Meet Betterview’s New Head of Marketing, Adam Frew

Betterview is pleased to announce the hiring of our new Head of Marketing, Adam Frew. Adam enters Betterview with multiple decades of experience in technology startups, marketing, and the insurance space. We got the chance to sit down and talk with Adam about his marketing philosophy, his thoughts on Betterview’s positioning, and his own fascinating career.

Betterview: First, I’d like you to tell me about your career so far, and how it has led you to your current position at Betterview.

Adam Frew: I have been involved in software and technology most of my career. I earned a degree in Imaging and Digital Art at university, fundamentally a blended degree in design and computer science. We had a phenomenal engineering department supported by Silicon Graphics with terrific computer labs and immense computing power. It provided fantastic opportunities to understand and explore the cutting-edge technologies at that time — the World Wide Web, the internet, multimedia, high-end 3D animation — and learn how design impacted their success. It was an incredible experience that directed much of my career.

After graduation, I worked at Kodak Digital Labs — the digital arm of Eastman Kodak. We developed proprietary high-speed film scanners to scan, print, digitize to CD, and upload photos directly to the internet in seconds. We were at the forefront of the digital photography revolution and web-based storage accounts — that we would now just call the cloud. I quickly learned how hard it is to bring new technology and unheard-of products to market. Adoption requires creating a level of trust and comfort that involves great product design, clear, concise marketing, and a strong Brand.

From there, I went on to work at a PR firm in Washington DC, Gateway Computer in San Diego, an online medical training company in Colorado, Parallels Software in Seattle, and even a Hosting and Cloud-focused event organization in Germany. I’ve also started a few companies developing websites and custom e-commerce sites and freelanced for Fortune 500 companies, small Mom-and-Pop businesses, and startups crafting brands, designing websites and collateral, and creating identities.

Most recently, I led marketing for One Inc, another InsurTech startup. While there, we built an entirely new brand and pivoted their GTM strategy to focus on processing inbound and outbound insurance payments—eventually becoming the industry leader in that space.

At each step of my career, I’ve found that what I learned in the beginning at Kodak is true everywhere — great design, concise marketing, and a strong brand are essential to a company’s success.

BV: What made you excited to join Betterview?

Adam: The product and the people. I’ve worked for companies where the product lacked features and functions, was hard to use, or was stagnant on innovation. Marketing and sales need to be ahead of the product and planning for things coming in three, six, or nine months. You have to get that conversation out there and start building interest before actually launching anything. When a company doesn’t invest in the product, the roadmap will slip, the messaging becomes unclear, and eventually, the customers will lose trust. On the other hand, when a company is invested in the product, the user experience, and has engineered its platform for growth and innovation, customers have faith the product will solve their immediate problems and support them long into the future.   

Everyone at Betterview is driving to create the best product experience they can to help their customers. It requires a vast amount of experience, knowledge, and work to automate gathering data from multiple sources, interpret issues and risks, provides actionable insights on properties across the nation, and do it all behind an elegant and intuitive interface. The people here believe in freeing our customers from time-consuming, often inaccurate, and research-intensive tasks so they can focus on more complex and rewarding work. Work that requires real expertise and ingenuity and provides the best experience to their policyholders. That focus on helping insurance companies build a better policy experience is ingrained in the culture and fundamental to the product here at Betterview. 

BV: Do you have a personal mission in your career?

Adam: Most of the time, intellectual concepts and ideas never leave a person’s head. They don’t become real. But the minute you start putting images and words to an idea, you can give it life. People can identify with this new thing. They can relate to it. Understand it. Want to have it or use it. Everything in the world has a story. I love telling those stories, creating that magic. Making something from nothing.

BV: Do you have a “marketing philosophy”?

Adam: Great marketing is about finding a key message that resonates with someone in an honest way. Not necessarily trying to trick them or confuse them or leverage their emotional states, but actually to answer the question: “what benefit does this provide?” The goal should be to give customers all the information they need to make the best decision possible—hopefully, in a clever and fun way. Let the commercial trappings of business disappear so that you can have an honest conversation. 

BV: What do you think needs to be the goal of Betterview’s marketing right now?

Adam: Coming into a startup like Betterview, you need to expand awareness about the company and its products to a large audience. What is it, and what does it do? We need to let people know how much thought and intention are going into development. The product is strong, and we have the ability to add so much more to it, providing even more solutions to our customers. The sky is the limit for how much it can grow. There is a lot to tell the world about us. But, it is also just as important to find that simple, compelling story that connects with customers and starts a great conversation. That’s my goal — start the conversation.

Betterview is on a mission to turn high-quality data into actionable insights for the industry. We foster a collaborative environment, working together to find the best solutions for our customers. If you are interested in joining a strong, innovative team, head over to the careers page on our website or contact us directly.