How an Agency Owner Can Find Extra Help to Unlock Full Potential

Joey Giangola: Ashley DeCarteret. How are you doing today?

Ashley DeCarteret: I am great. How are you?

Joey Giangola: Ash, I'm doing well, I'm doing well. I want to know this before really jump into anything too worthwhile. What's something, an item, an action, activity, anything that you will take, any help, any extra help, that you can get with that thing?

Ashley DeCarteret: Do I have to limit it to one?

Joey Giangola: I can take multiple answers, if you'd like.

Ashley DeCarteret: Oh gosh. I feel like everything is so new and different these days, I could take any kind of help and assistance in almost every different direction. One of my big focuses this year is implementing my technology stack that I have and making sure we're using it most efficiently, so anybody that has tips and tricks on AgencyZoom or Sales Pipelines, things like that, that's where I'm digging in a lot this first quarter, at least.

Joey Giangola: Well, it's very useful and practical for me, Ashley. It's very simple, scented garbage bags. Why not? It seems like something that, if it's going to exist, you might as well take advantage of it, and why wouldn't you want it to smell better? Because chances are, it's going to not do that pretty quickly.

Ashley DeCarteret: For sure.

Joey Giangola: But keeping on that thread of, again, continuing to look for ways to take extra help, I'm curious, have you come across, in your time in the industry, maybe found a reluctance of where maybe agents tend to maybe not look for extra help sometimes? Do you see maybe a resistance to that, or, "I can figure this out for myself," or are we maybe not as open as we could be?

Ashley DeCarteret: I definitely think that there are personalities out there that don't like to ask for help, and I think that's in every industry, not just insurance. I think there's a lot of egos that think they know everything, so why, I shouldn't need to ask. But I found, at least the people that I know, the industry events and things that I go to, everybody seems super, super, super happy to share and help. I'm really active with the Net View, the network of the refer users and the people that I meet there, the classes that I take there, asking questions, getting answers, seems to be the norm. There's also people that they don't want to share their secret sauce, they don't want to give away their secrets and things, where I'm like an open book, so I'll tell everybody everything that we're doing and hope for ideas and suggestions and tips and tricks to make things better.

Joey Giangola: Yeah. It's actually interesting because there is two sides of that equation, because there's people that have to provide the information for somebody who want to feel comfortable enough to ask for it, and all the way around in that exchange. Was there a moment for you where maybe you had a light bulb click on in terms of, "Wow, this is a lot easier if I just think about maybe somebody's already done this before"? Was there was a way that brought you into growing the agency in a way that maybe you'd never thought of before?

Ashley DeCarteret: Thinking back, and this goes back years, the first time I attended the Net View National Conference, it's called, "Accelerate" now, I think it was AMS Users Group, back then, I felt like we were on top of our game. We knew everything about the system. I was going more to see what was out there maybe, but I wasn't expecting to learn a lot. I took a coworker with me, and I swear, every break between classes, we were finding each other and going, "Oh my gosh. Did you know we could do this and we could do this and we could do this?

So humbling moment for me that I do not know everything, but it just reiterated that every agency is different and every agency does things differently. So the more you can reach out to other people and see what they're doing and ask questions and not try and reinvent the wheel, because I'm not an engineer and I can't do that. So the more I ask and the more I talk to other people, the better I become as an agency. But that first conference was my absolute "Aha" moment that I do not know everything.

Joey Giangola: I'll be impressed if you have an answer for this. Maybe it's a little unfair, but I'm going to give it a shot. Do you have a moment where you asked a question and you thought, "Oh man." Was there a specific question that unlocked something for you, that you weren't really expecting the answer? It had a greater impact than the overall expectation.

Ashley DeCarteret: That's a really good question. Usually, and I'm not going to remember a specific question, but things around sales and pipeline management and things like that, because that's never been a strong suit of mine. When I get around to other agents and round table sessions, I love, because we're usually talking through different things. I'll ask, "How are you generating leads?" Or, "How are you following up?" Or, "How are you utilizing ClientCircle or AgencyZoom, or any of these software systems?"

What happens with me a lot of times is, I'll share what we are doing and then somebody else will jump in and like, "Oh, I like that, but we do this a little bit differently." And then, that spurs another "Aha" moment of, "Oh, I never even thought about it that way, and we could add this piece to it." And it's a collaboration of ideas and just strikes insight. The most recent conference I went to where that was really, really great was the Spark Conference, brand new from Net View, it was in Cincinnati in November, and a lot of those around the tabletop conversations with other agencies, and a lot with social media marketing, HR, onboarding tips with new employees and things like that. That's a whole nother ball of wax that I'm having to deal with. The technologies that we're using, but not necessarily utilizing to its fullest and how are different agencies doing things. Trying to take the things that would work with us, or for us, and implement those when we get back. So I don't know that that answers your question, but...

Joey Giangola: Yeah, again, like you said, it's almost like your ability to see the puzzle and assemble it in real time, in a way, and how good can you get at that. I'm curious, for somebody that has, like you said, a lot of experience now, what question do you think, if you were to look back on somebody in a position 10 years ago, insert whatever timeframe, what question do you think they should be asking? What's something that you think has maybe gone overlooked, or give them a cut to the front of the line moment here?

