Tag: Humana

Media and Marketing

Ranking Louisville’s Twitterati

Twitter logo 150Humana has 3,000 of its more tech-savvy employees serving as unofficial brand ambassadors on Twitter, Facebook, and other heavily trafficked social networks. That’s out of 50,000 employees overall. Here’s how the Louisville insurer stacks up against other big area employers taking advance of free publicity on the short-messaging service Twitter. Founded in March 2006, Twitter has 313 million members.

2,390,000 followers

Amazon (joined February 2009)

1,760,000

Taco Bell (July 2007)

1,460,000

Pizza Hut (December 2007)

1,070,000

KFC (July 2008)

915,000

Ford Motor (July 2008)

430,000

Papa John’s (December 2008)

177,000

Jack Daniel’s (September 2010)

157,000

UPS (June 2010)

75,300

Texas Roadhouse (November 2008)

28,600

Humana (March 2009)

20,900

GE Appliances (September 2009)

15,700

Yum Brands (September 2007)

5,493

Haier America (March 2009)

4,597

Kindred (May 2009)

0

Brown-Forman (no account)

Tortoise or hare? Both!

The list shows that simply getting on Twitter early doesn’t guarantee a big following; you’ve got to work it. Tech behemoth Amazon didn’t join until nearly three years after Twitter launched, but it’s No. 1.

Katy Perry Twitter profile
Perry on Twitter.

On the other hand, Yum Brands has just 15,700 followers even though it was the second-earliest to join. But Yum’s a corporate brand; it makes sense that its consumer brands — KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell — do all the heavy lifting.

To put all these figures in perspective, consider the person with the most Twitter followers in the world: singer Katy Perry, with 91.9 million. Perry, 31, joined in February 2009. Top Twitter followers.

Boulevard’s on Twitter, too.

And we’re just getting started; please follow us.

* U.S. accounts only.

Latest Headlines

Humana leverages tech-savvy employees to build network of 3,000 advocates on Twitter and other social media — in just one year

A year ago, the Louisville-based insurance giant had already signed up 90% of its 50,000 employees to an internal social network, and 40-45% logged in at least once a month. That’s when it decided to encourage the most motivated ones to share approved articles about the company, plus other health-care news on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and other networks outside the company, AdAge reports today.

Employees use the hashtag #HumEmployee to make clear they work for the company. To launch the program, called Humana Advocates, the insurer hired Dynamic Signal, a Silicon Valley company that builds employee advocacy systems. The pilot program started with a couple hundred staffers, rising to 500 by January. Since then, the number has jumped to 3,000.

Dan Gingiss
Gingiss

The system shows a list of approved articles for users to share. But most of it “isn’t directly Humana-related, because we don’t want employees to look like shills for the company,” Dan Gingiss, Humana’s head of digital marketing, told AdAge. Most of the content is about health and wellness, some of which is created by Humana itself, with the rest from third parties.

Humana’s effort is only the latest example of how companies are fiercely competing for market share by harnessing free social media technology, where hundreds of millions of current and potential consumers spend more and more time. Twitter says some 313 million people use the short-message platform each month. The figures on Facebook are even higher: 1.7 billion, including 1.1 billion every day.

KFC bucket of chickenAmong Louisville companies, the battle is especially strong among restaurant giants that compete for young customers who practically live online: Yum’s troika of KFC, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell; pizza colossus Papa John’s, and steakhouse chain Texas Roadhouse. On the public-relations front, companies also need all the help they can get from employees to burnish their image when bad news spreads online.

The chains have recently pushed back against headline-grabbing behavior from employees themselves. Last month, Continue reading “Humana leverages tech-savvy employees to build network of 3,000 advocates on Twitter and other social media — in just one year” →

Latest Headlines

Aetna announces plans to slash participation in health exchanges by nearly 70%

Humana merger partner Aetna announced late this evening it will dramatically scale back participation in health-care exchanges under the Affordable Care Act to reduce its losses.

The Hartford-based health insurer said it will serve just 242 counties from the current 778, according to a press release. The followed a similar announcement earlier this month from Humana, which said it plans to largely exit the marketplaces, reducing coverage to no more than 156 counties in 2017 vs. 1,351 today.

Mark Bertolini
Bertolini

Aetna’s decision wasn’t entirely a surprise. In its second-quarter earnings report, CEO Mark Bertolini told Wall Street analysts the company halted plans to enter more states. “We are evaluating our footprint as it exists today to understand what solutions we can put forward to either fix the business or exit the business,” he said.

Aetna took a second-quarter pretax loss of $200 million and total pretax losses of more than $430 million since 2014 in individual plans.

