Insurance Must Better Its Relationship with Customers
As part of our 'Meet the InsurTech advisors' series, Françoise Lamotte, SVP, Head of Direct and Digital, MetLife EMEA, gives the insurance industry a reality check - is it going anwhere quickly and if so, where? This series will be host to the leaders of the InsurTech industry and advisory board for InsurTech Rising, 16-18 October in London.
What’s the most urgent challenge the insurance industry needs to tackle, and how can InsurTech help?
I would consider that the main challenge of the insurance industry is the customer relationship: how to understand consumers’ ever-evolving needs in a rapidly-changing digital world, how to get closer to them, how to deliver a great experience, how to meet their expectations in terms of responsiveness, in terms of simplicity, in terms of transparency. Digital start-ups and successful models have been great at solving the customer pain points. Uber is a fantastic example of solving the anxiety of waiting for a taxi, the concern about service quality and the issue of cash payment. Many InsurTech start-ups are working along the same lines: simplicity of quotation interfaces, speed in claims management, transparency of pricing. The assets developed there are very much needed and precious to over the customer relationship challenge.
What one piece of advice would you give to the industry’s leaders?
My digital journey started 10 years ago when I took the role of Chief Digital Officer of AXA Group. What I have seen since then is how difficult it is to turn large companies which are product and distribution led into customer focused ones. None of the large players – although dedicating important human and financial resources to innovation - are able to keep up with the pace of change given the magnitude of it, because they lack agility and the ability to experiment quickly. Only the ones who can work and partner with startups will make the transition successfully. Smart partnership means finding InsurTech companies that will leverage the brand, the data, the distribution capacity and the capital of incumbents to deliver a scalable and best-in-class customer experience.
2017 will be another big year for innovation in insurance: what will be the hot topics at InsurTech Rising in October?
I think that we have only scratched the surface of data analytics / big data and we will continue to see more applications across the value chain. The other hot topics are, firstly, the rise of bots: after moving from paper to electronic process, bots are the next wave of automation of process; and secondly, AI: we already see customer interfaces that leverage AI to handle simple requests. I expect that we will progressively develop the models to replace human interactions for simple tasks and also sales and more sophisticated products.
It’s 2027. How has insurance changed?
10 years ago, we could not have predicted or imagined half of the things that exist today and I certainly do not have a crystal ball. But based on what we know today, if I could make a guess: first I think that the constant will remain: the need for protection of one’s life, health and belongings; and I would hope that more people have access to insurance and protection. In terms of distribution, I would anticipate that sales, advice and services will be delivered remotely (mobile, virtual reality or whatever will exist then) and largely supported by automation (AI, analytics). As for products, I would expect some risks to have disappeared (car collisions with the progress of safe or driverless cars), others to have emerged… and pricing to trend towards the “pricing of one” based on all available data captured by connected devices. Let’s keep this for the record and reconvene in 10 years!
