Customer Engagement in a Connected World
Editorial by Andrew Dart
Welcome to this month’s Insurtech Insights, in which we are covering one of my favourite topics – Customer engagement in a connected world.
I first wrote about this topic over 4 years ago and about 3 ½ years ago I presented “The New Insurance Engagement” at a conference in China. It was born out of the realisation that, up to that point, most of the insurance technology created was being used to either improve the quote-buy-capture (renew) process or the claims process. Very few seemed to be looking to engage customers outside of those two main areas. I used this diagram to illustrate the vast amounts time where insurers could potentially add value. I termed it, “Customer Value Creation Opportunities”
These value creation opportunities are powered by:
- Mobile smart devices (and IoT sensors)
- Real-time two-way data sharing
- Analytics generating customer relevant insights
- Customer engagement
With these elements, we have the means to change the customer’s behaviour and potentially avoid or reduce claims, which benefits both the customer and insurer. Additionally, if we get creative, we can improve our customer’s life everyday as a pay-off for the data being shared. It’s really a matter of being truly customer focused and understanding what’s important to our customer.
If you look at the presentation above, you’ll see one of the early adopters I mentioned was Metromile. As, far as I am aware, they were among the first insurers to talk about a platform of engagement. It’s apt then, that Rick, in his article, looks at Metromile and their latest developments in customer engagement. He also covers a range of other insurers and InsurTechs and as usual, Rick’s piece is peppered with many links to extremely informative and useful articles. Definitely worth a read.
This month, Louise Portelli and Adrian Clamp from KPMG show how insurers may be overly complacent based on results from KPMG’s recent 2017 CEO survey. They believe traditional insurers are actually falling behind their competitors.However, they outline 5 key areas where insurers can focus to improve their customer engagement to remain competitive.
Finally, our newsletter has a curated set of articles about customer engagement that you’ll find below, if you want to dig deeper. This is courtesy of our TDI Newswire team that does a tireless job of finding the very latest morsels on insurance and technology from around the world.
I know you’ll enjoy reading this month’s edition of InsurTech Insights sponsored and supported by KPMG and thanks for taking the time to stop by.
P.S. See the link to join our free webinar on this same topic on the 29th of November. We have some great speakers including Dr. Catriona Wallace, from Flamingo AI and Tarun Mathur from PolicyBazaar. Hope to see you there!
Yours digitally,
Andrew Dart
Metromile; the pioneers of digital engagement insurance - By Rick Huckstep
Imagine a world where the insured has a continuous digital engagement with their insurer. Where the “insurance product” is a value add service that offers more than just financial protection. In this world, the insurance brand becomes “sticky” and churn becomes a function of product development, not promotional pricing. In fact, price is no longer the only buying criteria. This is the world of Metromile, the pioneers of digital engagement insurance.
KPMG Perspective - Customer engagement in a digital world - By Louise Portelli & Adrian Clamp, KPMG
In a connected age where the quality of the customer experience has become increasingly important across sectors, insurers face a challenge.
Insurance has long been an industry in which it is difficult to sustain customer engagement outside a claim or renewal. It is traditionally a transactional and commoditised industry in which customer relationships are not deep and contact is limited.