SPEAKER_01 0:00

So the wildest thing that's ever happened to me uh in my insurance agency was the time when I was almost tased. So I was a uh you know, I I I started my my insurance journey at the age of 23, and uh my hiring strategy at the time uh was to hire my uh sister's boyfriends. And so I had hired I had hired uh two of them at the time. Uh one was uh you know, Trevor formerly or at the time was uh twirling signs, selling gym memberships, and and then the other one um was uh his name was Rich. He was out of uh out of Michigan. He was I think he was selling suits at the time. So um, you know, we're going you know a couple years in, maybe it's like two, three years in at the time. So I've tr Trevor moves to California, so we we have a lot of success in Arizona. I have this bright idea. Hey, Trevor, let's go open up a farmer's agency in California. So he moves out to California. You know, he's got he's got this, you know, this girlfriend there. So me and and uh the girl I'm dating at the time, we fly out there, see him. My girlfriend's cold, gets the hoodie from his girlfriend, comes back, and somehow the hoodie ends up with my sister, who of course they're not together anymore, right? So now it's you know, I'm I'm sitting in the office, there's all this conversation about this, this, this $80 hoodie. So I call Trevor up at the time, who's who's not, you know, he hasn't produced very much in the last three months. So I'm I'm yelling at him, he's yelling at me, where's the hoodie? I was like, you guys became about this hoodie. So conversation's over. I'm like, you haven't produced anything in three months, you know, we're we have this big blowout. So hang up the phone, probably about like 40 minutes later, and just to preface, they had uh moved back to Arizona, you know, it's this whole dynamic between Arizona, California, all that fun stuff. Come back. So they're here, and you know, 40 minutes later, his girlfriend kind of shows up with her bare feet in front of my desk, in front of all my employees, and and says, Um, you want to take this outside? And I was like, man, I was like, are we uh are we are we gonna fight about this? Like, what's going on? I was like, okay, so we walk, we walk outside the door. It probably wasn't really great to have the whole situation with, you know, small my little mini insurance sweatshop at the time. Uh so I I walk outside the door and you know, she's kind of you know jawing at me, and all of a sudden she pulls out from her from her hoodie a taser and then like presses it and zaps it. And I was like, Oh my man, you're gonna you're gonna tase me over an eight out. I was like, come inside, I'll write you a check. I was like, let's go. So we went inside, you know, I wrote her a check. I was like, what's really going on? Talk to her for a little bit. She went on her way, but that's my uh wildest story. My name's Dan Garzella with the Garzella Group. We're in Scottsdale, Arizona, and I'm an insurance dude.

SPEAKER_03 3:05

You are our first taser story. Not to, you know, I don't I I I hope I did the story justice.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

Yeah, I was trying I was trying to remember it, but the the long the long and short of it was is there was a taser and I was I was about to get zapped over an $80 hoodie by one of my uh sisters ex-boyfriends.

SPEAKER_03 3:22

I caught I caught something interesting there. You said I got I would hire all my producers from my sister's ex-boyfriends, which seemed to me like there was a lot of opportunity to hire people.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

Yeah, well uh Yeah, well, there was, you know, my I uh I I moved out to Arizona at the age of 23, start a farmer's agency. Uh I mean you know, when you're when you're a captive agent, there's not not a ton of revenue. And so, you know, I'm hiring people, you know, I mean, they were both, you know, graduated high school, whatever. Uh um one sister moved out, and then you know, he was Trevor was selling gym memberships, so that was you know, I could afford to bring him over and mentor him. He's still with me today, by the way, so he's been with me for almost 20 years, which is awesome. Whole nother incredible story. And then, and then, and then uh Allison was, you know, she was in Michigan, and uh, you know, I was talking to, you know, met her boyfriend, and he was actually a smart dude, and I was like, Oh, why don't you come out to Arizona? And so, you know, that was two of my you know first three employees, three or four employees that just kind of got me off, got me off the ground, and then you know, I kind of built in group from there. But yeah, it was my initial hiring strategy. I was like, Yeah, you know, you guys, you guys seem like you you you're good at what you could be really good. Like, yeah, come on over.

SPEAKER_02 4:30

That's how we do it when we first start, huh? Like it's just like you guys seem cool. Come work for me.

SPEAKER_01 4:36

Yeah, come work for me. Well, yeah, well, you got to be resourceful, right? Like you're you're just yeah, I mean, you can barely make it yourself. You're trying to figure things out, and it's like, how am I gonna do it? And it's just like, okay, I'll take this piece over here, this piece over here, and uh, you know, and just grind. 100%.

SPEAKER_02 4:50

So, dude, Dan, what got you into this business? How is this what you wanted to do when you were eight years old and playing with uh No, you know what?

SPEAKER_01 4:57

I originally wanted to be a race car driver, and then my father told me I was too tall. So he's like, That you're never gonna be a race car driver, shared my dreams, and from then on, whenever someone told me I couldn't do something, I was always motivated to do it. So I I have to thank him for that. But no, when I when I moved out here, I uh I got my degree uh you know computer science IT. And so I'm from Michigan originally. Um I had a a good friend of mine that moved to Scottsdale, Arizona a couple years before I graduated. So me and a bunch of buddies flew out to Arizona, visited them, absolutely loved it. I I hate the cold weather, so you know I got to Arizona, I was like, ah, it's great out here, you know, love the weather, nightlife, like you name it. I was like, I'm sold, but I couldn't, you know, transfer to ASU at the time, even though I I tried, I thought about it, didn't make any sense. So then I had another friend of mine, you know, so then I finished college graduating. Another friend of mine, his parents were moving to Tucson, and so he called me up and he said, He said, Hey, I know we talked about moving to Arizona. Um, you know, I'm gonna move there because my parents are moving. What do you think? And I was like, Well, I weighed tables all throughout college. Um, so I figured I could probably get a job doing that relatively quickly. And then, you know, I had some seasonal management experience as well, and so I said, Yeah, I'm in. So two weeks, uh I told my parents I'd be gone. My I had $500 to my name. Uh dad wrote me an emergency check for another five hundred dollars, took everything I could pack into my little hatchbet, uh hatchback Mitsubishi Eclipse, and off to Arizona I went. And I uh originally went uh so I got to Arizona over two weeks. I went to probably like 50 different bars and restaurants. Uh, got a job at this fine dining restaurant on Camelback uh called Harris's at the time. I was like, I'm set, you know, I got a fine dining restaurant job, I'll be able to make my hundred bucks a shift, you know. Life's great. I went out that weekend, sent most of the money I had saved. Uh, went to go in my first day of work, and I saw the hiring manager with his head down and his shirt untucked, and I said, Hey, what's going on, man? He's like, Well, I hate to do the do this to you, son, uh, but the owner just came in today and shut down the restaurant. No. So I thought I had a job. I spent most of the money I had saved. I didn't have a job. I took the first job I could get, which was at Rosita's Mexican kitchen in Tempe. Took a second, no, actually, the first job was renewing readers' digest subscription, which was terrible. But I did learn, they did tell me that they're like, they're like, it's not asking marketing, it's telemarketing. And so that's the one thing I I learned from that horrible stint at renewing readers' digest subscriptions. Took another job at Rosita's Mexican kitchen, so two jobs. And then while I'm just starving and figuring life out and trying to look for something in my field, which is IT based, uh, recruiter, you know, from farmer's insurance called me, said it looks like you possess some of the qualities we're looking for. Why don't you come in for an interview? You know, I wasn't even gonna go into the interview because I was like, why do I want to sell insurance? You know, my current agent at the time wasn't super impressed with him, and uh, he's just like, why don't you just go and see what they have to say? So I went in, they're like, you know, here's what you can accomplish financially if you work hard. I was like, that's a win. And they're like, essentially, it's your own business, no one's gonna tell you what to do. I was like, that's another win. And so that's how I ended up getting into it.

