Want Some Insurance With That?

Some 25 years after the publication of Nicholas Negroponte’s seminal ‘Being Digital,’ it feels trite to write about how digital capabilities and the expectations they create among customers have transformed even traditionally sleepy industries like insurance.

Yet, the digital transformation of insurance is not a narrative of progressive evolution but rather a story of successive and disruptive waves. And we are on the cusp of a third one.

The first wave saw insurers learn to exploit digital tools to sell directly to customers. Established players as well as a plethora of tech-first startups proved it was possible to sell insurance online to customers without the benefit of an agent.

The second wave, still in flight, focuses on customer experience, bringing better and easier ways for insurers to process applications, serve customers and pay claims. These efforts have brought new efficiencies to an industry hyper-focused on cost while at the same time addressing the needs of consumers who expect immersive and contextualized digital interactions with all the businesses they patronize.

The third wave, in its infancy, focuses on ecosystems, that is the embedding of insurance within the value chains of other industries.