The Insurtech trends that will revoutionize the industry before 2020
Digitization is no more just a trend but a potential disruptor that is taking over every possible industry and challenging the traditional business models
Digital technology has taken the equivalent place of bread and butter, starting from wearing Fitbit all night to checking the Facebook/WhatsApp status the minute one wakes up. This is the common trend among million millennials in India today who probably don’t realize how digitization has taken over many things in their everyday life and made it seamless and instant.
For example, Internet has the capability of providing infinite information right from your home to workplace. Mobile phones are no more used for traditional call purposes but for better apps and technologies.
But this didn’t happen overnight. Frequent use of technology helped people elevate their quality of life, trust brands thus encouraging them to make use of innovative technologies available in the market. Even companies are seen closely following these trends and are implementing them by using new strategies and tools to keep up with the growing technologies.
Digitization is no more just a trend but a potential disruptor that is taking over every possible industry and challenging the traditional business models. Technology giants like Google and Amazon are examples of disruption caused in the industry today and have taken the phase of an addiction in millennials. This is not far from entering other industries such as Banking, Financial, and Insurance. Likewise, today we see the insurance sector too, on the same trajectory with the advent of ‘Insurtech’.
Insurtech startups are extensively using latest technology innovations in an attempt to significantly change the insurance industry landscape for the digital savvy millennial. While none were talking about Insurtech a few years back, it now seems to be the buzzword in the VC circle.
Globally, Insurtech startups are creating some of the most exciting innovations in the industry. Right from innovative business models like peer-to-peer insurance, Uber-like marketplace, migration to complementary services, on-demand insurance, IOT to personalize and lower premiums, they are reaching out to the new-gen like never.
Capturing some key Insurtech trends you will witness in India
1. The Magic of IoT
The insurance companies are not far behind in using its capability. In this digital world where people and data are all interconnected, insurers will offer personalized insurance services-based one’s behavior and performance. Partnerships between telematics in car insurance and fitness bands in health insurance are great examples of this trend.
Fitness bands — Insurance companies these days are extensively offering incentives to customers who wear fitness bands and are monitoring activities to reward them with lower premiums. This activity is predicted to result in a long-term behavioral change among users.
2) Migration to complementary services
To drive customer retention, insurers will start delivering enhanced services to the end users. For this, firms will increasingly collaborate with startups to reduce their go-to-market time. For example, some of the leading global Insurtech startups are seen offering customers complementary services like health plans, booking doctor appointments, recommending the best doctor, among other unique ideas. This means that customers are not only getting insured but are entitled to additional health-related services.
3) Built for efficiency
Unlike conventional insurance business models, Insurtech startups are not constrained by age-old IT systems, large field forces, physical paperwork. By applying latest digital technologies, companies are able penetrate to various parts of the value chain to drive higher efficiencies thus passing on the savings as benefits to the consumer.
4) On-demand insurance
We currently live in a generation, who is watching, eating and consuming everything on-demand basis. The mobile first approach and flexibility in the services provided Insurtech companies are seen more than appealing. With on-demand insurance the power to how, when and what one wants to insure is handed over to the consumer! For example, a customer can turn on the insurance for her DSLR via a mobile app when she starts her hike. And, once back, she simply can turn it off.
5) Transparency in offerings
Serious advice, the last thing any company should try to do is to tap the go-to-Google millennials with clauses, offers which in-turn will only confuse, an effort that put in to win them as consumers. Understanding this variation, Insurtech startups are making their insurance offers, policy details terms and conditions etc. more accessible to the customer. Which means the long, jargon-filled policy documents and explanations will soon be made extinct. Customers would be able to easily go through any part of an insurance feature they wish to understand, a pathway to a more honest and transparent way of getting insured.
There has been a long-awaited need to create products and processes across industries, keeping in mind a real benefit for the end-customer. Some industries have been mobilized towards innovation to meet this need. And not only have these innovations benefitted people but also have been profitable for the creators themselves. Insurtech startups seem to be on a similar mission i.e. to work towards providing people with the benefit that insurance was originally meant to give i.e. to simply protect what one loves.
