From "Placing Insurance" to True Risk Advisory | with Andy Bassett

Being built as an insurance agency, like many, we were kind of trying to be everything to everyone. That's very hard to scale. Very hard. And so we quickly identified that we need to laser focus on who a target market client is that fits our model, lean into that model, that brand, and then just go out and find as many of those as we can, because that's what's going to help us grow.

Hey.

Hey.

Welcome back to the accelerate your insurance sales podcast. This is going to be a special episode. This is a guy I've had a chance to actually work alongside with at one point in my career. And to watch the. The growth they've had in the last five to six years has been really impressive to watch and what they've done to really take a hold on marketing as a driving force for their agencies. So, Andy Bassett, CEO of Ellerbrock Norris, welcome to the show, man.

Good to see you, man. Good to be on. Got a couple Andes together. What could go wrong? What a great.

It's never, it's never a bad day when you got the same. Andy's in the room.

Right, Right. We're adding, actually adding an Andy to the team here at Ellerbrock here in a week or so or two weeks. And it'll be on the business development side, which I know we'll get into kind of that model of the developer.

Yeah.

It's good to be here, man. It's good to see you and happy.

I got some advice for you on that. So I, I, you know, with my team, one of my employees who runs our content program, her name's Amy. And then I brought my fiance in the business, her name's Amy. And we had our first, the first team meeting we had after that. We do it virtually, of course. I just, I said Amy, and both of them said yes. And I'm like, okay, this isn't going to work out.

Yep.

So my fiance, who runs our operations now, is actually known as AJ And Amy remains Amy. So some advice. Maybe when you get multiple Andes, you might start going with initials. It might be better.

I love it. I love it. Let's.

Before we get into what you guys are doing at Ella Brock Norris, you know, obviously I know you, your background a little bit just because of the work we used to do together. But what led you to get into the business? Because obviously you have family with the uncle starting, you know, being heavily involved and then Elliot, a cousin being involved. But your dad was in healthcare. What got you into the business?

I mean, it's funny. So I, my Dad was a retired, is a retired physician.

So.

So in college I was in medicine, but I also had a business degree because my passion for medicine just wasn't where I wanted it to be. And so ultimately, I mean, what led me into it is when I decided business was the pursuit I wanted to take in college. My uncle who we're in, you just mentioned the family side. We're actually in his exit plan right now. So fast forward to today. But he just approached me literally in college and said, hey, what do you think about joining my company? I want to grow it. His growth idea at the time was to grow geographically out of the small town that he had kind of. He didn't found Ellerbrock but through the passing of a partner became the primary owner of the company. And his vision to grow it was to grow geographically. So he literally approached me in college and said, what do you think about this? I said, I don't know if I know what you do, but you know, a family business sounds intriguing. So anyway, that was really, it's, you know, it's not the sexiest story ever, but that was it. I actually got licensed while in college and hit the ground running. And I love to tell the stories that, you know, the first office I was in, man, it had shag carpet walls. The guy at sublease from literally smoked all day every day in the office.

1970S right there.

Yeah, it was something, you know, back then you could smoke in restaurants and bars. So just I'm a 22 year old kid that needed a couple dollars to buy beer or whatever, you know, at the end of the day. So it wasn't a big deal to me, but it felt like I left a bar every time I came home from work. But no, the beginnings were pretty humble. But that's really it. I mean it was just family approach right out of college and just like I said, didn't know any different, but knew that the idea of building something was really exciting to me. The idea of family and carrying a legacy forward was all exciting. I could see that. I didn't know what it would amount to today, which has become really cool. But I could kind of see it at the time. I saw it as an opportunity jumped in and here we are 20 some years later.

Well, and for some geographical perspective for the people listening in, you guys are still headquartered in Hastings, right? Nebraska, Yeah. I mean is Omaha the headquarters now?

It's a funny question. Our leadership team is kind of scattered throughout. I mean our, our model when it comes to people, that's Been the huge focus of us is at the end of the day, we're going to find the most talented people wherever they are.

Yeah.

So we still have physical locations, which is where we're founded as actually out of Hastings, Nebraska, which is South Central. And then we have physical that. We have people in the Kearney location, which is a little further west of that. And then we have office in Lincoln and office in Omaha, which is where I sit.

Yeah. You guys, I just saw. Just moved into a beautiful new building in Hastings.

Yeah, really cool. So we sold. This is a whole nother conversation. We ended up selling our real estate. We had some real estate holdings and we divest that for a few different reasons. A big part of it was the exit plan for. For Brian. But when we did that in Hastings, we ended up moving to downtown and renovated a building built in 1887, which really cool. It turned out amazing. But it happens to be about a block. And the downtown Hastings area for a small community is really renovating and rejuvenating. It's really cool. But we happen to be about a block from where we were in the 30s and 40s as Little Rock Steel was the name of the firm and it was right across the street. We have a picture in there that we got from the Historical Society that shows it. So it's pretty cool. So we're happy to get really, truly back to the roots there.

Well, and I love the story. I think you guys were founded in 1906.

