Insurers need to focus on customer analytics to devise strategy and make good business decisions, said IBM.

Through analytics, insurers can tap all available data to generate an enterprise-wide view to gain deep insights and spot opportunities.

“Insurers need to think beyond the operating model it is currently using, and look at how to better source their core competency,” said IBM’s insurance industry leader Paul Robinson.

The challenges facing business leaders today, he said, are amplified by an inability to harness the infor-mation needed to make good business decisions.

The amount of data available to organisations is unprecedented, yet companies struggle to use this data.

“Insurance has shifted from a seller’s to a buyer’s market. And while today’s customers are willing to buy, their decisions are never just about price. Insurers must continually modify their sales strategies to appeal to the increasingly demanding and savvy insurance customer,” he told pressmen after the CEO & CIO Insurance Breakfast Roundtable here yesterday.

In the last two to three years, IBM has invested about US$5 billion (RM15.65 billion) on analytics alone.

Earlier, he presented findings of IBM’s study “Powerful Interaction Points – Say Goodbye to the Channel” which compared and contrasted behaviours of Malaysia insurance customers against worldwide and Asia averages.

The study covered more than 21,000 consumers in 20 countries, giving insights from experts and peers on delivering measurable benefits and quantifiable outcomes.–BTimes