Insurance companies upbeat about going digital but lacks focus

BANGALORE, INDIA: Infosys,  commissioned a survey of 200 IT and business decision-makers at insurance companies. Insurance companies in the US, the UK and Germany are well on their way to making the most of digital strategies in their business. However, for many, the success of digital initiatives is threatened by a lack of focus on the customer experience.

The study reported recognition among insurance companies that digital can play a major role in their growth (47 percent) and drive a unified customer experience (44 percent).

Specifically, 44 percent identify digital self-service as a key priority to improve customer experience and thus drive revenue growth 29 percent believe that Big Data is having a positive financial impact on business, primarily through improved underwriting.

Over one-fifth identify Internet of Things as a catalyst for creating positive financial impact on bill payment, policy administration and agent management 25 percent acknowledge the role of digital marketing in winning new business.

However, the study reported that when exploring the challenges and obstacles that organizations face around leveraging digital for customer portals, 60 percent of insurers highlighted that they are hampered by poor quality customer insights, meaning that some insurers could be making wrong choices about their digital investments.

The report also revealed that nearly two thirds (65 percent) said that their digital technology portfolio is the result of an as-needed/ad hoc procurement approach 50 percent said that the lack of a digital innovation strategy prevents delivery of digital marketing initiatives that drive growth.

The biggest obstacle to making digital technology effective (reported by 24 percent) is the lack of right skills.

Manish Tandon, executive vice president and head of Healthcare, Insurance and Life Sciences at Infosys: “ While many insurance companies have developed effective ways to leverage digital technologies to engage with customers, too many are not putting the customer experience at the heart of their strategy. This technology led, ad hoc approach to digital will not work.  Best practices in insurance and examples from sectors such as retail consistently show that being laser focused on customers, and using analytics to develop a deep understanding of customers, are the most important factors in getting digital right.”

The survey recommends Insurance organizations to “forge cross-company relationships to develop and support the digital agenda… leverage Big Data to create high-value contextual experience… selectively outsource to accelerate the speed of digital time to value.”