In today’s world, when people decide on a company to partner with, it’s contingent on more than just their book of service. It not about going with the largest company, most well-known, or even the one with the best price (which is still important). At the end of the day it is about the experience the company creates for the customer.
Consider two companies. The first has the best price but a slow response rate, clunky website, and dreadful customer service, leaving the customer feeling less than a priority. The second is more expensive but has strong correspondence with an easy to use app that creates a comfortable and safe environment, leaving the client feeling valued.
Without hesitation, most people will choose the second one, because people are willing to pay more for the better experience.
When companies look at how they can differentiate themselves from their competitors, they look at their book of provided services and see how these can be stream-lined to be more convenient and modern while increasing speed-to-service. This is how you connect with your customers.
It should be obvious when you watch commercials, review companies’ websites, even talk with a representative, that there has been a shift in verbiage, presentation, and approach that cultivates a better experience. Many industries have started this transition to adapt to the consumers’ needs, especially companies in the insurance industry.
How do you take complex insurance like automotive, health, and financial and make the transition from lengthy documents, complicated rules, and long processes to the technologies that up-and-coming consumers and businesses demand?
InsurTech has opened new opportunities to get extra creative and now companies are doing some pretty innovative things to push the boundaries on what insurance can do. Here are some ways technology has been able to increase accessibility and help insurance companies stand out from the competition.
Build the Experience and They Will Come
Mobile
Insurance of any kind is not simple. People will actively go out of their way to avoid dealing with it and when you combine that with a sluggish and awkward website that can’t be viewed on a phone, you’ll likely have trouble retaining customers. That’s why going mobile is a necessity.
Everyone is using their phones for everything; it’s practically glued to their hands. If you’re looking to attract and retain customers, it’s important to have mobile friendly websites or apps to improve user experience.
User friendly apps that allow for easy payments, tracking of plans, or connecting with a representative with the click of one button, is a great way to make sure your clients are getting what they need and eliminate jumping through hoops.
By embracing this technology to simplify insurance and make it mobile friendly, you can achieve a higher follow-through rate and address problems faster. This is a sure way to keep your clients satisfied.
Speed-To-Service
When an issue arises, speed-to-service is crucial. If someone is trying to obtain homeowners insurance, which has a very strict timeframe, and a discrepancy arises, being able to identify the issue, locate, and resolve is a must.
Same idea when there is a health emergency, which can happen at any time. Your customers must be able to get the help they need and from the appropriate person. However, a company can’t plan for these events to happen precisely during the typical working hours when you know your employees are in the office with server access.
Transitioning from 100% server-based storage to the cloud – or even a hybrid approach between the two – has been the move for many insurance companies. Utilizing the cloud opens the opportunity for accessing data anywhere, anytime and from mobile devices – which we have already noted are typically glued to everyone’s hand. This technology has allowed insurance companies to stay competitive and address customer inquiries faster than ever before, even during off hours.
Employees can access the necessary data and give a timely response without needing to travel to the office. Get freedom of accessibility while tapping into the data that’s right at your fingertips.
Self-Service
Even in the insurance industry, it is important to consider the current generation’s wants and needs. As the workforce population changes and technology inspires all to think differently, companies need to reevaluate what they’ve previously done to keep customers happy.
One of the biggest trends across industries right now is increasing consumer control. Consumers want more control over their lives. People won’t blindly trust a business, which is triggering them to become proactive with their accounts to better understand all the details.
With that, people prefer the ability to check their accounts at any time, pay a bill online, submit or even resolve an issue with just a few clicks and without the need to speak to others. To help balance this out and increase control while decreasing the need to talk to people, a self-service option is highly recommended through either a website or app to achieve client satisfaction.
Social-Media
Nowadays, most people are using their social media accounts for much more then posting – they’re now using it for other parts of everyday life, too. Insurance companies have taken note and have been looking into how they can incorporate social media to increase convenience for their customers.
Certain insurance companies are connecting to a variety of social media platforms which will allow their customers the ability to sign into their insurance portal using their Facebook credentials. This introduces the ability for clients to file claims and handle other related tasks right from Facebook.