SPEAKER_02 7:46

Woo! That is incredible. I love the I love the asking, asking marketing.

SPEAKER_01 7:51

Yeah, it's not asking marketing, it's tele. I'm sitting here on the phone, just hammering the phones, talking to, you know, eight-year-old ladies and you know, God knows who else. And you know, and he's like, it's not ask a marketing, it's telemarketing. Which the funny thing too is is I'm there like I'm I'm there in a suit, right? And everyone that's doing the telemarketing is probably like 15, 16, and 17. And so, I mean, I was like, yo, cool guy in college, and then I come out here and this is this is what what yo reality looks like, and a very humbling, humbling moment. But yeah, I'm I'm sitting in there just hammering these phones, they're playing music. I can't, you know, I can't hear myself talk. I'm going to turn down the music, they're yelling at me. Like it was just uh quite the experience of kind of getting into the uh insurance business.

SPEAKER_02 8:36

I mean that that had to help later on.

SPEAKER_01 8:39

Yeah, for sure. I mean, the you know, I I mean, I think most people, you know, the fear of picking up the phone and just getting through that. And I'm I'm actually more of an introverted person anyway, so that wasn't something I was comfortable with. I just kept, you know, day in, day out would just do it until I got comfortable with it. And and then, you know, and then of course you start to see success, and then you know, if you're a metrics person, which I am, I'm like, okay, I just need to call this many people to get these results, and I just need to do do it do it a lot, and uh, you know, then I can start to kind of forecast what the future looks financially. And so that's all started there. But uh yeah, it was good, good experience.

SPEAKER_02 9:13

It's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 9:13

And then you you got into the the old Yeah, so that was so that was I uh you know, I started with farmers, they had a uh unique program at the time. I don't know if they still have it, but it was it was a great way for someone with nothing to get started. So the way that they structured it, you know, I only had $500. Like I said, well, I had less than that because I had spent most of it, but I I had my emergency check and they uh you know basically gave you like a 90-day, you know, can you cut it or not? So, you know, being from Michigan, um I had no warm market because I was from Michigan. I know target market because I was 23, and their target market was like, you know, 35 two home or a home, two cars, etc. Uh, I had no experience and I had no money. So, you know, I had everything working against me, but they had this 90-day window, like give you access to the systems, phone, you know, some basic training and can you cut it or not? Thir 30 home and auto cross all three life policies. And so I uh you know worked day in, day out uh for for those 90 days, was actually able to hit the numbers and go to the next like six-month time period. So in the next six-month time period, they gave me effectively a loan of fifteen hundred dollars a month over uh six months, and they gave me benchmarks to hit. And if I hit the top numbers in six months, then they gave me a uh a loan over the next two years of about sixty-seventy thousand dollars to uh to to launch the business. And so um I worked uh two jobs seven days a week from 8 a.m. to midnight for about 11 months until I could support myself just selling insurance. And then I I hit those, you know, I hit those the six-month numbers. Then then once once you hit those and you go on the two-year program, they've got numbers to meet over four years. So they give you a loan over two. If you can hit the the top line numbers over four years, then they waive the whole loan. So I was able to, yeah, I was able to hit my four-year numbers in two years and then waive the whole loan. And so I basically was able to start with $500, you know, build the initial farmers agency um over, you know, get it launched, you know, first four years all I did is a ton of home and auto insurance. And then the uh, you know, the economic downturn came and I was like, okay, I'm I'm losing money faster than I can write it. You know, I've only got one option. I was like, how how do I how do I shift? And one of my mentors is like, well, why why don't you uh have you ever thought about commercial insurance? And I was like, sure. And I was like, how do I do it? And he's like, well, he's like, pick three industries you know you think you might relate to. So I picked uh apartments, commercial real estate, restaurants. He's like, start marketing, just kind of see which one, you know, which one you relate to and what you like. And so commercial property market, I just really took to and and so I focused on that. And over the next four years, I was top five out of fifteen thousand agents in the United States for commercial production for uh insurance. Commercial and so yeah, farmers. Okay and so that took me like you know, the next four years I did that, and then the following uh two was kind of the the my way out the door time period where I was kind of had that thought creep in my head, like you know, is it time to make a move? Is it time to make a move? And then and then ultimately I did. But I was able that's how I was able to get started, you know, with basically nothing and then grow it to a standpoint of you know, I was one of the you know top half percent in the company, and then sell it and use that as the launching pad for for my independent agency.

SPEAKER_02 12:22

Oh man, that is so cool. So I I I assume that you're crushing it with commercial and they're telling you you gotta sell more home and auto, right? And you're like, dude, I'm I'm killing it.

SPEAKER_01 12:35

Yeah, it was it was a version of that. So um I was I was absolutely crushing it with commercial. I at the time had nine employees, which is a decent size for a captive insurance agency. Um, I was also in five states, which you have to get a in the captive world, you know, at least in the farmers world, I have to get approval. Every state I want to go into, I need a business plan approval, a district manager that says yes. It's it's not an easy process. So so I had those five states, and then I and then all the people, you know, I had my home in auto, which I was still writing a pretty decent amount of, but the commercial, you're right, that's that's where it was at. And I was writing pretty decent sized commercial commercial policies, and then what happened is like anything else, you know, the market's cyclical, they weren't making money on an apartments or commercial property, which is actually what's just recently happened, coincidentally, uh, with the admitteds. But um, and the way they facilitate that is you know, they just price you out of the market. So so their direction wasn't write more home and auto, it was we want to write more of the two to five thousand dollar accounts. And I thought to myself, like, okay, I can do that, you know, I can shift my business model, I'll shift my marketing, I'll do all this because I still have my renewals. And then they ended up pricing my renewals up the same 40%. And you know, I was losing, you know, again, I I couldn't write new business, and I I I was losing my renewal book, and my team that I had made commitments and promises to, like, hey, this is where you can get with me. It couldn't get there anymore, and it wasn't you know, through any fault of my own. It was just, you know, it was just circumstances of the company taking a new direction. And so that's that's really what it was, is I got to a point where, you know, the the you know, the commercial that I had kind of built everything from wasn't there anymore. And then even on the person side, there was a new initiative, like they there had a new, like, this is our new person market to go to, and I'm just scratching my head, like, okay, how do I how do I manage that? And and my thought process was is by the time they figure life out, you know, which I thought would take about four years, like, you know, if I start over from zero, I think I can be back to where I was. And so that was kind of like how that whole thought process came to be from where I was at and then you know where I wanted to go.

