Winning in the new world of the connected customer

In this age, it's true: If you're not mobile you're not being noticed.

Are we making progress in the life insurance industry when it comes to being mobile? According to Quade's research, not really.

"Twenty-seven of the top 100 life insurance companies have developed mobile apps," Quade said. "The real opportunity is expanding your connectivity to the consumer. The life insurance industry has not yet moved 100 percent to delivering what consumers want completely online.

Quade evidenced this by illustrating a few experiences of his own. He recently used various life insurance mobile apps to get quotes on a life insurance policy. When he clicked "purchase policy," the app merely provided names of agents to contact, instead of letting him purchase a policy completely online. 

Google recently purchased the UK insurance comparison site Beat that Quote, leaving insurers anxious for what's to come. What are the implications?

Now what? In this mobile environment, Quade suggests:

• Build a compelling business case to assure senior management commitment to the emerging realities of the connected customer;
• Invest in data and analytics, critical to building a successful mobile deployment strategy;
• Do not attempt to move your desktop website to mobile; and
• Build a mobile technology platform that is a contextually relevant experience.

There are challenges to this, however. As Quade stated, mobile development challenges that remain are:

• Security – avoid a target data breach event;
• Interoperability – integrating with archaic back-end sytems;
• Customization – packaged solutions are difficult to retrofit;
• Environment – can exisiting environments and production systems scale to keep up with demand?;
• Collaboration – requires significant stakeholder interaction; and
• Budget – fully rationalize by striking a balance with qualitative and quantitative elements.

Quade, and many others within the industry, stress that going mobile may be challenging and intimidating, but it is also necassary. The livelihood of the life industry may depend on it.