Yeah, that's correct.

And you guys are still independent today. And I, I gotta believe, have no desires to. To be selling anytime soon, especially with you and Elliot kind of taking the business over at this point. One of the things you guys have really done well and. And we'd say we can say it's from the marketing perspective, but I'm a big guy. I'm a big tagline guy. Every time I see Ella Brock Norris, whether it's piece content from you or anything, it's protect your purpose. Yeah. What does that mean to you?

I mean, that's. It's everything. It's literally the core of who we are. It defines what we do, what we believe in internally, and then how we go deliver that to our clients into the marketplace. And so the Protect yout Purpose brand tagline, it's got. If you look at it, it's my business, my life, my future. And that encapsulates all the areas in which we engage with our ideal target market client as we're navigating through the things that matter. The most to them every day in their business to help them have success, which connects 100% to their personal life and how they manage ongoing risk in their personal lives. And then of course, post sale or exit of a business, which leads right into my future. And we're doing a lot of exit planning work and goal planning work for business owners as they transition. That's a huge, huge thing. As we know right now with the baby boomer generation being the primary owners, all in that exit phase of small business America. That at the end of the day, is the core of the communities we serve. To back to the question. Protect your purpose. I mean, it's literally everything that's ingrained in what we do. And Cameron Carlow, our chief marketing officer, shortly after coming into the firm, seeing what we were doing, seeing what we were building, understanding that vivid vision we built, he, like that came up with the protect your purpose brand tagline. The second he brought it to me, I was like, that's it, man. I love it.

That's the beauty of marketing is when you see something, you go, yes, right? And you know you've got something good. Well, I'd love for you to talk, if you're open to it, you know, to bring some perspective on this. I think it was what, 2018, 2019. I was still working at, you know, the Olson Group on the west side of Omaha. We were actually doing some team selling, you know, you, you, Elliot and I and, and Chase and some others. And one thing I was really impressed with when we'd go out of meetings together was how focused you guys were on risk management. Not just, let's sell us, let's let us sell you some commercial insurance. And, you know, you guys looked at the 10 areas of risk that you guys help businesses address, even perpetuation. When did you guys make that shift? I gotta believe there probably was a time you were the traditional commercial insurance carrier. When did you guys decide to make that shift? Like, no, no, no. We need to become much more aggressive on the risk management.

Yeah, I mean, that was on the heels of transitioning myself, Elliot and others into the leadership role of the company. So going back to what I said earlier about Brian Bassett, his vision of growth was geographic. Taking a small town insurance agency and getting us out to where the population is delivering the message. Did an incredible job with that. And as we started to transition, our vision of growth just shifted, which was more around how we felt we could go serve our communities the best, our clients the best. And it was really a look in the mirror. And a struggle that we had with the industry, frankly, and how productized, commoditized the insurance space had gotten. And we just wanted to figure out a better way to serve that type of client that was looking for something different, was looking for advice. And so it was an evolution to go from being a really good PNC insurance firm to shifting more to that holistic advisory model. And so it happened over a period of time. That's where Encore was born. I mean, when we were thinking through this model, we were thinking through the 10 impact areas of risky reference. And we were just trying to get our head around how to go out and kind of talk on total cost of risk type of thinking, which I know is a term that gets thrown around in the industry a lot, but that's where Encore was built. Encore is an acronym, Ellerbrook Norris Comprehensive Ongoing Risk Evaluation. And so, you know, 18, 19, 20, somewhere in there, as we were building that, that meant to take a complete shift in mindset. And I could walk through all the things that went into it because there's a lot. But at the end of the day, it was starting with a sales model. It was starting with how do we go out, how do we get this message in the market, how do we find the right people interested in it and then build the models to be able to deliver on that message. And so today, excuse me, today, the verticals that we serve primarily still the property casualty space. But the strategic benefit side, obviously near and dear to your heart, is a big piece of it. The exit planning side, as we mentioned already, perpetuation planning, business exit planning, safety consulting. Because you know, our core businesses are primarily going to be in the trades in construction, manufacturing, wholesale distribution, that kind of stuff. And then the final, which we're really excited about, we can talk about sometime on here or as we progress here. But is just our pure risk strategy focus where we just come in and do high level strategic risk advisory work for clients for a fee without necessarily engaging in a direct solution. And that's actually the focus of what we're trying to onboard most of our clients today. And then over time, if it makes sense for them to engage in a direct solution, then great. If not, if we stay in that higher level advisory capacity, it's a lot of fun and we're really successful there. So, you know, that's again an evolution. But really proud to say that what we set out on, you know, six, seven, eight years ago has absolutely 100 come to fruition today. But it took a lot, man.

We've had you guys. That's why I'm so impressed. I saw what you guys were doing eight, nine years ago, and it's like everything you said you were going to do has come to fruition, which is impressive because I think a lot of people in the industry are great at talking the walking pieces. Doesn't always happen. And I definitely want to go to that strategy, that risk manager advisory role, because I think that's. I almost see it, like for you guys, it's probably a little bit of a Trojan horse in some ways, because it ultimately leads to the business, the commercial insurance business. But before we get there, you talked about Encore.

