Finding Peak w/ Ryan Hanley - Nick Ayers on What it Takes to be a World-Class Marketer

Episode Date: May 19, 2022

Spartan philosophy, built in the black-ops lab of business: https://www.findingpeak.comFinding Peak podcast: https://linktr.ee/ryan_hanleyIn this episode of The Ryan Hanley Show, Nick Ayers, Chief Mar...keting Officer at Better Agency, joins the podcast to talk about insurance marketing, building technology, and putting on rockstar conferences. There's always a tremendous conversation when Nick's on the show.Don't miss this episode.Episode Highlights:Nick shares some ideas to take into consideration before starting a company. (7:06)Nick mentions that the cornerstone of marketing is being able to understand how people feel and being able to articulate the voices already in their heads. (12:36)Nick explains that a lot of companies will soon realize that they need to hire real marketing motions in their company. (19:38)Nick shares that their strategy has been to always commit to being genuine to their brand. (25:12)Nick talks about how the industry has changed and in some ways relaxed in the last few years. (31:05)Nick shares their journey to making their first acquisition and the questions they were asked by most people. (42:10)Nick explains that he believes that independent agents are the best channel for insurance distribution. (45:10)Nick and Ryan discuss the best insurance events. (48:37)Nick explains that they learned lessons from these past conferences which they will apply in their future conferences. (54:06)Key Quotes:"We're going to continue to be who we are, and that's a major part of our overall brand, and that we're going to try to be relentless truth-tellers." - Nick Ayers"We believe that independent agents are the best channel for insurance distribution. There isn't anything stronger or better than when companies work directly with independent agents." - Nick Ayers“If we want to compete with everybody else in the AMS or the CRM, we're going to constantly be playing that comparison game. We want to do something that nobody's done before." - Nick AyersResources Mentioned:Nick Ayers LinkedInBetter AgencyReach out to Ryan Hanley--Recommended Tools for GrowthOpusClip: #1 AI video clipping and editing tool: https://link.ryanhanley.com/opusRiverside: HD Podcast & Video Software | Free Recording & Editing: https://link.ryanhanley.com/riversideWhisperFlow: Never waste time typing on your keyboard again: https://link.ryanhanley.com/whisperflowCaptionsApp: One app for all your social media video creation: https://link.ryanhanley.com/captionsappGoHighLevel: It's time to take your business workflow to the Next Level: https://link.ryanhanley.com/gohighlevelPerspective.co: The #1 funnel builder for lead generation: https://link.ryanhanley.com/perspective--Episodes You Might Enjoy:From $2 Million Loss to World-Class Entrepreneur: https://lnk.to/delkFrom One Man Shop to $200M in Revenue: https://lnk.to/tommymelloIs Psilocybin the Gateway to Self-Mastery? https://lnk.to/80upZ9This show is part of the Unplugged Studios Network — the infrastructure layer for serious creators. 👉 Learn more at https://unpluggedstudios.fm.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

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Starting point is 00:01:17 We have Nick Ayers on the podcast today, which means you know we're going to be talking some No, Nick is one of the best marketers, if not the best marketer in the independent insurance game. Absolutely love having him on the show because just the way he attacks our market, his methodology, his mindset is exactly where you need to be. I'm a huge fan of Nick, his work and what they're doing over at Better Agency. And we talked a little bit about their new conference, which they've had a conference, the better conference, but they're morphing it into something larger, hopefully something that provides meaning, beyond just maybe like CRM sales, but kind of expands into the entire ecosystem
Starting point is 00:01:56 of being an independent insurance agent. And the name of that conference is the agency success conference. We're going to see a lot coming out about that from Nick, from the team at Better, and just everyone involved with this agency success conference. And I couldn't be more excited to talk about that
Starting point is 00:02:13 and better and CRMs and marketing and mindset and all sorts of awesome stuff. Nick is a tremendous person to have on the guest and just a tremendous professional in our industry. So it was wonderful to have him on the show. Before we get to Nick, quick shout-outs to today's sponsor, and that is Tarmica.com, T-A-R-M-I-K-A-com. T-A-R-M-I-K-A-com.
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Starting point is 00:03:15 Yo. Dude. Congratulations. Thanks, man. Is this mean, are you going to be like a master agency or? No, we're a new division. Explain it to me like I'm three years old. So SIA does not have an offering today or they do now or didn't before for like individual producers who maybe weren't ready or didn't have the capability to launch a full blown agency or maybe didn't have a book or we're starting or we're brand new.
Starting point is 00:03:54 or coming from exclusive weren't ready for the IA channel. They didn't have a great offering or really any offering for them. So what Rogue is doing is a dual purpose of both giving them a digital brand and playground to kind of test out what a true kind of quote unquote digital agency looks like as well as giving producers that come to them who aren't ready for a full blown agency, essentially an incubator system to launch them into having their own agency. So they come work for you. They get trained.
Starting point is 00:04:25 They learn how to how to do this. It's something like an internship. Yes. And then they go launch their agency under SIA. Yes. National? Yep. Awesome, man.
Starting point is 00:04:36 Bro, I'm so fucking pumped. It's unbelievable. I, I, uh, so it's funny. Don't ever tell. No one can ever tell you that drunken world domination conversations in a bar don't go anywhere. So, so how,
Starting point is 00:04:53 So how this happened was Matt and I are both at SIA Arizona's event back in late September. I was there with you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You were there. Yeah, you're there. So I do my thing. You do, you know, or he does his thing. I go sit at the bar and have a beer and dinner.
Starting point is 00:05:11 You were there for a sec. And then, you know, you left. He comes over and sits down and we just start rapping about, you know, whatever, insurance industry stuff. And, you know, he starts talking about different things they have going on. and then he mentions, you know, they're thinking about this, this model. And I said, well, you know, now I got, I'm like four or five IPs deep in here. So I got liquid, you know, I got liquid lips at this point.
Starting point is 00:05:35 You know, I said, well, what if that thing already existed? And we just plugged it into SIA. And he goes, well, what do you mean? So I pitch him essentially this idea in sort. It's not exactly what it's going to be, but close. And, you know, I don't know, we go or separate ways. I mean, how many of those conversations? have, you know, you had in your life and they just, you know, it's a talk and nothing that happens.
Starting point is 00:05:58 Yeah, yeah. And then he emailed me like that next week. And I kind of forgot about it, to be honest, we just, you know, whatever. That week he emailed me and he said, hey, I've thought a lot about that conversation. I'd like to have that conversation in a more professional setting, which we then did. And, you know, it took six or seven months to kind of piece it all together. But, you know, it came down to math for me. And what I mean by that is not math in terms of like upside for me or whatever.
