Ellen Carney

Principal Analyst Serving eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

Read Ellen's blog posts

Ellen is a principal analyst serving insurance eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals. Her research focuses on the eBusiness strategies, technologies, adoption trends, and best practices of property and casualty, life, group, and health insurers globally. Ellen works with insurance clients to understand how market forces are changing how consumers, groups, and distributors engage with insurance carriers and the role that technology plays in maximizing new opportunities.

Ellen most recently served the technology sales enablement role, writing research and providing advisory on how technology vendors sell and market their solution value to industry buyers, with a particular focus on the insurance, banking, and securities industries.

Previous Work Experience

Ellen brings nearly 20 years of experience in delivering technical and professional services to clients in a variety of industries and markets. She joined Forrester from ThruPoint, a New York-based professional services firm, where she was a principal consultant focusing on IT service business strategy to Global 100 clients in securities, banking, and insurance; telecommunications; and media and entertainment. Before joining ThruPoint, Ellen was a director and principal analyst for Gartner, following the infrastructure services market, including consulting, support, and managed services. Prior to her Gartner experience, Ellen spent seven years in a variety of sales enablement and support roles at the former Cabletron Systems, including strategic bid and proposal management; inclusion on approved vendor lists for corporate and global accounts; and master sales and GSA contract management.

Ellen has presented on vertical industry and role-based marketing in a variety of Forrester and client events. She has been cited in a number of publications, including Forbes, Fast Company, The Wall Street Journal, Best's Review, Insurance & Technology, and American Banker.

Education

Ellen received a B.S. in economics from Southern New Hampshire University.

Print Bio

Ellen Carney

Principal Analyst Serving eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

Read Ellen's blog posts

Previous Work Experience

Education

Ellen received a B.S. in economics from Southern New Hampshire University.

Research Coverage

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Ellen Carney's Research

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For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

REPORT: The Forrester Life Insurance Wave™: US Sales Websites, Q2 2018

US Life Insurers Disappoint With Weak Digital Guidance

April 18, 2018Ellen Carney, Jennifer Wise

Digital touchpoints are supplementing and sometimes displacing traditional sales touchpoints like advisors as customers research and then buy life insurance. To see how helpful they are to customers, we evaluated the websites of seven US life insurance companies. This report lays out where these companies excel — and where they lag — as well as what digital business strategy and customer experience executives can learn from them.
For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

REPORT: The Forrester Life Insurance Wave™: Canadian Sales Websites, Q2 2018

Life Insurance Websites Reflect Sales Models — Not Customer Goals

April 10, 2018Ellen Carney, Jennifer Wise

Digital touchpoints are supplementing and sometimes displacing traditional sales touchpoints like advisors as customers traverse online and offline paths in their life insurance purchase journeys. To see how helpful and easy to use digital sales features are to customers, we evaluated the websites of seven leading Canadian life insurers. This report lays out where these companies excel — and where they lag — and what digital business strategy and customer experience executives can learn from them.
For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

REPORT: Accelerate Your Digital Insurance Strategy With Six Emerging Technology Building Blocks

Tools And Technology: The Digital Insurance Strategy Playbook

January 5, 2018Ellen Carney

Digital technology is transforming insurance. Hundreds of disruptive early-stage insurers and insurtech startups are roiling up the status quo, powered by emerging and sometimes overhyped technology. Digital is now the essence of how customers engage and how carriers and agents operate, so insurance digital business teams must execute digital transformation now while scaling new innovations even faster. This report is Forrester's view of six emerging and interconnected technologies and what they mean for digital insurance strategy professionals.
For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

REPORT: Steer Your Customers' Insurance Journeys With Benchmarks

Benchmarks: The Digital Insurance Strategy Playbook

November 30, 2017Ellen Carney

Digital touchpoints must constantly evolve to reflect how consumers and small businesses research, buy, and use insurance. Digital insurance strategy leaders are under pressure to deploy digital services that delight their customers and foster loyalty. This report, which forms part of our digital insurance strategy playbook, details how digital insurance teams can apply Forrester's functionality benchmark methodology to assess how well their firms' digital touchpoints help the business win, serve, and retain customers. This is an update of a previously published report; Forresterreviews and updates it periodically for continued relevance and accuracy.
For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

