Life insurance advisors must continue to find new clients to survive and thrive. But in the increasingly competitive and rapidly changing life insurance industry, it can be difficult to stand out. Advisors not only have to compete with each other these days, but they’re also facing new competition from insurtech startups selling life insurance directly to consumers online.
The good news is that advisors can harness the power of insurance technology to expand their business. There are several insurtech solutions designed to support rather than compete with advisors.
By integrating the right insurtech platform into your business, you can provide more flexibility, connectivity, and capabilities to your clients than ever before. This is especially critical as Gen X and Millennials, who are becoming prime markets for life insurance sales, have different emerging needs from previous generations.
Insurtech isn’t just a way to streamline data or consolidate back-end processes. It now offers several benefits that can be major selling points to your clients.
Meet the modern life insurance shopper
Today’s life insurance prospect is shopping online and looking for a seamless digital experience. Recent research shows that nearly 9 in 10 consumers prefer to shop online for life insurance, and 90% of consumers interested in increasing or buying life insurance prefer to do so online.
Here are some of the defining aspects of a modern life insurance shopper:
- Always on the go, they want to search for and buy life insurance on their own timetable.
- They are well-informed and looking at multiple competitors online.
- They value personalized communication over traditional advertising.
- They want products that are easy to buy, understand, and use.
- Among Millennial clients, in particular, casual and quick forms of communication are often preferred over sit-down meetings or conference calls.
Equally as important as what they do like is what they don’t. Many potential life insurance buyers fear long in-person meetings, piles of confusing paperwork, and pushy sales agents. When they view buying life insurance as a time-intensive, difficult chore, they’re much more likely to procrastinate – or sometimes not buy it at all.
The benefits you can provide clients with insurtech
Advanced digital tools are now entering the market that are designed to support life insurance advisors in meeting clients’ needs and eliminating friction points. These new insurtech platforms, like LegacyShield, can act as a comprehensive connectivity hub, empowering client-advisor communication and fostering a greater sense of control among clients.
This type of platform represents a major value add-on because it provides clients with several benefits:
- Enhanced communication. A constant line of communication is opened between clients and advisors. Clients are able to contact their advisor directly through the site, and advisors can share policy updates in real-time. This has the effect of eliminating many of the dreaded time-intensive meetings while actually building stronger client-advisor relationships. Rather than just communicating at the time of sale or renewal, advisors and clients can be in a more fluid dialogue with each other.
- Flexibility & ease of use. A good insurtech platform has strong data capabilities and an easy-to-use interface that streamlines information for clients. They have the flexibility to view the information they want to see, anywhere, anytime, from their computer or mobile device.
- Peace of mind. Life insurance is intended to bring peace of mind that your assets are protected and will be passed on to your family. A digital storage and sharing platform provides clients with an extra level of comfort. Everything is stored on a secure platform, not just a folder in the home office, and clients can choose exactly who receives their information, and when they receive it.
- More organization. It seems our lives are growing more complex each year; the average person now has well over 90 online accounts. With a comprehensive insurtech platform, all of life’s most important details are saved in one place. That includes not only a life insurance policy or will but also family photos, videos, and memories. Clients can be reassured their full legacy is in place, taking pressure off them and their loved ones.
As more investments are put into insurtech, it’s critical to find the right solution to incorporate into your firm. Doing so can be the deciding factor between a client choosing you or another firm or insurtech competitor.
To learn more about how insurtech is changing the industry and how advisors can stay on top of the trends, read our blog, “Insurtech: The Disrupted and the Disrupter.”