Advances in technology have made increased convenience critical to the overall customer experience.
Reduce Cost Today, Benefit Tomorrow
Automate
Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence are hot buzz words in the tech world. Automating workflows to improve work process and effort equals huge impact for businesses willing to give it a try. In fact, the reduction in cost for redundancy processes and wasted employee time has led insurance companies to incorporate these technologies into their businesses.
Turning toward Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence means companies can automate and even improve their processes. One area that has benefited greatly from this opportunity is the claim department. Implementing an automated process allows for thousands of claims to be handled at a much faster rate, resulting a quicker turn-around time for customers.
This can also open the potential to take on more business, as processing claims faster than before gives insurance companies the capacity to increase the number of claims handled each year to serve more customers.
Chatbots
Another way AI impacts the insurance industry is through chatbots. Insurance companies are programing and training chatbots to receive questions and then deliver appropriate responses. By having a chatbot work with your customers, customers have the control, get instant gratification, save time and frustration, all while eliminating response wait time.
Don’t forget about the benefit to your employees who won’t lose their day answering simple questions repeatedly. About 74% of consumers expressed that they would be pleased to receive computer-generated insurance advice. Also, you can integrate these bots with other platforms, like Facebook and Twitter.
This is brilliant because most people remember questions or tasks they must complete while scrolling through Facebook. If they leave Facebook to log into another account, they might tell themselves they will get to it later. But, if a chatbot for your insurance company is conveniently there, they are more likely to get the answer to their question or follow through on the task immediately.
This type of convenience and integration into the daily lives of your customers is vital in providing them with the experience they’ve come to expect.
Downscale
Downscaling typically inspires negative feelings, but it shouldn’t be so scary when you’re thinking about cutting out unnecessary items to reduce your carbon footprint, become more efficient, and save money. As companies explore opportunities to make internal changes, they have found that technology has allowed them to do this easily.
When moving to the cloud, the benefits are more than just faster response time – it saves tremendous amounts of money on servers, server upkeep, and office space. Also, eliminating company waste becomes a simple transition.
When you create a viable application for your customers that allows them to review records, track items, or pay, you are opening the opportunity to eliminate paper mail. Your customers can get notifications when a payment is due instead of paper statements, and claims no longer need to be sent, but can be tracked in the app.
With new technology, it is simple to turn some of the more tedious or mundane tasks into a self-service option or implement a chat bot to address low level questions. This will save the company money by freeing up employee time and allowing them to focus their efforts on tougher tasks.
This also could potentially open the opportunity to take on more clients with the increased capacity to handle additional work. You can eliminate large spaces, unnecessary office materials, and redundant processes from your budget and as an alternative use the money saved to better assist your customers.
Drones
Drones are everywhere. If you look up at the sky during a sports game, parade, or fireworks, you’ll probably see drones flying around. As this technology has caught on, consumers are used to them in everyday life, so it’s no surprise that insurance companies have thought about how they might be able to benefit from drone technology as well.
If your insurance company insures properties and gets request for damages on tall buildings or houses, one way to reduce risk for your employees is to use a drone. With the cameras today, drones can take live footage streamline it to a computer or device for an agent to review.
That results in less time, faster results, lowered risk, and increased safety. Drones are a pretty cool way to enhance the inspection process while changing lives of your employees and customers around you.
Decrease Fraud Loss, Increase Customer Protection
Social Media
Insurance companies are retiring their private investigators and using social media accounts to conduct fraudulent investigations. Insurance fraud has been a major problem. When false claims are reported and are paid out wrongfully, it causes a ripple effect that increases insurance cost, making it more expensive for everyone else.
Using social media has proven to be fruitful in determining if a fraud investigation is necessary. If a client is on social media, which most are today, insurance companies can view the accounts and look for inconsistent details.
For example, if a customer states that an item of theirs was stolen and then themselves or the thief post about it on one of their accounts, insurance companies add that information to their investigations to use as evidence when evaluating the claim.
Being able to find discrepancies in reported claims is resulting in saving a ton of money on both the insurer’s and client’s side.
