Bain Report: Global Insurers Shift From Delivering Risk Coverage to Reducing and Preventing Risk

• Bain & Company's 2023 Global Insurance Report looks at the role of customer behavior, loyalty and impact of purpose on insurance companies.
• Consumers from across the globe show strong interest in risk prevention including 97% of survey respondents from Brazil and 81% from Japan.
• Consumers want to be rewarded for choices, including 59% globally want life insurers to reward them for healthy living.

Today's consumers want more from their insurance companies. Following several years of turbulence, including extreme weather, the COVID-19 pandemic and disease, significant disruption is radically changing the risk landscape for consumers with more and different risks. With this reality, consumers want their insurance companies to more than just help them when there is disruption, but help them reduce and prevent risk too. Bain & Company's new report, Customer Behavior and Loyalty in Insurance: Global Edition 2023, gives insight into the changing approaches of insurers and needs of consumers. View the report here.

Bain's new research, powered by Dynata, surveyed 28,765 consumers in 14 countries, confirming that consumers want more from their insurers than delivering coverage. Consumers overwhelmingly want risk prevention and mitigation services from their insurers. In Brazil 97% of survey respondents indicated interest in risk prevention as well as 81% of respondents from Japan. Additionally, more than 40% of millennials are willing and interested in paying for life insurance that includes risk prevention. Changing customer behavior also means a shift for insurance agents, who historically pushed out offerings with a pitch, and now need to pull in customers by addressing their priorities at the right moments. Technology, including digital tools and advanced analytics, will allow insurance companies and their agents shift away from a transactional role to a broader relationship-based consumer interaction.

"The consumer demand for more risk-prevention beyond traditional insurance services has led to new services," said Henrik Naujoks, a partner at Bain & Company. "For example, a European health insurer has launched new services and enlisted partners, such as health coaching and doctors. In some cases, the new services can lead to developing stronger relationships with consumers as in Southeast Asia, where a life insurer launched health and parent online forums that led to 300,000 customers signing up in the first year, with one-fifth of active users having then met with their insurance broker."