SPEAKER_03 14:35

And so I imagine starting over again, no way, right?

SPEAKER_01 14:38

Yeah, it was uh yeah, at least under the same circumstances.

SPEAKER_03 14:41

It's tough.

SPEAKER_01 14:42

Yeah, it was it's real tough and it's scary. You know, I mean, I was uh, you know, from all all you know measurements, you know, I was I was fine. I had all the money I needed, I had you know my house, I had my son. Um, but I was uh you know, I was uninspired. And you know, I I could have I could have just went and just started acquiring like little farmers agencies, you know, that was kind of what the growth looked like. My employees I knew I'd eventually lose them, and I was just sad and uninspired thinking about it. Uh the other option starting over was really scary. Um, but I was super inspired by the thought of of going that route and the people you know that that helped me get to where I was, you know, now I could deliver on the commitments that I made from them. You know, there's just one challenge is I gotta start from zero. And and initially I I thought I was like, well, what if I can just buy an existing independent agency? You know, I'd already have revenue coming in. That seems like a brilliant, smart way to go. And so we called every independent agency we could find in the state. There was 400 that we called on. We found 26 that were interested, four that were semi-viable. And at the end of the day, every independent agency is very different, and none of them panned out, and very happy that they didn't pan out in retrospect. So eventually made the decision, you know, got with the team, said, Hey, we got two options. Option A is we stay where we're at. This is likely what the the future looks like, or option B is we can start over from zero. Um, you know, there's a lot of uncertainty there. Um, but you know, we can continue, continue on. And so, you know, we chose we chose to start start from zero, and I took the the money from the sale of the agency, plus a business loan, plus maxed out all kinds of credit cards, paid their salaries, all that fun stuff, and just start over and and start over in the independent world and uh rocked it out. Wow.

SPEAKER_02 16:24

That's incredible. I and I imagine there's like an identity piece to that, right? Like you were probably known as you know one of the top salesperson with the company. You dedicated 10 years, and I just imagine that starting over from scratch was like a real kind of kick in the pants, like the feeling of it as well.

SPEAKER_01 16:41

Yeah, I mean it was it was uh so I the way I looked at it is yeah, certainly starting over, because you know, there again, I had my house, I had my son. It really what it broke down to is just asking myself the question, like what are you committed to? Right. And I just thought about it like I had I had it all per se, but I wasn't happy. Um, and if I start over, I was happy, but I, you know, I had a lot to lose. And but it was like, what are you committed to? And so I just looked, I just really thought about it and said, look, if I can just afford an apartment to put me and my son in, you know, even if I lost my house and all that, like that's what I'm committed, that's the level I'm committed to. And and I was confident, like, you know, the marketing systems were mine, you know, I owned them, I developed them all the you know, that was all me. And so in my mind, I was like, I'm just going from like having one option or one plug in the wall or however you want to look at it, and now I've got lots of options. So I'm like, if I take that same level of effort and apply it to having more options for new business, meaning a higher close ratio, and more options for renewal business, meaning I can have a higher retention ratio, like I should be able to, you know, I should be able to just, you know, shotgun and uh and grow really fast. And we did within um 18 months, we had already outwritten our 10-year farmers book. So the uh the results were were were exponential. And it was, you know, we we never looked at it. Then I had another problem. Then I had a problem where in order to keep up the growth, I had to keep going into debt. I had to keep I'd keep bringing on uh you know, bringing on uh you know uh racking up my credit cards or bring taking on the business loan or whatever so I could sustain that growth. And because you know, in the in the insurance business, you know, you're waiting on those renewal cycles, and so you're running all the business up front, you're breaking even up front at best, and that's the back end where you're making where you're making that money. And so at that fast of a growth rate, in order to sustain it, you have to keep reinvesting for for quite a while until it just uh you know, until the the revenue just greatly exceeds or yeah, the revenue greatly exceeds the expenses.

SPEAKER_03 18:30

I think once that's understood and you're confident in that, it changes everything, even in the captive model, right? Where you're kind of handcuffed and it doesn't quite pay the same.

SPEAKER_01 18:40

Yeah, and the captive model, like don't get me wrong, like gave me a start, gave me a ton of knowledge, like very thankful for for that model and and everything there. I I just got to a point to where it was no longer a fit and I capped out that business model. So, you know, and and I was you know really young. I was still 32 at the time or something like that. I mean, I still think I'm young, but yeah. But I had a lot of life on me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:03

So when you when you started getting into commercial, I mean I I imagine going from home and auto into commercials pretty tough, especially since there's not a like a linear path. Like how how did you start getting into doing like apartment complexes and stuff? What what did that look like?

SPEAKER_01 19:18

Yeah, so I mean you you gotta look at uh you know, you know, first you look at your your target market, so apartment owners, and then what are what are all the the trades? And you could do this for any business, but but what are the you know the trades or other businesses that are constantly touching that single business? So like related to apartments, you know, you've got your property manager, you got the people that manage the business, and you got the people that are you know selling selling the on the real estate and the people that are lending to the real estate, you know, we would market, of course, direct to owners, and then we'd market to the property management companies, which of course are working with the owners. Then we, you know, build relationships with the the commercial lenders, and then of course the commercial real estate agents. And so by doing that in in one market and then scaling it, you know, really what I do is I proof concept in one market, and then I scale it to the other markets. And so that's effectively how how it started. And in the unique, semi-unique thing with at least the commercial property market, it's probably like this with restaurants too, is those things start to spider. So they don't just own a property in Arizona, you know, they've got one in California, you know, maybe one in Washington, Oregon, and then they know someone in their network and they refer someone, then they own properties all over. And so it just kind of starts to spider a little bit as far as you know the network, and then you just kind of evolve with it. And so that's really how it was is just marketing to those various sources. And also, you know, the other thing too that from a commercial insurance standpoint is you know, you get involved in socio associations because your entire target market is all part of that association. Uh, the key thing is that you gotta be involved. You know, it's not just like I show up to a meeting and then leave, it's like I'm working to get on like a board or or one of those types of things to where you become the go-to and the in the trust level super high. So I just did a lot of that and then you know, and then I taught my team to do that, and then we just duplicate it over and over.