REPORT: Best Practices In Life Insurance Digital Sales

Life Insurers Need To Digitize Their Sales Processes

November 27, 2017Ellen Carney, August Du Pont

This report looks at how digital business strategy teams at life insurance companies can drive insurance sales and improve the customer experience. The leaders are not just making it simple, fast, and easy to open a policy but are helping prospects with their broader insurance needs. To compete, digital strategy executives need to provide a compelling digital experience underpinned by fast, digitized processes and cater to the broader needs of insurance buyers.

For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

REPORT: The Future Of Insurance Is Mobile

February 2, 2015Ellen Carney

Smart, portable devices in pockets, purses, and now wrists are opening up a series of opportunities and challenges for insurance eBusiness. The unrelenting pace of innovation means that mobile insurance strategies must be dynamic and fluid to stay relevant. This report lays out Forrester's vision of how digital insurance teams can capitalize on the opportunities being created by mobile devices. This is an update of a report originally published on September 28, 2012; Forrester reviews and updates it periodically for continued relevance and accuracy, and we substantially revised this edition to factor in new ideas.
For B2B Marketing Professionals

REPORT: Industry Essential: The US Insurance Market

August 10, 2007Ellen Carney, Marc Cecere

The US insurance industry is the fifth largest industry sector in the country. The industry generated almost $1.4 trillion in revenues in 2002, yet, on average, it earns less than a penny for every premium dollar received. Insurance is regulated at the federal and state level, and the need to comply with 51 regulatory bodies drives a number of IT solution considerations. What do you need to know when selling technology goods and services into the US insurance market? This market overview describes the structure of the US insurance industry, its business and technology trends, industry leaders, strategic technology suppliers, and technology investment forecasts. It addresses the property and casualty, life and annuities, and reinsurance segments. Health insurance will be treated in a separate document.
For B2B Marketing Professionals

REPORT: Industry Essential: The US Retail Banking Market

May 19, 2008Ellen Carney

At the end of 2007, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)-insured banks in the US held nearly $6.9 trillion in deposits, supported more than 73,000 branches, and employed 1.8 million people. With changing demographics, increasing choices for consumer financial services, and pressures to reduce costs, retail banks are looking to improve the efficiency and productivity of their assets and create enduring relationships with customers. Even in a challenging economic climate, the banking industry is more dependent on information technology than ever before. How should vendors position their technology to buyers and influencers in the US retail banking market? Forrester's Industry Essential report explains the structure of the US retail banking industry, its business and technology trends, and technology investment forecasts.?
For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

REPORT: The Mobile Insurance Metrics That Matter

October 6, 2015Ellen Carney

Mobile is now serious business for digital insurance teams, and it's rare to find an insurer that doesn't offer at least one mobile service to help customers research, buy, and service their insurance needs. For mobile strategies to pay off, insurance eBusiness professionals need to provide management with the insights and metrics that will justify current mobile investments and validate future ones. This report outlines the need for metrics to drive the actions required to ensure the success of a mobile insurance strategy. This is an update of a previously published report; Forrester reviews and updates it periodically for continued relevance and accuracy.
For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

REPORT: Trends 2013: North American Insurance eBusiness And Channel Strategy

Disruption Drives 12 Trends In Digital Insurance Agendas

May 16, 2013Ellen Carney

There's one word that sums up what's going on in the business of insurance right now: disruption. There are four drivers behind the state that the industry is in, all of which have implications across the industry: an improving economy driven by a turn in the housing market; activist consumers willing to both join forces with their insurers and regulate them through social media; converging physical and digital worlds that engage consumers through smart portable devices; and two maturing US regulatory reforms—access to healthcare and medical marijuana. Whether you think of the notion of disruption as provoking commotion, trouble, or tumultuous uproar, others, including new entrants, are embracing these as moments of opportunity in 2013.