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Contact Vox to learn about how we can help you create a comprehensive Customer Experience that drives bottom-line results dramatically higher.

Most major auto insurance companies profess a desire to improve customer experience over all channels, and there’s plenty of evidence they’re sincere in that intent. At the same time, good intentions and four bits will buy you a cup of coffee (ok, maybe four bucks at Starbucks, for a non-fat half-caf latte). What the recently completed Vox Mind-Model Study shows is – although there have been real improvements overall in the design, usability and functionality of many auto insurance websites – there’s still lots of room for improvement. Register here for the full Mind-Model study: http://www.voxinc.com/insurance-mind-model.htm.

So, if you’re a customer like me, feel free to be encouraged, and disappointed.

In this, the third iteration of this comprehensive study of online auto insurance environments we were impressed by some of the improvements we observed. These include:

• More emphasis on cross-cultural awareness (makes sense since Hispanics, for example, are the fastest growing minority in the United States);

• Moderate improvement in both the number of sites offering online insurance quotes, and new options to help someone get a quote quickly, like anonymous quotes and Live Chat; and

• The availability of search functions on almost all the sites we studied – a necessary feature these days.

At the same time, we were disappointed in the lack of progress on several fronts, such as:

• Search tools (I know, I just said search was good) that, while they exist on the site don’t perform the way a user would like, which means the value for this “added feature” is less than zero;

• Standard quote processes that are still too lengthy and convoluted for most users to find the will to complete;

• Typical browser settings for sites that seem to belong back in 2003 – most users now have monitors set to at least 1024 x 768, yet many sites are still at the almost-obsolete 800 x 600 setting, resulting in most companies cheating themselves out of valuable screen real estate.

If the online channel was an important part of the overall customer experience when we conducted the last study, it’s now essential – and in many customers’ minds the most important or only channel – for communicating, researching, and transacting the relationship. Companies that don’t realize this will proceed at their own peril.

The comprehensive study examines 14 of the major auto insurance company sites in depth, utilizing several methodologies and analysis techniques, which revealed some bright spots but also some surprising inconsistencies and flaws. Go here to register for the full Mind-Model study http://www.voxinc.com/insurance-mind-model.htm.