A bold move to another industry
On 24 April 2024, Swisscom announced that in addition to its core business, it would also be offering various insurance products. Customers can turn to Swisscom as a one-stop shop for communications, IT and entertainment – as well as liability, household, care, legal, cyber security and rental insurance.
Swisscom and insurance? Where do you start if you want to launch an offer that goes beyond your company’s industry? Answer: with the market and the customer. Swisscom’s moonshot team had already learned a lot about the market and, based on initial simple calculations, it quickly became clear that the market held potential for further innovative insurance offers. This raised the question of what these offers required in order for them to be attractive to customers. Understanding that insurance wasn’t a source of joy for most customers, Swisscom sought to introduce a new way of interacting with an insurance provider and selecting coverage.
The idea was presented as a “moonshot” – something that was so big it seemed impossible to make a reality. But with the right support, the idea gained traction and become tangible. When Creaholic joined Swisscom’s project, the extremely ambitious moonshot had received the green light for a first phase, but it wasn’t until initial workshops in our Invention Ramp that the first ideas were transformed into prototypes. From February to October 2023, our Dream Team supported Swisscom with workshops, smoke tests, prototyping, journey mapping and customer interviews. We weren’t just along for the ride; we helped steer the ship.
Exploring new pathways
Exploring customer needs to better understand the market; mapping current and target customer journeys
Through various interviews with potential customers, we gained a better understanding of how they deal with insurance today and what their needs are. Together with the moonshot team, we analysed the customer journeys of other insurance products. This insight was presented to all stakeholders of Swisscom’s moonshot project. As a next step, we identified the potential areas for improvement of every step. On top of this, we looked outside the box and drew inspiration from offers in other countries and other sectors.
Setting a trajectory with ideation sessions
Starting fresh with new ideas; feasibility set aside for now
To put this forward-thinking project on the right course and build on the knowledge acquired during the “exploration” phase, the entire team met in Biel for a two-day focus workshop at Creaholic HQ. During this workshop, new ideas were generated and big visions were dreamt up. The feasibility of the ideas was deliberately ignored in this initial phase. Over the two days, the first concrete mock-ups of the insurance offerings were created and constructive discussions took place. According to Alexander Mohri, Head of InsureTech at Swisscom, this is where “the magic happened”.
After the workshop, the Creaholic Dream Team elaborated on ideas before making them more concrete. The ideas were then immediately tested with customers and adjustments to the offers were made where necessary. Customer tests were carried out every three weeks throughout the project. This made it possible for ideas to be iterated and improved on an on-going basis.
Our approach was always hypothesis-driven. Ideas were based on various assumptions, which we validated or rejected with specific tests.
Course correcting with customer interviews
On-going iterations of ideas through based on feedback from potential customers
Once prototypes of Swisscom’s insurance offering had been created, Creaholic helped Swisscom get to the heart of customers’ opinions, pain points and wishes. Using interviews as tools to explore the customer perspective led to clearer understanding of customer needs, improvements of the value proposition and faster iterations of prototype improvements.
Smoke tests in Chur
When it comes to customer tests, it’s important to always be aware of the “saying vs. doing gap”: just because a customer says they will do something, doesn’t mean they actually will. To navigate this, we conducted smoke tests. In the context of product development, a smoke test is an evaluation in a real-world setting to assess if there are critical issues or if it requires more development to improve. We were faced with the question of which sales channels were suitable for selling the new insurance product range.
The hypothesis we were testing was that certain additional insurance products could be sold at Swisscom shops. The team at the Swisscom shop in Chur took on this challenge and for over a week, the sales associates “sold” insurance solutions that did not yet actually exist. The conversion rate was measured and qualitative feedback from customers was analysed. As soon as customers wanted more information or wanted to take out a policy, the test was stopped and the experiment was explained. Someone from the project team was always on site to support the shop team.
Contrary to some concerns held by the team members at the beginning of the smoke test, customers and shop employees reacted positively to the new product offerings. So much was learned under these real conditions. Swisscom and the Creaholic Dream Team used the results of the smoke test to determine what parts of the offering needed to be iterated before moving on to the next phase.
Mapping & creating customer journeys
Assessing intersections of various customer experience touchpoints by creating a journey atlas
As the offer became more concrete, a more important question arose: how would Swisscom integrate this completely new product range into its existing system and processes? With the help of a target journey atlas, the various user journeys across products and channels were mapped step by step and interdependencies on what already existed were identified. By working together with other partners, an MVP of the booking process and back-end systems was built in record time, proving that the technical implementation of the most important functions was possible.
The team led by Alexander was never satisfied with just the most necessary functions. They were already thinking ahead… what would come next? How could the offering be improved? It was clear to everyone that AI would play an important role. To further explore these possibilities, we met with some of the leaders in this field. In a joint two-day workshop with Google, we thought far, far ahead and considered a number of revolutionary ideas. These ideas were made more tangible with the help of mock-ups and more concrete prototypes.
Moonshot landing: Mission accomplished
On 24 April 2024, Swisscom’s ambitious moonshot, Swisscom sure, landed! The highly customer-centric offer went live throughout Switzerland after just over a year of intensive work. As the idea became a reality, the team grew and a completely new business unit was established. The new faces brought new ideas and fresh inspiration, strengthening the “one-team spirit” that Alex had established when the team was made up of only a few people.
This project proves that investment in innovation is as necessary for growth as taking calculated risks. With quick iterations, contact with customers, outside perspectives and real-world simulations, Creaholic helped Swisscom fast-track a moonshot idea.
Interview with Alexander Mohri & Tiziano Sabbioni
Want to make cross-industry innovation happen?
Do you have a seemingly impossible project on the horizon? Or do you need some fuel to imagine your company’s moonshot? We’d love to hear about your ambitions and support you in refreshing your approach to innovation.