Starting point is 00:06:27 It came down to math to how long till I get to realize my vision for what I want Rogue to be. If I do this myself, continue to bootstrap, continue to take, you know, a small amount of funding from, you know, and five different individuals were investors in Rogue and I am incredibly grateful and we'll always be for them. But if I kept kind of taking these small chunks over my math on our projections was we're looking five to seven years. before we really start to realize this no ceiling insurance career dream. Like this program is where we've always been going, but for me to do it myself, it would take forever. And now I'm looking at five to seven months to have it up and running
Starting point is 00:07:08 the way that I want. And obviously, it would continue to tweak. Sure. And that math just. Resources help a lot, though. Oh, my gosh. And just their experience, their network, the, you know, we had a call with HR today with their HR team, right?
Starting point is 00:07:21 So now my person, my operations manager, we now have a full blown resource set and, you know, HR pro who we can talk to and, you know, it's just, you know, and plus they seem they're, they're really good people. I've known Matt for a long time. And, you know, he's making a lot of changes there, I think for the better. And it's just, it's fun to be part of something, have some resources behind you. And now it's like, we can go. I hate. feeling anchored down. I hate it. It kills my soul. It's the, it's the thing like, in somewhat similar fashion, when you, when you think about running the company, like, like in the tech space, you know, the thing is do you bootstrap or do you take money? Do you raise
Starting point is 00:08:07 money? Yeah. For us, it's like, we want to go fast and far. And if we try to do that on our own, bootstrap it, that's going to take forever. Like, we're going to be hot soft. Yes. And we don't want that. So it's take, you know, get it. And let's like, let's chuck the ball down fill as far as we, as many times as we can. Yeah, you know, I think there's a, there's something, and everybody's been very, everyone that I've told, and now the release is live, so it's public knowledge, but on the people I told everyone's been, been great.
Starting point is 00:08:33 Yeah. You know, but some people had some questions, and not to be, they weren't being jerks, they were just asking questions. They had some questions around like, well, how do you feel about, you know, you're not the head of the organization anymore? You know, I'm still, I still own a small part of Rogan,
Starting point is 00:08:47 I'm still the president and will continue to be and, and all that. A small piece of a bigger pie or a big piece of a small pie. Like, what's better? Dude, 100%. Like, that to me, to me, that question is, is not, and I don't think this is the way anyone asked it meant it to be, but essentially what they're saying is, is your ego going to be okay with this move?
Starting point is 00:09:08 And I think a lot of, I think a lot of technology companies, I think a lot of, a lot of agencies, a lot of small businesses in general, the owner's ego gets in the way. And I just, dude, I, this, this, this vision that I have for the, for a no ceiling insurance career, right? Like you, you, you're, it doesn't matter what the name on like that your last name is never going to keep you from from going as far as you want. And you may hit a certain point and say, I'm good. I love right where I'm at. I'm going to stay here. That's great too.
Starting point is 00:09:41 But if you want to own 10 locations someday and you're 22 years old, we legitimately have a process to get you there. And there's no obstacles other than. then you just need to perform. And if you can perform and do the work, then there is a, there is no obstacle to you having as big and bad agency as you want to have something. And that to me,
Starting point is 00:10:01 one, it's never been built in our industry before. And two, it feels like work worth doing. So that's great, man. That's awesome. Congratulations.
Starting point is 00:10:12 I'm assuming you had to pull out of the Indian stuff. Had to pull out of Indian. Yep. Love Indian. No, no, no disrespect to them, but, you know, had to, had to pull out of there. You know, there's a couple different things like that. You know, there's a couple things where, you know, there are, I can't just unilaterally
Starting point is 00:10:31 make large decisions anymore. You know what I mean? Like there needs to be a little bit of conversation. Small decisions, no big deal. But like, you know, larger stuff, you know, I can't just go, you know, my way is probably obvious to everyone who listen to this show for any period of time is to be slightly half-cocked at all times ready to fire. And, you know, I got to be a little more thoughtful, which is a good thing.
Starting point is 00:10:55 And I'm blessed in that somehow I have been able to surround myself with a really solid team, like the eight people that we have in Rogue today, more coming now that we have some resources. But the eight people that I have that are coming over from kind of the prior version of Rogue to this new version. Completely blessed by them. Like just awesome, awesome people.
Starting point is 00:11:23 And that has helped me get this done. I mean, dude, I mean, I mean, you know, for the last, literally for the last eight weeks, basically all of,
Starting point is 00:11:32 all of the second half of February, March, and half of April, all I did was acquisition stuff. And I was able to basically let the other seven members of our team do their thing. And they operated the agency and continued to grow it, continue to grow it. And I mean, I must have wrote them a message every day, just how I was like, thank you. Like the fact that I can think about this stuff over here and get this done and not have to
Starting point is 00:11:59 think about every little thing that you guys are doing or feel like I need to be part of it. It's, it's a blessing. It's an absolute blessing. It is, man. That's awesome. Congratulations again. It's really cool. Yeah. So, so dude, I wanted to just catch up. I mean, obviously I'm always interested in your thought process and, you know, we don't, we don't always agree on everything, but our conversations are always- What don't we agree on? I don't know. You, you know, that's probably not true. I think, well, I do think you're, I think you're crazy, but I do, but at the same time, I think it's probably good crazy, so- It's fun. It is fun. It is what I love, here's my favorite part of, like, your whole online schick, and I mean, schick in a positive way, is when you'll say something
Starting point is 00:12:40 and like it's so obvious that all you're trying to do is get a reaction out of people and people take it so seriously. I'll be like blah. And I'll be like, oh my God. Are we living through an idiot test? Like do these people not know that he's completely fucking with them? It is my absolute favorite. Like you feel like you're in on this little like inside joke even though it's my favorite too,
Starting point is 00:13:03 by the way. You're like, I'm just watching this like, like, oh my gosh. It's like sitting in a ping pong ball and a box full of mousetraps. It just is like, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Is this part going to make it in the podcast? Yeah, the whole thing's going to be in a fire. All right, so I'll leave names out of it.
Starting point is 00:13:21 So I'm in another town a couple weeks ago. We're throwing a party at an event that we're not invited to. We weren't allowed to go to. And I ran into somebody there who works for that company. They came to the event. And I said, I don't quite understand. I don't understand. This is where I get confused. I don't understand, I don't understand why this other company isn't doing anything back. They're not, they're not throwing any bars. Like, I would
Starting point is 00:13:51 totally welcome. Let's let's talk. Let's go. Yeah. And, and they go, they have no idea how to respond to you. Like they don't know. They go, they're pretty flustered and, and they just don't. And I didn't have the heart to tell this person. I said, look, that company's like worth many billions of dollars and we're not. Like, uh, the fact that they don't know how to respond is, A, it feels good, but yeah, it's, it's entertainment and it's, uh, it's just fun. But yeah, it's the people they can't see the, the obvious sometimes. Now, sometimes I'm not like, sometimes there's like 95% truth. What I'm saying. Like, sometimes I'm just like ranting and raving. Sometimes I'm like, no, this is like purely me trying to get you, get your. Those are the best one.
