How Many Years Should It Take to Create a Better Experience?

Joey Giangola: Erin Neil, how you doing today?

Erin Neill: I'm great. How are you, Joey?

Joey Giangola: Erin, I'm doing great. I'm doing great. I want to know this before I really get anything too serious. Is there a lost form of excitement you sometimes long for?

Erin Neill: I don't think so.

Joey Giangola: No? Nothing that you can't recapture just of the youth, that the world is just... You're maybe jaded. You're just always happy and excited?

Erin Neill: I think there's something new to be excited about every day.

Joey Giangola: Well, that's probably something positive people have. And maybe I should look into that. That's maybe more of an inner question. For me, Erin, I was going with the last day of school. That's something that I can't ever really experience again. There's nothing that quite captures that excitement of not having to do something for an extended period of time. But I wanted to move that over to the world of insurance and sort of talk about maybe your career and how you viewed it and things that you were maybe once excited about that have since lost its luster, if you will. And maybe, I don't know, for whatever reason... I guess, what is something that you've kind of come and gone on in the business, that you maybe have forgotten about over the years?

Erin Neill: Well, I fell into the insurance industry quite by accident, so it wasn't like I was super gung-ho, ready to go out, and be an insurance agent and conquer the insurance world. I got a job at an insurance office in college, wasn't really sure what insurance really even was, fell in love with the industry, and kind of the rest is history, as they say. So again, I guess back to that positivity, I think there's always something new and exciting to be found in insurance. I do feel it's a blessing in a lot of ways, because it does change every single day. Whether people agree with that or not, it really does. And especially right now with technology in the space, there's something new every single day.

Erin Neill: So for me, I think my excitement has more shifted to that technology aspect and learning how to better serve our customers through technology, to provide them with a better experience, than maybe originally when I was just learning everything there was about auto and home and different kinds of products. Now, it's more based on how I can provide a better service. But I still get excited about it.

Joey Giangola: Well, so there's definitely a lot to dive into. I want to get back to the technology. But first I have to kind of understand a little bit more of ... Did you realize that you were maybe this constant optimist with this untapped positivity? Is there something that you do that you maybe could share with the rest of us that maybe aren't as inclined?

Erin Neill: Well, it's the morning. So I always start the day pretty positive.

Joey Giangola: All right.

Erin Neill: My first phone call could change the outlook for the day, but I do try to start each day as positive. It's a new day. There is a lot on my plate. But what can I tackle first? Eat the frog, as they say. But I have bad days too. I mean, there's days where I'm ready to burn down the ship and walk away, like that little girl in that meme and the house is on fire behind her. I don't know. I really do love insurance. And I don't know what keeps me positive about it. But again, there are bad days. There's bad days in every industry. But I really do enjoy it.

Joey Giangola: I don't know why I'm going to ask this question, but I'm going to go for it anyway. Have you ever envisioned a movie scene that would encapsulate the "I'm going to walk away today?" So I'm thinking the Dark Knight Joker, sort of the hospital blowing it up sort of thing. Is that your style? Or would you sort of do the gasoline with the match? I don't know. I feel like that's how I may picture what kind of movie scene would I want to ... I don't know why. That's not even a question, Erin. But if you have something, I'd be curious to know.

Erin Neill: No, I don't have a movie scene. I think the closest is that meme where that little girl's smiling ear to ear and the house is in the background just burning down.

Joey Giangola: Fair enough. I want to get back to the technology. I think the interesting thing that I would like to know is at what point ... Like you said, when you're first in the business, it's like, "What is all of this?", and this being insurance. And then you finally feel like, "Okay, I understand this." At what point did you maybe feel comfortable enough in your just industry knowledge to where you could focus on other things that couldn't even make it into your sort of atmosphere at that time?