SPEAKER_03 21:02

That's awesome. Find what works and keep going, right? Push pour gas on it.

SPEAKER_01 21:06

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 21:07

So what what does it look like now with uh how much how much farther along? What or when was the when did you leave the farmers?

SPEAKER_01 21:15

So we sold that in uh 2014, and then we uh of course launched Garzala Group in that time and then just started with I think nine employees, dropped down to seven or so, and then you know, and now across the various companies that I own, we're around 50 or so employees.

SPEAKER_03 21:33

Love it. And all insurance or do you have a lot of it?

SPEAKER_01 21:36

Yeah, all insurance related. Yeah, so I I uh so I own, let's call it four revenue producing insurance related agencies. There's some other ones on the way right now, but e each one solved a challenge for the other. And then once I solved it, I I monetized it. So Garzella Group is the the OG, and then within that, you know, I had talked a little bit about how we uh we specialize in commercial. Properties, so apartments, commercial real estate, hotels, motels, etc. And one of the challenges that I consistently ran into, you know, as an independent agent, is you know, I I'd work with large ownership groups, say that you know they got five, ten thousand plus units, and you know, the insurance person they're working with also knows what they're doing. And they're also very good at what they do. And so when you're in a competitive situation against them, you know, that well, the conversation comes up, well, what do you have that that my guy doesn't? And I've got an answer for that. But the reality is, is you know, not a lot because we all have access to the same markets, it's just more of a knowledge thing of programs in different locations and and just being on top of stuff and relationship building. So I didn't have it, so I built it. And uh that's what Avalon is. So Avalon's our proprietary apartment insurance program for apartment owners, commercial real estate. And so I launched that as a solution to having something exclusive that when I go to these ownership groups now and they say, you know, what do you have that that my guy doesn't? You know, I say, well, well, we have Avalon, right? And so that was uh an absolute game changer when we launched that.

SPEAKER_02 23:02

And what does Avalon do exactly?

SPEAKER_01 23:04

So it's a program manager, effectively. So our target market is you know large uh apartment owners across the US. We've got a uh billion dollar per occurrence loss limit, and we've got you know 30 different reinsurance companies supporting that. And right now it's property only, and we're just about to add our uh tier one tower, uh, which is for you know hurricane exposed properties, as well as our general liability tower. So our we'll have our companion GL. But it's you know exclusive to our agents, and it gives us a significant um you know leg up in the uh property insurance game uh when someone's asking you, you know, what do you have that my guy doesn't? And and it's it's been an incredible win for us.

SPEAKER_03 23:44

Talk some more about that. That's really interesting.

SPEAKER_01 23:46

Yeah, so um Avalon is I think you know, we launched in 2021. We write in almost all 50, probably 46 of the 50 states we're writing in. We, you know, from uh and we we we have we'll probably write, I don't know if you want like the appetite guys or what, but we'll we'll write 50 million per location. I mean, we'll we'll basically write anything that makes sense. You know, we're looking, we look at two things. We look at the the property uh itself, and then we also look at the ownership groups because you can have a really nice looking property, but if you've got uh an ownership group that um you know isn't fun to work with, isn't transparent, isn't a lot of things, like you probably don't want that property. It's gonna increase your propensity for loss and it's gonna cause a lot of problems. So what we're able to do through our structure with Avalon is we're able to kind of weed out a lot of the problem children, which uh the end result is uh a very very strong rate and term structure, which keeps us competitive for for in the long term for the long term in the marketplace, and not only with our agents, but also you know, maintaining um a competitive product for for our members.

SPEAKER_02 24:53

Awesome. And then so the that's two out of five so far.

SPEAKER_01 24:56

So you have three other.

SPEAKER_02 24:58

I found dark horse.

SPEAKER_01 25:00

I like dark horse. Yeah, dark horse is a cool name. So dark horse is our uh I call the platform, agency platform. The most common term people refer to it as an aggregator, but uh aggregators provide contracts, profit sharing, et cetera. Like you need those just to operate, so we're not just uh, hey, we give you contracts, play. There's also the other side of the fence, which is like a franchise, which is like Goosehead, which they provide a ton of uh infrastructure, scalable infrastructure and support. And they also take a grip of your renewal commissions, and of course, it's you know, they're branding Goosehead, they're not necessarily branding you. And so we kind of fit right in the middle to where we're of course providing the the contracts that the um that the agents need to launch, like of course, but we're also providing the scalable infrastructure, the infrastructure that's allowed us to scale our you know retail branch from zero to you know 70 million plus in you know less than less than 10 years because you know as you're you're you're growing, you get to one growth point, and then you need to reconfigure things to get to the next one, and then reconfigure to get to the next. And so there's challenges that come along with that. And while you know, some of our competitors will take you shopping, you know, they'll be like, oh, this is your agency management aisle, and this is your you know, accounting aisle, and this is this aisle, and and you do the best you can to put it together and figure it out like we just figured. Um and so they come to us for that platform. And the it was originally conceived because you know, our hiring strategy um early on when we launched Garzella Group is we're gonna get back to this, um, is we hired a lot of uh entry-level um people out of college, you know, train and develop them, kind of similar back to you know, my my days when I started, um you know, 23 years old, you know, I just figured, you know, let's get people that that I don't have a lot of experience, but there's a lot of talent there that maybe these big companies don't want, so let's develop them. And so the challenge that I had though is we'd be developing them, and then eventually they get to a point, you know, four years, five years, they're like, I want to do this for myself. And so then they would leave. And I was like, well, rather than leave, why don't I just build it? And so that was originally what precipitated the the launch and the build of Dark Horse. And then of course I came from the captive world and I had realized all the fear and all the things that go into the just like, okay, I've got something here that's stable, but I'd really like to, you know, play a bigger game and all the fear that goes into it. And I was like, well, what if I just solved for that? And so that was that's the other piece of Dark Horse. And so we launched that as again the the challenge was is I wanted a path to ownership for my existing uh existing employees that I brought in and developed, and uh and also you know, for people that were in my shoes, and so that that was the problem that led to the solution, which now is uh dark horse in the marketplace.

SPEAKER_02 27:36

That's awesome. So I imagine you had some buddies at Farmers and you're like, hey, if you guys want to jump ship.