Starting point is 00:14:37 And you do such a good job of it too of like you'll mix in, you know, I don't know if you have like an actual cadence or whatever, but like it'll be like very legitimate, maybe provocative, maybe not, but very legitimate, very good. And then there'll be one that you'll mix in that like there's just enough like of reality and truth in it to like to like light somebody up. But at the same time, it'll be like, you know, the actual take will be like, I don't know if you really thought about it like off the wall. Like, what is wrong with you? Don't you wonder you know, you get these reactions. And I'm just like, God, I just love it. What I love it is the people that don't comment on that stuff. But then like I hear I hear the scuttle butt like people talking.
Starting point is 00:15:16 Someone will say someone so said this. And I'm like, yeah, they get really lathered up about it. Yeah. Yeah. I'm like, you know, the interesting part, going back to what you said about the larger company not knowing how to respond to your, we'll call them just to give it a term, kind of more guerrilla-ish tactics, right?
Starting point is 00:15:38 Like, it's not, I think today it's not necessary. That's probably doing, I don't want to do it this justice. It's probably, it's much more, what you're doing, the branding. Yeah, sophisticated. It's much more sophisticated than that. But to them, it probably feels that way, you know, versus like, you know, it's almost like the American Revolution, like, you're in the trees, like taking these strategic shots and they're like lined up in the middle of the-
Starting point is 00:16:00 I'm William Wallace over here. I'm the dude from the Patriot. I'm no one from the Patriot over here. Yeah. They may take our wives. They may lock down our data and steal all our money, but no. Yeah. No, part of it is, I might say it in a more brash or louder way, but you and I both know, I mean, it doesn't take much when you listen to agents and you just get a feel for the industry.
Starting point is 00:16:30 This is by and large how a lot of people, like they think like they know there's a problem. There's a problem. them. They don't quite know how to articulate it. Maybe they don't have the desire to, you know, go at it with like a sharp as a sword, as I might try to sometimes. But this is what they feel. And I can't, this is how by and large the industry feels. This goes back to a point that you and I had in a discussion a long time ago when we first launched the AMS side. We didn't want to call it an AMS. Did not want to call it an AMS because nobody likes an AMS. They'll hate it. And so we try to get cute with it. We tried to be a little more clever and not call it an AMS.
Starting point is 00:17:08 And it was actually you said, guys, if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it's a duck. Yeah. And we said, yeah. And every time we would have a conversation with somebody, they go like an AMS, and we'd say, oh, it's not like an AMS because in our minds we're thinking, you hate your AMS. So we don't want to be compared to the thing that you hate. But then you just start to embrace and say, okay, this is how you have to reframe it.
Starting point is 00:17:29 But it's how people feel. And that's the cornerstone of marketing. is understanding how people feel and being able to articulate the voices already going on inside the brain, what they're saying. And, you know, if it hurts, it hurts. I don't have to tell people. Yeah, I think that, well, one, back a little bit, part of the issue that that you run into, definitely that I do sometimes that others who really understand get and, and kind of live and breathe marketing stuff, right? Like and brand and it most people in our space are so bad at it. The bar is so low that when someone who like actually knows what they're doing or actually
Starting point is 00:18:18 researches and develops and does some sort of testing or whatever, like that puts that in the market, though, it's like people don't, it like breaks their brain. Right. They're like, wait a minute. This can't. And you're like, no, no, this is how every other industry markets against each other except there's a thousand companies doing this way, and they're all really smart. The difference is there's just not the case in our industry. Like the way everyone markets here, now I do think it's starting to change and it is, it is much better. I think, I think, you know, although I want to be very, very careful with what I'm about
Starting point is 00:18:50 to say, so please don't take this out of context. I do think the fact that there has been a little bit of like an influencer market developed, I think has helped get the word out. I think that is also, it also drives me nuts to a certain extent because I don't want to be included. I'm not, I don't want to be included in that space.
Starting point is 00:19:12 I just talk on a podcast to my friends and talk shit. That's what this is. But like, you know, the, I think that has helped because it's given people a vessel outside of the just email blast corporate newsletter marketing piece to understand what's happening in the space. So I do think that has helped. But what's surprised.
Starting point is 00:19:32 me and this is this is my question my next question for you is that seeing the success that you guys have had by focusing on brand by by leading with your message by by all the different veins of content that you've got culture veins you have sales veins you have marketing veins you have customer veins like very like like again coming back to gorilla was an unsophisticated way just kind of juxtapositioning against I know larger um it's surprising me that more people haven't copycatted you. They will. Yeah, but why haven't they already?
Starting point is 00:20:08 It's like crazy to me that one of these, and I'm not saying even the big ones, some of the middle companies, like look at what you guys are doing and go, hey, we need to hire like a real marketer who understands copy and bring them in. Like it surprises me there hasn't been more copycats. To your point, the fact that it hasn't happened yet
Starting point is 00:20:29 is somewhat surprising. but I do think it's something that's going to happen. I think companies are going to, and this is a biased position, but I feel like a lot of companies are going to see the importance of hiring true marketing motions in their company. We're a marketing-led organization. I talk to other companies and they're very sales-led. It's very much get salespeople in there to have them calling lists, have them doing that.
Starting point is 00:20:50 And that's we're not leading from that angle right now. We're leading from a very marketing-led directive of brand, messaging, copy, content, all of the above to try to generate inbound response. And that's how we think about it. So when I think about our marketing org chart, I think about who we're hiring for that and how we're bringing stuff in and our cadence for that and getting people even to the idea. I talk to companies and they go, we only spend maybe like $1,500 a month in paid advertising. And I go, we're trying to figure out how to spend $100 grand. That's a different mindset. It's just a way different mindset.
Starting point is 00:21:30 I do think there will be people who will start to come. And as I told our team, even in style, because I always have to sometimes, sometimes you have to talk people off the ledge a little bit in the organization. You have to give them the what for? You have to give them the heads up. Like, this is the strategy. To your point, there's, we think about this much more than just me rolling off the rails. There is strategy to this. But I have to tell them, look, right now and as we started, we're still by and large, we were a challenge.
Starting point is 00:21:59 we were a challenger brand and we got to punch up a weight class that's just part of it and i think that's a lesson for us for anybody in business like you got to figure out the the weight class that you can punch above and because if you're punching down that's no that's that's you're going to stay there or you're going to punch lateral it's you're going to stay there so there's going to come a point even where it's like a teeter totter effect where we're going to kind of level off in probably i don't want to say overall so like we're going to continue to be who we are and that's a major part of our of our overall brand and that we're going to try to be relentless truth tellers, according to our point of view, we're going to do those things.