Yeah, talk.

Talk about the importance. Because when I look at a lot of agencies today, let's be honest, their sales process is all over the map. John does it his way, Betty does it her way, Steve does it his way. Like, everybody's got their own process. But you guys have ingrained Encore as. No, this is our sales process. Why? What is that done? Why is it so important? And then what is it done for your agency's growth?

Well, what it's done for our growth is. I mean, it's everything around our growth. Not only have we grown, but we've grown the right way with the right kind of clients, with the right mindset, both internally and externally. But you're a brand guy. And what I'll tell you is that was the key. Like when we were going through getting coached, getting advised from peers in the industry around this type of model, and I saw other firms doing it. We were part of peer groups that were engaging in this. But I saw to your point, some that were half in or some that weren't having success and right, wrong or indifferent. What I identified really quickly, and I had seen a couple firms is if we're going to do it, it's going to be our identity and we're going to lean into it. We're going to build a brand and it's going to be internally and externally, it's going to identify who we are. And that's where Encore came from. So when I saw the idea, we were sitting in Toronto, Canada, actually, and I'm in a room of our colleagues, and I was like, I like this idea, like the total cost of risk mindset. We were getting coached throughout that conversation early on, but I realized right then that we had to have a brand way to lean into an internal lecture. It's funny, I got on my phone and I googled five and six letter words that begin with en. And that's where it came from. Envision was the first one and I couldn't quite get my head around it. But Brian Bassett, who, you know, who I mentioned earlier, my uncle, that we're. He loves acronyms. I was like, I'm looking, I go, encore. I'm like, ooh, Ellerbrock. And originally it was Ellerbrock Norris cost of risk evaluation. And I was like, well, this is it. But then we of course shifted to the comprehensive ongoing risk evaluation, which better defined, I think, our model. But yeah, that's it. I mean, it's a brand and an identity and a belief. And then the protect your purpose brand tagline came out of that, you know, practicing that model.

Yeah. I look at the agencies that take a process like Encore, brand it like you have so many are so afraid to do it because they think they're pigeonholing themselves. But that's the point. If you're going to scale, you got to know exactly who's a good fit for you and say no to everybody else. If they don't want your process, walk away.

Well, and I can't. So one of the things we identified with our growth and after we institute this is being built as an insurance agency. Like many, we were trying to. Trying to be everything to everyone. That's very hard to scale, Very hard. And so we quickly identified that we need to laser focus on who a target market client is that fits our model, lean into that model, that brand, and then just go out and find as many of those as we can, because that's what's going to help us grow. And that's where we can like to the content marketing. We can get much more dialed in who we're talking to, whether it's on the website, whether it's on social media, whether it's how our business development team is going out and calling on and doing the cold outreach. It all aligns to a relatively targeted audience. It doesn't mean that we can't help in the communities, those that sit on the edge of target market. But we're going to take a lens that is we always say, you know, aim small, Miss Small. Right. With the marketing side. And so that's really where the target market came from. But yeah, that was a big shift from, you know, Brian Bassett's probably, or not even a Brian thing. Just the way a lot of agencies were built is you're gonna go out and serve the communities and provide what you can over time. All of a sudden you're like, wow, we're kind of, we're doing A lot for a lot of different people. And that gets hard to scale. We all know what it does from an efficiency perspective on the service side. And so anyway, yeah, there was a very intentional effort to get more.

Yeah, it's kind of that attitude of you need insurance, we have insurance. Do you want some? Right. And you have to get very focused on who's a good fit for you and be able to walk away. I want to come back to what you said about, you know, being. Being almost more of a consultant in many ways, not just selling insurance to, to these businesses. But before we get there, you brought the marketing and this is something I want to, I want to get your thoughts on because there was definitely a point and I observed it from afar where it was obvious you guys were buying into the marketing because when you look at a lot of agencies, there's still some that feel marketing equals the carriers and who we quote. No, that's not marketing, that's quoting.

Yeah, exactly.

And then there's others who have more of a corporate marketing feel which, eh, it's kind of stale. You guys really took to the marketing, what brand marketing looks like in the last four or five years. When did what made you realize, okay, we need to dive into this and make this a core part of what we do to grow this business. Because not every agency gets there.

