Consumers may not be into brand names

Health insurance shoppers may not necessarily care as much about carrier brand names as the carriers and their marketing firms think they do.

Steve Zaleznick, a marketing strategist at HealthPocket.com, a health data company, says in a new analysis that his company tried to measure the importance of health insurer brand importance earlier this month.

The company asked Web users, “Would the absence of popular health plans like Aetna and United on Obamacare exchanges make you less certain that you can find your best health plan option there?”