Zurich Insurance

Service Provided

Our consultancy provided Zurich with a "Product as a Service" offering to identify and validate a new distribution channel for Klinc, their electronics insurance product. A dedicated squad of product managers, designers, and engineers tackled the challenge, ensuring the feasibility of the new channel, adapting internal operations, defining the necessary integrations, and building the software.

 

Problem

Zurich sought to validate an untapped distribution channel in partnership with a global online e-commerce SaaS provider. The objectives were to:

1. Validate the channel's potential.

2. Adapt internal operations to integrate this channel smoothly within three months.

3. Define the app and necessary system integrations.

4. Develop the app.

 

Solution

Research and Validation

We began with an extensive research stage, inspired by Paul Graham's advice to "do things that don't scale". Using online tools, we scraped retail websites to identify 20,000 potential merchants, combining this data with financial information from Amadeus to score and rank them. We collaborated with Zurich's B2B sales team to reach out to merchants and their insurance brokers, conducting user interviews to understand their needs and willingness to adopt the product. This research allowed us to develop a robust business case, projecting expected revenue, identifying top revenue concentrations, and outlining a clear growth roadmap. The new channel had the potential to triple monthly policy sales, setting the stage for a global partnership if the regional case proved successful.

 

Adaptation of Operations  

Next, we focused on adapting Zurich's operations. This involved modifying policy issuance, payment methods, claims handling, and analytics to fit the new channel. Merchant onboarding was initially manual, targeting the first 10 merchants to kickstart the process. Legal and compliance checks ensured all modifications were feasible. We planned for tiered growth: 10-100 merchants in six months, followed by a reevaluation for scaling beyond 100.

 

App Definition  

In defining the app, we aimed to minimize Zurich's internal resource use, requiring only an API key to integrate with existing systems. We built a middleware app to manage the integration with the SaaS provider, collect tracking and analytics data, and control the user interface, enabling us to test and iterate on our experiment.

 

Development

Finally, we developed and deployed the app, adhering to best practices and ensuring it integrated seamlessly with Zurich's systems. The app's scalable architecture facilitated future growth, laying the groundwork for potential international expansion.

 

Results

- The new channel had the potential to triple monthly policy sales.

- Developed a clear business case and growth roadmap.

- Validated the MVP, setting the stage for international scaling.

- Provided Zurich with critical insights, ensuring strategic investments were well-founded and positioned for success.