As cyber liability continues to heat up with competition, independent insurance agents need to make sure they’re keeping pace. Barring a few obvious exceptions, prices are headed south—and that means now is the time for independent agents to get into the game.

“Most agents really do need to offer the coverage to every single client, because almost every single client has exposure,” says Alex Wayne, executive vice president at A.J. Wayne & Associates, Inc. “Even if you’re business-to-business and you don’t necessarily have any personally identifiable information, you still have personally identifiable information of your employees.”

Consciousness about the importance of the coverage has certainly been growing. “Two or three years ago, we were still kind of pushing hard on the coverage—trying to explain it to agents and educate them to try to get them to go sell it to their clients,” says Brian Thornton, president of ProWriters. “Now it seems to be the reverse flow—either the agents are asking for it or the clients are asking for it. We have some agents that want to quote it on every risk they’ve got.”

As awareness continues to expand, competition follows suit—breeding opportunity in the process. With the exception of large, highly exposed risks like large retail companies with massive amounts of credit cards, “the good news for the agents—and the insureds, for that matter—is the coverage is affordable, and it can be obtained pretty easily in the market right now,” Thornton explains.

It’s not just pricing that’s becoming more favorable. The process for obtaining cyber coverage has become less painful, as well. Thornton says in the past, markets asked 50-100 questions on an application—even on small accounts.

“It was a lot of really in-depth IT information for a very small risk,” Thornton explains. “Now, a lot of markets have figured out their underwriting model and their appetite, and they can really whittle it down to very few questions—making it much easier for the insureds and the agents to actually obtain the coverage.”

Wayne agrees, noting that agents have more cyber knowledge at their fingertips than ever before. “The No. 1 thing agents need to do is educate themselves,” Wayne says. “It’s easy to get quotes. We can offer an indication based upon a very limited amount of information like name, address and revenue.”

But as the market continues to evolve, it might no longer be necessary for independent agents to call themselves cyber experts. “It really seems to be working through the wholesale channel and MGAs,” Thornton says. “They’ve got the time and ability to sit down and not only help sell the coverage with the agent, but also continually educate them on what’s going on.”

Perhaps the most important form of self-education will be keeping a close eye on state and federal regulation of data security. “When you take a look at the Target breach, all of this has really started creating a lot of turmoil,” says John Immordino, vice president of professional liability and brokerage at Arlington Roe.

Immordino notes in particular an executive order issued by President Obama last year that focused on developing best practices for cyber security. Released on Feb. 14, the order has sparked additional action from Congress, which has introduced bills that would require companies and organizations to implement safeguards—or face penalty fines and other consequences.

Regardless of what happens in the coming months and years, Immordino says agents won’t be able to sell cyber without keeping a finger on the regulatory pulse. “If you’re going to play in this area and you’re going to be out there discussing it with your clients, you need to stay current with the regulatory climate,” he says.

Jacquelyn Connelly is IA senior editor.