Today In 5 Minutes Or Less (TLDR):

• 🔒From Zero to $12 Million,Unlocking Growth Lesson …

• Why Human Connection Still Matters in Insurance wi …

• Around The Web 🌎

🔒From Zero to $12 Million,Unlocking Growth Lessons for Your Agency 🔒

Dear Insurance Champions,

Our goal? To help you build a predictable, scalable, and freedom-driving agency sales machine. In today’s edition, we’re serving up tried-and-true lessons from a fellow agent who built a $12 million book,starting from scratch.

Here’s how you can turn hard knocks into major growth momentum:

1. Learn to Survive Solo,And Then Build a REAL Team

• Never Rely on “Locked and Loaded” Hires: When that dream team disappears (it happens!), be ready to do the work yourself. Dial, quote, and close what you can.

• Interview Proactively, Always: Don’t wait until you’re desperate. Keep your interview pipeline full, even when you’re staffed. It toughens your culture and fills gaps before they hurt.

• Separation Creates Synergy: Move away from “everyone does everything.” Dedicated sales and service teams outperform hybrids who are constantly switching hats.

2. Invest in Growth,Don’t “Save” Your Way to Scale

• Up Your Spend to Get More Leads: Agents crushing the leaderboard aren’t cutting costs. They’re out-investing the competition on team, leads, and tech. If you’re in it to win it, you need to put dollars to work.

• Benchmark Acquisition Cost,but Stay Quality-Driven: Sure, Internet leads might be $200. Mailers may cost $550. Choose what aligns with your carrier’s goals and your retention strategy, not just what’s cheapest.

3. Get Relentless With Data & Process

• Let Data Dictate Action: Dive deep on every metric. Which zip codes are winners? Where are high-value bundled households? Track your close ratios down to the source.

• Ruthlessly Audit Your Vendors: Every 3-6 months, review what’s working and cut what isn’t. Revisit vendors later,they change, too.

• Separate, Specialize, and Optimize: When your service team is servicing and your sales team is selling, everyone’s happier and results skyrocket.

4. Never Leave Team Accountability to Chance

• Set Clear KPIs and Track Them: Log in, run the numbers: calls, texts, emails, closes. Meet one-on-one when output dips,problems are often personal.

• Celebrate Career Paths: Your agency isn’t just another job. Make sure your team sees a future with you, not just in insurance.

5. Focus on Culture Over Ego

• Don’t Burn Bridges, Build Boomerangs: Top performers might leave (“grass is greener” syndrome). But if you’ve created the right environment, they’ll come back, and become your best promoters.

• Don’t Take Departures Personally: Focus on systems, not ego. Your job is to build a business people want to be part of, not to win every popularity contest.

Quick-Action Checklist:

• Review your hiring process, are you always interviewing?

• Separate your sales and service roles if you haven’t already.

• Audit your lead/vendor spending this month,reallocate to what’s working now.

• Start tracking your close ratio by zip code or lead source.

• Schedule a team check-in to talk about career growth opportunities.

Big Growth Starts with Small, Relentless Improvements.

Remember, you’re not just building a business; you’re building a career community. Out-invest your competition, never stop recruiting, and let your processes,not pure hustle,carry your agency into the future.

Craig Pretzinger and Jason Feltman

The Insurance Dudes! 🚀

Why Human Connection Still Matters in Insurance with AI on the Rise

If you’re running an insurance agency today, or thinking about what you’d do differently, there’s one thing you can’t ignore: how AI is shaking up the way we all do business. When you’ve got an agency with any kind of scale, or you’re working within a bigger captive system, leaning into AI isn’t just the smart move, it’s the necessary one.

But here’s the thing I’ve seen that makes all the difference: use AI where it truly works best, right up front. Let it help answer those first questions, filter out the tire-kickers, or take care of that routine busy work. When you’re dealing with hundreds (or thousands) of inquiries and quotes, AI helps you keep things running without driving your team into the ground.

Let’s not kid ourselves, though, there are hiccups. We’ve all been those frustrated customers or agents, stuck when the system doesn't get it. But every agency I’ve seen really crushing it with AI is ready to bring in real humans for the moments that actually matter. And that’s the piece most people miss. When the situation gets complex, those high-value, high-emotion, high-stakes cases, that’s when you bring your human team to the table. That’s when our real value shines through.

So if you’re building your book today, focus on doubling down where humans matter most. Complex coverage questions, emotional claims, sensitive life moments, or those nuanced commercial accounts… that’s where you create loyalty and real relationships. People aren’t just looking for another faceless agent. Especially as more of our industry gets automated, a real person who genuinely cares, who listens, who solves the real problems, that’s going to be worth more than ever.

Trust is not going out of style any time soon. Machines can answer questions, but they don’t build trust. Your clients need to believe you’re a real person on their side, not someone just trying to close the next deal or, worse, scam them. As the tools we use become more advanced, the human relationships at the core of our business become even more essential. That’s where we win, and where we stay relevant, no matter how smart the AI gets.

Around The Web 🌎

The YouTube 🎥

It’s always a good thing to have smart people onboard, even if they do a job better than you!

This Week On The Podcast 🎧

We put together a free book and checklist to grow your insurance agency 👉 Here