Going forward, insurance brokers are going to be more connected to the insurance companies they do business with than ever before. One challenge for companies, however, is that brokers are themselves not all at the same place digitally.
Insurance executives gathered for the Future of Insurance virtual conference, hosted by Reuters Events, say one of the next steps in each of their own digital transformation initiatives is an effort to bring digital tools to brokers, and end-to-end digital services to customers.
“I think brokers will be bigger than they are today. We are seeing a trend in market consolidation.” - Rowan Saunders
More, they say brokers in the future will likely be a lot bigger than they are today as market consolidation trends and the need for technology investment continue to play out in the industry. Brokers, they say, will also be more specialized.
“I think brokers are undergoing a very interesting change,” says Rowan Saunders, chief executive officer with Economical Insurance.
“I think brokers will be bigger than they are today. We are seeing a trend in market consolidation. Brokers will be more specialized than they are today, particularly in commercial lines segments.” More, he says broker digital offerings will be much greater than they are today. “They will be more integrated with insurance companies.”
Normal channels of sales are no longer available to consumers, adds Sasha Sanyal, global business leader, insurance with professional services firm, Genpact. Where the sale of insurance was typically an in-person task, she points out that the process has completely changed in a very short period of time.
Providing brokers then with the digital tools they need to manage in this new paradigm, is the next obvious step or phase in an insurance company’s digital development. That said, Louis Gagnon, president of Canadian operations for Intact Financial Corporation says the broker channel poses a challenge. “Brokers are not all at the same place,” he says. “Connectivity for them is not always easy. Making sure that they have the best tools and that we can connect to them, and for them to connect to their customers, I think that is, I would say, a big step.”
