THE INDUSTRY IS UNDERGOING A TRANSFORMATION.
The insurance industry faces great challenges: stagnating premiums, low-interest rates and fewer remaining options to cut costs. Customers are also becoming more independent. High-quality information and up-to-date offers for switching insurance companies are always available just a mouse click away. According to the consulting firm Bain & Company (2012), almost 40% of insurance customers have thought about switching providers. They learned from their experiences with phone and energy companies that switching providers can save them real money. Insurance companies cannot afford to lose these customers. This is why they need to become more flexible, innovative and connected with their customers.
This trend of dealing with more knowledgeable customers who are willing to switch providers will continue into the future. This is why new and non-traditional providers in the insurance market have been actively pursuing the possibilities afforded by digital technologies. Recently, Google introduced an insurance comparison site for California and other U.S. regions. Combined with data from its regular search engine business, the company can generate huge amounts of user data. Perfectly customized insurance products can be offered to customers based on this data. And according to a study conducted by the IBM Institute for Business Value (IBV), almost 20% of people under 30 (millennials) would buy an insurance policy from Google.
THE THREE DIMENSIONS OF CUSTOMER RETENTION.
What do insurance companies need to do to increase customers‘ trust, retain customers and increase revenue and profit in the process? The IBV survey results show three areas to work on:
1. DIMENSION: KNOW YOUR CUSTOMER BETTER.
Customer behavior is influenced by their previous experiences and their underlying psychographic factors. Insurance companies must know and understand their customers better. They must begin to view their customers as individuals and not only as target groups. They must approach their customers and appeal to them both rationally and emotionally.
2. DIMENSION: OFFER REAL CUSTOMER VALUE.
Customers know what they want. And they know it more than ever before. Low-priced direct providers are seizing the moment, and comparison portals are making it easier to switch providers. This is why insurance companies must present their customers with high-quality, customized offers. ”Value“ doesn‘t just mean a low price. Value also means quality, brand, and transparency.
3. DIMENSION: INTERACT WITH CUSTOMERS.
Millennials (customers under 30) are the insurance market of the future. This generation wants speed and variety. They want to be addressed and listened to – on all different types of media. This means insurance companies must approach their customers both in person and using the entire range of digital technologies.
A SYSTEMATIC APPROACH TO THE FUTURE.
It is easier to retain customers than to find and win over new ones. SugarCRM offers highly innovative and flexible tools that enable insurance companies to form a rational and emotional connection with their customers. In this way, insurance companies can turn customer data into customer relationships and open up new sales opportunities for now and the future.
INTEGRATE INTERNAL INSURANCE APPLICATIONS AND DATABASES:
Information relating to policies sold, outstanding payments, customer claims, credit scores, etc. all contribute to a deep knowledge base on customers. A powerful CRM system lets companies perform both direct inspections and targeted analyses. This is why Sugar offers simple but extensive linking options: with internal insurance accounting systems, contract and damage overviews and customized software for agencies to manage customers. Internal specialists can quickly add modules and functions and are easily able to add fields and link modules to other data sources (e.g. viewing legacy systems or existing customer databases). Due to this integration and flexibility Sugar can be put into operation easily and quickly.
LINK WITH SALES PARTNERS:
Sugar provides the ability to integrate brokerage firms into the CRM system making cooperation even more efficient. Brokers gain role-based access to processed customer cases (including policies, premiums, invoices, damage reports) which provides them with a 360-degree view of their customers. Further role-based differentiations are also possible at the employee level of the brokerage firm. Example: a sales employee can view the policies sold by a colleague but is unable to view the actual premium amounts.
SALES AUTOMATION:
Sales processes have several steps and are often a lengthy process: initial consultation, follow-up consultation, offers, and modification. Sugar systematizes this process and provides digital support with an automated reminder system. Offers and contracts can also be generated directly from the software. This makes the sales process extremely transparent, and data no longer needs to be recorded more than once.
CONNECT ON SOCIAL MEDIA:
With Sugar, information from social media can be used directly for customer relationship management. For example, marketing managers can use Sugar to incorporate data from social networks in their campaigns.
