As your brand continues to enhance its digital capabilities, remaining as omnichannel as possible is critical for your success. Focusing on building out hybrid interactions that combine people and technology is key.
However, while 48% of insurers reported CX technologies play a key role in their business, only 26% plan to increase their CX technology investments.18 This will be problematic in the long term as the industry faces shifting consumer behaviors and a greater engagement with consumers. Keeping your eye on technology and maintaining focus on enhancing these features can promote an excellent CX.
This shift towards offering policyholders additional ways to interact with their insurers is being well received. However, it's important to note that the increase in detractors stemmed from an insurer’s digital system being too difficult to use, providing poor support or taking too long.
But with so many technologies to choose from, how do you prioritize what is most important to consumers? According to Gartner, consumers are placing security, claims processing efficiency and efficient ways to locate important information as the top priorities to make their CX optimized.19
Specifically, AI technology is sure to transform the industry and add significant value when applied to not only insurance policies but also to revolutionize pricing and underwriting. AI is set to improve the process of offering insurance and paying on claims. For example, you might have a car crash and use your smartphone to inform your insurer. AI could then diagnose the cost of repairs by analyzing images you took of the damaged vehicle.20
Type of insurance interaction by channel (% of insurance customers)
Source: Gartner, “2020 Gartner COVID-19 customer experience survey.”
Digital interactions by NPS category
Source: Bain and Dynata, “Customer insurance trends study.”
Positive impact of chatbot implementation21
increase in sales from out-of-office-hour quote conversions from chatbot
decrease in agent handling time for customers who have already interacted with a bot
Paying special attention to leveraging chatbot technology to increase speed and efficiency for policyholders is important. Technology-forward insurers such as US-based Lemonade offer insurance to homeowners and renters with zero paperwork, lower fees and instant responses by leveraging bots, claiming to insure policyholders in just 90 seconds and pay claims in under three minutes.
Data and analytics will also play a key role in parametric, or usage-based, insurance, which uses heavy hardware consumers install in order to track specific metrics used for this insurance model. Since the advent of the smartphone, being able to track where consumers are and how fast they are traveling delivers data that can be used beyond the obvious auto insurance arena. It gives all insurers the ability to more accurately determine risk and provide tailored insurance products at variable rates depending on a particular consumer’s behavior.
In addition, the use of blockchain can improve speed for many areas of the industry since all the pertinent, precise details of a policy or prior claims are available on the blockchain. This means consumers can get insurance payments faster and more efficiently. Finally, APIs allow for personalized insurance products to be added at the point of purchase for specific instances, such as when purchasing a laptop.
Top consumer expectations for insurance transactions
Transaction is safe and secure
Fast response and claims resolution in an emergency
Easy to find content
Providing guidance on the right product
The transaction happens quickly
Source: Gartner, “Top 3 customer experience trends for digital insurance 2022.”
18 & 19 - Gartner, “Top 3 customer experience trends for digital insurance 2022,” gartner.com.
20 - Raconteur, “Insurtech innovation: 5 trends for 2022,” raconteur.com.
21 - Kearney, “Digitization in insurance: A golden opportunity for GCC insurers to get ahead of the competition,” kearney.com.