Expand your insurance tech stack - here's what you need to know

Insurance technology, also referred to as insurtech or insuretech, like its property and financial technology cousins, has seen high growth over the last decade. We now have entire events and accelerator programs dedicated specifically to insurance technologies.

The strong motivation for such vast innovation in this space can be generalized by two particularly large areas of opportunity: 1) cutting costs by expanding operational efficiencies and, 2) improving the customer experience – the latter being a non-negotiable in today’s digital economy. These are good starting points for the focus of any insurance tech stack and for demonstrating how your business can set out to capitalize on these opportunities and many others. All you have to do is know what you want to achieve then choose how to implement your solution.

Here we’ll look at a spectrum of various options when it comes to an insurance tech solution that will help you get your desired results, like making it easier for customers to get your services, or cutting unnecessary time spent on tasks that could easily be automated. It’s important to note that technology has been an incredible driver of the end-to-end solution model, removing intermediaries whenever and wherever possible. This can be, but doesn’t have to be your strategy, however. There are many ways to utilize insurance tech in small ways with big impacts.

And if you’re a traditional insurance provider, the good news is you don’t have to be – or act like – a technology company in order to use technology to do so.

Integrate

Adding a new SaaS vendor can be a great way to grow your tech stack. The beauty of these cloud-based services is that you’re taking little risk with few resources. SaaS vendors provide a broad range of possible technology integrations that can help you move the needle on goals targeting both front-end services and back-end workflows.

Front-end - When it comes to optimizing for customer experience, whitelabeling your digital quote and application services is excellent for making headway on your goals, fast. The technology company does all the work and all you have to do is provide the branding.

Back-end - Add a critical data source from which to run new process automation or machine learning capabilities. Estated’s property data API can automatically pull in the structural characteristics of a particular dwelling to improve the accuracy of replacement cost calculations for homeowners insurance quotes, among other information used to make paperwork more tolerable.

There are many great insurance technology companies out there to contribute to or inspire your next move forward with available technologies.

See how Blend Insurance Agency and Estated data work together to leverage both data and digital platforms for the home buyer in the mortgage application process.

Buy

In this context, we’re using “buy” to mean “acquire.” The insurance industry in particular makes this type of synergy extremely logical and rewarding for all parties involved. Though through the perfect pairing of talent and luck some early-stage technology companies go on to achieve unicorn status, many hope to get acquired and a big pay out for a job well done. In turn, the acquiring company gains the knowledge and technology asset that allows them to build their insurtech stack.

Build

Building your digital differentiator can be a great move if you want to make a big play, either for customers you don’t yet have or to match or out-do the capabilities of your competitors. Building could come from an acquisition as mentioned above, or hiring your own tech team. This would fulfill the need for skill sets in-house to pursue a custom build of a website, application, AI, automated workflows or other useful insurtech. Alternatively, hiring an outside agency to build your tech suite is a popular option.

Whether you’re an incumbent insurance provider or a technology company taking advantage of the sizable (we’re talking trillions here) market opportunity, there are many ways to compete as well as partner to carve out your spot (there’s plenty to go ‘round). Now that you have some ideas to work with, what will the next iteration of your insurance tech look like?