Early this week came news just about as big as anything theinsurance world has seen in the past few years:CVS has agreed to acquire Aetna for $69billion. Pending approval of the merger, there are severalimplications to highlight for the benefits industry, specificallyas it would affect benefits advisors.

First, this deal makes it even more clear that the battlegroundin the insurance and health care spaces is distribution. Acombined CVS and Aetna prove that the biggest players in theirrespective spaces (retail / pharmacy and insurance) are willing tobet on reinventing how health care is delivered. They aim to dothis by integrating the actual manufacturing of “products” (healthcare) and how that “product” is distributed (via the nearly 10,000retail pharmacies CVS currently operates).

It also highlights the importance of insurance companies andbenefits advisors having access to data that can inform and shapethe way that health care is designed, delivered, and evolved overtime. As one of the most omnipresent retail chains in the country,CVS has access to a boatload of data about consumers: not only whatprescriptions you take, but also what over-the-counter medicine andother products you buy. Aetna, on the other hand, has the providerrelationships and of course, the insurance itself. Those are twomassive puzzle pieces that should fit nicely together in order todeliver a more seamless and intelligent health care experience tothe consumer.

This merger has important potential ramifications for benefitsadvisors, who currently own a significant piece of the benefitsexperience via employee benefits decision-making, purchasing, andmanagement. Given the fact that over 157 million Americans gainaccess to health insurance plans through their employer, theadvisor that delivers those insurance plans is a key component ofthe status quo. You should take this opportunity to makeinvestments in ways to protect and add value to thoserelationships.

One way you can do this is to provide a positive and “sticky”benefits experience for employer clients and employees through abenefits marketplace technology platform. While the benefitsadvising industry has, for the most part, embraced that this sortof technology is here to stay, it’s time to standardize on it andmake it the way you do business. This will help you avoidlosing business to a competitive, compelling offering that may, forinstance, combine the convenience of CVS’ care delivery mechanismwith the insurance products offered by Aetna (which, as of thisyear, is the third biggest provider of health insuranceplans in the US).

Health insurance carriers aren’t going anywhere, and willcontinue to be a vital partner for benefits advisors. But as thispotential merger proves, they’re looking for ways to more tightlyintegrate the products they’re creating with the way those productsare delivered and used, and benefits advisors are at risk of beingcut out of the equation entirely if they don’t take decisiveaction.