Starting point is 00:22:34 Am I going to fill the necessity to make a boogeyman? And I don't know if that's the right word, but am I going to fill the necessity to go at somebody as hard as maybe we do today? Probably not. Like, that's going to evolve over time. And there'll be a little bit more nuanced to it. And as I tell people, I was at, you mentioned the SIA event in Arizona yesterday. I was actually there working our boo.
Starting point is 00:22:59 booth and I had a number of people come by the booth and they would they and I hear this in conversation quite a bit. Nick, you know, you're pretty abrasive sometimes and either they really like it or they don't know how to think about it or they don't like it at all. And that's, you get all that. And I tell people, you know, that's fine. You can, you have that opinion. And yes, that that is me. But I also say those who know me also know that I'm, I'm not shy from getting on a one hour conversation with you. And where I don't ever publicize or blast it and we talk about your, you know, we talk about stuff and trying to be helpful in that regard because I truly do believe in our industry. I truly do believe in our channel and the people in it and trying to help them improve and be
Starting point is 00:23:37 better. I can so you get all of that. What I do online, I'm very upfront with it. If I was to, you know, take the classic pro wrestling term K-fave, if I was to break K-fabe and let you in behind the curtain a little bit, a lot of it is for my own entertainment, but a lot of it is also for a very clear point of view that we believe that industry technology has been broken. It has broken the way that business in the insurance world from a vendor standpoint is broken. And not that we yet have all the answers, but we do think we're going in that direction.
Starting point is 00:24:09 And we want to take as many people along with us. And so, like, we're going to be very clear about that point of view and that perspective. Yeah, I think what I've always respected about your style is that is the like unapologetic nature by which you approach it. Not so much as like unapologetic, like I don't think you're ever meaningfully trying to offend someone to be hurtful. But not, maybe not an individual. Yeah, not an individual.
Starting point is 00:24:38 That's what I mean. Not an individual. But, but, you know, when you get, when people push back on you, you don't do the apology thing or the,
Starting point is 00:24:47 oh, it didn't mean to say it that way thing or whatever. It's just like, look, like this is, this is the way, this is what I thought. It's certainly what I thought at the time.
Starting point is 00:24:55 And, you know, I think that, I think that, breaks people a little bit. I think it, I think it really messes with people because what they're used to is, oh, hey, Nick, you offended me with that thing. Oh, I'm so sorry. Hey, I apologize. Timmy Jones was offended. I didn't mean to offend Timmy's the bat. You know, like, you know, that's what they're used to getting. And I think, I think the way, and this is kind of where,
Starting point is 00:25:21 what I'm interested in is I think that strategy works almost every time. over the long run. But in the, but in between and especially at the middle, there's a lot of ups and downs as people kind of get calibrated to, to the, to the style. And you have to have a level of internal perseverance, both as an individual and as an organization to kind of ride that wave. So I'm interested, like, have you had conversations ever where you're like, ah, maybe we pushed it too far? Oh, I don't know. Like, or has, have you guys had a strong commitment to this strategy been able to stick with it. It's funny, you mentioned that. So I think going back to the original point, why people don't do a lot of this is because there's a big
Starting point is 00:26:07 risk associated with it. If you don't do it right, and I don't pretend that I do it right every time, I don't. And I don't pretend that I am always 100% correct and right. There are certainly things that I could have in hindsight, I go, maybe put a comma there or be a little bit more, you know, that's a comma, not a period. Let's, let's nuance this a little bit. So I definitely think there's those opportunities and you learn from them and you iterate and you get better at it the more you do it there's a big risk associated to it you're putting your brand on the line you don't know how people are going to respond to that uh sort of sort of style and i also say like the style has to be real and genuine and whether that style is maybe a little bit more provocative
Starting point is 00:26:44 naturally that's just my natural idea like i that's kind of me in a nutshell but that's not everybody's idea like i think being genuine to the brand is is important but we have conversations conversations internally quite a bit where we go, is that really what we should say? Like, I'll put something out there. And I've gotten a lot better where I'll give you an example. There's another player. So the counterpart to the other big company, they have something on their website. And I'm not going to name the company by name, but if you guys go on a hunt, a treasure hunt, you'll find it. They have something on their website where they say, we've spent the last 35 years tinkering. And I saw that. I go tinkering. I go up to 35 years. You should have this figured out a little bit more.
Starting point is 00:27:34 Like experimentation stops at this point. And I wanted to call that out. I wanted to come out and say something about that. Not in the effort to say like, hey, we have this figured out. But something saying like, again, guys, this is broken. 35 years tinkering and how many dead bodies in the wake of that? Yeah. There should be some... Tinkering since 1984. Yeah, there should be some accountability to that. So I ran that by my team and I said, hey, I think this would be...
Starting point is 00:28:05 Because I don't want to... I have the ability to move unilaterally, but I just don't believe that's being a good teammate, you know, when I have other people tied to what we do. Certainly not also if it's something slightly provocative. Right. Now, there's other things I've done where I was like, that's not provocative at all. And my team's like, Nick, we can't do that.
Starting point is 00:28:23 I'll give an example here in a moment, but I took this to the team and I said, you know, I'd like to, I think this is maybe, not even I think like, maybe we should do something around this. And the response was, yeah, maybe, but let's, let's like, let's, let's think about it first. Let's flush it out a little bit more before we just like, just go, you know, throw stuff against the wall. I had a post that I wanted to do. And again, thinking about other people, trying to think beyond just myself. Whether you like him or dislike him is not the point, but Donald Trump, as an example, has people on that side of the fence. And so I found a clip where this was before he was ever in politics. He was in pro wrestling and he slaps Vince McMahon. Which is an awesome scene. That's like one of the heyday moments. No, it's in the press conference.
Starting point is 00:29:14 It's like, yeah. And he just slaps Vincent McMahon and I made a video meme out of it. And my team was. And so at first I submitted it. I was going to run an ad at it and Facebook declined it. They declined it. So I'm like, well, let's just go with this organically. And then our team was like, we know what you're doing, Nick, but you got to understand how this might, like, you got to think about the other side of it.
Starting point is 00:29:37 And part of me was like, I don't really care. Obviously, it's, I'm not endorsing or it's, this is a funny video. I mean, it's just funny. Yeah. And, but we, you know, we got to, I try to act a little bit more. And we have these conversations internally. and even with people externally, sometimes we get conversations from agents and they don't quite know. And so I don't give them the whole secret sauce or the Colonel Sanders recipe.
Starting point is 00:30:00 But I'm also, I want to take that feedback in because I realize that there do have to be some swim lanes. And you just can't have Wild Wild West all the time. It would be fun, though, if you could. I think it's called the Babylon B. I think you, listen, that's the world I want to live in. I want to live in the world where we all just equally, praise each other and encourage each other, but also just bust each other's balls all day long. Yeah, that would be. I grew up with five brothers and four sisters. Like, this is how I grew up.
