On Point: bolt CEO Dwane on How Democratizing Distribution Benefits Insureds and Agents

Technology has made it easier for consumers to explore and purchase insurance on their own.

While some fear this ease of access could put agents out of work, Jim Dwane, CEO of insurtech bolt, a property/casualty insurance exchange, said putting the basics in the hands of insureds will make agents’ expertise more valuable and the process of selling more efficient.

On Point podcast host Peter van Aartrijk spoke with Dwane to learn more about the role insurtechs will play going forward.

While insurance has a reputation for being slow to embrace innovation and technology, Dwane said adaptation has accelerated that in recent years. His company, bolt (which stands for Business Owners Liability Team), matches insurance buyers and sellers.

“If you can get the consumer — be it a small business or a person — if you can get them to do 50 to 75% of the upfront work digitally, that reduces their cost basis,” Dwane said.

When insureds feel comfortable doing more of the initial legwork, it brings higher margins on that business, he said. This enables agents to focus more on the consultative selling process and less on that operational, administrative work.

“It’s really happening in a lot of different areas — claims, analytics, document management. But really where we focus, where bolt’s kind of space in the world is, is in distribution,” he said. “And the reality of it is, insurance distribution is democratizing.”

As technology democratizes distribution, agents will move beyond the role of administrators and more heavily into the position of risk advisors, he said. “So, I think it’s a win for the digitization, is a win for the consumer, but it’s also a significant win for the agent and broker, you know, whether that be an independent agent, a captive agent, or an agent in a contact center for a large carrier like a Progressive or a Farmer’s.”

Dwane said people want someone to talk to and counsel with to answer their questions. The carriers and distributors that will be most successful in optimizing technology in sales are those who take the opportunity to pull customers out of the digital journey when they need more guidance.

“The more complex the product becomes, the more important choice becomes, and the more important that human intervention becomes,” he said. “You really have to identify the right time and the right place to make that insurance offer so that you can optimize conversion.”

“Some people are comfortable going deep into the journey and only need help at the very end. Other people need help in the earlier part of it because they’re less comfortable or more risk averse,” he said.

“So, the companies who figure out where to insert themselves and support the customer kind of to cross the finish line in the buying experience, I think, are the ones that are going to be successful in the next five to 10 years.”

Technology is also making it easier to embed insurance into other transactions, simplifying the process for people who may not have had access before.

“You can now buy your car insurance when you purchase a car, and in some cases, you can do it completely digitally at that moment,” Dwane said. “The same can apply with homeowner’s insurance when you’re refinancing or financing or purchasing a house. The same thing can be said for commercial.”

Now, “not only are we looking to enable embedded insurance, enable digitization, we’re also looking to expand the pool of people who are given the opportunity to purchase financial protection products,” Dwane said. “So, it’s democratizing away from the traditional channels, and it’s moving more toward point-of-sale oriented.”

Overall, he said that technology offers the industry an opportunity to hyper-focus on the top of the funnel to drive maximum traffic and optimize conversion.

“There’s a lot of technology companies out there that kind of pound their chests and say, we’re disrupting, we’re disrupting. The way we like to characterize it is we are enablers,” Dwane said. “We enable others to disrupt. Right? And we think that’s a really sober, clear-headed, interesting place to be in the industry.”

While technology such as artificial intelligence markup language is going to play a growing role in sales, it will eventually come back to having a human understanding, he said.

“You’ve got to have that insurance DNA somewhere incorporated into the fabric of the organization,” Dwane said. “Because, again, at the end of the day, that’s the people you’re talking to — to help solve their problems.”

Listen to the whole conversation on embedded insurance with Jim Dwane, titled “Insurtech Bolt Leans In on Embedded Coverage,” on Insurance Journal TV.

Topics Agencies