Insurance companies and agents are often on the frontline when it comes to helping people and businesses respond to a crisis. This has been exemplified numerous times throughout the pandemic, where insurers are the first onsite or on the phone with a customer to address issues like claims for pandemic-related damages. However, before a crisis presents itself, it’s imperative that insurance companies first earn a customer’s trust.
And there’s good news on that front. Despite such a tumultuous and unpredictable past couple of years, the insurance industry has fared well when it comes to customer trust. According to Deloitte’s “2022 Insurance Industry Outlook,” overall confidence in insurers increased since the start of the pandemic.
To help maintain increased customer assurance, insurance companies need to continue to adopt relevant technologies that enhance their communications strategies. According to the same Deloitte 2022 report, insurers are finding it increasingly hard to offer customized customer experiences on their own. By leveraging customizable communications tools and technologies, insurers can create a more holistic customer-centric journey. Effective communications tactics can help create more personalized and authentic interactions between a customer and a brand, and ultimately help build trust and loyalty with customers.
Such essential technology can be found in SIP trunking, which can enhance the customer experience during an emergency and provide scalability so insurers can respond seamlessly during an influx of customer calls.
But what exactly is SIP trunking and how can it help insurance companies better communicate with customers?
At a high level, SIP trunking is a cloud communications technology that allows companies to send calls over the internet. It’s a VoIP connection between your PBX (a private domain) and your telephone provider (a public domain). SIP affords cost savings and unique advantages to a businesses’ communications solutions. These factors are critical for insurance providers looking to build trust with customers. Below are a few ways SIP helps insurance companies enhance their communications strategies.
Increases reliability and scalability. In the event of fraud or a natural disaster, insurance companies must stay online and be accessible to customers. SIP Trunking solutions provide reliability to help insurance companies alleviate the impacts of emergencies. They also enable scalability to be able to respond accordingly. This could include the need to support a sudden surge of incoming callers or open a new contact center in a different location not impacted by the natural disaster. SIP cloud-based numbers can be up and running in seconds so that insurance companies can support customers during a large-scale incident without disruption. The Flowroute HyperNetwork™ plays a large role in our ability to provide a stable and reliable communications network, which is critical during a crisis. Our HyperNetwork meshes multiple telecom and IP networks into a single optimal route, so our customers across all industries stay connected and mitigate stress during outages.
Enhances security. Security is an essential pillar within the insurance sector. Insurance agents and contact center reps manage highly sensitive and confidential information – over the phone or through other communications channels. Customers need assurance that their information is protected and secure. Evaluating network security protections is just one way insurers can safeguard their customers’ communications. A SIP carrier like Flowroute helps support these efforts by providing account level protection to help insurers mitigate their risk of toll fraud.
Fosters a better experience. Another benefit to SIP trunking is its ability to provide crisp and strong voice quality. This can be especially critical when insurance agents talk with customers while they’re in a vulnerable and potentially traumatic experience. During a high-stress situation, the last thing any customer wants to experience is a dropped call or not being able to hear their agent. This assurance improves the overall experience a member has with their insurance company.
Provides access to real-time flexibility. Since SIP trunking is a cloud-based software, the solution also empowers insurance companies with the flexibility to tailor their communications, which is helpful when responding to an urgent event. For example, if voice calls are not practical during a disaster, insurance companies can add SMS and MMS capabilities to their offerings. With SIP trunking, insurers can get a more dynamic range of options to adapt to the crisis at hand and meet the needs of their customers accordingly.
As we’ve learned in the past couple of years, it can be challenging to plan for the future. A crisis can hit at any point and the unimaginable can quickly become a reality. This is why it’s imperative to be prepared and implement the right communications technologies in order to significantly enhance an insurer’s ability to support large scale crisis response and maintain trust with their customers.
At Flowroute, we pride ourselves on our SIP trunking capabilities and are proud that we’ve been named the top SIP trunk provider for three years by our customers. Our cloud-based architecture and carrier-grade solutions give our customers in the insurance sector the confidence they need to run their business and the flexibility to adapt to the future.