A unique approach to unique business

Rough Notes, May 2000 by Doucette, Nancy

What do Keith Savino, Richard Savino and Mike Bergstein have in common with Mahatma Gandhi?

They share an idea: "Be the change you want to see in the world."

Together, the Savino brothers and Bergstein have agency management and ownership experience totaling close to 75 years. Factor in their involvement in industry technology efforts and insurance program creation and you have a powerful synergy that can help empower the online insurance industry and create a new business model.

"I've always wanted to bring insurance products to the marketplace through an efficient sales process," Keith Savino says. The Internet would provide the efficiency he envisioned. "We had to think in terms of a click and mortar combination, not brick and mortar," he continues. So the threesome set out to create a virtual agency-an entity entirely separate from their respective independent agency operations that would empower independent agents to do business online. The result: InsureHelp.

"We have been supporting the automation efforts of the industry for years, so this was a natural for us and probably comes as little surprise to those who have worked with us," Savino notes.

"Designed to support the independent agents in the online world, InsureHelp is an aggregator and an enabler of the process," he explains. "We're not a service venture or a software company We've done everything we can to facilitate what needs to be done online, while drawing on the strengths of the existing distribution channel. InsureHelp was built for the consumer, because it leverages the efficiencies of technology, and the superiority of the agency system. What better combination can you have?"

InsureHelp makes the most of its creators' knowledge of the industry and how business gets done. Designed to market specialty lines only, InsureHelp provides a growing list of specialty products that can be rated, bound and paid for online. "It's totally paperless," Savino says.

InsureHelp manages the entire process-including collecting the customer. But unlike a lead generation concept, which requires follow-up, InsureHelp provides a once-and-done solution. For instance, suppose a prospect visits a vertical market Web site. Let's say this prospect is a wine enthusiast with an extensive personal wine collection in his basement. One evening, he's visiting one of his favorite sites-an online publication about wines. He notices an insurance link. The particulars of the personal wine insurance program-coverages, deductibles, premium-are available online. The prospect can complete the simple application right then, enter his credit card information and the transaction portion of the process is complete in less than five minutes. InsureHelp assigns a local agent to service the account and provides the coverage verification. (This same process can take place at the agent's Web site as well. See "Get on board," on this page.)

Savino notes that the system is intelligent enough to "know" if the activity originates at an agent Web site and in that case provides no other contact options. However, if the prospect arrives by way of a vertical market Web site, as in the example above, the prospect can select an agent from a drop-down menu that lists the agents or brokers selling that line of business in that particular state. Given that InsureHelp's developers are agents themselves, it's no surprise that this initiative vigorously involves agents. "E-coverage companies that exclude the agent are missing out on the importance of the strength that a physical presence provides," Savino points out.

The simplicity of the underwriting process is key to the efficiency of InsureHelp, Richard Savino explains. In fact, InsureHelp will select only those lines of business that don't have a complex approval process. Even at that, he says InsureHelp expects to have 30 different lines of business available by year-end-although not all lines may be offered in all states.

Because InsureHelp is databasedriven, Keith Savino says new products can be added in a matter of hours. "That's Internet time!" he declares. "We threw out the rules when we built this, too. It's not a collection of Web pages that are linked. We built it from the ground, up. And we built it so we'd be able to grow ... so we can respond to the marketplace quickly."

He continues, "The technological underpinnings were completely to our specs. We can support various rating engines including our own and can integrate with both the agents and carriers for data transfer."

Similarly, agents can respond quicklyand efficiently-as well and take advantage of opportunities they might previously have ignored. Mike Bergstein uses the exhibitor insurance as an example to explain how InsureHelp enables agencies to develop

opportunities that otherwise might be overlooked because of the expense associated with stand-alone policies. "If a prospect called and wanted a stand-alone exhibitor insurance policy, most agencies wouldn't invest the time or energy. That's a missed opportunity. But, if your best customer called looking for a unique coverage, such as insurance for an exhibitor, a personal wine collection, or a wedding, you'd do everything possible to find out how to write it. And in the brick and mortar world, this is where the inefficiency starts."