Ah, insurance. A common necessity that few consumers genuinely love but put up with. The claims process in health, motor, home, and many other subsets of coverage is frequently something consumers avoid dealing with at all costs. But when they must, they make it known how cumbersome and frustrating the experience is: car and motorcycle insurance saw a spike in complaints last year and remains the most begrudged insurance product. But we know this problem isn’t just in auto insurance alone. Insurance companies at large are always competing to convince customers that they are the lone policy provider who won’t cause extra headaches when life hits hard. Customers, however, rarely feel those promises are actually met when their biggest times of need are met with lengthy phone holds and confusing web hunts searching for answers to their basic coverage questions. 

However, there is a small but rising tide of insurance companies taking innovative approaches to customer support and quickly becoming the leaders in the insurance space because of this choice. AI, advanced analytics, and intelligent bots are faster, sleeker, and easier for insurance companies and their policyholders alike than the infamous games of phone call tag many consumers know and… hate. 

Customer service and support don’t have to be the notorious nightmare they have long been for consumers, especially in the insurance industry. With innovative future-proofing of basic call center functions and embedded AI solutions, insurance organizations can transform the way they reach people during their most urgent and vulnerable moments—and build longer-lasting customer relationships in the process:

AI-based service

Another future-proof customer service solution for insurance providers is to lay the foundation now of AI service. This may mean an AI-powered customer service app for helping customers with insurance queries at all hours and from anywhere, an intelligent conversation platform to streamline claims processing, or a complete customer service platform based on AI and leveraging VR to connect with AI “experts” who can provide personalized service in the metaverse. 

While some of these solutions may seem a long way off for your organization, the numbers suggest something else: the market for AI in insurance is projected to reach $45.74 billion by 2031. Customers are growing to expect the smart, fast, and customized responsiveness of AI-based service. So if your insurance organization doesn’t have a plan to pivot toward that model as the status quo, you will quickly be left behind. 

The latest in AI chatbots

Expanding on the AI foundation discussed in the previous section, it’s critical that you invest in AI specifically for chatbot functionality as an insurance company. The efficiency of AI-powered chatbots is a huge cost saving for insurance call centers as they can deflect large numbers of customer calls and resolve many simpler issues, if not some of the more involved claims processing as well. An AI-guided chatbot can provide information to inquiring customers on member benefits, claims, referrals, coverage, cost estimates, and more, so your human customer service agents don’t have to and can spend more time on trickier customer service requests. 

Customers, too, love to resolve their insurance questions and claims quickly—without the tiring back and forth of human phone calls—whenever possible. While a personalized, human touch is still certainly wanted, the top priority for most customers in a time of insurance need is speediness and fast resolution. AI is built to do just that. In addition, even your AI-based chatbots are not completely free of that human touch. With machine learning and natural language processing becoming more trademark musts to AI algorithms, the interactions with AI chatbots are quickly resembling traditional human interactions. Human-guided AI also gives these chatbots the ability to not only handle masses of repetitive tasks or requests but also to identify when the greater context requires human intervention to properly judge and resolve, routing all the previously disclosed information to a skilled human agent who can quickly take over from there. 

Advanced analytics for self-service

Finally, one of the simplest ways you can supercharge your customer service operations as an insurance provider is to put as much information as possible within easy reach of policyholders so they can self-serve their own questions or needs. However, this isn’t just a call to dump all your information on the company website. More useful is to leverage advanced analytics to identify what your customers truly need and are looking for and put that information front and center for when they most need it. 

Policyholders want to make tough decisions easier and their lives better during times of unexpected crisis, when insurance is typically suddenly involved more directly than the majority of the time. In addition to powering AI chatbots with answers to simple, commonly asked questions for rapid help on the frontlines, you should be building out self-service portals for customers to easily navigate and find answers to their more complicated queries or to provide financial guidance that is informed by the customer’s particular circumstances. Humanoid service robots can provide reliable, secure answers while still providing a human touch that understands the nuances and specifics of human interactions and information. Contact Center solutions built on the Financial Services Cloud with Salesforce are powered by Einstein, the hub for advanced analytics, and custom-built for the unique servicing needs faced by insurance providers. 

Ultimately, the key to all three of these solutions is a foundation for mature data analysis that is built to scale as you grow. Salesforce, and its intuitive Customer 360 functionality, is a pristine solution to become the base of all data functions in your organization with regulatory needs, partnership opportunities, and cutting-edge user experience in mind for ongoing growth. Service Cloud functionality can support all of the above solutions—and more. Learn how to get started with a solution like this today by contacting Simplus.