Technology adoption is redefining the business space and this has taken a broader dimension with changing consumer behaviours.
Insurance industry is not left behind in this transformation, sweeping the business environment, particularly as Artificial Intelligence (AI) takes greater role in identifying customer, accessing risk, product distribution and process efficiency.
Stephen Alangbo, managing director/ CEO, Cornerstone Insurance Plc on the side – line of the recently concluded Insurance Meet Tech 3.0 Conference held in Lagos said as operators in insurance, the place of technology in shaping services cannot be overlooked any longer.
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He said when you compare banking to insurance, you will see how technology has driven acceptance of banking services against what is happening in insurance.
“We have identified the importance of technology in insurance to enable us meet the needs of our customers. If you bring a product that people do not need, it takes a long time for them to buy. Therefore, at Cornerstone Insurance, we are using technology to be able to identify what our customers need before we bring it to them, he said.
“We have Artificial Intelligence (AI) being built. AI is everywhere now, so we are saying should we use AI to be able to, first, address some of the things that hinder insurance penetration. First, is distribution? When there is simplicity in this distribution, there could be possibility of adoption. We also want to use the technology to be able identify the needs of our potential clients.”
Alangbo said, “If we use AI to identify their needs, we also use technology to build products that meet the needs of the people. We use the products to be able to improve our processes where speed is what people need.”
On how to boost transparency and claims payment with technology, he said transparency in the processes is what people need, and so efficiency in claims payment is what we are prioritising.
“We are using technology to be able to build our processes to ensure that we satisfy our customers, and that is why we are regularly looking at what to do to make Cornerstone the choice underwriter for potential customers”.
On how to take innovative products to the insurance public with tech, he said “We believe in product design through data analytics to be able to see the products that meets the need of the people, and we give the products to them.
“We have gone into partnership with organisations such as InsurTech, Brokers, stand-alone Agents, Telcos and these are making Cornerstone different from every other organisation.”
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“So, we are also building capacity as an organisation to ensure that we have a real understanding of insurance and be able to know the products that people need.”
So these are some of the things that we have done to be able to ensure that we don’t only differentiate ourselves, we satisfy the needs of the customer by bringing the product to them through technology, through product innovation, and through artificial intelligence.”
Dan-Olufemi Olayinka, chief technology Officer at Cornerstone Insurance said, AI is actually an omni-channel virtual customer service platform to be able to relate well.
“So, one of the areas where we have identified that value can be delivered is in the area of customer engagement and communication.”
According to Olayinka, what the company has done is to identify the pain points and the areas of challenge, and through customer engagement, we are bringing it to the barest minimum. Customers call in to get information and all of that, trying to get product knowledge and buy, how do I get this done? And you find that there is a wide gap there. Therefore, that was why we came up with an omni channel, and interactive system that can step in.
“It’s virtual, and it’s also omni channel because you can contact it through any medium of communication that you can think of, SMS, email, whatever you understand, and it’s able to answer your questions. Now, the interesting thing about it is that the engagement on that platform is also integrated into our core system.”
“Now the second phase which we are looking at is to make it conversational as we deploy technologies, we are bringing AI that can support real life communication, recognizing the natural language processing, where the system can now take your voice. It’s already being put in place, as, we are actually in the simulation stage right now.
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