Taking Customer Experience to the Next Level

By Microsoft Industry for Financial Services Team

October 24, 2016

Using data-driven insights to improve the customer-insurer relationship

taking When I think about revolutionizing customer experiences, I can’t help but think of the iconic 1939 film adaption of The Wizard of Oz. Specifically, I recall the moment when Dorothy lands in Oz and the film switches from black and white to full technicolor. This transitional moment is so powerful that it even continues to impact audiences who have known nothing but color TV their whole lives. Service providers in all industries are constantly trying to discover the ‘next big thing’ that will transform customer experiences. Right now, that next big thing is uncovering game-changing insights from the world’s vast and growing data stores. Already, these insights are transforming the way firms do business—from driving more accurate demand predictions to shaping better customer experiences.

Unfortunately, when it comes to their insurance providers, customers remain less than satisfied. According to consumer surveys, insurers are not keeping up with their expectations—and customers are often not staying long enough for insurers to prove any different. In fact, 72% of insurance customers were planning to renew or purchase insurance in 2013, creating a “switching economy” that Accenture estimates $400 billion in insurance premiums were up for grabs for insurers better able to meet customers’ demands.

Using data-driven insights to create better customer experiences

One way to deliver better customer experiences is by building a comprehensive, holistic picture of your customers using analytics tools. By consolidating data across multiple systems, insurers can develop a 360-degree view of each customer—not simply a demographic profile, but an individualized view that makes it possible to treat each customer in a personalized way. From there, insurers can systematically find insights that facilitate better customer experiences and greater opportunities for their agents.

By integrating insights into CRM systems, leading insurers enable teams across the organization—from marketing to customer service to local agents—to connect to customers in new, more effective ways.

Adding value to customers’ lives

Insurance companies have a wealth of data about their customers: where they live, what they drive or what assets they own, for example. However, the real value from this information hinges on drawing insights, and translating those insights into relevant customer experiences.

Imagine your teenage daughter is turning 16 in the next few months. You receive an email from your car insurance provider with information about adding teen drivers to your policy, a recommended local drivers’ education program, and a discount for adding more family members to your plan.

This marketing effort, targeted towards policyholders who are guardians of potential teenage drivers, is a key example of how service providers are improving customer experience. Making a 360-degree customer view available across your company gives everyone a full picture of each customer and provides the insights necessary to add value to customers’ lives.

Helping agents identify what customers want and need

Let’s continue the example of the customer that receives an email about adding his teenage daughter to his car insurance policy. In addition to providing information, this email campaign will also connect the customer to their local agent, who can help the customer make the addition to his policy. In this way, the customer’s relationship with their agent deepens and becomes stickier, and the agent is able to act on relevant cross-sell and up-sell opportunities.

With analytics that flow into CRM, the local agent is empowered with individualized insights about that customer’s background. Anticipating that a current policyholder may need to add their nearly-driving-age teenager to their policy, the insurer made it possible for their agent to proactively address a need before the customer had to make the effort to ask. Instead of relying on ad hoc customer knowledge or executing scattershot campaigns, the agent is able to offer the right product at the right time and drive the most productive, relevant interaction possible.

Lacking face-time with customers, it’s imperative for insurers to find other tactics for driving satisfaction and loyalty. This means there’s greater pressure to make every customer touchpoint count, so delivering a seamless, personalized experience every time is key.

In action: If P&C Insurance

It’s no doubt that data, and the insights derived from data, plays an integral part in knowing your customer. With the emergence of big data, insurers are facing unprecedented challenges capturing, analyzing and acting on their massive amounts of data quickly and cost-effectively. Legacy analytics tools are failing to keep up with insurers’ new analytics needs.

To address this need, If P&C Insurance, a property and casualty insurance company serving three million customers in the Nordic region, developed a predictive modeling solution using Azure Machine Learning.

Based on customer data on age, duration of policy, household data, payment solution, product composition and previous contact points, If P&C was able to quickly produce customer churn and upsell predictions:

The Churn Model helped If P&C predict whether or not a customer would cancel their policy in a 40-day window surrounding their renewal date.
The Upsell Model was used to predict the probability of success of a potential upsell communication to a given customer.

By leveraging advanced analytics, insurers like If P&C were better able to uncover the value of data quickly and cost-effectively. This enabled them to reach out to customers proactively in order to improve retention rates and drive sales.

How Microsoft helps

The process of engaging customers can’t be one-size-fits-all. It requires companies to know who their customers are, what they’re doing—and what they may need. Many carriers have access to troves of internal and external data, but lack the ability to leverage this information to identify patterns and trends to better serve their customers. Improving customer experiences requires companies to deliver on three expectations:

Synchronized channels. Today’s customers expect their service providers—including their insurers—to remember their preferences and decisions. That means customers should be able to pick up where they left off on one channel and continue and complete an action without having to start over. Coordinating your systems end-to-end delivers a consistent experience across all touchpoints.
Personalized customer experiences. Engage customers at the right time, in the right place, in the right way. Dynamics CRM enables you to give everyone in your company a holistic view of each customer so that the right actions can be taken in each case.
More predictive customer engagement. Insurers must be able to translate data into recommendations and suggestions, based on what they already know. Using the big data and advanced analytics capabilities of Cortana Intelligence Suite, insurers can better anticipate customer needs and determine the next best interaction with each customer. In addition, Azure Machine Learning builds upon existing customer data, using state-of-the-art machine learning algorithms to predict customer outcomes related to things like churn or profitability—so you can step in to address them proactively.

Intelligent customer engagement enables your company to build customer trust, loyalty and insight while also enabling your agents and service teams to be as productive as possible and deliver exceptional customer experiences.

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Check out Microsoft solutions like Cortana Intelligence Suite, Azure Machine Learning and Dynamics CRM which make it easier for you to connect more effectively to your data and your customers.