to spam is mimicking a human process closely enough that a computer (or algorithm) can't tell the difference, then making that scale. Google does manually review the SERPs for the highest grossing terms basically daily to try and find foul play, but those can be beat, too. So why doesn't Google just manually find and serve up the best pages of content? Because you just described Yahoo. So it's a very complex game that evolves every day as both parties advance and become more sophisticated, often in response to each other. If you think you can do better you either have to out-engineer Google or find a way to rank sites based on something other than links.

webjprgm 13y ago
Could Google Analytics data be used as "something other than links"? They can track traffic, bounce rates, how long people stay, how often the same people return. Would that provide a better indicator of quality pages? It would only apply to sites that opt-in by using Google Analytics, but if it made them rank higher than everyone would do it. (How many don't already?)
- josephlord 13y ago
  No Google already know too much about all of us.
- austenallred 13y ago
  Just because blackhat SEO ranked it doesn't mean it's not a page people will use or stay on. That would also require every site to have Google analytical installed. Google is a big company for sure, but not quite that ubiquitous.

Terretta 13y ago

> Can you give an example of an auto insurance company that is a non-profit? Privilege Underwriters Reciprocal Exchange (PURE) is not "non-profit" but theoretically "policy holder owned" with surpluses to the benefit of subscribers. To your point about credit unions, insurance 'unions' are interesting: Overview: http://www.pureinsurance.com/about/index http://www.pureinsurance.com/about/index That said, there is a marketing arm that extracts value as fees for marketing and management, and a financial stakeholder umbrella seeking return on capital. It's an interesting structure: Structure: http://www.pureinsurance.com/about/pure_group http://www.pureinsurance.com/about/pure_group In any case, my experience with PURE has been superior to my experience with other insurers (except Met-Life who was excellent but unable to competitively insure my property), and my costs have been 30% less than the most competitively priced usual players.

rogerbinns 13y ago

> Can you give an example of an auto insurance company that is a non-profit? AAA who do my insurance: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Automobile_Association http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Automobile_Association

jrochkind1 13y ago

> Can you give an example of an auto insurance company that is a non-profit? I couldn't find any. Perhaps you mean a mutual insurance company? Aren't mutual's non-profit? They aren't trying to extract a profit for investors or other owners, but just need to charge enough to pay business expenses (including salaries, as well as the main expense of an insurance company, paying out claims and funding reserves to pay out claims, etc.) USAA mentioned in some other followups is... even weirder than a mutual insurance company, but it's legal structure is effectively the same as a mutual insurance company.

leephillips 13y ago
"Aren't mutual's non-profit?" No, they distribute the profit to policyholders, who are effectively shareholders of the corporation. I belong to one, for auto and home. I get a dividend each year of 20 - 25% of the yearly premium, which is competitive even without considering the dividend. It's not open to the public.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]