Erin Neill: Well, when I started, I started at a captive agency. So I worked there for nine and a half years, and I pretty had much had all of that down. And I think that was part of the reason why I was ready to make a change. It was getting a little bit boring. Plus working for someone else that ... I don't know how to word this right. It wasn't growth-oriented, so to speak. They didn't really want to spend a lot of money on marketing. They relied on the carrier to do all their marketing for them. They weren't really open to new ideas. I just kind of felt stuck, because I will say, if I wasn't in the insurance industry, I think I would probably be in the marketing industry. I really do enjoy that aspect of growing an agency.

Erin Neill: And so at that point in my life, I just felt really stuck. I couldn't practice all this marketing that I wanted to do. But I really knew everything, or felt like I knew everything, about that carrier and their products, and there wasn't a lot more growth there. So then when I became independent, I think, and started my own agency from scratch... I think most people that come from the captive world and do that, we're completely overwhelmed with, "We've got so many choices. We feel like we have all the options. We need to get access to every carrier we can get our hands on. Got to learn everything about every carrier." So I think it was probably around year four or five of being an independent that I was like, "Okay, hold up. I've got enough carriers. What carriers can I take off of the plate that aren't really serving me well? What can I do to make this a better experience for my customer and just kind of move forward from there?" So it was probably around year four or five.

Joey Giangola: So I would imagine there's a couple things in there that I think might be interesting. And the one is maybe what specific technologies did you go after? But even maybe before that, what areas of that experience, I guess, have you seen ... I guess you've had probably had some time to sort of gauge the results. What has moved the needle so far? And then maybe what technology have you introduced to help that along?

Erin Neill: I kind of refer to years one through four or five as the years I was running around like a chicken with my head cut off, because I felt like I had to have all the carriers. I wanted to write every piece of business that came into the agency. If I couldn't write something, I couldn't figure out why. I didn't really have an aspect that there was even any other technology out there. One of the things I knew that I wanted was a drip marketing campaign, and I'll talk more about that in a minute. But years four through five, it was really just a lot of overwhelmingness for me, kind of like Mike Stromsoe uses a lot the fire hose analogy. That's what it was like going from captive to independent, like you're just getting sprayed in the face with a fire hose and trying to figure it all out.

Erin Neill: The first thing I really did is I stopped really taking on any new carriers, unless they were somebody that had a home and an auto product, they were a solid carrier, somebody that had been around for a long time. I really kind of turned off all of the new startup carriers, because I noticed that this new carrier would come into the market ... Especially I'm in Texas, which is a really hard market most of the time anyway, and then right now it's exceptionally hard. That was helpful for me, because I would end up with a small book of business with a one-off carrier, and then they would decide to pull out of Texas. And then I would be sitting here trying to handle non-renewals, still write new business. I would always lose at least a third of the book, because I couldn't move it over to somewhere else.

Erin Neill: So I realized that was a big time waste. Another thing around that year, four and a half or five, I realized I didn't have to write every customer. I didn't need to write every piece of business that called me. Some of it just wasn't a good fit for us. And so I had to define what our standards were going to be as an agency, what our ideal client was going to look like, and what we really wanted to focus on writing, and try to stick to just that. And then as far as the first piece of marketing or technology that I wanted to implement was I really wanted a drip marketing campaign. And I really wanted it to focus on new sales, because I felt like one thing that I wasn't great at, and I knew my team wasn't really good at, was following up on the sales process.

Erin Neill: I thought, "If I could automate that, that would be really easy." And so I went through a whole series of technologies over the next, probably, four years, five years, until AgencyZoom came along. And I'm not going to go into all of that. I think most agents now know how robust that system is. There's some other ones like it, but it really integrates with the management system I use, and so I really like it. But that was probably the one piece of technology I searched for the longest before I found one that really was slick and worked well.

Joey Giangola: It's hard to underestimate, like you said, that ability to make sure that that follow-up is happening consistently all the time. What maybe, I guess, pressures did that take off and allow you to open up to ... Like you said, you knew that was happening all the time. Was there anything that you were able to sort of shift your focus to then maybe, again, create even a better experience as well?