Yeah. So first off, people, is what got me there because we have a really good team in place that we think together. Well, so I will admit, did I have the vision of true marketing that we're doing today as well as some of my counterparts and partners? No, not necessarily. So Ryan Brott, who's our chief growth officer. So there's three of us that sit in the executive team. Elliot Bassett, who you mentioned, sits in the president role then Ryan Brott's our chief growth officer. He sits over the collective sales team and he was a big part of why leaning into this and the idea we kind of use the term the traditional model, which is build books of business on the backs of producers. It's hand to hand combat. You're going out, you're fighting, you're making cold calls, you're stopping in, you're doing all the things. And Ryan had this vision that there's a much better way to use hand to hand combat the right way, but to be able to go out and scale a message to the right target market more through, you know, true marketing that we can get out and we can get in front of folks so that when we go to do the hand to hand Combat. Our team is armed with a lot better, you know, weapons, I guess in this analogy, right, to be able to go out and be able to push this stuff across finish line. So really. And then bringing Cam Cameron on the team, you know, that was a lot on Ryan's mindset and idea around. Look, if we're going to scale this firm, you know, we gotta stop thinking. This is something we say all the time. We gotta stop thinking about building books of business and building a business. And there's. It's very different, you know. And I think that's a lot of why you see, there's a lot of reasons you see consolidation in our industry, but I think that's a big one, is, you know, these, these baby boomers built really good books of business, but they built it on their own backs. And it's, it wasn't overly scalable and they didn't have the internal plan. And it's like all of a sudden what do you do with these books? That it's not really necessarily it's operating as a business, but it's kind of by accident. And so we wanted to make a big shift away from that. And so really marketing was a huge piece of that. And so I guess that's kind of the journey as to how we got to where we are. Well.

And I want to commend you as somebody who observes content every day. One thing I love that you do specifically sitting in the CEO role is, is you're posting weekly behind the scenes of what's going on with the team. Whether you guys are doing a strategic planning session, you take a picture, whatever, because I gotta believe and I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. When you get a peek behind what it's like going what's going on behind the scenes at your agency? Two things happen. It makes your clients who see it feel proud they work with you. Also gives an opportunity for potential prospects to see what it looks like. But the one that people don't realize that I think it happens all the time, is it becomes a recruiting weapon. 100 yeah, I'd love for it. Have you seen, because you do such a good job with the behind the scenes type content, have you seen it become a little bit of a recruiting weapon as you look to bring on the right kind of people to your team?

Absolutely. So on the recruiting, I will say this was another big shift for me and it is one of the best decisions we made. We brought on an internal recruiter. So Mikayla Hoover sits in the role of our director. Of talent. And her role is to go out, build a pipeline, source people. You know, we're doing a lot on the safety consulting side, so there's a ton of stuff that's going on there. But just broadly across the firm, she would tell you 100% that the content we're putting out there creates an absolute level of interest in the right kind of people. I think that's the piece that's key, is there's a pool of people out there for whatever role, whether it's in the our exit planning side, whether it's our safety consulting, our benefits, our pnc, wherever that area may be, There's a lot of people out there, but like being able to narrow down quickly, somebody that sees the vision can align with what we're after, that content positions it because, you know, you can really easily get the understanding. And frankly, it, it attracts to your point, people that say, that's the kind of model that fits what I'm after. And so I, I know Michaela would tell you that. But for those that end up watching this, that are in firms, you know, because we're to invest in a director of talent, that's certainly, you know, it's not easy at a firm our size, but the dividends it's paying already. Because what we found is. On that topic real quick. What we found is myself. Other leaders in the firm would spend 10%, 20% of our time trying to recruit, trying to go find. Of course, we'd go hire external third party recruiters and we shouldn't have a ton of success there. And we were just doing it okay. And it was working because a lot of the content we were able to get people interested. But at the end of the day, we realized in order to achieve the vivid vision here at Ella Brock Norris, it's all, all gonna happen because of people. So, yeah, I mean, you're spot on. That content creates a pipeline of people that understand what you're doing. And so when you go to tap into that pipeline, when you need somebody or when you're looking to grow, it's sitting there, they've got interest and they're already down the road and bought into the model, which is a huge piece of the equation.

Yeah, I love that you guys decided to bring that in house because I learned too, as, as I grew, as I've grown, my team, my problem in recruiting, if I'm doing it, I like everybody. So I'm going to find a reason to hire them. You're going to find something like, oh, there's A, There's a, there's a place for that. You got to let somebody who's good at going, yep, no, or you know what I mean? And so that's. And there's plenty of outsourced people in the industry that could do it for you. But you guys have decided to take the step to actually bring somebody in house. That's awesome.

I mean, the, the, the only thing I'll add, there is difference between outsourced and internal. There is such a difference. When somebody. When you have, when you're, when you believe so deeply at your core around a brand, a philosophy, a mission, a vision like we have here at Ellerbrock, it's really hard to get a third party to truly, deeply understand that and be able to portray that out in the market. When somebody's in your four walls living it every day, she naturally is able to portray. Amazing.

That is very well said. Well, if you're listening, go Andy Basset, Eller, Brock Norris. Go check out his content because you want to see how it's done from an insurance executive. He's one of the best. So. And I, I'm not saying that to blow smoke up your butt, man.

It's.

You do a great job as the visionary, as the visionary leader of this organization. I wish we could get more CEOs doing what you're doing.

Yeah, well, it's fun. Look, I mean, at the end of the day, being able to share what we're. If you're passionate about what you're doing, being able to share that where, however, whether it's on social media or in a elevator convers. It's easy, right?

Yep. Yep, 100%. Well, let's stay on marketing one for a little bit more. You came out with my business, my life, my future.

Yeah.

Which is a tagline you guys use as well. But talk. What led you to going, okay, I'm actually going to turn this into a book.