Still, it underscored the challenges insurers are facing as the Affordable Care Act defies forecasts. The unexpectedly close attention consumers are paying to prices on ACA marketplaces is contributing to millions of losses at Louisville-based Humana and Aetna, leading both insurance giants to retreat as fewer healthy people than forecast have signed up, a point reflected in Aetna’s release.

Humana and Aetna logos 250“Providing affordable, high-quality health care options to consumers is not possible without a balanced risk pool,” Bertolini said. “Fifty-five percent of our individual on-exchange membership is new in 2016, and in the second quarter we saw individuals in need of high-cost care represent an even larger share of our on-exchange population.

The insurer’s announcement comes amid its fight to save its proposed $37 billion merger with Humana after the Justice Department sued to block it.

Wayback News

26 years ago today: McConnell accused of exaggerating his record; Humana bans smoking — and an infant girl named Jennifer Lawrence is born

By Jim Hopkins
Boulevard Publisher

CJ front page August 15 1990
26 years ago today.

On Aug. 15, 1990, The Courier-Journal delivered a 52-page paper chock-a-block with news. President George H.W. Bush was rounding up support for an embargo against Iraq, retaliating for its invasion of Kuwait less than two weeks before. Sen. Mitch McConnell, still in his first term, was on the hot seat in his re-election campaign. Kentucky’s powerful tobacco industry still didn’t accept the dangers of smoking. And comedian Bob Hope and his pet poodle were in town. It was a humid Wednesday, with temperatures heading for 86 degrees. The news:

“U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell’s re-election campaign is extolling his 5½-year record with a wide range of radio commercials — at least two of which exaggerate the impact of his work,” CJ political writer Al Cross wrote in a page-one story. “Those two ads say McConnell worked out the financial problems of Big Rivers Electric Corp., and saved the Kentucky construction industry by casting the deciding vote against a presidential veto of a highway bill.”

The record, including statements from company and government officials, contradicted McConnell’s account, Cross said. But the Louisville Republican vigorously defended the commercials, saying they weren’t inaccurate or misleading. At the time, McConnell faced Democratic nominee Harvey Sloane, the former Louisville mayor and  county judge-executive.

Humana building
Humana Tower
Humana nixes smoking

Citing concerns about deaths linked to passive smoking, Humana said it would ban smoking at its corporate headquarters downtown and in all division offices starting Feb. 1, 1991. The health insurance giant’s decision came after a June report by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that about 3,800 lung-cancer related deaths per year among non-smokers are caused by secondhand cigarette smoke. Humana estimated only 1 in 7 employeees smoked, a decrease of about 35% from several years before.

The story noted that “the tobacco industry, which has never agreed that smoking is a hazard even to smokers themselves, has attacked the EPA findings as unsubstantiated.”

Comedian Bob Hope signed copies of his new book, “Don’t Shoot, It’s Only Me,” at the W.K. Stewart Booksellers in the Holiday Manor Shopping Center. The 87-year-old stayed at the Galt House with his wife Dolores and their poodle Baxter.

Bacons logoThat day’s CJ carried three full-page ads for Louisville-based Bacon’s Department Store, and four full pages of business news, including 2½ pages of stock listings. The Dow Jones Industrial Average had closed the day before at nearly 2,748 points.

ValuMarket was selling half-gallon cartons of Sealtest ice cream for $1.98. TWA offered roundtrip tickets to New York City for $158.

And unknown to most everyone reading that day’s paper, Jennifer Shrader Lawrence was born to Gary Lawrence, a construction worker, and his wife Karen, a children’s camp manager.

Postscript

Iraq is Continue reading “26 years ago today: McConnell accused of exaggerating his record; Humana bans smoking — and an infant girl named Jennifer Lawrence is born” →

Latest Headlines

The wails of August: Humana and Aetna bit by surprise consumer focus on price

The unexpectedly close attention consumers are paying to prices on marketplaces created by the Affordable Care Act is contributing to millions of losses at Humana and merger partner Aetna, leading both insurance giants to retreat as fewer healthy people than forecast have signed up, according to a new story by The New York Times.

The result: Louisville-based Humana said it plans to largely exit the marketplaces, reducing coverage to no more than 156 counties in 2017 vs. 1,351 today.

Mark Bertolini
Bertolini

Aetna of Hartford expects a loss of more than $300 million in Affordable Care Act business this year; it previously said it was a break-even operation. And it told investors in its second-quarter financial report that it’s halted plans to enter more states. “We are evaluating our footprint as it exists today to understand what solutions we can put forward to either fix the business or exit the business,” CEO Mark Bertolini told Wall Street analysts.

