Evolving Agent Relationships

Novarica’s Insurer Client and Council Member Town Hall meetings have enabled us to share our thoughts and hear from others in a way we had not before. The pandemic has allowed us to have these virtual discussions more frequently and with more members of the community. Finding these silver linings, and making the most of them, has become something on which we have centered most of our weekly conversations.

Novarica will continue to deliver an all-virtual events calendar in the second half of 2020. Sessions will run every Tuesday from 1-2 PM EST for the foreseeable future. Each week will focus on new and emerging issues, including updates on topics like analytics during a pandemic and revisiting disaster recovery and business continuity plans.

Last week, Novarica VP Kevin Rall and Senior Associate Emerson Davis led a discussion about the pandemic’s impact on distribution channels and agent relationships. Novarica’s 400 Under 40 council provided several insights into the goals and wishes of the agent community. Agents are prioritizing capabilities that improve their ability to communicate with clients, encourage self-service, and provide collateral that helps them convey the value of insurance products. These capabilities are positioning agents as thought leaders and trusted advisers, eliminating administrative tasks from their to-do lists and salespeople from their titles.

Specific capabilities, such as e-signature, are in particular demand because of the complete upheaval of the insurance distribution process. Agents can no longer conduct business and build connections across a dinner table. Capabilities that support the digitization of agent business will be crucial when insurers want to encourage agents to sell their products.

Agents are innately optimistic. (The job requires them to be.) Many agents expect things to pick up in the second half of 2020. Emerson commented that belief is fueled partly from the tightening of renewals in commercial insurance. One 400 Under 40 agent recently shared that some renewal premiums have increased by 40%—encouraging agents to place risk elsewhere, while insurers may price more aggressively to win new business.

Another way for insurers to grab producers’ attention is to think from the outside of their organization looking in when considering user experiences. Agents want better portal capabilities, video presentation of content, and digital applications. Insurers testing these capabilities with pilot programs are taking a significant first step in providing what many agents feel is the future of their business.
This week, Novarica EVP Martina Conlon and VP Nancy Casbarro will discuss how insurance business processes are evolving due to COVID-19, and where insurers are focusing their budgets for 2021.