Choosing insurance business intelligence software: A complete guide for insurers 

In our information-driven age, companies accumulate and operate vast volumes of customer and business data in their operations. However, its sheer amount can’t benefit organizations until they learn to derive actionable insights from the company’s data. That is where business intelligence tools come in handy. They streamline and facilitate the routine of data collection, cleansing, analysis, and visualization, and enable users to leverage their predictive capabilities to forecast industry trends.

Realizing the immense value of state-of-the-art business intelligence platforms for their workflows, business leaders invest heavily in software, with an expected market size of around $40B in 2029 and a solid CAGR of over 5%, according to Statista. The insurance sector is moving in step with this across-the-board drive, embracing insurance business intelligence solutions among other specialized products on an ever-growing scale.

This article covers the role and key assets of business intelligence for insurance, highlighting the use of insurance business intelligence software and outlining the prospects for BI tools in the domain.

Business intelligence in insurance: How it works 

To perform their business functions effectively and outpace rivals, insurance companies need to know their customers inside and out and make informed decisions about where, when, whom, and what insurance products to sell. For decades, such market and customer data analysis relied on mathematical and statistical models, demographic patterns, environmental data studies, and other time- and effort-consuming methods, often yielding questionable results.

By integrating business intelligence software into its digital ecosystem, an insurance company can perform data analytics more quickly and efficiently. The power of BI solutions lies in the four-element data management pipeline they use.

• Data mining. Relevant customer and market data is retrieved from all available internal and external sources (CRM, ERP, social media, weather reports, medical records, police protocols, etc.) and stored within a centralized database.
• Data curation. The information is cleaned and structured to ensure data consistency, accuracy, conformity, understandability, completeness, and timeliness.
• Analyzing data. Specialized mechanisms sift through the cleansed data to detect trends and regularities, or, vice versa, anomalies.
• Data visualization. The results are presented in easy-to-read reports, tables, interactive dashboards, graphs, and other visualizations to uncover actionable insights and enable more strategic business decisions.

How does it work in the context of insurance?

For instance, an insurance company wants to find out why claims processing is so sluggish. The person responsible for business performance uses claims business intelligence software to analyze claims management records and the company’s personnel key performance indicators. The advanced analytics the system yields reveals which aspect of the claims handling workflow (inefficient processing, waiting for documents, staff errors, etc.) is causing delays, enabling insurance executives to take corrective steps and fine-tune key business processes.

What perks does BI software bring to insurance businesses?

Benefits of insurance business intelligence solutions

Our team distinguishes the following advantages of BI tools for insurance companies: 

Data consolidation

When all available business information is pooled into a centralized repository and structured in accordance with best data governance practices, insurance organizations obtain a single source of truth accessible to employees across departments, which promotes the free exchange of information, prevents data silos, and ensures enterprise-wide collaboration.

Operational efficiency

With complete database visibility, all workforce members are on the same page, enabling the company’s pipeline processes to run faster. Moreover, BI solutions can include performance measurement capabilities, allowing managers to track employee productivity, identify lagging departments, and take remedial measures.

Improved decision-making

Advanced analytics provided by business intelligence software yields valuable insights across multiple processes, giving decision-makers a solid foundation for taking specific tactical steps or conducting strategic planning.

Enhanced customer experience

BI solutions help insurers obtain a 360-degree view of each client and perform granular customer segmentation based on demographics, location, preferences, income levels, etc. With such data at their fingertips, sales departments can personalize offers and services, launch targeted marketing campaigns, and unlock the hidden potential of cross-selling and upselling initiatives. As a result, agencies maintain high customer retention and attract new customers, increasing brand recognition and loyalty.

Sharper competitive edge

Insurance companies can not only monitor their own KPIs but also gain a glimpse of third-party data on rivals’ specific operations in the niche. By comparing them with internal performance indices, they can understand their current position, pinpoint problem areas, and plan for their improvement (for instance, adopt advanced technologies, integrate a new software product, fine-tune pricing policy, switch to new marketing channels, target emerging demographic segments, etc.).

