069: The importance off curating an easy straightforward customer journey with Henry Newby - Superscript

Things are changing in the world of insurance. What can you do to stay ahead of the curve? How can you adapt your business in order to acclimatise to this new landscape, which has been changed forever by big tech companies such as Amazon and Google?

In this episode, we’re thrilled to be speaking with Henry Newby, the Partnerships Director of Superscript, an innovative start-up insurance provider. Superscript recently announced a partnership with Amazon, to provide policies to British SMEs through the Business Prime subscription service. In conversation with Boston Tullis’ Sarah Myerscough, Henry elucidates the significance of simplifying the provision of insurance solutions in accordance with the culture of instant gratification facilitated by the business models of companies like Amazon. He highlights the importance of forming new, mutually beneficial business partnerships with other businesses, with whom you can share data and thereby provide a more streamlined, easily accessible service to your own clients.

 

Quote of the Episode

‘There is value in having a diversified distribution strategy’.

Henry Newby asserts that business partnerships can create an array of new avenues for broadening product availability, and channels for their distribution. He notes that, while Superscript initially developed on a basis of paid acquisition, forming partnerships with businesses such as Amazon enabled the company to substantially expand its provision of quality cover, and to provide more nuanced solutions.  A particular area which substantially boosted Superscript’s distribution strategy is in its formation of partnerships with companies with data assets, which can be harnessed in order to actively support clients by ensuring that they always have the best possible cover.

 

Key Takeaways

Throughout the episode, Henry repeatedly emphasises the importance of curating an easy, straightforward customer journey. A key means of doing so, he suggests, is by employing publicly available information about potential clients’ businesses in order to eliminate the need for them to manually input such information.

This principle of streamlining and digitising the quote journey will become increasingly important in years to come. Superscript’s partnership with Amazon permits it, and other companies with similar agreements, to access the data which the tech giant holds about customers, and to use it to pre-fill certain fields within the quote journey.

This underpins the importance of nimbility, which is once again the word of the week on the Insurance Broker’s Podcast. Insurers must aim to be flexible in their provision of cover, and in the ways with which they engage with clients, in order to stay ahead of the curve.

A key means of doing so, Henry suggests, is to maintain a more consistent engagement with clients, but in a less arduous fashion than that which accompanies traditional quote journeys and renewal dates. The subscription model of Superscript is simple and automatic, following the same monthly payment principle of many services used by households across the country, such as Netflix , Spotify, or indeed Amazon itself. In doing so, there is both a more consistent dialogue with clients, and the ability to provide them with insight into the continued suitability of their cover, or lack thereof.

 

Best Moments/Key Quotes

“What Amazon are looking to do is to acquire more businesses to their business prime proposition that it operates as a as a monthly subscription model… Once they've acquired those customers, obviously, they're looking to retain them over the longer term.”

‘We're able to effectively access some of the data that Amazon already holds about that customer and use that to pre fill certain fields within the quote journey itself’.

‘You can see that the cogs changing, you can see the moves going in the direction that you guys are going [towards].’

“We're looking to work with partners who are residing on data assets that we can utilise to improve the customer experience to inform product development, to enhance our pricing and underwriting capability, and also actually to support customers in terms of the ongoing management of their policies with us.”

“We actually think that regular engagement with our customers is a good thing, not a bad thing. And part of that is actually about supporting them on an ongoing basis.”

 

Resources

The Future of Insurance: From Disruption to Evolution by Bryan Falchuk

The Second Curve: Thoughts on Reinventing Society by Charles Handy

 

About the Guest

Prior to joining Superscript in 2018, of which he is the Partnerships Director, Henry Newby had 25 years of experience with working for large multinational insurance organisations. He previously worked as the Business Development Director for AXA UK for ten years, and spent 11 years in various roles at AON Warranty Group.

Henry’s LinkedIn page: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/henry-newby-83756b2

 

About the Host

Sarah Myerscough is the Sales and Marketing Director of Boston Tullis Group. The founder of The Insurance Brokers Podcast, she brings a wealth of marketing experience and a fresh perspective on marketing in the insurance sector. Boston Tullis works with insurance brokers to offer solutions to business development ceilings, particularly in the rapidly developing fields of video marketing and thought leadership.

If you would like Sarah to help you develop an integrated marketing strategy, using state of the art concepts, then please book a free 20 min call via Calendly.

 Website: https://bostontullis.co.uk/ 

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