Starting point is 00:30:30 Like, we just broke balls all day long. And so I realize that doesn't translate into grown up life all the time, but that is the utopia that I wish to, I wish to live in. What's up, guys? Sorry to take you away from the episode, but as you know, we do not run ads on this show. In an exchange for that, I need your help. If you're loving this episode, if you enjoy this podcast, whether you're watching on YouTube or you're listening on your favorite podcast platform, I would love for you to subscribe, share, comment if you're on YouTube,
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Starting point is 00:31:51 and I hope you enjoy it listening as much as I do creating the show for you. All right, I'm out of here. Peace. Let's get back to the episode. I do think one of the really, one of the things that has been very, I'll just use the word fun, over the since, say, like, since like 2014, 2015, 2016, since that time period has been, I feel like the industry in general takes itself less seriously, not that. that our jobs aren't serious, but in general, the, the, the professional thing,
Starting point is 00:32:26 we take ourselves less seriously than we did, you know, seven years, eight years ago. That to me, I think part of it is the podcasting scene. I think that has been a plus. I think part of it is, you know, so a lot of these legacy organizations have not been able to hold control and they've, they've had things like IAOA and, and, you know, all these startup and sure tech companies who've developed their own brand and stuff. And I think all that has definitely helped the conversation because you don't have to be stuffy. It's not, I don't think people come to conversations as much expecting stuffy.
Starting point is 00:33:02 It's still stuffier than like, like a marketing conference. But although marketing conferences have gone woke, so I, those are more stuffy actually than anything in the world. Yeah. Bro, I used to show up to events and on calls and I would wear my hat backwards. and people would lose their freaking mind. I know. Like this was like, again, five, six, seven years ago. So to your point, I think it's been conditioned a little bit more.
Starting point is 00:33:30 I also think the industry, as I see it, my perception of it a little bit, is that it is getting a little bit younger. Yep. And I do think the advent of more technology and I think overall brand in the world, you're seeing a lot more of that in brands across the globe where they're becoming, there's the woke stuff, but there's also the brands, I think, are starting to fill that sort of, and I think it's, I think it's a tactic more than anything, but they're starting to feel that, that granular, authentic way of life, and they're incorporating that into the brand.
Starting point is 00:34:04 So we're getting conditioned on all sides from it. I definitely agree with you, though, that what was very taboo just a couple years ago is now almost commonplace. I see, bro, I see insurance agents with their own Air Force ones. Pretty cool. It is cool. I think it's awesome. I think it's really cool. I think it's cool.
Starting point is 00:34:25 Go back seven, ten years ago. Imagine somebody's showing up to a rough notes conference or a state big eye conference or whatever. Rocking those. Probably not happening. Yeah. Now people do it with pride. Yeah. Dude, it's, I mean, I just look at the, I mean, now, obviously, I haven't done that much speaking lately,
Starting point is 00:34:46 but, you know, just the evolution of my wardrobe in speaking. When I first started, it was full suit and tie on stage. And now it's like if I put a jacket on, that's like super formal. Most of the time it's like a polo or something like in jeans. And like it's it just is it's, you know, and again, like cursing on stage. Now, again, I think part of the reason I don't get as many speaking gigs as I used to is because I refuse not to curse on stage. But like, you know.
Starting point is 00:35:14 You want to come speak at the better conference next year? I don't have the better conference anymore. Let's do it. Let's do that. Let's make this deal happen right now. I love it. I'm in. Mark it on a conference anymore, but yeah. Whatever it is. I'm in. It costs as much as you want. It, it, it, it, it, it, I just think that, you know, and what's funny is, you know, like I was saying this. I went to, I went to, I went to, I did two conferences back to back. Nebraska and Arkansas. So I went to Nebraska first. And I did this basically the same presentation in both.
Starting point is 00:35:43 You know, I don't really use slides and I kind of do a little Gary V. style where I kind of, it's like what's on my brain I'm talking about, but I do have a through thread and narrative that I work through the whole thing. Um, so every presentation is different, although slightly the same. The Nebraska conference, a lot of dudes in suits, a lot of, you know, sitting straight up and they're great. Don't get me wrong. I mean, I love the people in Nebraska and I go back there in a heartbeat, but like, I could tell they didn't appreciate the, the F bombs and the sexual innuendo and the conservative jokes. You know, I always like the bust on libs because I think they're bananas. And like, so like I, you know, I weave in, you know,
Starting point is 00:36:20 and I, you know, give like I do my why the Buffalo Bills are America's team and all this kind of stuff. You know, I bake in all this like non-insurance stuff because otherwise we're talking about fucking insurance for an hour. Tell me how to properly read an ISO form and yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, now granted, there were a ton of people in the audience that were laughing too, but it was a very, I could tell the word. And then we, and then I go to Arkansas. and, you know, it's just a different crowd. I love going to Arkansas. That's my favorite.
Starting point is 00:36:48 One, they just do a great job. And two, I mean, it is just belly laughs and they're hooting and hollering and yelling from the crowd. Yeah, I want to go to the one where they have hecklers. I want to go to that one. Oh, dude, I was heckled in Connecticut. This is one of my all-time favorites. I'm going to butcher this story. So I go to Connecticut.
Starting point is 00:37:07 This is a long time ago. This is probably like 2015, 2016, young agents event. maybe 100 people in the room. And it's, but it's big round tops. It's, uh, so like eight, you know, the big round tables. It's, it's high boys. Yeah, whatever it is. I, I hate that format for, for an audience because yeah, there's always somebody who's kind of cockyed and, you know, it's like, it's very tough. Doesn't matter. So front table sitting straight on to me is this dude in like probably got a $20,000 suit, $20,000 in clothes easy that he's wearing. And he's sitting back, probably late 50s, early 60s.
Starting point is 00:37:45 But, you know, good looking dude, but he's got his, from the beginning, he is, and people can't see me, but he's in the chair, legs out, crossed, leaning back, arms folded, head back, like, like everything about this from a body posture is like, I hate you. I don't believe you. And I think you're an a hole. Like, that was basically his body posture. So I get 10 minutes. And I'm talking about content marketing.
Starting point is 00:38:07 I mean, this isn't like. Right up his guy's alley. Yeah. So he's shaking. He starts by shaking. shaking his head no, right? I can just see him. No, no, no, no. And I go, so the good, what, unfortunately for him, I had reached a point in my career where I was completely willing to address him and his head shaking. So I, I stop. And I, and I go, what, what's your name, man?