USER-FRIENDLINESS:
The more employees use a CRM system, the more important it is to have software that is intuitive and user-friendly. This also results in less effort spent on training users and administrators. SugarCRM‘s system architecture was built so that it is easy to add new functions and link with other internal databases and systems. This is why Sugar can be implemented and rolled out quickly even at large insurance companies.
MOBILE ACCESS:
Time is short, and this applies to customers too. This is why sales employees should be informed when they go into customer meetings and ideally already have a 360-degree view of the customer from the CRM. So it is a good thing if consultants can access customer history, model calculations, prior contracts, terms, etc. before and during customer meetings. Sugar supports iPhone, iPad, Android and all other devices with mobile browsers.
PORTAL SOLUTION FOR CUSTOMERS:
Why use these solutions only for sales when customers might be interested too? Sugar gives you the option to grant customers access to their data. Similar to online banking, customers can view their data, correspondence and make changes to their data (e.g. change of address) online. This is a valuable service for customers that also saves insurance companies administration time.
FREE TO CHOOSE THE TYPE OF DEPLOYMENT:
Sugar can be run on the customer‘s data center or on-demand from the cloud (Sugar Cloud, Public Cloud, Partner Cloud). For those who prefer external clouds, SugarCRM offers hosting in clouds that are in Germany or Europe (e.g. cloud solutions from T-System or IBM).
SHORT PROCESS FOR MORE CONVERGENCE.
Customers are changing and have more demands than ever before. They want to stay up-to-date around the clock, shop online and surf on mobile devices. Forward-looking companies are preparing for these changes by establishing new processes to converge marketing, sales, and service. SugarCRM will help your company master this transformation. A broad portfolio of solutions can be integrated easily with Sugar.
To follow are some examples:
• ADVANCED WORKFLOW SOLUTIONS
let organizations create smarter solutions for lead transfers and sup-
port. Companies will drum up even more interest from new and existing customers.
• Marketing automation solutions
support multi-step campaigns in both the planning and implementation phases. Insurance companies can easily manage and improve marketing cooperation with their agencies.
• Integrating ANALYSIS AND REPORTING SOLUTIONS
helps insurance companies recognize trends and identify customers looking to switch providers so they can begin countermeasures before it‘s too late.
CRM solutions are critical for an insurance company‘s business and must work reliably for years to come. The software has proven itself in numerous international companies. Furthermore, a global developer forum ensures there will constantly be new innovations. Over 30,000 developers are active on sugarforge.org and are constantly working on improving Sugar.
WIN OVER HEARTS AND MINDS AND MORE MARKET SHARE IN THE PROCESS.
SEIZE THE OPPORTUNITY TO ACT.
Take advantage of your existing potential by linking, processing and analyzing your customer data. Combined with external information from social networks, you will gain unprecedented customer knowledge.
START TAKING ACTION NOW.
By better knowing your customers‘ needs and demands, you can offer them new options and continuously updated and customized products.
START INTERACTING.
You will always be in the loop thanks to modern communication channels with your customers. Develop relationships with the important millennial target group and use the power of customers‘ emotional connection to ”their“ insurance company.
Download our FREE Whitepaper on CRM for Insurance here.
Contact iZeno. We would be glad to assist you and discuss your needs at any time. We can explain how our modern and intuitive CRM solution can help your company prepare for the future.
iZeno is the Elite Partner of SugarCRM
iZeno is the Elite Partner of SugarCRM with over 12 years of successful implementation and delivery over 200+ Projects. We are also recognized as the APAC Reseller of the year for FY2018.
We work with companies & organisations to build a 360 overview of their customers (internal and external) and optimize their sales, marketing and support processes using SugarCRM and also integrates with many other solutions such as Telephony systems (AWS Connect, Cisco, Avaya, Aspect,3CX), SAP , Hootsuite, Moobidesk, Zendesk, Inbox25, Xero and other core systems to drive business outcome.
With leading presence in the region, headquartered in Singapore and operation in Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and Philippines, no project is too complex for us, and our team is always ready for a new challenge.
Contact Us for a discussion on your CRM initiatives and Customer Experience Challenges.