Latest Headlines

Papa John’s opening 40 more outlets in Russia; judge sets Dec. 5 trial date for Humana-Aetna case, jeopardizing $1B breakup fee to HUM; and ouch: new GE beverage maker like something out of ‘Spaceballs’

A news summary focused on 10 big employers; updated 3:14 p.m.

PAPA JOHN’S said today it will open 40 restaurants in Russia over the next eight years, with the first store scheduled to open in St. Petersburg next month. Franchiser PJ Western Retail already operates more than 80 restaurants in Russia and Belarus; it’s owned by Global Restaurant Management and private equity firm Capman Russia Fund (press release). The chain opened 357 outlets last year, and now has nearly 5,000 restaurants consisting of 752 company-owned and 4,141 franchised in all 50 states and in 39 countries and territories. Beyond the U.S., the country with the single-most locations is China, with 244, as of the end of last year (annual SEC report).

In Hawaii, a Papa John’s worker is among the latest of scores of people affected by a recent hepatitis A outbreak, according to the state Department of Health. The unidentified employee worked at a restaurant in Waipahu on the island of Oahu, and brings to a total of 168 cases confirmed through yesterday. DOH investigators suspect the source of the outbreak was likely a product widely distributed primarily on Oahu (KHON-TV).

Judge John Bates
Bates

HUMANA: The federal judge hearing the Justice Department’s case to block Aetna’s $37 billion purchase of Humana has set a trial date for Dec. 5 — later than the companies had requested — and allowed 13 days for the proceedings. The date is a compromise between the two sides. During a hearing yesterday in Washington, U.S. District Judge John Bates said he was leaning toward an early November trial, but he later accepted the Justice Department’s arguments that date wouldn’t give the agency enough time to prepare. The insurers had argued for an earlier time frame, noting that the current contractual agreement between the two is subject to a Dec. 31 deadline. If the merger isn’t approved by then, Humana would have the option of walking away and potentially collecting a $1 billion breakup fee. Bates told the parties to proceed with the “expectation” that he will issue a ruling in mid-January  (Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg).

Antitrust cases are typically kept on a strict timetable set by the judge, who in this case is very efficient, said David Balto, a lawyer representing several consumer groups that oppose the insurance mega-mergers. Even though Aetna and Humana extended the deadline to close the deal by the end of this year, the litigation is likely to force them to extend the closing again (Courier-Journal). The DOJ last month sued to block the merger, arguing that it would likely raise consumer prices and stifle competition.

Bates was appointed to the bench in December 2001 by President George W. Bush (Wikipedia).

Ford Explorer Sport
Sport’s MSRP: $45,000.

FORD says professional Generation-Xers don’t always drive SUVs, but when they do they drive a Ford Explorer Sport, according to a new vehicle customer study by MaritzCX. the The vehicle has the highest percentage of Gen-X buyers of any non-luxury SUV in the United States, MaritzCX says (press release). X-ers are the spawn of the huge baby boom generation. There are no precise dates for when the group starts or ends; demographers have used birth years bracketed by the early 1960s to early 1980s (Wikipedia). Ford employs nearly 10,000 workers at truck and auto factories in Louisville; more about the automaker’s local operations.

KFC is opening a new restaurant today at Louisville International Airport, as part of an ongoing renovation of the terminal there (Courier-Journal).

TEXAS ROADHOUSE has reportedly backed out of plans to build a restaurant in the northern Chicago suburb of Mount Pleasant (Journal Online).

AMAZON‘s stock touched a new record trading high, $773.75, before easing back to a recent $771.51, up $2.95. It’s one of the Louisville area’s biggest employers, with 6,000 workers at distribution centers in Jeffersonville and Shepherdsville. More about Amazon here.

GE: The new GE Keurig Beverage Center prototype would be built right into the wall and replace basically every appliance that makes drinks, including coffee, soda, and smoothies. Wolf Appliances debuted a semi-similar mega-coffeemaker two years ago. The cost? Well over $3,000, and it didn’t even have the built-in blender.

Spaceballs posterThere’s no plan to make more Beverage Centers just yet (and no word on how much each one would cost), but Chris Bissig, GE Appliances’ manager of concept and brand development wouldn’t rule it out (CNET and Tech Insider).

CNET’s cruel conclusion: The gadget looks like something out of “Spaceballs,” the 1987 Star Wars parody starring director Mel Brooks, John Candy and Rick Moraines, featuring a character named Pizza the Hut.

Here’s a bad photo of what it looks like:

GE Beverage Center
That’s a pullout tray of Keurig cups is in the foreground.