Starting point is 00:38:33 Any Bill or Bob or what the fuck it was, something to be. And I said, why, you keep shaking your head, no, what's up? And he's just like, you call, you called, you called him. him out. He didn't even heckle you. You just called them out. Yeah, yeah, at first. Yeah. So I said, why are you shaking your head? No. I said, I'm interested. Honest question. Honest question. Why are you shaking your head? No. Not my clients. My clients will not do insert whatever digital. My clients don't read. And I said, okay, I appreciate that. I said, you keep shaking your head. No. And anything else you disagree with, let me know. Went back to doing my thing. Right. So I, well, no, here's the thing. So now this is like,
Starting point is 00:39:13 a fucking wet dream for me. It was like I just, this is like perfect. It was like, I now dial it all the way up. It is, the future is only, I'm like, I am way out into, you know, the another world. Just everything is absolutes and guarantees and digital this and customer experience. And I can just tell his face is getting red. He's fucking hating it. He's about to explode.
Starting point is 00:39:41 Yeah. And I said, I go, so then I stop. because now my be honest with you when I started seeing this dude shaking his head I told myself the rest of my presentation
Starting point is 00:39:49 I am only talking to this guy like I won't speak to another human so I just dialed in on this guy and just to wrap this up you know now he's starting to say like Ryan so now he feels like he knows me Ryan no way he's going
Starting point is 00:40:01 no way it's not going to work my clients are high end you know my clients don't read they don't watch any video his clients were high end or they were you know whatever they were you know they you know they're
Starting point is 00:40:13 the rich muckety mucks he deals with muckety mucks i guess and i said so what you're saying is rich people don't have the internet and he goes well what do you mean i said well you seem like a rich guy you're wearing twenty thousand dollar suit well it's not that much i go you have you over text message before sure i have what are we talking about and i just shut up he didn't have a word to say right he has nothing he literally has nothing because i just trapped him on purpose and i got him too like the way it came off was just like he literally had nothing to say now 99 other people people are staring at this guy. So long story, by the end of the presentation, he comes up to me, shakes my hand, he goes, fuck, you got me. I guess I got to do this. He goes, I guess I got to do
Starting point is 00:40:58 this digital thing. Damn you. And then he turned around and walked out. That was the whole thing. And I just was great. This is one of my best speaking gigs ever. You got to get a testimony. I live for the day where I have somebody like try to heckle me on stage just so I can verbally eviscerate them. Yep. I had a Hanover rep one time tell me, because I told a kid, a kid asked me, hey, Ryan, what do I do if my agency principal won't let me do this stuff that you're saying?
Starting point is 00:41:26 I said, we'll find a new agency or start one your own. That was my answer. Moved on. I didn't think twice about it. This Hanover, nothing against Hanover. I love Hanover, but this guy was a Hanover rep. He comes after the presentation, he comes flying up. I mean, I can see he's like on a mission.
Starting point is 00:41:40 Now, I unfortunately originally thought that he was going to say something nice to me. He then starts berating me on how I don't understand and you got to make a $300,000 year one commitment to be part of our company. And I said, well, maybe then you're not the right carrier for him. Maybe he should go find someone who's actually going to support him like that. You know, and this guy's, it's like, what do these fucking hecklers think? Like, what do they think they're going to get? Like, you're going to come up and change my mind? Like, I just did an hour and a half on content marketing, bro, you think you're going to come up here and tell me that like, somehow we're stupid comments going to make it so I don't, it doesn't work?
Starting point is 00:42:13 I wish somebody would, I wish, I wish, I would happen. You know what you got, you, I just want to put a plant. Like, you just, like, tell someone to do it. You got, no, because then they'll know that. What you, what you got to do is you got to slow play them. So you have to be kind of reasonable at the beginning and make them feel like they can push you around. And then as soon as you figure out who your, who your Huckleberry is, you just lock in
Starting point is 00:42:35 on that mother. And you're just whack, whack, whack, whack, whack. It's amazing. It's so amazing. Yeah. Yeah. I also like picking, you know, young kids in the audience, dialing in on them really good. If you can find a CSR, then you can rip on agency owners because you can be like, you know how these fat old white bastards just beat the shit out of you all day?
Starting point is 00:42:59 And they'll like get all red face. This is why no one invites me to speak anymore. You come to our conference next. You can do all this. You already here, folks. The problem is all your people are going to be super cool. Yeah, they will be. Oh, my gosh.
Starting point is 00:43:23 So, all right, so let's, let's, we'll put this back on track. So let's talk a little bit about better and what you guys are up to you. I know you're making a bunch of power moves. And it's awesome. I mean, obviously I'm a huge fan of what you guys are doing. And I think that you're just, you are absolutely pushing everybody else to do things that make them uncomfortable, which is a great thing for our space. So, so what's happening? I know what things can you talk about. So I don't want to bring anything up because I don't
Starting point is 00:43:52 always know what things I'm not supposed to say or supposed to say. So I'm going to let you guide. What things are happening that we can talk about today or that you can talk about in the future? When does this podcast come out? Sometime in the future from today. I have no idea. You're making an assumption that this is a professional, professionally organized thing. A couple weeks probably. I'd say two or three weeks at a minimum. Fantastic. Then by the time this has already happened, I can say this stuff. So by the time you're hearing this, so we announced just a couple weeks ago that we just recently, we made our first acquisition, which I think was really, it was great for us.
Starting point is 00:44:33 One of the things we could ask quite a bit is people just assume we're going to sell to, you know, the empire. And we tell people, let me ask us, you know, what are you guys going to sell? we always go, yes, of course, one day we will, just like you will. You're going to sell your agency one day. Do we know when, where, who? No, we don't, but I'm not going to die in this chair. I think that's a fair and reasonable and practical answer. Yes. And, but one of the things that I always kind of, it always kind of bothered me is when people would just always kind of start with that. They just assume, and for a good reason, a lot of, that's not like that hasn't happened. Yeah, a lot of bad history. A lot of bad history, right? But when we were able to then make an acquisition,
Starting point is 00:45:13 like it felt somewhat validating to us. And we were able to confidently say, look, you know, one day, one day someone's going to buy a better agency. Because that's how all business works. I mean, all the players you know today have been bought and sold multiple times. But to be able to say now we're acquiring, it just felt really strong. And so we acquired neoteric agent. We've rebranded that to proposals by better agency. You're going to see a lot of cool stuff happening with that.
Starting point is 00:45:42 there's a lot of reasons why we purchased that. By the time you're listening to this, we will have announced that we have closed on our series A. And so you can go find the press releases of that. We believe we're trying to create a category called agency success. For us, we want everything that we do and focus on. How is it going to help agents have greater agency success? That's not always with just the one component of technology,
Starting point is 00:46:07 but there's got to be a more holistic approach to that. And so we're going to be investing heavily into that mantra of agency success from technology, making the technology, everything that you have. We want it to be one platform and one browser. If I could put everybody at one Chrome browser for the entirety of their day, that would be a huge win for us. So that's how we think about technology. That's how we think about product. Deep integrations, not just surface level integrations, but deep integrations where they matter the most so that people can be more efficient.