SPEAKER_01 27:44

Yeah, well, well, I uh I I did, but unfortunately they jumped ship before before I built it. So a lot of them, uh a lot of them had already left and and went, you know, went to you know various uh various other groups. But for sure, you know, I was uh you know, it's it's it's a long sales cycle, let's put it that way, because you know, when you're a captive agent looking to go into the independent world, you've always you kind of kind of got this like you know bird chirping on your shoulder saying, I don't know, I think maybe it's time, I think maybe it's time. And you know, from the time you decide like, okay, I'm gonna act on that, I mean it's six to eighteen months. Like you're trying to figure things, I mean you spend probably at least six months trying to do some, you should be probably six months to a year doing some due diligence about okay, if I'm gonna do this, how am I gonna do this? And then you get to the point to where you've you've got a plan and it's okay, now I need to execute on the plan. And so, you know, the the sales cycle is really long when it comes to you know dark horse in in our target market.

SPEAKER_02 28:36

So it's just about you know kind of bringing those people in, getting interest, and then nurturing them through their own, you know, through their own uh their own cycle of of okay, when uh how am I gonna do this and when am I gonna when am I gonna do when you bring on a new client with dark horse, how long does it take them to get like do you guys have uh markers for like what to expect throughout different phases?

SPEAKER_01 28:58

Yeah, so the the fastest one, so we can build out the entire infrastructure that took, you know, probably us 18 months to two years of just working nonstop in like our fastest person did it in two weeks. It's typically four to six weeks to build it out, and and I think that within give me another six months, I think I can get it down to a two-week average as far as getting all the infrastructure set up, onboarded, agency contracts, like you name it ready to go. And then we've got um, and then of course, you know, we've got milestones over about the next 18 months as far as making sure that they're getting up to speed. You know, there's there's a couple things to think about. You know, you've got like your your core carriers, we call them our rapid launch carriers, you know, that's the ones that that most get. But then every market's a little bit different, and every agency's needs are a little bit different. So we start with the core and then we then we tailor to what the needs are for the specific agent or the market, and then and then we build from there. So, you know, if one or you know all the agents have little different niches, and so if they say I have like I I we had met with one that were probably gonna onboard beginning of the year that uh had a a cyber niche and they've got a significant amount of of premium they can bring for cyber. I I've already built Avalon, which is one program, and I was like, look, I can I can show you how to build that and connect the dots. So we'll do stuff like that. We're always looking what it what can we do to add value to the agent because we need you guys to be successful. We want you to grow. And so how do we do that? And we really think outside of the box as far as how to execute on that. And we do it over an 18-month time period, and then the checkpoints usually drop off a little bit because it's not as necessary. But we're always like, what do you need and how can we help?

SPEAKER_02 30:34

And what kind of revenue, like, or what kind of investment do people usually come in with and what kind of revenue are they at at the end of that 18 months?

SPEAKER_01 30:42

So it's it's very agent, it just depends on the agency and what they're bringing to the table. Like as far as you know, it's it's five grand is the uh basically to build the infrastructure, which which honestly should probably be like 25 grand, but it's five to get them launched. And then as far as what what type of money that they're they have saved, I mean that that's what I would say is you probably look, you know, you gotta figure out up front what your monthly expenses are, probably multiply that by 12 would be kind of my suggestion, and that that's the kind of the money that I'd I'd like to have there. And then you're looking to break even on your monthly expenses in six months. So you're setting your your marketing goals um and revenue goals to to meet up in that six-month time period. So you break even and you still have this money, and then you'll hit your renewals and and all that fun stuff. So there's a you know, a calculation, you know, dialed into kind of like making all that work. You know, as far as revenue, like our top agent, you know, is probably gonna be at eight million in premium, eight to ten within two years, you know, the the lower level ones, you know, maybe half a million. So it just really depends on the agent through market, a lot of different things. You know, we can we do everything we can to support get them launched at the end of the day, you know, they have to execute. So it just depends on on how good they are at executing. But we're we're there for them to put all the resources and IP into them that we can.

SPEAKER_03 32:04

Super cool. My head is is spinning right now. It's very exciting.

SPEAKER_01 32:08

Yeah, so that's that's that's that's three or five, right? Yeah, that's three. So four. So I uh we just launched an insurance accounting company. So one of the barriers to being able to scale is accounting. And insurance accounting is very, very different than your traditional accounting because you know you've got every time there's a transaction, someone adds a car, removes a car, you know, that creates an accounting transaction that needs to be accounted for. Then you have your whole agency bill system to where you know you've got your your general agent that's in between you and the carrier, and then you've got all the the money going back and forth between that. And and the way that that company launched, this is actually you know kind of a funny story. So rewind to like 20, I don't know, maybe 2017. My sister, who actually works for me, I don't know if I mentioned that. She she uh works for me, actually runs Dark Horse. Um, she was handling all of our accounting at the time. We were quite a bit smaller than we are now. And um, she uh uh informed me that she was you know pregnant with her first child. And she said, uh Dan, I'm gonna be gone in in nine months. And so effectively I I had nine months to to learn accounting. So before you know it, she she was gone and and I didn't learn anything. So I had I had to figure it all out within like you know two weeks to make sure everything worked and then and then manage it from that. And she came back, I was like, I'm never doing that again. And and so the first thing we did is uh you know that that that's where the redundancy part in accounting is important too, because if you have one accounting person and that person something happens to them, like now you gotta figure it out and business can't stop. So I outsourced it to a company, they did an okay job. I outsourced it to another company, they did an okay job, and finally I just was like, I gotta bring this back in house, hire someone. And so that was where the idea for insurance accounts came to be. I was like, I this is a pro if it's a problem for me, it's gotta be a problem for everyone. So I spent the next you know three years basically building it per se. Finally found the right person to run it and then and then just launched it. And so we do the insurance accounting from you know your smaller, smaller agency all the way up to you know agencies that got uh you know 50 million plus in in premium and more. And uh and the demand for that that company is incredible. So so yeah, that was that's insurance accounts. That one's uh it's it's a new launch, but it's not new. It's it's been and we've been living it over the past, you know, how many other years here and all my other companies perfecting it to be able to bring it to market.

SPEAKER_03 34:26

That's awesome. Is that is it accounting or is it bookkeeping too?

SPEAKER_01 34:29

Is it all of it? All of it? All of it. Uh we we don't we we refer out taxes, so we don't do too much in the tax space right now. We can do it. You know, the guy the guy running the company, uh he he was the financial controller for American Express North and South America for 10 years. So he's I brought him in. He's actually a friend of mine from from college. And I brought him in. I was like, man, I never knew uh what a badass you were. But he was like started putting financial projections together and all these things, and I'm looking at him like, wow, this is uh this is pretty incredible. So yeah, so he he runs he runs that company, does an incredible job, and then we have specialists and all the you know, uh applied epic, uh, MS360, easy links, all the all the major management systems we have specialists in. Um and uh you know he's able to do that. But to answer your question, yeah, we're we're basically doing, you know, we can do, you know, of course the commissions reconciliation, direct bill, agency bill, accounts payable, accounts receivable. I mean, we could do the whole full full stack or full cycle accounting. Um, and then we have optional add-ons for payroll and taxes and things of that. But for the most part, we're doing just the big bulk of uh the traditional agency accounting that you would need to run your agency and not have to worry about it.

