Life insurers will have to engage with people through popular social media sites if they want to deal with underinsurance, says Commonwealth Bank Chief Marketing Officer Andy Lark.

“Life insurance is boring, so it comes down to content that must be able to be accessed on a phone or tablet,” he told a CommInsure event in Melbourne.

Mr Lark says life insurers must simplify their content and seek new ways of engaging with people.

“You have to look at entertaining ways of attracting people and the writing on the wall is games,” he said. “We are entering a society of players.”

Of the 410 minutes a month people spend on Facebook, 50% of it is spent playing social games, Mr Lark says. And of the 750 million users of the social network site, 270 million are gamers.

The Commonwealth Bank has introduced games for property investors and children to help them understand how to manage a bank account.

“Insurers will have to think of themselves as being in the entertainment industry,” he said. “And content has to be fun.”

Mr Lark says insurers will have to capitalise on new technology as more then 60% of Australians have a smartphone.

It would also seem the modern consumer and their smartphone are inseparable. He says 80% of them watch TV with their devices in their hand while 40% are using them to access social networking sites at the same time.

Mr Lark says these consumers are also accessing financial services sites, with 82% of internet users using it for banking.

Commonwealth Bank is the fourth most visited site in Australia, and has 100,000 followers on Facebook.

“If I was selling life insurance, I would want to build the biggest collection of people on Facebook,” he said.

“That is now the power of the social media networks.”