Yeah.

And I believe. Do you even do like a seminar workshop with it?

Not directly, but we've got. Yeah. So we do a lot of different seminars and workshops that are kind of like tied to pieces of the book. So the idea of the book was a couple fold. Number one, we wanted to have a way that we could kind of give something when we're in, whether it's prospect, client speaking, whatever it is, where we're talking about conceptually what we do. It's big. It's big to think about holistic risk management. It's big to think about the different ways we can engage with people. But the bigger thing is what we found as we were going through this is it's hard sometimes for people to connect all those dots to why compliance has such a significant overlap with safety, which has such a significant overlap with key personnel planning within an organization and trying to figure out how singular strategies in each of those impact areas, as we call them, coordinate. So that's really the idea of the book, is to talk about the different areas that we help our clients navigate through, that we analyze on an ongoing basis, but then to think deeper about how does this all connect. And at the end of the day, as a business owner, when you're thinking about people, they think about risk management in the insurance lens. When we think about it as a broader holistic strategy, at the end of the day, you're increasing value in your company, whatever that means. That means a lot of different things to a lot of people. But getting people to connect the mindset to. I'm going to invest in risk management one way or another. I want to understand how is that actually improving my company, creating value, allowing us to achieve our goals. So that's really what the book is about. And it was designed to be supportive. So I think one of the things people ask is the book first or the model it 100%, as we've just talked about, we built this model philosophy and belief. The book is a result of that. And it's just something to be able to give, you know, were we. Was I writing a book to go out and be a bestseller? No. But was. Were we writing a book to be able to support our team and their conversations every day and give it to people and have them be able to kind of read through it at their under however they want and connect the dots? That's 100% well.

But I think that's a really good perspective because we live in a day and age where people write a book for the sake of writing a book so that they can use it for other purposes. Right. Where. Which is. Might be speaking gigs and stuff like that, which, hey, it's great. But I've always, you know, one of the reasons I haven't written one yet is I tell people, I don't know what I'm gonna. I don't have anything. I don't have anything to say right now that I think is book worthy. But to your point, you've taken your philosophy that you guys have been preaching now for years and just applied it into book format. I think that's. That's awesome.

Exactly what it was.

Yeah.

Yeah. So. And it turned out great. We're excited about it. And, you know, it does. Our team was just telling a story on a executive briefing, which is the first meeting we have with in our sales process. They were talking about diving into exit planning was the big concern for this business owner. And they left the book behind because there was just such a natural conversation around. The owners were trying to. Trying to connect the dots on how it all comes together and like, well, here's, here's a really good way to understand it. And so that was a story yesterday, I think our team was telling us.

That's awesome. That equals credibility. So let's go to that advising. Earlier you mentioned that you guys have taken your advisory to a whole new level where you have taken on some work with clients where you're just providing the strategic planning. Yeah. Not even selling them the insurance, which for a lot of people in the industry would be like, what? Why, why aren't you, why aren't you selling the insurance, too? I equated it to a Trojan horse. We're like, yeah, that's great. Provide the service like that first, and I guarantee it's going to lead to becoming their insurance advisor down the road. But I'd love to talk about why you made the shift and kind of what, what that looks like for you guys, because again, most. Most don't think that way.

Yeah. I mean, going back to Encore and building the sales process, that's where it starts. Our sales process. We're very diligent about it. We have a set series of meetings. We go through. We go through some really cool exercises. One specifically called the card exercise, where we literally take the 10 impact areas of risk and we have them kind of prioritize risk in their minds. And it's amazing to watch, you know, the different owners or executives of business have different perspectives on risk and the dialogue it creates and the mindset shift that happens in that moment is amazing. And so what we realized, and actually, I mean, it happened kind of organically and by accident, frankly. But what we realized is we had people saying this is an incredibly valuable process. Like, I would pay for this, or I would like to just engage in this. We're like, well, you know, what the heck? So as we continue to go through our sales process and those exercises, our mind started to shift to, well, we could 100% put a focus on this being just a way we engage with clients. We could probably figure out a model in which we charge for it, and it allows us to sit in a seat of More of a coach from a risk management standpoint and help them navigate through these things that are challenging their mind. So that's where it started. And so what we're doing ultimately today, I mentioned earlier, we have the verticals, we have the insurance side, we have the benefits, we have the safety and we have the exit planning. Those are direct solutions taking a step higher, which is where we can sit there and go through essentially our sales process over time with our clients. So the way we've structured it is we do them on an annual agreement, but we break it down into quarterly sprints. And the idea is each quarter we're generally going to dive into one of the 10 impact areas of risk and just sit in that coaching role. So like if it's insurance as an example, we're not doing policy audits necessarily. We're not, we're certainly not going out and securing any. We're just telling them, here's the things that make you a better consumer of insurance. Here's the expectations you should have when it comes to renewal. Here's the expectations you should have when it comes to claims management. Here's the expectations you should have when it comes to whatever. Here's, here's the, you know, here's the things that make you a best in class business in the eyes of the insurance marketplace and just give them the education to be better consumers of insurance. We're not saying we're going to step in and replace the current relationship. It makes it really valuable and really easy to engage. And by the way, a big part of it, those that are in the insurance world know some of the hurdles. Even when you have a really good model. Hurdles are existing relationships. That's my brother in law. Or it's, it's, you know, about to retire, so give it a few more years. Or it's timing, you know, the renewals we just renewed and you know, insurance companies get weird with Bors sometimes or whatever, those barriers all go away. It's like, look, we're not looking to step in. We'll just sit in that advisory model and we can engage immediately. So the sales process shortens. We're able to engage, we're able to shift mindset. And to your point, we don't set it up at all as like a technically a Trojan horse or any sort of bait and switch idea. We're very clear. But when we get into that role and we spend the time, they naturally start to raise their hands and say, hey, you know, you've been giving me really good advice. Why don't you guys just step in and handle the benefits? Or why don't you guys just step in and do the insurance or the safety consulting? And so it's a really, really cool way to be able to engage but I can't stress enough how much it shifts the mindset the right way around. So accelerate sales process speeds up mindset and it essentially allows us to get compensated to, to continue to take people ongoing through our sales process. It's awesome.