SPEAKER_02 35:35

That's awesome. And and it is regardless of if they're with Dark Horse or not.

SPEAKER_01 35:39

Yeah, it was originally just Dark Horse in Garzella Group. You know, again, we we perfected it internally over the last three years and then finally got it to a place where like, okay, we're this is ready for uh to be commercially available. And so then we launched it in the marketplace. So now it's open to anyone that needs insurance accounting services. It's it's specific right now to those three uh management systems uh Pide Epic, AMS360, and Easy Links. And then um then we'll add probably Hawks off down the road and some others, and and we'll take calls and you know, if there's a specific use case that maybe we want to consider, we'll consider it. But for the most part, we just focus on the three major agency management systems and then managing all the accounting for those agencies.

SPEAKER_02 36:19

Makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 36:20

Then what's number five? So I was like, did I did I say five? So there there is a fifth one. This one's not generating revenue yet, though. This one's uh called lowermydti.com. That's really just a tool right now for our internal agents. So it's uh on the purse line side, we do a ton with uh mortgage and real estate, you know, lenders and real estate agents. And so the platform allows those lenders and real estate agents to refer their customers to the platform, which will then refer that customer to one of our insurance agents for the purpose of securing the homeowner's insurance for the loan. And the lowermydti.com, where it comes from, is the the whether the loaner closes or not is tied to the debt-to-income ratio. And part of that calculation, you know, you've got your principal and interest, taxes, and insurance. So an insurance is a part of that calculation. So you can have deals which are on the fence for qualifying or not qualifying, and even a small reduction in the insurance cost can make the difference between the consumer getting in that home versus not getting in the home. And as long as we take care of the consumer, then that takes care of the referring party, the mortgage real estate agent, which of course then takes care of us, the insurance agent. So right now it's just a tool. The long-term vision of that is we'll actually probably turn that into a leads company. And once we get the volume high enough, then agents that are on our platform uh will be able to subscribe to it, and then you know, we'll create connections with mortgage and brokers, real estate agents in various markets and whatnot. Um that's that part of it's still a ways off. But internally it's a tool that we're using with our existing referral partners. Cool, man. Wow, you got a lot going on.

SPEAKER_02 37:53

It's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 37:54

Yeah, yeah. Busy uh, you know, what one of the cool parts about uh going into the independent world is you know, you're the world of creativity just kind of opens up to you.

SPEAKER_04 38:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:02

You know, when you're in the when you're in the captive world, you know, it's just you know, the the company has the company's direction, and you know, you're you're gonna you're executing on that direction. Um, you know, a lot of a lot of personal lines, a lot of life insurance, uh, you know, oftentimes, and you know, whatever they want to write, which may or may not be may or may not be what you want to write. Once you get into that independent world, then it's like, oh man, I can I can do all this other stuff. So, you know, I just start getting ideas and start going and growing and and and the revenue is so much higher in the independent world that you have the ability to do that. Um whereas in the captive world, like it's just like the the margins just aren't such, and it's just not structured in a way, generally speaking. I don't want to speak for everyone, but generally speaking, it's not structured in a way to give you enough revenue to do all these other things.

SPEAKER_03 38:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 38:43

I don't think it's an it go ahead. You go. I was just it it just I like the way that you've done it, it's a great way to start and learn. You know, I mean uh it is interesting that they give you a loan um and then if you succeed, then okay, they forgive it. I feel bad for the guys that don't succeed and then have a loan to pay off the job they had. But uh that's interesting. You know, but but that's a it it fosters an environment where you can actually I think there's a little bit more connection and you get some some decent maybe some decent uh advice you know from the company and such.

SPEAKER_01 39:20

Yeah, you know, they show you the ropes and uh you just kind of you know, you just you're just figuring stuff out and just growing. I mean it was it was great. It was yeah, it was great until uh until I just outgrew it.

SPEAKER_03 39:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:31

And then I just you know decided that then you just gotta deal with the fear. That's like, okay, I I know there's something bigger out here. I'm I'm comfortable where I'm at, like I just need to get over here to that point, and it's just making that, you know, that come to terms with that yourself on again from from the way I look at what are you committed to? Like, okay, I'm committed to this. Okay, so what what are you really committed to? Like if I if I lost it all, you know, are you committed at that level? And or or most of it. And the the fact of the matter is is if you're already at good where you're at now, like, and you've got more options over here, like why why why wouldn't you still be okay?

SPEAKER_04 40:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:04

I mean, and then you just got to trust in yourself. And and again, I I I just was gonna work until it happened. So I wasn't worried about the amount of time or effort that it was gonna take.

SPEAKER_03 40:14

Yeah. There's some of us where it doesn't matter, you'll just keep pushing. It's like yeah, it's not gonna go bad because I'm just gonna keep going.

SPEAKER_01 40:20

Right.

SPEAKER_02 40:21

What are you seeing like when people come over without the experience? Like you had the experience of working commercial, you had your marketing systems. What are you seeing that when people join, how are they getting through that if they don't have those kind of things?

SPEAKER_01 40:35

So we're we're typically not bringing on agents like scratch agents that don't have any experience. I mean, it's more common to bring on uh I mean, we're very commercially focused at Dark Horse because that's what I was at Farmers. That I mean the margins in commercial are far larger than the margins in purse lines. So we'll bring on agents that are purse lines focused uh but have commercial ambition, and then we'll teach them that. You know, whether it's you know, we we have you know the resources internally, you know, we're able to leverage the resources for my other companies to help them. And then of course I've got a whole laundry list of of outside resources too that can help them uh you know from a marketing perspective, from a you know, knowledge education perspective, like like you name it. And as we're doing stuff, you know, I'm living it too in our retail branch. So I've got a unique, a unique selling proposition, the fact that I've got a retail branch that I'm doing it all the time. So as I'm learning and figuring things out in this retail branch, as things are changing, I'm pushing that over to Dark Horse and saying to our agents and being like, hey, here's a marketing source here. You know, here's uh you need staffing, I can solve for your staffing, you know. So all those challenges that come up we can solve for because I'm living it in my retail branch. And so I just bring that knowledge over to over to our agents to help solve their challenges.

SPEAKER_02 41:46

Let's say an agent comes on with you, builds it up to 10 million, situations change, they want to be able to sell the book. How do you guys handle that?

SPEAKER_01 41:54

So they can sell it to any agent in the network for whatever any agent wants to buy it for. If for whatever reason no agent wants to buy it, then we ask for first writer refusal to buy it back. If for whatever reason we don't want it, then you sell it on the open market.