Telematics
The world of cars continues to change and evolve, with automotive manufacturers always pushing for the next big thing. Now, they have been looking at how they can utilize cars to be more then just transportation devices. By teaming up with auto insurance companies for example, they are implementing telematics devices, like GPS, into the cars to track data that can be sent back to the insurer.
This new technology can track the cars location and incident reports, which helps reduce fraudulent claims as well as track someone’s driving record. If their specific data shows that they are a responsible driver, even at an age not typically deemed so, they can get additional discounts on their insurance.
With all the data available today, insurance can transition into a more individually specific model.
Personalize the Data
Monitoring
Today, people don’t want to be categorized, they want to be individualized. They want things to be personalized and intimate to their specific needs. By embracing this, insurance companies took the Internet of Things (IoT) technology approach and transformed it into a new business model.
Companies partner with technology like Fitbit, Apple Watch, and other health apps that can track, monitor, and suggest different ways to be healthier and benefit your life. Insurance companies lowered costs by showing that people were taking preventative steps to become healthier.
This approach opened the opportunity to track new medicine, see how it’s working, and even check if whether or not someone was taking their medication. All these different ways allow people to get the individual care they require, while driving efforts to lower the cost for both employers and employees alike.
Homeowner’s insurance companies have also turned towards personalized data. They are tapping into smart home equipment like Nest, smoke alarms, locks, sprinklers, and security devices. Those who install these into their homes are taking preventative steps to reduce risk, which in turn allows them to receive additional discounts. What a win-win situation.
Drones
Traditionally, people are placed into pre-defined groups from data that was determined by historical trends, whether it aligns 100% with you or not. Advanced technology has transitioned the way companies collect data to become specific to individuals, shifting the use of historical data to be a thing of the past.
People don’t have to be placed into a box based off income, age, gender, or location anymore and, uniquely enough, drones are helping to achieve this. Let’s take homeowners for example. Typically, younger people are deemed to be more reckless and less responsible, leading to a more expensive insurance premium. Now, with the use of drones, they can collect data in real-time and confirm whether or not this is true for an individual, giving new homeowners the chance to prove that they don’t fit in the stereotypical category.
Another way drones are helping to cultivate change within the homeowner’s space is related to people typically living in places that deal with a lot of natural disasters. Homes that are more susceptible to hurricanes, flooding, and tornadoes will have a higher premium due to their risky location.
However, there are a lot of different ways people are protecting their homes to mitigate that risk, so continuing to group that way doesn’t really make sense. Drones can survey homes and see which ones are taking precautionary steps to better stabilize their house, or reduce potential damage, before and after an incident and can determine the severity of damage.
This helps with saving money for the insurance companies as well as the homeowners, while rewarding them for protecting their investment.
Expand your portfolio
Delight your Customers
When insurance packages are put together for a company, its tough to make one fit everybody perfectly. So, by improving the way data is collected, insurance companies can learn more about their customers and see what areas people are wanting coverage in that they might not be offering at this time.
By creating complementary add-on packages, you can better fit your customer’s needs. Maybe they have a client that likes to travel; they can create a travel add-on insurance package. If someone is thinking of starting a family, companies can offer additional coverage to assist with hospital expenses in addition to their general insurance.
People want to feel protected and like their best interests are being taken care of. By creating these subset options, insurance companies can truly provide their customers with coverage for whatever they need.
Innovate to Meet Consumer Demands
Insurance companies sure have their innovative hats on and are working incredibly hard to make the lives around them better. From enhancing internal workflow, to meeting the demands of external customers, they are constantly pushing boundaries and using technology to achieve their goals.
If your business hasn’t adopted new technology to meet the changing landscape, you’re in danger of falling behind the competition. There is no time like the present to start thinking about the great things technology can do for your company and start taking steps to deliver a better experience for your clients.
If you’re looking to brainstorm, you have started but hit roadblocks, or you have a solid plan and are looking for a compatible partner to bring your project over the finish line, Geneca is ready. Our innovative process has resulted in a 97% success rate when it comes to tech projects like these, so don’t wait until tomorrow! Let’s work together to leverage technology for your insurance company today.