Insurance Carriers: Want Broker Loyalty and Growth? Be a Trusted Advisor

As a carrier, it’s easy to end up stuck at arm’s length because the sales motion is reactive to broker requests, especially in middle-market and smaller business segments.

From a broker’s point of view:

They send over specs, and receive a quote from their rep. The quote is filled with information in a multi-page document, which they receive from every carrier they engage with. But there’s no context; is this a good Competitive? Is this the right coverage? Does it the align to the customer’s needs? Is it industry leading or below industry peers?

Plus, the quotes and supporting materials provided to brokers are not presentable to the end customer. The documents are technical with lots of insurance speak.

Now, the broker is stuck going through each carrier’s quote to find the high points that are most relevant to the customer they’re working with. This may equate to three hours per customer searching for the right information!

It’s time-consuming, repetitive, and creates a sea of sameness that invites brokers to focus on price while ignoring critical differentiators that make you a better option vs. your competition.

There’s a better way so you can put your best in front of every broker, every time. And it’s feasible today.

Related: Discover 9Lenses for insurance companies

A Better Broker Experience = More Carrier Wins

Because of the reality of how important brokers are in the process, more and more carriers are rethinking how they engage today. 

The broker has the most influence on the customer’s buying decision. This B2B2B and B2B2C model isn’t going anywhere, so how can you inspire confidence that builds trust in your policy vs. your competitors?

How can carrier reps come to the table with insight and guidance and provide a “wow” factor to the broker who’s having the conversations with the buyer that you’d love to influence … at scale?

This is the shift I’m seeing across the most forward-thinking carriers, and it’s coming in the form of digital advisory tools that provide both context and recommendations.

Context

Tools give pros and cons of the policies quoted, but also additional information such as:

• What does a typical policy look like for similar businesses in this industry?
• What’s missing from the current spec that other peer organizations commonly include?
• What advice for the customer can brokers can use to be consultative?

Recommendations

Context can be everything, but recommendations turn it into action. So these tools also provide a proactive approach, such as:

• How can additional context empower a broker to have a more informed, more strategic conversation with the client?
• What questions would be best to ask to make sure the customer considers the most important information for their decision(s)?

Your CX Becomes Your Competitive Advantage

By giving brokers this kind of value-add support, carrier reps elevate themselves from quote responders to trusted advisors. But the presentation of this information also matters so the key points stand out among the sea of sameness brokers typically get.

The best part is brokers can share these resources directly with the end customers to be helpful and consultative. Imagine the carrier’s advice, brand, and differentiators directly influencing the end customer!

Brokers notice and communicate who’s easy to work with to customers. And that influences customer choices.

As a bonus, this approach also supports cross-functional internal alignment, another major carrier challenge.

The idea of a more ideal broker experience isn’t just theory: one carrier we work with is enabling their sales reps to take a spec, input key variables like industry and company size, and generate side-by-side policy comparisons based on real benchmark data.

This is consultative selling at scale!

The goal is to provide that kind of value across every rep, every territory, and every broker relationship … not just through isolated one-offs. It’s a systemized approach that elevates every interaction and your entire company’s in-market reputation.

Brokers Want This From Carriers

I’ve chatted with multiple brokers to gut-check this, and all agreed the experience of wading through tons of paperwork just to find the necessary information isn’t ideal.

They told me their biggest challenge is time. After all, they’re working this process for many customers each day, plus working on their own retention and upsell initiatives.

The last thing they want to be doing is scanning through a 12-page document to try and get the few pieces of information that are most important for their upcoming customer conversation. Sometimes, this means they have a spreadsheet built where they can quickly grab the right fields, then use their own manual side-by-side comparison.

This leads to differentiation based on price, and often little else.

As a carrier, you offer particular advantages and differentiators. By meeting brokers where they are, you stand a better chance of having those come through to the customer.

Our platform makes this shift possible by equipping carrier reps to be far more consultative with each broker request. If you’re ready to deliver real differentiation at scale, let’s connect on LinkedIn – I’m always up for a conversation!