Sussex Insurance COO discusses social media and its impact on the insurance industry
Narrator: Aly Kanji is the Chief Operating Officer and General Counsel for Sussex Insurance. He has written a social media policy for Sussex employees and he talks to ILStv about social media’s impact on the insurance industry.
Aly Kanji: Social media is an interesting area for the insurance industry. Insurance traditionally isn’t something that’s very sexy. It’s not something that’s at the forefront of innovation either. Here we are talking about buying insurance online and insurance companies not prepared to bind coverage online; and yet the internet’s been around at least a couple of decades in mass use.
So social media is an area that really hasn’t, I think, taken off in insurance. Certainly amongst our agents and our staff, it’s not something we’re seeing as being prevalent. People aren’t looking to social media to get insurance information or insurance advice. That being said I think it’s something that’s going to change. I know from Sussex’s standpoint we created an intranet on our website with discussion groups for our staff and it’s something that isn’t being used to the extent that we anticipated it would be used. And part of that is the social media savvy of the insurance community I don’t think is where it is in other forums and other industries. Is it going to get there? I think so, and I think it’s going to be important. But there are risks as well. Obviously there has to be concerns about giving advice through those types of mediums and people relying on that advice and where that can lead you. So it’s a fine line, but I think it’s something that’s certainly going to evolve and it’s going to have its place, but where that ends up, I’m not sure.
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