I think a lot of advisors in the industry today are trying to get hired because they bring in a different idea like a cost containment strategy. And my argument is you got to get the agent record first to build that trust and credibility. But in your case you're getting the trust and the credibility even before you get the AOR by bringing the advisory role. I think that is phenomenal and I've witnessed the 10 area of risk Card Xerces exercise and I think it's, it's really cool to watch the business executive look at that and almost like they're playing a game and then, and then before you know it, they've got the top three sitting there. Yeah. And it absolutely drives an impactful conversation.

It's. Yeah, it really is cool. And then we've, you know, we've built our own internal technology to support all this as well. So to, so to build out the assessments that we're able to go through in the strategy relationship, strategic relationship and be able to give outputs and, and score things against peers and against industries. You know, we've got all that proprietary software that we're utilizing. It takes the card exercise and digitizes it.

And so really about that, Andy, if you don't mind. Launch. Yeah, yeah. You guys have built out the, you've created the software to help talk, talk about launch a little bit. I think what you guys are doing that with that is really cool.

It's really cool. And it's, it's probably since you've seen it, it's, you know, 10x what it was. Elliot spends a ton of time there. But yeah, really cool. It essentially was digitizing the sales process like taking our message model and belief and putting it in a digital format. And so we did it internally. We also saw some opportunity and need for like minded firms to be able to have access to something similar. So there are a handful of firms across the country that are using launch and their agencies to deliver a similar message. But I mean at the end of the day it's a, it's a portal in which we can Take all of this information, all of this process, all of this strategic design we're doing and putting it into one spot where we can holistically make sure that all the work we're doing on behalf of a client is getting correlated and coordinated and being able to create the inputs, the outputs, the visuals for the client to understand what we're doing, how they're investing their time, our time into whatever it is we're engaged with is starting to show, you know, an ROI or some sort of success. And so, you know, it'd be deep to get into launch as a whole. But like high level, that's 100% but high level, that's the idea and it does. There's another tool that really quickly shifts the mindset of a client. When you can put that up, you know, in a meeting and start walking through it early on, they're like, oh yeah, okay, now I get it, I get what you're talking. I understand this holistic risk advisory model idea belief.

I'd love, as we kind of start to, to get to the, towards the end here with law. With that in mind with Launch, I'd love to get your thought leadership. Put your thought leadership cap on for a second. I gotta believe, you know, the AI. There are AI components in, in launch. When you look at AI and it's the impact it's going to have on the industry, I'd be curious your thoughts on where you guys see opportunity to leverage it. You know, it's funny, I have some agencies who are still telling me that they're contemplating their stance on and I'm like, I don't know what you're, what you're, what you're talking about. It's here. You better have a stance and it better be the right stance.

By the time you have a stance, it's going to pass you right by.

Exactly, exactly. So just talk about maybe like your, your take on it and how you, you see opportunity for agencies like yours to leverage AI to continue to create that organic growth you're looking for.

