Quick story: On Saturday morning, as a favor to a dear friend, I took pictures of a junior high soccer game up in Cleveland. The plan was to then meet my freshman-in-college daughter at the house and immediately head to southern Ohio to shoot/watch my sophomore-in-college playing soccer. I know, it’s a lot to bite off, but these days are short. As I drove in the drive way, my daughter excitedly waves a greeting, then goes to get her stuff out of the car. Her carefree smile turns to a look of frustration as she realizes she has locked the keys in the car – no windows open, no hope.

No problem. I keep an extra key to my cars on my dresser. Not there. Dang. Call AAA. For some reason, they are not showing my annual payment – sorry, gotta pay before you can play. But I paid it – got the history right here on my bill-pay history online. I’m sorry, sir…. I finally get that straightened out 45 minutes and several call-transfers-repeat-the-situation-to multiple-people-while-I’m-on-a-deadline-good-grief!!!

Then I notice outside there goes my daughter to the car with an old left-over piece of floor-board molding from the basement and my heavy-duty, L-shaped nail-puller. She proceeds to wedge open the top of the driver car door where it meets the roof and the rear-door, and stick the piece of wood through the opening down to the auto-lock. Minutes later we’re on our way, calling AAA to cancel the service call.

“How’d you know what to do?” I asked. “I googled ‘breaking into a locked car’. There were several YouTube video’s showing how to do it,” she answered with a big smile.

So what does this have to do with insurance technology? I think it reinforces the point that the Web is where it’s at. To reach younger generations with insurance messaging, perhaps the best place to find them is online. Perhaps Esurance/Geico/Progressive should sponsor a site that’s all about user-generated content about cars – locking your keys in there, wet spots on your garage floor, noises from the back tire, how to avoid common rip-off’s at the car-repair chains, simple stuff which Joe the Plumber and Jane the single-mom can use to save money, save time, save frustration. And oh, by the way, Get-A-Quote and save money on your insurance, too.

A story to stimulate some thought – and reinforce other thoughts. I’ve been saying it for a while now. If you’re and insurer and you don’t have an aggressive Web strategy, I can almost guarantee you will be one of the ones that are left standing when the music stops… Call me – happy to help.