Profitability source awareness

The specialized features of a well-crafted BI solution provide complete transparency into sales channels, enabling an insurance company to create an omnichannel customer experience. The revealed profit indices allow marketing experts to identify the channels that generate the most income and to allocate more investment to their development. Moreover, they may decide to abandon the least effective sales instruments or, conversely, double their efforts to improve performance.

Given such weighty perks, it is no wonder that business intelligence solutions find multiple use cases in the insurance industry.

Applications of business intelligence in insurance

There are four major areas of the insurance pipeline where BI tools excel. 

Claims management 

This is the fundamental workflow that, to a large degree, conditions the success of business outcomes in the sector. To meet customer expectations, insurance businesses must provide prompt, efficient, and fair claim handling following policy terms. Thanks to business intelligence solutions, adjusters and claims processors can access claims data in the client’s profile, check its validity, approve settlement, and calculate disbursement sum in a New York minute, enhancing customer satisfaction and thus fostering increased customer loyalty.  

Underwriting and quoting 

Here, it is all about risk management. Before offering people a policy and determining the price of the premium, employees should conduct an out-and-out risk assessment, taking into account claims history, previous coverage, customer behavior, creditworthiness, property details, healthcare records, and other factors. BI tools allow agents to do it quickly and error-free, leveraging business analytics to generate appropriate quotes.  

Fraud detection and prevention 

The insurance market suffers from fraudulent claims that cost the sector more than $40 billion annually in the USA alone. Unscrupulous clients forge information on applications, inflate actual claims, report fake injuries and damages, or even stage accidents to get money from insurers. Business intelligence software can minimize insurance fraud by tracking claims data, identifying suspicious deviations, and alerting personnel who should look into numbers and subject the claim to a thorough investigation.  

Customer relationship management 

Improving customer satisfaction is one of the principal business objectives in the insurance sector as well as in any other vertical. It can be achieved by conducting a meticulous BI analysis of feedback data from customer support teams, call centers, and consumer reviews. By regularly discovering customer queries, pain points, and preferences, insurance companies can address issues before they escalate and provide a top-notch customer experience.  

To get maximum value from business intelligence, insurers  should monitor market trends and keep abreast of the fresh approaches. 

Current trends in BI solutions for insurance

Three cutting-edge technologies will shape the field’s contours in the foreseeable future, helping forward-looking insurance organizations stay ahead of the curve.

Artificial intelligence and machine learning 

AI-powered technologies (ML, large language models, natural language processing, deep learning, and more) are revolutionizing the domain of data analytics. They can be utilized to bolster BI tools and allow insurers to exercise more knowledgeable risk prediction, improve predictive analytics, create customer personas more accurately, and automate simple and repetitive operations related to data processing. 

Internet of Things 

Wearable devices and various sensors geared for collecting and transmitting real-time data serve as an additional source of vital information concerning a person’s health parameters, property state, vehicle conditions, etc. When accumulated and analyzed with the help of BI mechanisms, this data enhances insurers’ risk assessment efforts and allows them to determine premium pricing fairly.  

Blockchain 

Together with improving multiple business intelligence tasks, IoT devices pose new security threats, becoming access channels cyber criminals can exploit to penetrate the company’s digital infrastructure and get hold of sensitive data circulating there. The distributed ledger system the blockchain technology relies on can mitigate such hazards and add an extra level of security to data repositories, ensuring the inviolability of dossiers stored there and leveraged in business intelligence initiatives. 

To make the most of BI tools, you should not only pay attention to the latest trends in the niche but also partner with a seasoned IT vendor, well-versed in business intelligence software implementation and development. 