Starting point is 00:46:37 We're going to invest heavily into that platform. We're going to invest heavily into community. So things like our event next year and other things that we're doing, things that are going to cost us a lot of money. But again, we are going to invest in agency success. Community, education, platform, those are the things that we think about as we think about this overall category. If we want to compete with everybody else in the AMS world or the CRM world,
Starting point is 00:47:04 we're going to constantly be playing that comparison game. We don't want to play that comparison game. We want to do something that nobody's. done before, much like what you've done with the news today. Like, you're trying to do something that nobody has done before. So you've got to go through the brick wall. And that's what we're trying to do. We believe that independent agents are the best channel for insurance distribution. There isn't anything stronger, better than when companies work directly with independent agents. So we want to facilitate that as much as possible. We're to strengthen the channel. We want to be an asset of the
Starting point is 00:47:31 channel. We don't just, we want to get out of this mode of just thinking about CRM or just AMS. those that sort of fragmented thinking is why our industry is in the mess that it's in. Yeah. We want to think about things in a more, I guess more progressive way for lack of a better term. We want to think about where the industry needs to be and how do we get there. So that's that's what's in the news for us. In the next probably 60 or 90 days, you'll start to hear news of other stuff that we're doing that we're coming out with. Things that we're going to try to do to, again, make this vision possible with one platform, one browser,
Starting point is 00:48:08 so that agents can do everything that they need to do inside of one cohesive ecosystem. What's the name of the new conference? The agency success conference. I like it. Yeah, we don't want to be just the better agency conference. We weren't this last year, but that branding still tripped people up quite a bit. People would think, well, I'm not a better agency user. And we said, we're not putting on a business or a company event.
Starting point is 00:48:32 No, I heard that from a couple different people that thought that same thing. And I said, I'm sure you'll get a lot out of it, even if you're not a better agency user, but that's definitely- We didn't talk about better agency at all. Yeah. And to some people, some people were like, when are you guys going to talk about better agency? And I would tell people,
Starting point is 00:48:46 we can have those one-on-one conversations, but we don't want anybody to feel like this was a time share of it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You didn't pitch it at all. You're grown-ups, you can make decisions, and, you know, there's half the people there were not customers. This is, this is a completely whatever comment, but the only bad part about that is the better conference
Starting point is 00:49:05 is actually a gangster name for a conference. So it's kind of a bummer because it's such a great name for a conference. But agency success is too. I mean, sometimes sometimes like on the nose is the way to go, right? Because it sticks in people's mind. It tells them exactly what it is. You know, I struggle with that sometimes in my own marketing, you know, trials and tribulations because you want to be so creative.
Starting point is 00:49:28 And at the same time, you're like sometimes just naming the thing exactly what it is is the right thing. We totally stole from HubSpot, to be honest with you. If I'm being completely honest, that's fine. You know, they created a category for inbound marketing. Their conference is called inbound, which I'll be going to. And so it's nothing new under the sun, but we wanted it to be an industry conference, not a company conference.
Starting point is 00:49:54 We'll have stuff off the side for people who really want to know about better agency, but we're going to be pouring in. We're bringing in some global headline speakers we're excited about. And we're going to try to do some stuff that hasn't been done in the conference space in a long time because we believe that there's a lot of value there. Probably since Elevate 2018, the greatest conference in the history of the insurance industry. Was that Milwaukee? No, that was Cleveland. Milwaukee was better.
Starting point is 00:50:21 You think so? Milwaukee was better. I'll be honest with I'm going to do a little not. I'm just going to straight brag. I think the fact that I kicked off Milwaukee with 47 Star Wars gifts is like an all-time. fucking, I want to see that beat. I want to see someone beat that. I'll tell you why that conference was better than Cleveland.
Starting point is 00:50:42 Yeah, tell me why. I'm super interested in that. So I'm always, me personally, this part's subjective, but I really enjoy the first of its kind type stuff. Yeah, yep, yep, I get that. And it was the first one for you guys, and it was unique. I think you guys tried to do a different spin
Starting point is 00:50:56 on other conferences that were out there. So I liked the uniqueness of it. I thought the venue was phenomenal. I thought the venue was phenomenal. But the best, thing about that event is there was, and you can see this in hindsight, there was such a culture around the people that came there, and there was such a family-like feel. You have, you have these little sub-pockets of groups of people that were doing stuff, and that stuff is, that is,
Starting point is 00:51:27 that is the, that is the, that is the X factor, the, the mojo of, of an event is when you can do that, Because anybody can put out content and have cool AV and that stuff's all well and good. You just pay money for that stuff. You get that stuff. But there was there was culture and invite and what's what's sprung out of that. Yeah. It's careers. All that.
Starting point is 00:51:48 So even at the time, maybe it wasn't it was just a conference at the, let me walk that back. It wasn't just a conference, but it was a conference at the time. But when you look back on it now with some time, what was that? Five years ago. That was 2017. Yeah. So five years ago now you look at it. you're like, okay, where are these people now? And where can you go back in time and say,
Starting point is 00:52:08 where was a pivotal part where a lot of this kind of, this seed was kind of planted a little bit. Yeah. And you look at people's careers. You look at things that are being done in the industry, things that still haven't been done to this day, that to me is why, on top of all the aesthetics and the location and all that stuff, that is why I think Milwaukee was the best one. Yeah. I don't, to be honest with you, it would be like picking which one of my children I like better for me because you don't have a favorite I have a favorite I don't actually my kids are different that they're both different and I like them and different because one is yeah type a very cool but also kind of a prick and the other one is just
Starting point is 00:52:49 funny and silly and I like them both but it would be harder if I had a girl it would probably just be her because both of them are dudes and whatever but long story short or I keep fucking saying it, Jesus. It would be hard because there were things about 2018, like 2017 was amazing because it was the first for me. But 2018, the process of planning it, the thought, the challenges that we overcame, some of the nuanced stuff that maybe people did or didn't pick up on. It was much, it was much a much bigger lift to pull off 20. because now we had expectations. And I thought we're 2017. There were zero expectations. They're like, who are these idiots that are putting on a conference? Let's go check it out.
Starting point is 00:53:39 Right. 2018, people are like, oh shit, that first one was actually not bad. What can they do? And I thought we did a good job of meeting the expectations. No, you know, because we could do. There were so many opportunities and so many battles. And look, I mean, in large part, part of the reason that I left Trusted Choice right after it were because of the battles and the stances I took on that conference. I rubbed a lot of people the wrong way to get that pulled off and not be another boring freaking drivel fest event
Starting point is 00:54:13 where we just, you know, we all just get in a circle and shake each other's hands. You know, it, so that part, you know, not allowing that thing because all of a sudden, all these people who could have given two craps and didn't even show up to 2017, we're like, oh, we got to be there now. So now they show up. And there, you know, there was a lot of pressure on that one.
