We recently had the opportunity to partner with the Managing General Agents Association in the UK to deliver a webinar exploring Insurance during COVID-19, more specifically how the novel coronavirus pandemic challenges the status quo and shapes the world of Insurance. In the one-hour webinar session led by Softelligence Founder and CEO, Adrian Blidarus, we explore these learning objectives:

• Have a clearer understanding of how the paradigm of the traditional way of doing business is being reshaped by the coronavirus pandemic
• Explore and be able to recognise how customer experience will drive digital transformation
• Be able to identify portals, platforms, channels and systems that deliver on post pandemic customer expectations.

We invite you to watch the webinar recording above or on YouTube here.

In this session, we argue that customer experience is the winning bet, especially in difficult times. While cutting costs may be inevitable, the exercise needs to be done with a focus on efficiency. In this respect, we recommend that organisations in Insurance and beyond invest in self-service capabilities and automation, as well as migrating customers and partners to digital channels and portals that can boost satisfaction levels significantly.

Adapting the Insurance industry to COVID-19

We’ve identified four areas that can help the Insurance industry to adapt to the context of COVID-19 and continue to deliver business performance:

• Collaboration tools
• Data and Analytics
• AI and Machine Learning
• Chatbots

Collaboration Tools

Before COVID-19, about half of global workers stated that they don’t work from home. This statistic is likely to change dramatically. The quick wins within the Collaboration Tools area for the Insurance industry are enabling digital quote and bind, digital signature functionalities as well as cybersecurity measures. Taking things further will bring on online portals for brokers and end customers and an increased focus on data protection. Lastly, to accomplish digital transformation, a data-driven culture can ensue across the entire organisation.

Data and Analytics

Data volumes are exploding, with more data being created in the past two years than in the entire previous history of the human race. In the area of Data and Analytics, quick wins come from the cloud which enables data access from a central repository, followed by security to distribute information across the enterprise in a controlled manner and, last but not least, data quality. Taking things further we see an opportunity in blending external data into analyses as well as the ability to drive business decisions from intuitive data systems. Finally, to accomplish digital transformation, data needs to be embedded into all business processes with automated triggers. No decision is taken without foundational data, information winning over intuition for an augmented decision making process.

AI and Machine Learning

With forecasts of 154% growth of the AI software market worldwide in 2020, this is clearly an area full of opportunities. Using the data at hand to start rapid AI and Machine Learning proofs of concept (PoCs) can be a quick win, especially in the areas of claims settlement, fraud detection, resolution of referrals and pricing. The next step is to integrate these PoCs into line of business applications to assist human operators in taking decisions more efficiently. Ultimately, a portion of human decisions could be replaced with decisions based on automated triggers that can often be more precise and consistent.

Chatbots

It’s estimated that more than 4.5 billion people are using the Internet as of January 2020. This makes online channels all the more essential and shows a need to manage them as efficiently as possible. Chatbots can the answer for first-time interactions, for filtering requests on behalf of human operators and generally meet a greater need for automated customer service tools that can offer support and bind elementary policies in Insurance. They can also help MGAs and insurers to open online channels for their broker partners as well as for customers that seek to more easily access services. Ultimately, conversational AI will be a success factor in digital transformation.

Delivering the change

For an organisation that is not a digital native, as is the case with many insurers, brokers and MGAs, fast-following of early adopter strategies coupled with a great execution are the next best thing to disruption. With COVID-19 now being the disruptor, strategies need to focus on fast-following of digital natives, learning from other industries, combined with a great execution.

Learn more on the MGAA website

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