CUSTOMER STORIES
How we built the online platform for one of Ireland's leading insurance companies
SERVICES
AWS, Serverless, UI/UX
Sam McIlroy
Lead Product Manager
Prestige Holdings is one of Ireland's largest insurance companies. They provide a home to some of the island's best-known insurance brands and have built an exceptional reputation based on superior customer service and approachability.
In 2021, Prestige hired Instil to develop a new digital brand, Stroll - an online car insurance platform that would complement their brokerage business. Our task was to design and develop a completely new online experience from the ground up in under 12 months.
Background
As a traditional brokerage, Prestige services a demographic that largely prefers to interact with real people over the phone rather than online. But with consumers increasingly trending towards digital, the long-term direction of the company was clear - they needed a digital offering.
We were hired to develop their new platform. Entering an already saturated market, our goal was to create an experience that rivalled the very best in the industry. Therefore, every part of the user's journey had to be a delight, from quote to renewal. Furthermore, we had to drive back-office efficiencies that would further benefit the customer experience.
Approach
When starting any new project, it's always important to reflect on your processes. They need to fit the context and challenge ahead. In this case, Prestige knew their domain intimately but didn't know anything about software development.
We therefore had to create an approach that pulled the customer into our world but without overwhelming them (as traditional software processes can often do). Here's how we went about it:
Built a cloud-native serverless architecture that allowed the team to focus more on delivering business value quickly than invisible infrastructure.
Adopted a dual-track product development approach tailored for a client new to software development and designed to minimise churn and accelerate delivery.
Developed a design system that ensured consistency throughout the buyer's journey, from the initial landing page to renewal, across web and mobile.
Impact
The first version of Stroll was delivered to the market in just 12 months. In that time, we developed a highly scalable online portal to guide users through the quote and purchase journey, a cross-platform mobile application that helps users manage their policies and claims, and a backend serverless platform that integrates with legacy insurance technology to ensure a smooth user experience.
All of this and more with a team of only 10 people using the very latest in modern cloud services, enabling us to:
Help the client meet their business goals and get to market quickly by working smartly with a client new to the world of software development, and focusing more on delivering business value rather than infrastructure.
Reduce the long-term operational costs of the platform by letting AWS do the heavy lifting, paying only for what we consume and reducing operational overheads.
Stroll Insurance is now a successful digital insurance brand in N. Ireland, competing well with many of the big players on the market. Their lead product manager, Sam McIloy, had this to say about the engagement with Instil:
Instil has consistently helped us achieve business goals by paying attention to our needs and requirements... Overall I am very happy with Instil's services, and I highly recommend them to anyone looking a reliable and experienced software partner who won't shy away from stepping up to a challenge.
Sam McIlroy (Lead Product Manager, Prestige Insurance)