When Google entered the insurance market late last week, the company told carriers that “Google Compare for car insurance provides a seamless, intuitive experience for connecting with your customers online…They can then buy their policy online or over the phone through one of your agents.”

How? Enter Bolt Solutions, Inc.

Partnering with an initial select set of insurance carriers, Bolt is working with Google to enable carriers to leverage Google to “effectively and efficiently reach consumers in the midst of their buying decisions” in its current California test market. Bolt is providing a streamlined “on ramp” for carriers to participate in the new site, filling gaps in licensed agents and technology for carriers that don’t have those capabilities already in-house.

Bolt Solutions (formerly SeaPass Solutions) launched the Bolt Agency about five years ago as an online independent agency where small businesses could choose and buy insurance online. In the process, the company refined its sales and servicing platform—an end-to-end environment, from quote to issue to service—that it now provides to other insurance industry partners, including companies such as American Express OPEN for small business and Google Compare’s participating carriers. The platform includes the technology, people, processes and markets necessary to support multi-channel, multi-carrier choice solutions.

IA talked with Bolt Solutions CEO Eric Gewirtzman about Bolt’s evolution, Google’s insurance industry launch and what it all means for independent agencies.

IA: Can you tell us about evolution of Bolt as a company, from being an online independent agency to offering an insurance online platform to companies like American Express and Google?

Gewirtzman: Bolt started out as a tech company, and we still are at heart—with a platform that allows carriers to profit from the disruption that’s going on in the industry. That’s our roots. Through this process we created an online agency leveraging our technology know-how.

With the know-how we built internally both on the software side and the distribution side, we started offering [the platform] to other players in the marketplace so they can leverage it and basically enjoy the expertise we’ve acquired.

Bolt offers personal and commercial insurance coverage directly through its own agency website. So you’re more concerned with refining and continually updating the platform than losing sales to the companies you’re sharing your platform with?

Yes. The marketplace is huge. Google is creating a very interesting expansion of what has been available to consumers to date. From our perspective, what the Bolt platform is able to do is create an easy “on ramp” for carriers to participate in Google Compare. It’s leveraging both what we’ve learned and built and the tool set to make carriers’ participation really easy. We give them an enhanced ability to control their participation, analyze their flow and handle the accounting piece around that channel.

Is a requirement that carriers participating with Google use the Bolt platform?

It’s not a requirement. Carriers can go to Google directly or carriers can come to us and get both our experience and some of the tools that we’re offering to carriers to participate.

Can you comment on the carriers that you’re working with?

No—you would have to talk to Google.

What makes Google’s insurance site different from what is already out there?

As we all know, Google has an immense amount of consumers that visit their site. They’re a source of a lot of people doing research on insurance and a starting place for a lot of people that want to buy insurance. And I think it’s not just about comparative rating—it’s about making it easy for the consumer to access and gain access to the carriers and the products. Google enhances the ability for carriers to access customers that they didn’t have access to beforehand. We’re happy to be part of that and help carriers get to those customers.

It was widely reported prior to the launch that Google would be entering insurance in the auto market as a first step. But knowing your company’s legacy and experience in commercial lines, Google now has a partner in place that knows the commercial lines space and could facilitate carriers participating. Would entering commercial lines be the logical next step for Google?

I’d have to refer that question to Google. I can’t elaborate on their specific roadmap. The key concept of our platform is that the carriers have the option and they have control over which channels they participate in based on their appetite. And they can do so in a dynamic way.

Google said it “will be introducing as local agent support for providers with agent networks.” Is there functionality in your platform to make that connection?

Both entities [Google and Bolt] are thinking about it, as Google mentioned. I can’t elaborate further than what they mentioned [in their post]. But from a Bolt platform perspective, with regards to having local agents benefit from this, we’re looking at that and how we can help. We are an agency with a large contingency of agents [both captive and independent] that subscribe to our platform through our Superior Access subsidiary.

I view Google Compare as a very compelling channel, and it’s shining a light on a need that has been out there for a while. Google has the capacity to take this forward and provide a good customer experience, which is key, but agents are a pretty significant channel today. And I still think they will be.

Let’s put it this way: I’ve read a lot of publications that say Google entering the market means the demise of the agent. I don’t think that’s the case. I personally think the agent channel is extremely valuable. I do think Google is additional channel and agents need to be aware of what is going on. And carriers need to be aware of that is going on—this is coming and they have to make sure they have the tools they need to be ready for the new market. There is a lot of change in a lot of areas, and insurance has been one of the laggards. But now it’s coming—and very quickly.

Typically the industry has considered its distribution channels as direct, captive agent and independent agent, each using online in different ways to support their own efforts. Do you feel Google is creating a fourth channel by entering the market?

I don’t know. The jury is still out on that. What is clear is that the consumer is dictating how they want to buy. Google’s foray into the space is their reaction to what’s happening. We realized that early on when we created the Bolt agency. And part of the development of our platform is helping carriers to embrace this change. How do carriers operate in this new world in the most efficient, consumer-facing fashion? 

The big change is really how the consumers are demanding that they want to interact with their insurance provider. And it’s an omni-channel world. You have people in a single transaction moving from one channel to another. When consumers are in the information-gathering phase, it’s not always clear what channel they will actually use to buy.

So I don’t think it’s a fourth channel—it’s an enhancement of what is already out there. And a big enhancement at that.

As a Google partner, what will you be looking for in the California test market? What do you expect to learn?

Yes, it’s a test, but we very firmly believe regardless of the result of the test, the market is changing.

In terms of expanding into various states, Google is leading that charge. We’re in all 50 states, but our primary business is in 48 states. Google has its infrastructure in place nationwide and we’re set for all 50 states. We view California as a big and important test state—and it’s also a tech-savvy state. So it will be interesting to see how the market reacts to Google coming in.

Katie Butler is IA editor in chief.