THE EFFECT OF TRUST IN THE ONLINE COMPLETION OF INSURANCE PRODUCTS COMPARED WITH TRADITIONAL DISTRIBUTION CHANNELS IN GERMANY
THE EFFECT OF TRUST IN THE ONLINE COMPLETION OF INSURANCE PRODUCTS COMPARED WITH TRADITIONAL DISTRIBUTION CHANNELS IN GERMANY

Summary/Abstract: The insurance distribution in Germany is unique, because in most countries insurance intermediaries do not have that much power. On the basis of the government influence and the progress of the digital market, customer behavior and the insurance sector in general are permanently changing. Because of that, some success factors are becoming more important than others. In the distribution of insurance products there are many different success factors. Trust is one of the most important success factors for customers in the business relationship and in purchasing insurance products. Is it possible that if customers are losing trust in insurance intermediaries in general, the online distribution increases? The analysis of the survey shows that customers who have bought an insurance product online before, generally do not as trust in insurance intermediaries as much as customers who have never bought an insurance product online. As this paper will show, well-known “research online, purchase offline”-effect was observed in customer behavior if they bought an insurance product. Many studies predicted that this customer behavior will change in the future, so that digital distribution will rise in some segments. In the life insurance segment this effect won’t be as strong as in other segments, because the products are more difficult to understand for the layman.

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