"Agents who use AI are going to replace agents who don't"

“Agents who use AI are going to replace agents who don’t” | Insurance Business America

Technology

“Agents who use AI are going to replace agents who don’t”

Adaptation, not fear, is the key to success, says insurance veteran

Technology

By
Emily Douglas

RiskAdvisor wasn’t born as a grand business plan – the tech start-up emerged organically from David Watson’s ruminations on the sector. Looking at frustrations and frictions, redundant tasks plaguing processes and prolonging turnaround times, he was determined to change the insurance game.

“If it takes me two hours to build something that saves 30 seconds every time and you do that 1500 times a year, then my team has saved time,” he told Insurance Business. “But also my agency has made money off that investment.”

Built initially on a low-code platform with minimal coding expertise, RiskAdvisor evolved beyond internal use. Watson (pictured above) soon realized its potential to benefit other independent insurance agents struggling with similar challenges.

“It helps to have a conversation that’s focused around what your personal lines clients need. [Also] if someone is new to the industry or has used a slightly less focused process in the past, it’s going to point out: ‘here’s some great cross-sell opportunities, here’s some upsell opportunities, here are the right questions to be asking in this hard market where getting accurate and correct data is vitally important,’” Watson said.

“But then, on the back end, you have all this structured data. Let’s make it easy by eliminating duplicate entries. So whether it’s sending it to your rater, your CRM, even sending it to virtual assistants and wholesale brokers on the personal side, we give you one point of entry for anywhere you really needed to go – making it more efficient on the back end, but also revenue generating on the front end.”

And Watson really believes in the resilience of independent agents who prioritize providing value. However, he contended that adaptation, not fear, is the key to success – especially in an evolving technological landscape.

“AI is not going to replace insurance agents. Agents who use AI are going to replace agents who don’t,” Watson said. “I’ve stolen that from Jason Cass – and plenty of people have said something similar. The important thing is that the agents who adapt to emerging technology while continuing to provide value are the ones who will replace those agents who are not willing to adapt.”