Ashley DeCarteret: I think in order to make any kind of change or improvement, you have to fully understand the process in the first place. One of the things that I pride myself on is I've worked in almost every role in the agency, so I understand all of the different functions and how the process should work, or at least, "Here's all the puzzle pieces." I think too often, we go into trying to make improvements, and we look at just this piece that we know and understand without looking at the full scope of, "Well, so I do this, but my coworker does this and the insurance company does this." And until you have a feel for what the entire scope of the workflow process, whatever, is, I think that's the first step. You have to ask the questions of, "What do you do now? How are you doing it now? What are the stumbling blocks that you're having now?" Because until you fully understand the whole thing, you're not going to be able to make any improvements. You'll stumble around in the dark and make things worse before they get better.

Joey Giangola: I want to bring things back a little closer on, you mentioned what you were working on right now and the things that you're looking for extra help on. Jump into that a little bit more specifically. What are some of the things that you are... I don't want to say, "Struggling with," but what are you trying to improve? What are you finding along this journey as you're acquiring extra help for these things?

Ashley DeCarteret: We recently implemented AgencyZoom, which is a CRM sales pipeline system, and there's a lot to it that you can set up automations for contacting clients or prospects, and that's the piece of it I haven't wrapped my head around yet. How do I want to set these up? What kind of context do I want to have? How do I word the information? We have a texting service through our management system, through AMS 360, but I don't think that integrates with AgencyZoom. And then, we also use ClientCircle for handwritten cards and things like that, they have a texting option. I'm wanting to look into a web chat kind of thing. So there's all this technology that can be utilized with all these systems, but trying to figure out which one to use and in which service, without driving my coworkers insane with adding 15 million different locations, they have to look for things. I want to utilize the technology we currently have to the fullest capability, and the automation piece in AgencyZoom is one we haven't implemented yet. And then adding in the text and the web chat and all the things.

Joey Giangola: So if you could explain, in a perfect world, the overall end result, the experience that your clients, you're hoping to build for them. What would that look like? Again, if you're just saying that, "I wish all of these things that we just talked about, this is ultimately what I wanted to do and why I wanted to do it."

Ashley DeCarteret: Right. And there's twofold. There's the prospect side of it, there's the existing client side of it. The prospect side of it, I want to be relevant and in front of potential clients when it makes sense, without overwhelming them with information and making them shut off. We're a small agency, smaller mid-size agency in Northern Michigan. We're not a big metro area where maybe communication is a little bit different. We try to be a little bit more personal and we try to not frustrate them with spammy type communication, so there's that piece of it. I want to be able to go to an event and get the old-fashioned business cards and things like that, but be able to communicate with those prospects in a way that shows we're the center of influence, that we're the experts in the realm. I want to be their first, second choice, so whenever they're having an issue with their existing carrier or their existing company, I want them to come to us as their first, second choice.

For the client side of things, we need to be proactively communicating with them in a way where providing relevant information, certainly with the insurance industry these days and rate changes and inflation and cost of building and all of these kinds of things, there's a lot of things going on. I want to be able to provide them with relevant information that makes them an informed consumer. Also, sharing that center of influence, we're the insurance experts, you can trust us with protecting your assets.

I want to be able to reach out to them to review their coverages on an annual basis, without making it really time sensitive on our end. I want to automate it a little bit, and I'm doing a lot of that with ClientCircle right now and really enjoying that process. We have a great website with a policy review form that we've had really good responses for people updating and just answering questions. Have you added onto your house? Are you driving for Uber? What things have happened in your life in the last year that have changed your risk exposure? So that's great.

I think one of the biggest complaints that we've had from customers is that they never hear from us, or they feel like they never hear from us. So trying to implement the things where we're proactively communicating with them, but not someone individually having to go through and touch every single policy, every single... It just becomes way too time-consuming. So if we can have the automation that does a lot of that for us, and then we can focus on actually advising the insurance of coverages, and why changes are needed, or so on and so forth. That's my goal. So prospects I want to be in front of so I can be their first, second choice. Clients, I want to be proactive in communicating with them so they know that we're taking care of them, and we are aware of their situation and we're not just, "Write us a check once a year," kind of thing.

Joey Giangola: It's probably too simple of a question, but how close do you think you are?

Ashley DeCarteret: I probably have... I'm halfway there. I would say I'm halfway there. I've got the systems, they aren't set up yet, and there's a lot more that we could be doing with them. But like I said, we've been using ClientCircle, which is formerly Rocket Referrals. We've been using them for a few years and started a renewal review process through their system that's automated. That's been going really, really well. I think we're just over the year mark on that. So that piece of it, I think, I have pretty good. The prospecting sales side of it, retaining those leads that we get when we sponsor events and things like that, we're probably at 2% on that.

Joey Giangola: Maybe the most unfair a question, but what do you think you might be most proud of in your insurance career moment? Is there a moment that stands out to you or, "I'm really glad that happened"?