Erin Neill: Well, I think, one, having the automation behind the follow-up in that sales process was key. Our close ratio, even though I didn't have an accurate way to measure close ratio before, instantly went up. We were closing more sales, once we started doing that. And then it took time off of me, because I wasn't shuffling through 10 pointy pieces of paper to figure out who I needed to follow up with that day. When it's the time for you to follow up, that software actually sets a reminder on your calendar to call that person that day with their phone number. So it just eliminated a lot of, "Oh, I've got to do this today, do that today." Well, now it's on a task list, and you just check, check, check all the way down, so.

Joey Giangola: I want to stay on the marketing thread, as you said, maybe that's where you would've ended up if the cards fell differently. You also mentioned you weren't able to do things at a captive agency that you can do now. I guess maybe paint a picture as to some of the limitations that you struggled with and how maybe simple and maybe silly would've been to not be able to do them, and then maybe what other things you've been able to do now sort of in your time of independence, if you will.

Erin Neill: So I left the captive agency in 2009. And so, one of the things that I wanted to do was just as simple as joining a local chamber of commerce, joining a networking group. My agent was just like, "Oh, I was when in the chamber 15 years ago when I started the agency, and I got nothing out of it. I'm not going to spend the money on that."

Erin Neill: "Okay. Well, what about a networking group?"

Erin Neill: "I don't know. I've never done a networking group. How much does it cost? I can't afford to have you out of the office. I don't want you ... "

Erin Neill: And I'm like, "Okay. Well, what about some advertising? What about the newspaper?"

Erin Neill: "Oh, the newspaper's dead. People don't put ads on the newspaper anymore."

Erin Neill: "Okay. Well, what are some things that people look at? What about a Facebook page?" Facebook was brand new in 2009, just getting out there.

Erin Neill: "No, we're going to get sued. We'll have an E&O. You can't have a Facebook page."

Erin Neill: "All right. What about a branded website?"

Erin Neill: "No, no. Captive carrier is not going to let us do a branded website."

Erin Neill: So there's just literally nothing I could do. Not a single idea I had was going to work, so I just really had to sit in the office and answer the phone all day and hoped that our parent company was doing enough marketing to keep our phones ringing.

Joey Giangola: But you got to make that list of a hundred family and friends. Erin Neill: Yeah, but after nine years, I'd exhausted that list.

Joey Giangola: Yeah, it goes quick. Yeah, I mean, that's definitely interesting. And now, fast-forward to where you're at today. I mean, that all sounds, like you said, a little silly now. What are some of the things that are on the forefront of your mind? Where are you looking to push what you can do? What are the ideas that are sort of just out of reach for you right now that you're trying to get?

Erin Neill: So one of the ideas I've been working on for the last year... You probably know this. I had two agency locations for 10 years. And they were about 15 miles apart. The pandemic happened. We were closed. So my locations, even though they're only 15 miles apart, they were in two different counties. So one of them was in a very strict county, where the pandemic was. And we were actually closed for business. We were open, as far as answering the phones and that kind of stuff. But because of the pandemic regulations, we couldn't have people inside the office. It was very strict in that county. The other county that my other agency in was wide open. There was no mask regulations in the county. Business was as usual. And so it was very odd during that time.

Erin Neill: But the good thing about it is one of our locations was closed for a year for face-to-face traffic. And so I decided, "You know what? I don't know that I actually need two shingles, two office locations, two areas." The office building I was in, at my other office location, actually emptied out. All the people left with the pandemic, went home, worked from home and that kind of stuff. And so, it opened up an opportunity for me to buy the building here. So my husband and I bought the building. We remodeled it. And at the middle of 2021, we consolidated both of my office locations to one space. And that went off super smooth. There was zero issues with people being upset that we weren't at the other location anymore.

Erin Neill: And so that spurred into, "How can I open myself up to other states?", because one of the things that I noticed was a lot of my clients during that time, especially my high net worth clients, were buying second homes in other states. And they might not be super far away, but they might buy a home in Arkansas. They might buy one in Oklahoma. I had a couple buy homes in Colorado, one in Utah. And I couldn't help them with their second home. And even though I might refer them to one of my friends that was an independent agent ... I know one of them, he bought a million-dollar home in Colorado, and he went and insured it with GEICO and didn't really know what kind of coverage he was getting, didn't really understand it. And I thought, "I can be a small town agency and still work in these other states."