I mean, it's an amazing tool, right? So we use the term human optimized tech driven. At the end of the day, it's still a relationship business. We're still going to bring the best people in, but we're going to use AI to make our people better. To make to. The way we look at it is if we can use whatever the AI tools are, and there's lots of them, we're using lots of them. If those tools allow us to be able to Take whatever it is off of our team's plate so that they can, as the human, go in and deliver at the highest level the client experience and be client engaged. That's where we're going to invest in any sort of technology, any sort of AI. And so that's going to be the belief. It's not we're replacing people mindset, it's we're empowering our people to deliver the highest client experience. And whatever that tech tool, AI is, we're going to invest in it to give our team the best path to success for our clients. Because at the end of the day, that's what it's all about. The more we deliver that client experience and the results at the client level, we achieve our goals, our clients achieve theirs. I mean, that's the beauty. What I can't tell enough to people about being in a more strategic advisory model is at the end of the day you can sit down and say, I'm on the same side of the table as you client, I'm not selling you insurance as a commission based product that we're going to have that we're sitting here where it's like, if you grow, we grow. If our job, if we're doing the right thing with AI tools, with whatever it is we build internally at Ellerbrock Norris to deliver at the highest level so you can achieve your goals and grow as a company and support, support the communities we all serve, we all win. You grow, we grow, we make money together. And the moment the people connect that dot, and that's one of the beautiful things I get to do in the CEO role is sit in those meetings with prospects and clients and say, look, we're just like you. We're not, we haven't, we never will, and don't plan on it at all. Sell to private equity or any of the big firms. We're navigating the same things you are as a company. And they're in the same spot. They're a manufacturer, wholesale distributor, construction, whatever, trying to remain privately held, independently owned. We're in this together and that is a really cool thing. And so back to the AI question. Anything we're going to invest in, if it allows us to support that belief, then we're going to invest in it all day.

Well, and I think what you said is spot on. It's not to replace us, it's to make us better. And I think I see a lot of agencies trying to figure out how to use it so that they can spend more time on what matters Most now it's how. What are you defining as what matters most? To me, it's you actually being in front of a client and prospect, being the strategic advisor. So anything you do behind the scenes that you may have taken pride in in the past should be done with AI and be automated now so you can spend the majority of your time in front of a client or prospect being the strategic advisor.

I mean it's stuff like, you know, on the insurance side. Policy audits. Yeah. I mean people took pride in being able to open up a policy and pull out all the things that are wrong. Spend that time on a phone deepening a relationship with a client. Let the AI give you those tools.

Love that. Yep. One more question, then we're going to get to know you a little bit. If you're okay with it, Get a lightning round for you. I do want you to give your take because you know, when I look at the spectrum of the industry right now and I go, okay, what, what separates an agency that ends up going to 1 to 2 million dollars versus 1 that grows to 10, 20, 50 or 100. I think it's putting yourself in rooms with people who challenge you to think bigger. And you know, I know when we first met you, I think it was through, was it through Insight Performance Group?

Yep.

With Larry, Larry, Lenny. And you guys are still members?

Yep.

What does being a part of an organization like that do for you as an executive? Because I think it's important that insurance agency executives are in those rooms with other like minded individuals.

Yeah, I mean I can't stress the value of peer to peer groups where you can get in think tank, share thoughts. What I always, what I learned really quickly in our, in our relationship with Insight is everybody's navigating very similar things but they're on different stages of the journey. You know, some are, some are, we're further along in the journey and some are much further along than us. So you don't have to reinvent the wheel all the time on how you're going to navigate certain things as you grow. And so having those that trusted peer group that can kind of help tell you how they navigated through it doesn't mean it's me the way you're gonna do it. But like that's so, so valuable. And seeing, you know, seeing the different things that, that people navigate through just because of geographic differences or because of, you know, just market, you know, trend differences in certain areas, like all of this information that you can take in, internalize and then go deploy, however it makes sense for you. You just can't get that elsewhere. And I, and people, it kills me because people are always like, well, I don't, I don't want to give the secret sauce away to the competition. That is such narrow minded thinking. I can't even explain. It's like go. If you're, if that's, if you're scared of that, then your secret sauce ain't that good. Right. And so at the end of the day, like that, to me, it was like, we're gonna go, I'm gonna go at the top of my lung, share what we're doing. Because if any firms that are trying to achieve what we're doing can take pieces.

Yeah.

And get better, it makes the industry better. It makes, you know, our, the, the, the communities we serve better for it. And so we always took that mindset is we're going to be an open book. And those that are similar to us, we get incredible value from one another and we ultimately grow together.

I'm so glad you said. I've actually had agency executives turned down being on the show because they don't want to share anything on the show.

That's wild. Yeah. Like, I just, I can't understand that, you know, and, and I'll be, and to be honest with you, being in Those, it's, it's returned 10x on us. I mean, we have opportunities right now that we're in, in conversations with firms all over this country with opportunity to do really cool things from a scale standpoint. And it's absolutely because of.

Yeah, it would have never happened had you not been in the room. Yeah, no, 100%. Well, let's get to know you a little bit, if you don't mind. I'm a big guy on habits, rituals, discipline, things like that. So this is going to be our quick, two, three minute chance to get to know Andy Bassett. You cool?

All right. Yeah, let's do it.

All right, Andy. So I'm big on morning routines. What does your morning routine look like?

So I have a very specific morning routine. My wife would, she'll laugh if she listens to this. I'm an early riser, so I'm up at 5. I work out right away, so I'm a workout. Like it's just, if nothing else, it's a stress thing. So I get up 5am I work out. We have a sauna. So I do sauna after the workout and then I cold plunge. So that's, I do the whole. I love it. I've gotten it yeah. So my morning from about 5:15 to about 6:45 is workout, sauna, cold, plunge, and then I make the coffee, take one up, hand my wife one, get myself one. So that's my morning before. And if I miss it, man, feels off. Yeah, it really does.

