Digital Reigns Supreme: New Insurance Customers Want an Online Experience

Safeco’s digital investments fuel your ability to deliver the ease, choice and expert advice that consumers want today and in the future.

Consumers want more ways to engage and do business from wherever they are and on whatever devices they have handy. Analysts and industry watchers have no shortage of data points to reflect consumers’ growing insistence on digital experiences.

Looking at just two of these studies – Forrester’s “The State of Digital Insurance, 2016” and the J.D. Power “2016 Insurance Digital Evaluation Study” – we learn that current insurance consumers are:

• Online-savvy. Consumers are active online and relying on their insurers’ websites; 56 percent of all insurance customers have visited their insurer’s website in the past month. Roughly 33 percent of U.S. home insurance customers interact with their insurance company via email.
• Connected. They are using multiple devices and channels and have begun using their mobile devices for insurance purposes. Ninety percent of Gen Y customers expect all the services and information available from the website to also be available on the company’s mobile app.
• Self-directed. Insurance consumers are looking for the information they want anytime and anywhere, as evidenced by the 73 percent of U.S. consumers who research life insurance online and the 60 percent who research vehicle insurance online.
• Open to new media and technologies. They are embracing the newest technologies and viewing digital media at a higher rate than ever. In 2016, 46 percent of insurance shoppers said they find videos of policy information helpful, a seven percent increase from the number who felt that way in 2015.

The Forrester article also states that consumers are adopting new behaviors and technologies faster than ever before – a trend that they refer to as ‘hyperadoption’ – which is affecting the insurance industry on a large scale.

How Safeco is Investing in Digital Capabilities

As Safeco’s president, I have no doubt that all carriers and agents need to be deeply digital in their approach to interacting with customers.

Our approach in providing digital capabilities to customers is to use technology to automate what we consider to be lower-value touches. These are the things customers want to be able to do on their own, and they are also the things that many agents would rather relieve their staff from doing because it’s not adding unique value to the relationship.

We’ve recently streamlined customers’ Safeco.com registration process, making it easier than ever to allow policyholders to service their account on their own terms. Earlier this year we launched Safeco® Mobile – an app that integrates with customer’s Safeco.com account so everything they can do on Safeco.com (manage policies, make a payment, download an ID card, etc.) can also be done within the app.

In addition, the claims and roadside support feature on the app guides customers who have been in an auto accident through the accident scene information gathering and claim submission process. Customers can also file a glass claim and get immediate towing services in the event of an auto incident. Plus, they can track claims for any policy type – all from the app.

Safeco is investing to be an industry leader in customer self-service, and while doing so, fueling our agents’ ability to deliver the ease, choice and expert advice that consumers want today and in the future. But evolving to meet changing expectations is a shared responsibility. Like insurance carriers, independent agents who invest in technology and have a plan for meeting the consumer on their terms will be the agents who win in the long term.