Starting point is 00:54:40 And to get it off was fun. It was good. It was a good conference. I just remember I remember Milwaukee being one of my favorite conferences ever in space. I have favorite, like, even with past innovation conferences, there are ones where I'm like, no, that one was way better than this one. Oh, for sure, yeah. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:54:55 You guys, before you, this, before you left, you did seven. Six? How many did you guys do? So if I take Anaheim out of it, where it was like the 35 people, we did San Antonio, Orlando, Phoenix, Las Vegas, San Diego, Tampa. So I was a part of six. Six. Dude, that's awesome.
Starting point is 00:55:17 I mean, and how big that thing got. I mean, it's freaking tremendous. And the thing I liked about the work that you did there was, you could have, again, I think, I think the hard part about, about that is when you get into year two, year three, year four, it is easy to start to let the event get corrupted in different ways. And you, it does not, I mean, I went to San Diego and I thought it was a tremendous event. I loved it. I was a, I mean, some of the connections I
Starting point is 00:55:47 made there were big launching pad pieces for me with Rogue. And, you know, I enjoyed every minute of that conference. And, and I was impressed by how you did not allow again, like the stuff that kills conferences, you didn't allow it to creep in. You kind of stayed true to the mission and to have success. I mean, that's a very difficult thing to do. And I'm excited for what you can do for this agency. I love conferences. I just, I just, I'm really, I'm a, I'm a, I'm a, I'm a, I'm a, I'm a, you know, we learned a lot of mistakes. A mistake is the shoe's wrong word. We learned a lot of, there's a lot of little lessons that were learned from certain stances that we took, you know, but we took stances. We had, we had, yeah, even if they maybe were like stances where you could
Starting point is 00:56:29 say, well, maybe do something a little bit different. So kind of learning from that and iterating, creating something different. There's a part of it where you, like, you create a template, and then there's part of it where you're saying, okay, what can we do to this template to kind of iterate and things and all that stuff? Like let's create SOPs that make things simple. Like this is a traditional business lesson in it of itself, but like let's create like a framework. We know what goes in the framework, but can we make some of the aesthetics different? Yeah. And so like this one, you know, we're going to make it a, it's an industry conference. So it can be open to people. I get this last one, over 95% of them were agency owners, but we told people, if you have people
Starting point is 00:57:06 on your team that you want to come, that want to come and do that, if there's, if there's media that wants to come, if there's press. And I told like exhibitors, like one of the things that we did differently is I tell exhibitors, I want you to compete with our event. Compete with it. Please take people out. Go wine and dine them. Go. That's what people remember. Yeah. And so go create those experiences for attendees that they want to be on the content sessions. I'll be on the content sessions. Dude, I think that is a tremendous, I think you're, I think you're absolutely dialed in with that mentality. Because people, if people know, this is one thing I never understood. I mean, it is people like, oh, well, I paid all this money
Starting point is 00:57:42 for all these people to have dinner. It's like, that's the cost to do a business, bro. If they want to go out with a vendor, they're going to remember that they come to the event, that they then get to network with all their people. And if what you're telling them is they then can't network with, now they got to choose another event to network with that group. They're going to go to the other if that group is important network with. That doesn't, it doesn't make it's, it's again, that's the scarcity mindset that I believe wrecks a lot of events. You got to let people do their thing.
Starting point is 00:58:10 They're going to find ways right. Cass is always going to buy a suite and take your people. He's always going to do. What's the, like the two biggest events that I think of, and this is like you talk about punching above a wayglass. This is, these events are different stratospheres, but you look at like the Super Bowl and you look at even like WrestleMania, which is, I know people can laugh at that, but those are extravaganzas where it's not hardly anything to do with what goes on in the field, as much at or in the ring, as much as what's going on around it.
Starting point is 00:58:38 Yeah. And that's, you're creating an experience for people. And that's what it should be about. I remember going back to Milwaukee at Elevate. I, quite honestly, I don't remember a single thing that was said from stage. That one thing. I think I remember you had some dude from insuring on there. I do remember Ted Devine yelling at people and honestly people being.
Starting point is 00:58:57 scare. But I wasn't even in on those. Like I wasn't even there. What I remember is hanging out with Chris Landgielton, Josh Lipstone, Erin Netti. Like I remember going and paddleboarding on the lake. I remember going to eat. I remember that stuff. Yeah. And that's that's how I want to think about it too from the attending experience. Like we want to put out great content. We're going to have stuff there. But we know that you come and this insurance world is interconnected in ways they're way different than just it's about the relationship side of things. Yeah, it's awesome. Dude, if someone's, you know, been hearing about Better Agency,
Starting point is 00:59:36 they want to check it out, where do they that? And the conference, is there a link up? Is there a place people can go to at least get on a mailing list for the agency's success conference? Depending on when you put this out, there might be at the time. I don't have that stuff up yet, but I can, if it's up, I'll give it to you and you can, when you push this out. To find out more about Better Agency, the best thing I would tell you to do,
Starting point is 00:59:56 honestly, there's really two sources, two of the best things, is you can go to our YouTube channel, hit that subscribe button, but you can go, you can watch a lot of the content that we put out. We put out content every single week. We do a live show every single Wednesday night where we have a live audience coming in. It's our spin of a podcast, but we want a live audience. Yep. And then you can go to better agency.io and schedule a discovery call with our team. They're not going to hard sell you anything, but they are going to try to figure out the pain points, problems that you have in your agency and see if there's a fit there and then, you know, take you into the application, show you the demo, all that good stuff.
Starting point is 01:00:28 So I would say YouTube, better agency, online, and on our website. Guys, I highly recommend, you know, if you're looking for an agency success tool, a platform for agency success, I highly recommend better agency. I think, I believe in what Nick and Will and the entire team is doing. And you guys, you guys have shown that you have staying power. I think it's absolutely tremendous. And dude, as always, I wish you not be. but maximum success.
Starting point is 01:00:56 Thanks, man. I appreciate it. Yeah. Close twice as many deals by this time next week. Sound impossible, it's not. With the one-call closed system, you'll stop chasing leads and start closing deals. In one call. This is the exact method we use
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Starting point is 01:01:46 That's master of theclose.com. Do it today. If you like the show, please take a moment to rate, review, and subscribe. It really does help the show to grow. Thank you for listening. Happy holidays. Want to give your host a gift? Consider subscribing, rating, and reviewing the show this holiday season. It really helps the show grow. From all of us at Believe, have a Merry Christmas, everyone, and a happy holiday.

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