CUSTOMER STORYFaster information retrieval allows this life insurance company's reps and brokers to better serve customers in the moment.

At one of the world’s largest mutual life insurance companies, an employee portal was supposed to enable its 6,000 field reps and 20,000 brokers with every web-based tool needed to support customers and do their jobs. The only problem was, it didn’t.

A fragmented portal experience

The portal united information from various data sources (ServiceNow, SharePoint, multiple external websites), provided links to internal tools, and gave access to broker platforms and CRMs used by agencies. But the portal was stitched together a bit like Frankenstein. Each different data source had a unique way to search its information and the UI was sorely inconsistent.

This incongruence meant there was a steep learning curve for new agents, and seasoned agents relied on idiosyncratic navigation techniques that sometimes led to some information, but rarely to all of it. Since not many people knew how to use the antiquated IBM WebSphere technical stack that the portal was built on, updating the system wasn’t easy, and missed connections persisted.

The disjointed portal caused employees to waste a lot of time spinning their wheels trying to find what they needed to support their clients. So most agents just didn’t use it. The insurance company wanted to change that, to upgrade the experience its portal offered and the technology behind it so its employees could be more efficient and less frustrated. Increasing portal usage was identified as a principal business goal.

Search as the critical connection point

A survey of portal users identified search as one of the most important aspects of the redesign. In the current state, search results were often outdated, links were frequently invalid or duplicates, and top results rarely included what users were actually looking for.

Even if a user had the specific ID number of a publication, if they entered a search query with a space between “pub” and the ID number, rather than without a space as it was indexed, there would be no results found. Field reps resorted to calling the back office to ask for publications to be sent to them, wasting more time procuring collateral that should have been at their fingertips.

If an agent were trying to sell to a customer sitting across the table, they would spend precious time awkwardly fumbling and clicking around, attempting to find information, hardly the professional experience they wanted to deliver.

Building a modern search experience

To meet the agents’ needs, the redesigned portal would feature a search bar at the top of every page. The modern, seamless search experience the insurance company planned required several key capabilities:

• Typeahead/autocomplete offering potential content matches as users typed
• Faceted results allowing users to pare down to the most relevant matches
• Document previews showing document type and how recent the information was
• Results sorting by update date, document type, and other relevant factors
• Security trimming so documents were only visible to authorized personnel
• Personalization so agents would automatically see their clients and have additional filtering capabilities

As the insurance company evaluated search providers who could enable all of these features, Lucidworks rose to the top. Lucidworks’ advanced AI capabilities could deliver relevant content and personalization to users with all the specifications the insurance company had outlined.

Transformation through AI-powered search

Piece by piece, the insurance company and Lucidworks used AI-powered search to transform the old Frankenstein portal into a user-friendly, modern application. They implemented the solution in stages:

1. First indexing tools and resources
2. Then adding policies and clients
3. Implementing global search with facets, sorting, and autocomplete
4. Finally enabling signals to provide personalization for each user

Like a skilled tailor transforming a patched-together garment into a bespoke suit, the new search experience gave each portal user the most relevant experience for their specific needs.

Measurable results

As new search capabilities were rolled out, portal usage began to rise. Agents struggled less, and time once needlessly wasted on information chases was reclaimed for more productive activities and more polished customer interactions.

The company saw employee satisfaction scores increase as representatives became more empowered with immediate access to information via effective search. Time previously wasted hunting for data was now spent more productively, creating better experiences for both employees and their clients.

The portal’s informational fabric, once patched together and compromised by substandard search, is now transformed with Lucidworks into a sleek, seamless system where tools and data are readily accessible at users’ fingertips.

By enabling employees with a consistent, relevant search experience throughout the portal using Lucidworks AI-powered search capabilities, one of the world’s largest mutual life insurance companies transformed how their 26,000 representatives serve customers—proving that in the insurance industry, the right information at the right time makes all the difference.