SPEAKER_02 42:11

Cool. And if they ever wanted to take contracts, like let's say they wanted to just do it themselves after a while.

SPEAKER_01 42:18

Yeah, there's a a buyout provision. So we've got a five-year term on our on our agreement. Uh, I mean, I mean the goal is to provide so much value that you know you get to the five years and and you're like, yeah, there's just like maybe I I'd make an extra, you know, 10% uh by taking it out, but to have to like reconfigure and put all this together and then lose all this support, like it's not worth it to me. So so that's where we're at. But if for whatever reason it's not a good fit there, and they wanted to buy out that, buy out the the uh restrictive covenants, if you will, we provide that option. Cool, man.

SPEAKER_03 42:48

It's almost like a hybrid where you get you get a lot of the attractive features of the captive model, but the freedom of the independent model. Not to say that it's very much a lot of freedom here in our model. I just want to be very clear. There's a lot of freedom, and I love it. You're a free captive. I'm very free.

SPEAKER_01 43:06

Yeah, look, I I mean, look, every you know, every it's uh, you know, we're we're not for everyone. I I bring the experience of being in that captive world and the experience of being just pure independent. And, you know, I mean, I I I just like to work, so even now I work six, seven days a week. Um, but you know, everyone's got a kind of a different stomach uh for you know the amount of time, energy, and effort uh that they want to put into someone. And you know, of course, you've got your spouse and you've got just a lot of other things to think about. So, you know, I put together a platform that to the best of our ability solved for for all of that, but it's not for everyone, you know. Some people may say, Hey, you know, I want to do it this way, I want to do it that way. That's fine. You know, we just look for the people that are a good fit and you know, I I I look to help out everyone. You know, we've got uh you know, we we've got you know a podcast of our own that that we have and you know, and the goal of that is, you know, I'm just I'm just looking to help people, they could be with someone else and and if they get value from from you know hearing hearing you know my suggestions and thoughts then then great. What's the name?

SPEAKER_03 44:03

Give it a shout out. What's the name of the podcast?

SPEAKER_01 44:05

It's called uh From the Dark Horse's Mouth.

SPEAKER_03 44:07

From the Dark Horse's Mouth? Oh, that's a great name. It's a great name with a great name.

SPEAKER_01 44:14

Yeah, that was uh our former uh the marketing company we're we work with one of the former account executives was like you know Dan you should you should start your own podcast you know and here's what I would call it and I was like that's a great idea I've got zero desire to do a podcast or any social social media and then I found myself I was like you know the one thing I haven't done was a podcast in social media and so so that's how that whole thing came through so not not now I've got a lot of both.

SPEAKER_02 44:38

Yeah I don't think anybody really wants to do it at first but it's like it's such a good leverage way to get information out there and then when you get over you get over it like it's it's not too hard. Like this conversation's a fun conversation like I I would like to have this conversation with you two dudes.

SPEAKER_01 44:56

And so it's like for me it's like it's not that bad but you know life does happen and it's like hey what's the one thing you could put on the back burner doing the podcast you know so yeah it's it's it's a it's a lot I'm uh certainly more comfortable with it now than I was you know way back when you started but it's just like anything you know it's just like picking up the phone and cold calling or um you know speaking in public speaking in front of people it's just all those uncomfortable things like it you need to be you need to get comfortable being uncomfortable that that that's where your success is and so again it was just one of those things I wasn't comfortable doing and I was like that's where the growth is and so I'm gonna do it. And yeah it's it's pretty cool I mean you guys you guys I'm sure know like it kind of just grows and builds on itself and you know someone randomly reaches out to me and says hey I I heard you on your podcast and I'm looking for this or want to introduce you to this person and and it really just helps your uh you know the growth of your business just through awareness. I mean it's it's really cool. It just takes time.

SPEAKER_02 45:53

Yeah 100% it's it's shocking so sometimes you get comments and it's shocking. It's like wow yeah there are people that are listening.

SPEAKER_01 46:02

Yeah I was on a people come up to me I was like you actually listened to the whole thing?

SPEAKER_03 46:05

Yeah I was on a trip in Mexico and I was not related right but there happened to be another guy that was an insurance agent he goes hey are you Craig Pressinger for the insurance and I was like huh? My wife was just looking at me with her mouth like just a gape because she couldn't believe that somebody came up and and was treated me like you paid him didn't you Craig I did. I did and it worked. I got lucky that's funny. Yeah it's just so weird.

SPEAKER_02 46:31

Super cool so like I love that you said that um you know about being uncomfortable because that's what 100% and I think that's like get used to being uncomfortable and continue that that cycle of constantly like being in situations where you're pushing yourself. So like what are some other things that you're seeing that that maybe some big hurdles that you've gotten through and and how you did mentally but like what are you seeing from other agents? What are they what's getting them them through some of these things?

SPEAKER_01 46:57

So when you say some of these these things are you referring to just basically the insurance market conditions?

SPEAKER_02 47:02

Yeah insurance market conditions like what what are you seeing that's getting them through some of the most difficult times and um yeah well I think first and foremost like you have to continue to move forward.

SPEAKER_01 47:14

Like if you stop, you know like things are tough and you you you know kind of clam up and turtle shell it like that that that's a problem. So I think you have to move forward. You know we've spent the last couple years just really from an operational standpoint like okay we're not we're not quite you know selling as much as we we we would like to um but we're gonna use the time energy and effort to build something new or you know something you know we're we're gonna continue to build and grow so that when things do come around which they are by the way we're gonna be ready for that for that next uh next stage of growth. So I I think that it's just you know you you just have to continue to move forward. I also think that you know marketing solves a lot and and also it's it's a new looking for new ways to do things and new opportunities. For example back when I you know the way I got into commercial insurance you know like I had talked about before is you know in 2000 when the mortgage crisis hit and I couldn't write I was losing business faster than I could write it. It's like how do I hedge this? And so even though like in the moment like that's worst case scenario oh my God what am I going to do but without that moment I would have likely never went into commercial insurance which has been the catalyst for you know all of my future growth in these other companies so it's just really looking for the opportunity and the obstacle that presents itself and then once you find that opportunity then of course you know you you need to you need to to work through it and and grow it and build build something with it. So I think that in any any market any down market there's a significant amount of opportunity you just have to work work through it and you just need to look for it.

SPEAKER_02 48:45

Awesome.

