Raise your hand if you feel newer technology is sprinting past you. It seems like every day there is some new InsurTech firm promising to knock the insurance industry on its behind and revolutionize how things are done. You can either choose to embrace it, or watch it pass you by; either way, your business will be impacted by your decision.
Technology can be crucial to your firm’s sustainability. If you haven’t explored technology solutions yet, you need to. The train has left the station. Yesterday’s article covered the basics of “Spring Cleaning” your CRM database. The reality is your clients have a host of experiences in their personal and professional lives that are setting the expectations for how technology both enables and supports their relationship with your firm. Trying to compete on product and price is a losing proposition. The measures of service, personal interaction, and ease of doing business are being compared to the best experience they receive from anyone, not just your competitors. The heightened expectations acquired from interacting with Amazon, Disney, Apple, Uber set the bar for how you will be measured. Add in the recent shove into adopting technology like Zoom, WebEx and Microsoft Teams and you need to get in the game or get out of the way.
This article is in no way an endorsement for any product mentioned, but rather a sampling of how technology enables efficiencies and effectiveness for your firm and clients. What innovative tools are you using to better serve your clients? Are you outsourcing tasks to technology to free up your producer’s time to better serve your clients in a one-on-one, personal basis? How much more effective could you be if you prospected in an informed, data and insight rich personal manner? Don’t know where to begin to evaluate the best CRM platform for your firm? One resource is SelectHub, which offers a tool to find and compare software based on your firm’s needs.
Let’s start with your office. The foundational CRM platforms of today are much more robust than the early versions. They do more than simply organize and store data. Platforms such as Salesforce, Hubspot, Sage, Pega, Chime, Microsoft Dynamics and a hundred others have small business solutions that automate antiquated manual processes, create lead generation lists and trigger customer retention alerts as well as monitor client interactions across channels. Much of this is driven by AI. Yes AI – Artificial Intelligence. If that sounds like it isn’t relevant for your firm, consider how it can help create personalized and customized solutions by continually churning all the data (machine learning) to discover the primary needs and wants of your clients. It enables better experiences not only to attract new prospects but to increase client loyalty. People go where the best experience takes them. If you make it individualized and easy to do business with your firm, you will win.
The automation benefit of AI is its capacity to take over tedious and time-consuming tasks such as:
- Certificate request processing
- Claims management
- On-line open enrollment
- Compliance tracking
- Carrier service centers for your smaller accounts
- Comparative raters (both personal lines and commercial property and casualty)
If AI hasn’t been in your consideration set, take an online tutorial, read about it, learn how it can work for your firm. AI brings predictive analytics and data intelligence to the forefront. It can synthesize years of insured data and help segment clients based on key criteria putting the power of the information in the hands of your producers.
This week, MarshBerry is holding its first ever Virtual Connect Member Summit. These summits allow for firms to take advantage of their peers’ experience, both good and bad, with these technologies. The lessons learned during this time are invaluable and most members walk away with a new/fresh perspective on how technology can change their businesses, and how close competitive threats may be when others are employing technology that you lack. While technology won’t solve all your problems, it can certainly help.
It’s worth mentioning, the author of this article is not the most tech savvy person, but this old dog has learned a trick or two about harnessing technology in business operations. If you have questions about Today’s ViewPoint or would like to discuss your technology strategy and how we may be able to help please email or call Eric Kuhen, MarshBerry Strategy Consultant at 440.637.8118.