Well and I important point there. You don't have your coffee until it's done.

No. Yeah, none of that. Yep.

If you have your coffee too early, it actually can create some undue anxiety with the, with what? You know, the caffeine if you have it too quick. But I, you know, I saw somewhere you should wait 60, 90 minutes to have your first cup of coffee.

Well, and so that's. And I know there's all different, like the hot cold therapy, which order you do it in, which order you work out. I know there's lots of ways for me it works best to work out heat, cold.

I love that. Well, so I'm going to go to the workout quick. So you get, you got an hour to do a workout. What's your workout of choice?

So it's funny, it's all over the board. We have a peloton. So I like to do, I kind of work, I would say hit workouts.

Okay.

One day, just a varying degrees, bike the next day. So I just kind of alternate.

Yeah. Awesome. I love it.

And the hiit workout, they're kind of all over the place.

Now you've got, you're a girl dad, so. Right. You've got a wife with two daughters.

Yep.

You got an afternoon to yourself. What are you doing?

Oh man. Any. Well, if it's an afternoon, the answer is not travel. But that is our thing as a family. We absolutely love to travel. But honestly it's anything I can do to, to hang with the family make. At the center of my purpose. Absolutely. Is my wife and kids. And so you know, oldest is a senior now. So we're going to, we're awfully close to being empty nesters. But you know, I'm a golfer. I'm all the things. But like I all of that took an absolute backseat the moment we had kids. And so to answer your question, my answer is not to go. Like I'm very strategic about things like golf. It's gonna be client related. It's gonna all that. But if I have an afternoon, I'm not necessarily choosing to go hit the golf course or whatever. I'm just gonna figure out something we're gonna do to hang with my kids. I love that.

Where's the daughter going to school next year?

So the oldest is at KU right now.

Oh, okay. You're three.

The youngest. I have one there. Yep. And the youngest, there's a. She's gonna be at KU as well. So we're gonna ask Nebraska.

What. What happened here?

Very good reasons for both of them. Program specific for my oldest and then my youngest is really interested in medicine and cancer specifically. And turns out the University of Kansas has a big cancer undergrad medicine program, so.

Awesome.

They have reasons. They're actually both dialed. And I love it. That's because of their. That's because of their mother.

Well, last question. Books, podcasts. What do you listen to right now? Anything you find interesting.

Yeah, you know, so I'm all over the board on podcasts. Books. So what was the most recent? So I actually got off of a couple business books, but so I'll talk about, let's just say a couple of my favorite books. Extreme Ownership is one of my favorite books I think I've ever read. So if those of you that haven't read it should. And then one. I was just talking about this book last night. Cause I'm reading a couple different ones right now, but I'll get to the. One of my favorite books is a book called Die with zero. And I know it sounds extreme in what it is, but the idea in the book, and I've carried it forward a ton, so you talk about what I do in an afternoon. The idea is to think through currency differently in your mind, which is not just money, but it's time. It's health and it's memories and being able to balance all that while you have your health, while you still have time and you're building a business and making money as business owners. The. The pieces I took out of that book have carried me forward so much. So I just. That was a very significant read for me to just get some mindset shift I needed. And so I mentioned travel and things with family. Look, we do it.

I think that to your point, two books that have had a big impact on me with money was. That's one out of that. It got me thinking of money. Like convenience credits.

Yeah, there you go.

I use money to create convenience in our life. And then the other one was Dan Martell's buy back your time, which I know Elliot I think is involved with. Dan is. It's the whole purpose of using money to buy back your time.

Yep. Yeah. Similar. Very similar concepts in that.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, Andy, this has been awesome, man. If somebody was tuning in, got inspired, just want to maybe shoot you a message on LinkedIn. What would be the easiest ways to reach out to you?

Yeah, I mean, obviously if you search me on LinkedIn, you'll find me. I'm checking it regularly. If you go to our website, ellerbrock norris.com you know, all the, all the, you know, my email and everything is, is on there and I'm, I'm in tune to that all day. So, yeah, I'd love to have people reach out. I said before, I'm an open book. We love to share what we're doing. We believe in what we're doing in every way, shape and form here at Ella Brock. And the more we can share that, the more it makes people better. That's what we're all about.

That's why you guys are successful, man. So. Well, Andy, thank you. This was awesome.

Yeah, appreciate it. It's fun. Let's do it again.

I hope you took a lot from this. This is a guy who, who runs an agency that is on the fast path to explosive growth. So thank you. Take notes and replicate and duplicate because this is the way to do agencies today. Be good everybody. That's all we got for this episode of the Accelerate your insurance sales podcast. One of the most valuable things you can do to help us and other new potential listeners find our show is for you to rate the show and leave a review. So as a special bonus for you, if you leave us a review, take a screenshot of your review and send it to me as a DM to my LinkedIn profile. I will send you a free copy of our LinkedIn Diamond Playbook, our proven four step strategy to grow your business on LinkedIn. So go right now, leave us a review, screenshot it and send me a DM on LinkedIn. Also, please share this podcast with anyone you think would enjoy it. That's it for now.