Augment your business intelligence with DICEUS 

We offer insurance business intelligence software as part of our ready-made software products suite that includes the following:

• Policy Administration System
• Group and Individual Insurance Management Platform
• AI-Powered Underwriting Workbench
• Customer-Facing Super App
• Customer Web Portal
• Broker Portal
• Data Analytics and Data Warehouse
• LLM Chatbot

Although data warehouses and data analytics aren’t identical to BI solutions, they are often discussed alongside business intelligence.

A DWH primarily serves as a data foundation, being a centralized repository that consolidates data from multiple sources, making it reliable for business intelligence reporting.

Data analytics, in turn, examines data to detect patterns, finds answers to business questions, and generates insights.

Together, these two solutions provide the basis that BI tools use to deliver reliable decision support, dashboards, and reports.

DICEUS Data Warehouse for Insurance

The DICEUS Data Warehouse is designed to grow alongside your business, adapting as your needs change. From the start, it’s built on agile, modular, and scalable architectural principles, making it easy to add new data sources, expand models and tables, and evolve data marts. The system also enhances automation, monitoring, and support, so you always have reliable data capabilities — even as your data grows. With continuous implementation and maintenance, you get a flexible solution that keeps up with your business.

Our DWH is designed as a coherent engineering platform with aligned tools, structure, and operations.

Key advantages of our DWH for insurance businesses

Our solution was built with the insurance sector specifics in mind. Since 2011, our team has developed many software solutions for insurers such as VIG, UNIQA, Fairfax Group, and brokers like WTW. As a result, we know how these companies operate, what challenges they face, and how reliable data is important for them. Below are the key benefits our solution provides:

Improved decision-making. Our DWH brings all your business data together into one reliable source of truth. So, business leaders can quickly analyze trends, monitor KPIs, and make smarter decisions.

Better operational efficiency. DICEUS DWH automates data processes, removes manual work and scattered spreadsheets, giving teams instant access to reliable data for faster decisions and fewer errors.

Understanding customers. With all customer data in one place, insurers better understand customer needs and risks. This means more accurate targeting, tailored products, and improved customer loyalty.

Scalable architecture. Our DWH adapts to your unique data environment and business goals. It grows as new data sources, technologies, or analytics needs arise, offering long-term flexibility. This scalability means your data infrastructure supports key initiatives like digital transformation and AI adoption.

DICEUS Data Analytics

DICEUS Data Analytics solution for insurance businesses captures and analyzes data from various sources. Its intuitive, interactive dashboards allow users to track metrics for key aspects of the insurance company’s operations.

For example, the sales dashboard can showcase the efficiency of all sales channels the company leverages by showing the number of policies purchased through each channel, the dynamic volume of written premiums, and the number of quotes that were not converted into policies for a specific period. Armed with these figures, you can determine the most successful channel, take remedial measures for underperforming channels, and understand where your marketing efforts should be directed.

On the dashboard related to claims, you can see their total number, segmented by type and completeness. This information will help you track patterns in claims data and allocate additional resources to handle pending claims if their number is substantial.

The customer profile and marketing dashboard enable personnel to dig deep into customer profiles and explore customer behavior (clicks, engagements, views, conversions, and purchases) across each interaction channel. Such analytics are instrumental in assessing the efficiency of marketing campaigns and tapping new cross-selling and upselling opportunities.

If the functionality of our data analytics solution doesn’t meet your business and technical requirements, our high-profile developers have in-depth niche expertise. They can craft a unique BI solution from scratch. Drop us a line to reinvent your data analytics with the best-in-class business intelligence software for the insurance industry.

Key takeaways

Business intelligence is a software-driven effort consisting in collecting, cleansing, analyzing, and presenting business data. In the insurance context, it is geared to essentially facilitate and streamline basic industry workflows, such as claims management, underwriting, fraud prevention, and customer relationship management.  

When implemented by an experienced vendor and bolstered by disruptive technologies, BI tools can help centralize relevant data under one virtual roof, increase operational efficiency, boost decision-making, augment customer experience, sharpen the competitive edge, and assess the profitability of existing sales channels, thus revolutionizing the entire performance of the insurance organization.  

Frequently asked questions