Ashley DeCarteret: When I first started my career, I joined the Young Agents Council in the state of Michigan, part of the Michigan Big Eye, or Big Eye of Michigan, formerly Michigan Association of Insurance Agents. I was part of the Young Agent Council for quite a few years. I got involved with Net View at the national level. I was on agent's advisory councils for different carriers and things. I was doing a lot in the industry and knew a lot of people in the industry, which was great for my career development as an insurance agent and moving into management of the agency.

What I realized, maybe six, seven years ago, is I wasn't doing that level of involvement locally. And so we're, like I said, Northern Michigan. I was going to chamber events, but I wasn't super involved in different organizations locally, and I switched things up a little bit. I aged out of the Young Agents Council first, and then decided to join boards here locally. So I was on the board at the YMCA, I was on the Chamber Board, the Rotary Board. I'm on the board for the College Foundation right now. So this isn't an insurance thing that I'm doing, but it's getting me involved in the community, and people know my name and they know that I'm in insurance, and I'll talk to people about their coverage even if they don't have it with me. So it brings in a lot of people calling us for quotes, which I really enjoy.

But two years ago, not this December, but December 20... My gosh, it's 2023 now, but December 2021. December of 2021 at the Breakfast for Champions event that the Petoskey Chamber does, I received the Athena Award, which is... I feel like it's a lifetime achievement award for Northern Michigan. It's always the women that have received this award locally are my absolute mentors, role models. As Stephanie was up starting the announcement about the recipient for this year, I leaned over to my now husband and I said, "10, 20 years from now, this is the award that I want to get. This is the big thing for me." And Stephanie started talking, and within a couple sentences I realized it was me, and I started bawling. I was absolute wreck, bawling.

That was probably one of the biggest highlights of my life, being recognized in a way that I was not expecting. I was hoping to get there someday, but I had no concept that people in the community felt that I was there already. So switching my focus from a national impact within the industry to more local impact in my community, it did a lot of good. A lot of good, generated a lot of business for the agency, generates a ton of goodwill for the agency, and then also makes my community a better place, which is great.

Joey Giangola: Well, taking one thing away from that story, Ashley, it's that you're a little off on your timeframes in terms of when you think things are going to happen, in a very positive way, so at least that's good for you.

Ashley DeCarteret: Right. Maybe everything will be resolved next week, that's what I'm hearing.

Joey Giangola: Well, based on our math and our logic, I think that's a safe assumption.

Ashley DeCarteret: Great.

Joey Giangola: So we've at least done that for you. Actually, I got a few more questions for you.

Ashley DeCarteret: Sure.

Joey Giangola: And the first one, again, very simply, what's one thing you hope you never forget?

Ashley DeCarteret: The challenges that I've had in my life. I was a single mom for many, many years. My ex, well, I'm sure a wonderful person, had a lot of challenges, and trying to raise two children, run a business, go to grad school, I got my MBA, and then be involved in the community and do all the kinds of things that I do, it was not easy. And looking back, I wouldn't change a moment of it, because it inspired me, it encouraged me. It was hard, it was not easy, but it made it worthwhile, something to work for. So I don't ever want to forget the challenges that I had to get where I am.

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

Ashley DeCarteret: I've probably got pages and pages and pages of things. I think my Twitter bio for years was, "As always, a work in progress." There's a ton of stuff I don't know, and one of my goals is... I read a lot. Book I'm reading right now is called, "Think Again" by Adam Grant. It's really, really, really good. As I'm looking to do all of these efficiency implementation in the agency, I'm realizing we can't necessarily take the same things that we've always been doing into new environments. And so, it's a lot about rethinking what we're doing and how we're doing it.

And the book talks about how challenging it is when you have beliefs that are really core to your value, how hard it is to change your mind on those things, and to look at new evidence and make new decisions, and people get frustrated with things, and like, "It's always changing, it's never the same." Well, as new evidence comes out and new things, you've got to adjust your thought process on things. So I have a ton to learn, and one of those that I'm working on right now is relearning, thinking again.

Joey Giangola: All right, Ashley, fair enough. Last question to you. If I was to hand you a magic wand of sorts to reshape, change, alter, speed up, really any part of insurance, what's that thing, where is it going and what's it doing?

Ashley DeCarteret: That's a really good question too. I think that one of the challenges we face, and have been facing for years, is this commoditization of insurance. The, "I can save you 15 minutes," or. "15% in 15 minutes." All the amazing commercials out there for insurance really give the consumer the perspective that a policy is a policy is as a policy, and that's not the case. And I don't know how to fix that. I don't know what the magic wand would do with that. But educating the consumer that not every policy is the same, not every policy has the same coverages. There are definitely things that are relevant for you, Mr. Smith, that aren't necessarily the same for Jane Doe. And understanding the value of a trusted advisor to walk you through all those decisions. That's what I would love to see. The Amazon's coming out with insurance, the Costco's coming out with insurance, all the direct writers, which aren't bad, but they aren't necessarily the best advisors on how to protect you, individual consumer. So somehow fixing that, I think, would be amazing.

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

Ashley DeCarteret: All righty. Sounds good. Thanks for having me.