With over 66% of top financially performing companies leverage social in their processes and over 80% positive impact on trust for CEOs who openly communicate on social, social can mean power to some and hype to others.
In the next 3-5 years the use of social media by Insurers will increase from 4% to 51% as one of the most important mechanisms to engage customers according to IBM CEO study.
Is this because of hype? I don’t think so. Financial Services has always been a “social” industry – we are now just shifting from F2F and phone to more online interaction; mirroring the shift of our customers and employees. The leading FSS companies are using social to explain changes to the financial environment and to provide increased clarity around specific products – partially due to changing regulatory requirements, but also to build trust.
Financial Services as a sector suffers from a major trust gap – social is a powerful capability for building trust
Financial Advisors are using social to engage clients and prospects – using social compliance capabilities to provide support for suitability and records retention. Many financial companies have embraced external social media for brand promotion, engagement, and marketing. Leading financial companies have also brought social capabilities inside the firewall. Regulatory requirements necessitate active social compliance monitoring and reporting
Complex, expert-oriented activities (e.g. commercial or specialty underwriting) can be faster (social collaboration) and more accurate (engaging the right people). Networking social capabilities into traditional core insurance and financial services business processes and legacy systems can create dramatic value while leveraging investments you have already made.
Today I am at Prudential for their Technology Leadership Conference and we will discuss these topics and more! I’d love your thoughts – especially if you are in the industry!
Sandy grt thoughts indeed! Insurance is undoubtedly a social industry and success in this field (especially for the advisers & field persons) is based on ‘how socially connected they are’.. I handle many insurance accounts with a business development perspective for software and my wife is into the operations of an Insurance major. Social could be an important source to get more customers via ‘social listening’ ( Tweets n posts like “wish I cud hav an # insurance policy with a cover for wife, my policy no***** from #xyz insurance sucks, does insurance co #xyz really has a customer care?” are common could be real opportunities). Also some of the worst processes which always hurt the customers are policy issue, claim processing, cancellation, surrender etc. All are basically due to lack of collaboration. Couldn’t they go Social to collaborate better to meet the TAT and to ensure customer delight? Social Business could be a game changer for Insurance.
Agents/Reps/FAs are social networkers by nature and training, so why would they not gravitate to online social networks. We saw this as early as 2007, when we noticed that those identifying themselves on Linkedin as “New York Life” were not employees but our field agents and managers. We actually worked with Linkedin to develop what would have been the first social networking compliance tool (a la today’s Socialware, Hearsay Social, Actiance) but that was killed by the then-CEO b/c of his ignorance of financial industry regulations in re: monitoring, reporting, and retention. He said at the time: “The purpose of Linkedin is to facilitate professional interaction, not to spy on employees.” What a lost chance!
Sandy,
Love the notes, think I have talked to someone else in that same meeting! I am working on a conference workshop with this exact topic, would love to speak to you about potential ideas and/or gauge interest in you attending. Please feel free to respond.
I’d love to hear more!!!
Sandy, please feel free to contact me at aroby@texaslife.com or 254-750-2414