Next-Level Customer Experience
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Next-Level Customer Experience HOW DO INSURERS GET THERE? ©2019 LIMRA | ©2019 NEOS, LLC limra.com | neosllc.com TABLE OF CONTENTS Executive Summary . 4 Key Themes and Takeaways . 5 What More Mature Peers Are Doing . 12 State of the Industry . 14 Summary. 24 Methodology. 24 About the Study . 26 ©2019 LIMRA | ©2019 NEOS, LLC 3 limra.com | neosllc.com EXECUTIVE SUMMARY LIMRA and NEOS have partnered to: • Identify customer experience challenges and opportunities that life and annuity insurance carriers face • Understand how customer experience is managed and measured within companies • Learn how customer experience efforts are prioritized to shape the organization’s future-state In addition to understanding these areas, survey respondents were also asked to assess their organization’s current state in terms of a customer experience maturity model. The levels of maturity are described below: Figure 1: Maturity Model* MATURITY LEVEL Customer experience is not a competitive differentiator for the company. Tends to be a reactive versus proactive organization around the customer Initial with no roadmap in place. Depends largely on individual knowledge, actions, and ad-hoc measurements. Minimal customer journey focus. Existing customer experience measurements are not utilized. Customer experience is identified as an important metric, but not completely acted upon. Process and structure are in place, but not fully Emerging scalable or repeatable. Customer feedback comes from several groups and sources without framework for action planning. Organizational objectives and roles are understood. Methods for measuring customer experience are established. Business (customer) Defined segments are defined. Customer journey is defined and documented. Customer experience is viewed as central to the vision and mission of the company. Measuring customer experience and customer interactions along the customer journey consistently. Engagement models are in place and work Managed is scheduled, planned, and measured. Teams are working together using the defined process. Customer experience data collected is used to improve the customer experience and journey. Customer experience process and data collection Optimized are optimized and communicated across the organization and are in sync with business demands. Dedicated team focused on the overall customer experience from start to finish. *This maturity model is based on proprietary information developed by NEOS and LIMRA. ©2019 LIMRA | ©2019 NEOS, LLC 4 limra.com | neosllc.com KEY THEMES AND TAKEAWAYS As results were analyzed, a number of high-level themes emerged as insurers plan to improve their customer experience capabilities. 1. To move to an optimized customer experience, life and annuity insurance carriers must shift from a reactive to a proactive approach. While carriers recognize that a “listening strategy” can strengthen customer experience, many still rely on escalations and customer complaints to obtain information. Shifting to a proactive approach requires investing in activities and tools—like customer journey maps, self-service capabilities, and voice of the customer mechanisms—to move the needle to a more optimized experience. With most respondents falling under the emerging and defined levels, it’s no surprise that 82 percent use reactive moments—like complaints and escalations—to obtain information about policyholders. And nearly one fifth of respondents are not using any external benchmarking organizations (such as LIMRA, Forrester, or JD Power) to compare their customer experience, tools, or processes to their competitors. Figure 2: How Companies Obtain Information About the Policyholder/Beneficiary Customer Experience “Oftentimes“ our customer Complaints and escalations 82% journeys and customer Input / feedback from client-facing employees 80% touchpoints are based on an accumulation of Market research and benchmarking 78% operational needs with How does your Customer interaction monitoring/quality control 75% little thought given to what company obtain Customer touchpoint surveys 75% the end experience for the information customer will be as they Customer tracking surveys 73% about the policy go through our processes / beneficiary Website usability testing 50% to accomplish a task. I customer Social media monitoring 47% think journey mapping experience? Select and really understanding ALL that apply. Focus groups 45% and designing customer Through distribution partners 25% journeys and experiences, Mystery shopping 13% and looking at the overall customer lifecycle to design Other 3% touchpoints, interactions, and experiences that However, with the focus on moving towards an optimized customer experience, comes delight the customer are table stakes.” a shift in approach—from reactive to proactive—with carriers looking to gather feedback throughout various stages of the customer journey. Sixty-six percent of respondents – Client/Member are investing in big data to better understand customer behavior, including web Experience VP at engagement, social media activity, customer support calls, etc. For even better analysis, major insurer feedback will be aggregated with information from agents, distribution partners, and other company team members to understand the customer experience journey. To support the importance of moving to a proactive approach, survey results suggest that most annuity and life insurance carriers are investing in proactive tools to better understand the customer journey and meet customer needs. ©2019 LIMRA | ©2019 NEOS, LLC 5 limra.com | neosllc.com Figure 3: Investing to Better Understand and Serve Customers 85% 89% 87% LIFE LIFE LIFE RESPONDENTS 72% RESPONDENTS 81% RESPONDENTS 81% ANNUITY ANNUITY ANNUITY RESPONDENTS RESPONDENTS RESPONDENTS Customer Voice of Self-service Journey Maps Customer Capability In addition to investing in the right tools, conducting internal process reviews will also be critical to optimizing the customer experience. While these activities may not always be customer-facing, they will deliver a positive impact on customers. Recognizing this, 84 percent of respondents noted inefficiencies that, when addressed, could ultimately improve processes. Meanwhile, 74 percent are investing in business process design (such as using automation, assigning touchpoint owners, and redesigning processes based on customer pain point identification) to better serve customers. While the objective for better customer experience can differ, both annuity and life respondents ultimately want to improve efficiencies and reduce expenses. When surveyed, respondents identified pain points which were categorized as being either internal or external. Internally, pain points among departments are agent availability and responsiveness, clarifying the claims process, and legacy systems that slow down process modernization. Externally, customers desire clarity about product offers and their benefits. They also want seamless transactions, so companies should look to provide additional functionalities that enable customers to perform transactions independently. Figure 4: Identifying the Objective for Improved Customer Experience 93% LIFE RESPONDENTS 76% 72% 84% LIFE ANNUITY ANNUITY RESPONDENTS RESPONDENTS RESPONDENTS Believe the objective Believe the objective of customer experience of customer experience is to improve process is to improve service practices efficiency / reduce expenses to meet customer needs ©2019 LIMRA | ©2019 NEOS, LLC 6 limra.com | neosllc.com “We change our business according to [our customers]. We don’t do our business � and expect our customers to change.” –Fortune 500 insurer, explaining how their company takes a customer-centric approach versus solely targeting increased profitability. 2. Carriers must inform and determine actions based on defined metrics 79% and tools—and use them to their advantage. of respondents’ companies are investing Most companies understand the importance of monitoring processes and the use in tools that capture of effective tools. However, many carriers are still in the process of understanding feedback during key how to truly present, apply, and use the information gained from various sources of moments data. Measuring the business benefits of customer experience helps with internal sponsorship and proving the business case. Many companies use predetermined metrics—goals, milestones, key performance indicators—to help quantify the success of an activity or initiative. By measuring the success of an activity that directly contributes to the customer experience, leaders can prove a business case and obtain additional buy-in or investment for using a particular tool or service. For instance, one respondent goes above a typical business case presentation and shows a video of a frustrated customer repeatedly receiving an error message during online registration. By putting the internal stakeholder in the customer’s shoes, it’s typically an easier sell than a traditional business case presentation. In fact, 79 percent of carriers are investing in tools that capture feedback during key moments. For instance, one of the largest life insurance companies in the world uses a transactional Net Promoter Score (NPS) survey—an external tool that measures a customer’s satisfaction after an important part in a process or after a large transaction (often referred to as a key moment of truth)—to identify any pain points and determine improvement opportunities. From an internal perspective, a Fortune 500 insurer surveyed uses Probabilistic