Why Business Insurance is the Best Partnership You’ve Never Heard Of

Thanks for joining me, Jason. In your opinion, why do you think more companies should add a business insurer to their partnership portfolio?

Thank you for having me. So at a high level, it’s a product that, for the most part, all small businesses buy or should buy. So it’s often a product business owners are already purchasing.

That means it’s a top-of-mind checklist for a lot of those businesses. So for our partners, if they’re going to source [insurance] from somewhere, it should be from you.

Another benefit is that it's a great risk management tool for the partner. Say, you have [an] ecommerce business selling through your platform. Ensuring that they have the right insurance helps protect your business, as it can also help lower your total cost of risk.

It’s also another touchpoint to get your brand in front of your customers. Business insurance renews every year, so you have that built-in interaction with them when it’s time to renew.

And finally the last reason, and the one that people always refer back to, is that it’s a potential profit center. Here at Simply Business, we compensate our partners for lead flow. This is a way for them to additionally monetize the businesses they already source or the customers they already have.

What kind of partner do you think would benefit from working with a business insurance company?

Really, it’s any business that wants to further their relationship with their customers. Like I said, this is a product [small businesses] likely already buy, so they should buy it from you or through you.

It's another opportunity to build your brand and strengthen your relationship with your customers. When we work with small businesses, we want to see them succeed; we want to see them grow. Working with a business insurance company is a way just to demonstrate that you care, and that you want to make sure that your customers’ businesses are protected.

We live in a very litigious environment, so having insurance is a very important way to make sure that your customers stay in business, no matter what happens.

When it comes to dream partnerships, business insurance may not always be top of mind for some companies. Why do you think that is?

Insurance is a really old industry; we’ve been around for a very long time. It’s taken a while for that shift to turn into a move toward a digital, top-of-mind approach. So I think that’s a big part of it.

Another element is that it’s a complex, highly regulated industry, especially in the US. Carriers have to file with 51 regulators to get things approved, so there are kind of perceived hoops that need to be jumped through or fear that might come with that.

But that’s why we exist. Simply Business was built so that we can create a digital solution for small businesses to buy insurance, but also make it really easy for partners to be able to sell that product.

That’s why you’re currently seeing this new push and attention around insurtech and technical improvements in a very antiquated world.

Gotcha. So what are the key signs [a company] should look for in a potential partnership with a business insurance company?

If I'm looking to partner with insurance, the first things I'm going to look at are whether or not they have the appetite to truly insure the businesses that I work with. I want to be able to offer products to my customers that fit their needs and actually do what they’re supposed to do.

I also really want to make sure that the data is at the forefront. I want reports to ensure that I'm learning as much about my customers as I can, which is just an additional benefit to the partnership.

I absolutely want to be able to offer choice. I want my customers to be able to see a couple of different quotes so they can make an informed and educated decision and feel good about the option. You can't just shove one product down their throat and say this is what you need.

I also want to work with people who care. I want to work with people who are passionate. And partnership is the key to this whole thing, there needs to be mutual benefit, especially when it comes to technology integration. That seamless integration piece is really important, if you're a tech-enabled partnership, it has to work within the platform that you're working with.

The biggest thing is to treat [the partner’s] brand with respect [...] Whether it’s being offered through a call center or an online journey like ours, the brand needs to be front and center and represented the right way to customers.

Absolutely, that’s so important. So why does a business insurance company like Simply Business make for such a good partnership?

In my opinion, it’s because we built it to be that way.

We want to put our partners in the forefront, support their brand, and support their customers. We want to provide [their customers] with the best possible solutions for insurance so that they can sleep at night. That's the most important thing, that small businesses are protected. The products we provide do that, and that helps further our partners’ relationships with their customers..

A big reason why I think Simply Business is the leader in this space is that we are financially stable. We're in a burgeoning industry with a lot of venture capital money, and a lot of interest in finding the new solution. Simply Business being a wholly owned subsidiary of Travelers with operational autonomy is a really important thing, because insurance is a product that is intended to ensure survival of a small business and therefore it's important that the company [you partner with] is also stable.

And stability is something that differentiates us from many others in our industry in the tech space. We’re not fixated on continually courting investor funding. We can focus on supporting customers and partners.

And the biggest thing for us is that we really embrace the word “partner.” This is something we're doing together, to collectively support small businesses. We both want to see them succeed, so coming together and providing that mutual support for small businesses is the most important part.

Well, thanks for joining me, Jason. I appreciate your time and join us next month for another conversation with one of our thought leaders here at Simply Business.