Erin Neill: And so, right now what I'm trying to do is, through my web presence, grow in these surrounding states and other states and really focus on these people that have multiple homes. They may have their homestead here in Texas, but they've got another home in Colorado or Arkansas, Oklahoma, somewhere like that. It's a vacation property, so that they can have a complete package and not have any coverage gaps there.

Joey Giangola: You'd said something that I thought was interesting in that a lot of, I would say, agency owners possibly run their business or make decisions out of fear of what people are going to think or how they're going to react. And like you said, closing down the location, did you let that drive the decision longer than maybe it should? Is that something that you thought would have a negative impact? Or have you had that instance in any other areas of the business as well?

Erin Neill: So I'm a faith-based person, and so when I bought the other location, I really told God ... I was like, "I have a 10-year plan. I don't know what 10 years is going to look like." But this area that the other agency was in, it's pretty much completely built-out. Most of the homes in that area are older homes, so they're a little bit harder to insure. I didn't really know, like I said, what the 10-year plan was going to look like. Well, year 10, the pandemic happened. And so I was like, "Okay." But being closed with that face-to-face interaction for a year, it really did take away all the fear, Joey, because nobody came into the office for a whole year anyway. They did everything over the phone and via email. And they still talked to us. They still were dealing with the people they were familiar with, but they didn't come in.

Erin Neill: And the area that I'm in now has a lot of retail shopping. There's a lot of really good restaurants, a lot of doctor's offices. So I did reach out to some of my VIP clients, who've been with the agency for a really long time, and just kind of get their idea how they would feel if I relocated to just the other office and consolidated. And the overwhelming answer was, "Oh, I go to the doctor there," or, "Oh, that's where I go get my hair cut," or, "Oh, I love to go eat lunch at this restaurant," and not been any issue.

Joey Giangola: All right, Erin, I've got three more questions for you.

Erin Neill: Okay.

Joey Giangola: And the first one is, what's something you hope you never forget?

Erin Neill: It doesn't really have anything to do with insurance. And I wouldn't say it's something that I hope that I never forget, but I think because I hope my kids never forget how much I just care about them and how much do they center my world. And I know the same. I lost my dad 20 years ago, actually 24 years ago. The same was true for him. So just never forget that sense of family and the importance of relationships.

Joey Giangola: Now, on the other side of that, what's one thing you still have yet to learn?

Erin Neill: Oh my goodness, there's a lot of things that I have left to learn. So my kids are only three and five, so I know that they're going to teach me a lot of lessons in this whole parenting thing. So yeah, I don't know that I'm ready for those. I know that there's still a lot to learn in this insurance space. I said in the very beginning, "It changes daily." And I really think that technology is going to be a big differentiator going forward. And so, I hope that I'm always open and willing to learn about those kinds of things.

Joey Giangola: All right, Erin, last question to you. If I were to hand you a magic wand of sorts to reshape, change, alter, speed up really any part of insurance, what's that thing? And where is it going? And what's it doing?

Erin Neill: If I had a magic wand, I think I would use it to educate the public on the importance of insurance and how it's not just about price. That is kind of the biggest headache that I see in my agency, and especially right now with the hard market, is a lot of people are very, very focused on the price and not paying attention to the coverage. And we all know that coverage is what makes the insurance policy do what it's supposed to. And so, I just wish that more people would be understanding of that, and that there would be an easier way to educate them on why I might have a Safeco quote, my competitor has a Safeco quote, and mine's $300 higher. Well, it's because it has this and this and this. And we do try and do our best to educate people on that. But that's probably my biggest thing.

Joey Giangola: Erin, this has been fantastic. I'm going to leave it right there.

Erin Neill: All right.