Stats at a Glance:
40% to 14%: E&O exposure dropped dramatically.
90%: Reduction in time spent processing Certificates of Insurance
50% YoY: Increase in the agency's tracked efficiency ratio in March
Company Overview:
Company: Houchens Insurance Group
Key Stakeholder: Scott Robinson, CFO and Supervisor of Accounting & IT
Specialization: Business, Employee Benefits, Personal, and Select coverages
About
Houchens Insurance Group (HIG) is an independent insurance agency offering comprehensive insurance solutions across the country. With a sustained reputation of being a “Best Place to Work,” HIG has also been recognized as a best practices agency.
Driven by leadership with a robust experience in insurance, information technology and manufacturing, HIG holds a strong ethos of continuous improvement. As Scott Robinson, CFO, puts it: “When I wake up I want to improve. I want our processes to improve.”
Challenge
HIG’s commitment to continuous improvement sets it apart, but it also puts them at the forefront of new technology adoption. Their forward-thinking approach typically pays off, but some technologies have fallen short of expectations.
As the saying goes “What gets measured gets improved.” At HIG, efficiency is a critical metric. For example: the insurance industry relies heavily on humans reading and analyzing hundreds of pages of complex documents over and over. This is a task that human beings are simply not built to do efficiently, and it tends to detract from even the best employee experience.
Another key metric for any agency is errors. Before Outmarket, HIG relied on a third-party service for policy comparison, and they were pacing at a 40% error rate.
The challenge of continuous improvement requires a careful balance of enhancing quality while driving efficiency. How can the agency radically reduce hours spent or manual processes without increasing errors? Or to take it up a notch: how can they increase efficiency and reduce errors simultaneously?
Additionally, structuring complex excess coverage "towers" was extremely difficult, as any break between stacked coverages causes issues. Manual workflows like comparing competing policies, identifying coverage gaps, and issuing Certificates of Insurance were painfully time-consuming. To scale effectively without sacrificing quality, the agency needed a better approach.
The Solution
Houchens initiated a multi-department rollout of Outmarket AI, equipping their marketing, customer service, and accounting teams with the technology to streamline processes. The platform’s ability to "chat" with dense insurance documents and generate actionable insights proved invaluable.
Scott’s top-utilized Outmarket workflows include:
Tower Analysis: Outmarket identifies issues across multiple towers to ensure they stack properly. "Tower analysis has been financially probably my biggest push," Scott noted.
Policy Comparison & Proposal Generation: Houchens uses the tool to quickly identify holes in competing policies, then asks the AI to draft client-facing emails explaining why their policy is superior.
Certificate of Insurance (COI) Verification: Staff upload a sample COI along with the policy, asking Outmarket to instantly verify if the requested verbiage agrees with the underlying policy.
The Process
Houchens didn’t just adopt the software; they embedded it deeply into their operations — from leadership to production, and marketing to customer service. For example, when an employee receives a rapid-fire question from a client, they can simply upload the policy into Outmarket, ask the question, and get the answer. From there, they can generate an explanatory email and deliver a comprehensive response to the customer in 10 to 15 minutes. Previously, it would take that long just to find the right section in the policy manual.
Houchens actively provides input to the Outmarket team on their product roadmap. Houchens leadership has developed a new perspective on how they structure work in their business because of Outmarket. Now, they regularly see opportunities to rethink their approach through technology and continuous process improvement.
The Outcomes
The adoption of Outmarket across Houchens Insurance Group has delivered profound results across operations, financial savings, and employee satisfaction:
Massive Reduction in Errors: The agency’s error rate on policy comparisons dropped from 40% down to 17-20%. Many of the remaining errors are immaterial, such as a misplaced period.
Scaling Without Adding Headcount: The efficiencies gained have allowed Houchens to avoid having to replace retiring or departing staff in their customer service and marketing departments. Overall, the agency tracked a 50% year-over-year increase in their efficiency ratio in March.
Winning Back Business: In one instance, Houchens lost a bid to a cheaper competitor. Using Outmarket, a marketer analyzed the winning policy, found critical coverage holes, and had the AI draft a targeted email for the sales team—completing a multi-day task in a matter of hours. The client switched to Houchens two weeks later. In total, Scott knows of at least three to five situations where information from Outmarket directly won them a new customer.
Rapid Task Execution: One employee successfully processed 61 Certificates of Insurance in just 3 hours. She estimated that the manual workflow would have previously taken her four to four-and-a-half days.
Faster Onboarding & Happier Staff: New hires are learning faster by directly "chatting" with policies in Outmarket instead of hesitating to ask their supervisors questions. Employees have personally reached out to Scott to share that they feel less stressed, happier, and capable of delivering a better quality product, particularly in customer service. Scott noted: “If a person is happier in their job, they feel like they're doing better in their job, they're just overall not as stressed in their job, I have to believe they're handling the customer better."
In Their Own Words
"Our error rate is improved and our efficiency has improved so much that we have not had to replace individuals that have left the company.”— Scott Robinson | CFO, Houchens Insurance Group
1. On Solving the Core Problem of Manual Work
"In insurance, employees are reading through hundreds of pages of paper and different documents over and over in a day. Humans are not built for that. So Outmarket gave us the ability to take that valuable task, make it more efficient, and give us better quality in that aspect."
2. On Scaling and ROI
"Our error rate is improved and our efficiency is improved so much that we have not had to replace individuals that have left the company."
3. On Employee Satisfaction and Retention
"I've received multiple calls, multiple emails from customer service, our employees, thanking me, saying our job is a lot easier. I'm happier. I feel like I'm doing better, I feel like I'm delivering a better quality product."
4. On Winning New Business
"It allowed it to happen within a matter of hours. If you've done that, compare it, analyze the cases, then write an email and present it as a salesperson. It had taken days before and was likely too far along to complete, but this time it happened in just hours." (Context: Using Outmarket to analyze a competitor's winning bid, find holes, and win the client back).
5. On Fostering a Culture of Innovation
"The answer cannot be 'because we've always done it this way.' That is not an answer. So we have to always question. How do we do this? How do we do it better? Is this the right thing to do? And Outmarket discussions have helped us look at things a little bit differently in different aspects."
1. The "Time-to-Value" Call-Out
"She said it'd probably take her four, four and a half days. It took her three hours to complete the 61 certificates of insurance using OutMarket."
2. The "Direct Revenue" Call-Out
"I know of at least three to five situations that the information produced from Outmarket has won us a customer."
3. The "Quality Control" Call-Out
"We were using a third party and the errors have gone from 40% to around 17 to 20 percent now..."
