NRMA Expert Advice – Building the financial resilience of Australian small businesses

People don’t purchase what they don’t understand. NRMA Insurance observed small businesses struggling to purchase cover without human assistance. The complexity of business insurance makes it hard to engage with and attribute value to one product over another. This leads to underinsurance, and poor customer confidence when selecting policies. Our user research showed that insurance is an emotional decision for business owners, as they must imagine the worst to understand the cover they need. We set out to give customers the confidence to accurately determine their needs, then purchase the policy that provides the most appropriate cover for their situation.

NRMA Expert Advice guides customers through a simple, quick and accurate needs analysis - producing algorithmically generated recommendations for business insurance. Over 24 weeks and 67 hours of user testing, we designed and developed a digital tool that helps customers meaningfully understand their risk exposure. The tool supports users through the digital process of personalised advice, making changes to their cover and improving their understanding, with human help available at every step. “This is really cool, really good actually. Last time I just trusted that someone else would do it for me… I didn’t really participate in the process.” - Sally, Hairdresser

Small business owners. Peace of mind: The comfort of protecting one’s livelihood and meaningfully understanding how each product can be used creates huge psychological value for customers. NRMA support teams. More time to focus on complex enquiries and needs. While the online experience supports traditional business measures, our design process generated understanding of new indicators the business could use to measure customers’ clarity and consent in the cover purchased – a key factor in ensuring the tool meets regulation and compliance standards. The tool’s unique proposition in the Australian market created broad industry impact – redefining how insurance companies can support businesses.

Output 1 - Digital product: - Guides a user through entering their information accurately and understanding their cover. - Provides examples of cover in use specific to the user’s occupation, creating real-world understanding. - Shows the user how their answers have been considered in the recommendation. - Digitised guidance through alerts when a user changes their recommendation beyond what we think is safe (referred to as ‘guardrail messages’). - Save for later enables users to continue on any device, and allow reflection and comparison before purchase. - Tested and refined to work across many kinds of desktop, laptop, tablet and mobile devices. - Connects users to call center staff with a shared experience, supporting them to answer specific questions at key points at discovery, consideration, evaluation and purchase journey. Output 2 - Product intelligence: - Documented underwriting algorithm, co-designed with National Underwriter in order to deliver personalised advice. - Recommendation engine, allowing the tool to provide users personalised recommendations for their business in addition to users capability to edit their recommendation e.g. cover types, sums insured and duration of cover. - Call centre and webchat team process flows allowing the product to integrate the tool into existing quote, buy and claim workflows.