SPEAKER_01 48:46

What are you looking at going forward what are you seeing as like a a couple huge opportunities that agents have so I think again I think the the the person market it's been an absolute train wreck the last couple years and and it's coming it's coming back around so I think that there's opportunity there. I think you know there's a significant amount of opportunity I'm gonna I'm gonna say the buzzword AI you know if you're not adopting and you're not an adopter a first adopter of AI I I think you need to be because you're gonna be able to leverage that technology to significantly grow your business. I mean if you look at it from a person standpoint first, you know personal inside high sales cost, high service costs, pretty slim profit margin. Well the more stuff that you can utilize AI for so that your people can focus on you know value driven tasks and reduce sales and service costs, the more that profit margin is going to increase and ultimately the way I look at it, the more I'm gonna be able to pay them. You know I I'd like to be able to pay them more and offer them more benefits and I I think AI is a way to do that. So that's on the person side commercial is a little bit more complex. So you know small commercial you probably see see more of the AI part of it first. But then there's also like the marketing capacity you know there's just a lot you can do with it. So I I think like on a going forward basis the biggest game changer is AI. The the hardest challenge for that is figuring out how to use it. You know you got to train it. There's a billion different AI everything's AI branded so you got to sift through all the BS to find you know something that actually works and so it takes a lot of trial and error on your side but I think that really that's the where the next uh significant growth is going to come from how are you leveraging it? So I actually built a uh conversational AI which we just launched related to X states so what that'll do is you've got uh you know you say you've got your whole uh you know say you've got a thousand X-states and as much as I'd like to think that my people are actively sifting through those even maybe yourself you know the the fact that they probably aren't and and not at not at the level that you would like them to so I built a conversational AI to actually have those conversations sift through all the prospects to get them to a yes and as soon as that is a yes then it goes into our agent's leads inbox and our agent's able to work that and so that's one way that we're leveraging it. Another way that we're uh leveraging it is basically like as a receptionist we're working with a company called client connect which is phenomenal and so if you haven't heard of them you should look into them because they've got some great stuff on both the receptionist piece but also a sales and service AI that I I think again we're in the early stages of it but everything I see is positive and and it can really really move the needle. But we're always looking at ways to leverage it from that capacity. The other way that's really you know just at the very ground level that anyone can do is you know I mean we all know chat GPT and I mean I don't know if you spent a lot of time using it but you can ask that ask it about anything and it can give you an education that chat GPT you can educate yourself in a very short time period with that on a on a lot of subjects and and it's not perfect but it's pretty damn good. And so the way that I you know and I've I've been pushing it forward in the agency like look I I want everyone to talk about what your AI win is for the week you know tell me a story about how you how you leveraged it for a certain situation and and and what it does is you know is it takes you know you could just be getting started and you know maybe you would have to go like 10 different places to figure out the answer to something like you can effectively get it with a high degree of certainty right there. And so that's just at the very minimum. Then you look at like the high level like I've got you know one of the executives that runs one of our companies a super intelligent guy you know he's almost insulted at the thought of someone else using AI right because he's so smart. But the the fact of the matter is I went to my skills yeah I was like look man I was like if the AI, you know if you're using AI and you know I heard a statistic, I don't know if it's true, but they say you know it can add 20 points to your IQ, right? So if you've got you know someone that's say average and you're up here well now they're at your level or if you've got you know if you've got you not using AI and then you using AI and you're competing against yourself you're gonna lose every time it's like 10x production easy right yeah why don't you why don't you leverage the tool yeah I mean it's not going anywhere so leverage I mean there were people that said what are you talking about cars?

SPEAKER_03 52:59

I'm gonna keep riding my horse you know I mean literally that there are those people and those are you would you would still be riding the horse.

SPEAKER_01 53:05

That's the example I gave him I was like Kevin you'd be you'd be riding the horse right now light lighting your house with candles a dark horse 100% yeah it's nuts.

SPEAKER_03 53:14

I mean I just I asked it the other day it said 50% of Americans have not used it or just very barely used it.

SPEAKER_01 53:22

It's like wow yeah it's it's it's crazy.

SPEAKER_03 53:25

It's a fact blowing I mean I it's like all day every day constantly you know so dude I like yeah there's so many things.

SPEAKER_02 53:33

I mean dropping conversations in there and like the insights you get is crazy. Like I use it for I've been doing this with a few other companies where like I'll help them just drop take all their sales calls drop it in chat GPT and then we just figure out where the like the leaky bucket is you know yeah analyzing people like that's been the hardest thing forever right hiring figuring out what your sales guys are saying whether or not it they're saying the right wrong thing like how clients are responding what's the key themes that they're asking for like all that stuff can be figured out in like seconds now.

SPEAKER_03 54:06

I put my disc profile and my wife's disc profile in there and I said this is what happened the other day. How do I you know navigate this better? Oh well this is why blah blah blah and it it's like holy shit.

SPEAKER_02 54:20

I mean just yeah that's right that's a good one I did that with my wife too. And we just said because they don't listen to this. You get good insights though because everybody hears stuff differently and then you understand why and then you go oh my god when you say this it's not what she's hearing.

SPEAKER_03 54:38

She's hearing this and it's like well okay there you go it's a reaction right well dude I mean you have you've gone the distance we've been like roganish lately with our just keep going and going and going except for the listeners we don't know.

SPEAKER_01 54:53

Right. But you know let let's let's just we'll we'll cap it off here let you let you run you have five things to to uh look at what if if somebody was coming into the aid or coming into this world now a young'un like you when you started what would you tell them like what's the the the number one piece of advice you'd tell them well I'd say uh know your metrics is probably number one I'm amazed at how many people don't know their metrics and and I I c I call it I call it the power of 10 um which seems simple to me but you know you take any 10 occurrences 10 qualified prospects of those 10 how many are you gonna close what's the revenue that that generates and then you know you balance that against your expenses and and if you need to 2x or 3x or 4x your revenue you just 2x 3x or 4x your opportunities so I think that's the the simplest most basic thing that can uh you know piece of advice that I can give to anyone new coming in is just know your metrics um you know and once you solve for those once you can work that all the way through is a 10 qualified prospects close three generated you know X revenue then you just do some simple math and and and put effort behind it and uh you'll have success.

SPEAKER_03 56:01

Love it.

SPEAKER_01 56:01

Love it.

SPEAKER_02 56:03

So how can everybody like list your stuff if they want to if they want to know about the podcast everything else.

SPEAKER_01 56:09

Yeah so I knew you're gonna ask me that and I knew I probably should have came prepared uh the podcast is on all the podcast mediums so it's called from uh the dark horse's mouth it's on uh youtube and uh Spotify and and all that fun stuff if you go to our website darkhorse insurance dot com there's uh a button there listen to our podcast where you sub can subscribe if you want more information on dark horse there's a discover button insurance accountants same thing probably just easiest to go to the website it's easy to remember insurance accountants.com I go to the contact us if you need need uh accounting help uh within your within your independent agency those are probably the two big ones other than that you know garzella group.com you can go to contact us it'll give you a list of all the all the various companies and um you know Dan your beast thank you so much for coming on today it's been awesome yeah I appreciate it thanks guys too you're right up the street too I'm down Tucson