5 ways to become a digital broker

In recent years, many industries have undergone a rapid digital transformation as consumers have demanded access to the latest technologies. The pandemic further emphasized the need for technological solutions to ensure consumers had a seamless transition from traditional business practices to those run online. While the health industry adopted telehealth, and ecommerce skyrocketed over the past year, many in the benefits industry were left scrambling to make the switch to digitization all at once. According to a recent survey of insurance executives, 95% are looking to speed up their company’s digital transformation.

As benefits offerings increase in importance for prospective and existing employees, it’s paramount that brokers are able to meet the demands of their clients. For those transitioning to digital models for the first time, and for those looking to capitalize on this key moment in time in the benefits industry, here are five actions that will help brokers embrace the digital age.

1. Implement digital marketing

To meet customers where they are, it’s important to establish an online presence for your business. Millennials will make up 75% of the workforce by 2025, and Gen Z is not far behind. In order to reach this digital-first generation, businesses need to build and maintain effective websites and social media pages, and to increase online outreach via email and social media. If moving your business online is a daunting idea, there are a few simple considerations to help you bridge the gap between analog and digital marketing.

• Mobile responsiveness: Millennials are on their phones now more than ever before, and there’s been a 20% increase in online shopping from this group in the last 18 months, surpassing desktop as the primary platform. Knowing this, it’s important to make sure your website scales appropriately when viewed on a tablet or mobile device.
• Website templates, customization and imagery: Work with a web developer to find the right template for your business that is also customizable. Be able to make quick updates when needed and make sure you add plenty of imagery and videos to drive traffic. On average, pages with images or videos draw 94% more views than their text-only counterparts. If you’ve done the hard work of getting prospective customers to your website, don’t lose them by having text heavy pages.
• Leverage SEO features: Search engine optimization (SEO) sounds daunting, but in simple terms, it means adding in the right keywords to your website content so that your site shows up on search engines, like Google. When building a website, there will be fields for image tagging, meta descriptions, title tags and other fields.
• Social media pages and sharing: While working on your website, make sure you’re also setting up social media profiles for your business. Decide on which social media platform is right for your company (they might not all be), but LinkedIn is a recommended platform to have in the brokerage and benefits space and will reach the right audience. Further, make sure your website has easy-to-share social media buttons so you can promote content from your website right onto your social media profiles. Look for site builders that make the image preview of your site look good when sharing it on social media.

2. Choose the online enrollment solution that works for you

With digital natives comprising the bulk of the workforce and increasingly sitting in the driver’s seat when it comes to evaluating key business partnerships, you can’t afford to be a paper broker any longer. The technology solution you adopt now should make the employer’s job easier right away. Employers will look to find solutions that streamline the onboarding process, simplify open enrollment, save time, and reduce opportunities for manual errors.

Related: Technology has redefined the role of a broker

Direct to Employer (DTE) companies are looking for any way to cut brokers out of the equation, and without the ability to get your groups online—and fast—you run the very real risk of being rendered obsolete. Some suggestions to consider while evaluating potential solutions are:

• Widely applicable: Does the solution work for all your groups using paper today/? If you implement a solution for a 25-life group that’s meant for a 100-life group, you’re going to find it too difficult to implement and maintain, removing some of the benefits. If you buy software only for your 100-life groups but have a 25-life group ready to go digital, you’ll need to maintain two software solutions, which is expensive and difficult to manage.
• Less error prone: Aside from being time consuming, relying on paper forms can also create errors. Make sure that the solution you select has a way to audit for discrepancies so that you can quickly (and accurately) manage your group’s data.
• Built for partnerships: Does the solution work with your partners? From carriers to general agents to enrollers, there are technology experts in the insurance ecosystem that can help you get started and support the software over time. Choose a solution that’s built for you to continue to work with your partners so you don’t have to go it alone.
• Low cost: Is the solution affordable and is the cost and package flexible, depending on group size? The more value you can pass over to your clients, the better chance you have of retaining them.
• Connected to carriers: Does the online solution submit data directly to insurance carriers? Does it keep information in sync so employees and admins only need to make changes in one system for updates to be made to multiple carriers? If a connection isn’t available to an insurance carrier, can the group still enroll entirely online?
• Secure and protected: Now, more than ever, it’s critical that you only partner with companies that take security risks seriously. Data security threats are evolving in real-time and you must have a partner that is committed to evolving their protection of your data rapidly.

3. Consider an agency management system (AMS) 

Becoming a digital broker today means using simple technology to make your job easier. And some of that begins by considering the use of an agency management system (AMS), which can help simplify your day-to-day operations at your agency. An AMS is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) technology that agencies use to more effectively run their operations and organize their book of business. This software is designed to help organize your working processes and keep everyone on the same page.

So, what are the benefits of an AMS? For starters, you can manage your agency from anywhere, centralize your data and organize clients, prospects, groups, policies, agents and carriers, all in one place. Improved documentation is also an added benefit, because it reduces the issues that arise from duplicating information or looking up previous documents. When a broker adopts an AMS, they are able to automate their workflow and spend less time on manual, tedious tasks, ultimately spending more time focusing on winning new business or providing better service to their clients.

Brokers often find than AMS allows them to grow their book of business by selling additional lines of coverage other than simply health insurance; for instance: property and casualty, auto, Medicare, Life, etc. Additionally, it can improve a broker’s profitability and professionalism by freeing up their team’s time and allowing them to focus on providing better service to their clients. By adopting the right benefits administration tech solution that is integrated with an AMS, brokers can grow their business and retain their clients.

4. Expand benefit offerings 

The more you can strategically streamline HR processes while connecting groups and their employees with enhanced offerings, the more relevant you will remain for your clients. The expansion of voluntary benefits is an easy way to help your clients add value to their employees while offering you additional revenue opportunities.

Also: Voluntary benefits in 2021: Hit refresh

According to a recent survey, since 2018, the number of voluntary benefits plans offered per employee has increased by an average of roughly 3%. Given how important additional benefits offerings like ancillary and voluntary can be to employees, it makes sense that employers would place a higher value on the companies that can connect them and their employees to these types of expanded offerings. DTEs will try to sell your clients on more comprehensive benefits plans. The best line of defense in protecting your book of business against DTEs is by putting expanded digital offerings in front of your clients and offering more customization around plans, products, and services. Lastly, make sure you create more pathways for employees to secure the voluntary and ancillary products they want and need.

5. Embrace the digital revolution

Your customers will invest in you if they know you will deliver a solution for them today, and into the future, that cuts down on errors and risks, and that seamlessly brings their benefits onto one platform. To keep your clients, they need to be confident that you’re already looking ahead and charting a course to help them navigate through the challenges that will emerge tomorrow. If the pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that we need to be able to be nimble and be able to work not only in person, but remotely, too. Becoming a digital broker will enable you to do just that.