Christos Provistali: Exploring the Power of Emotional Connection in Business

Speaker 1 This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy.

Speaker 1 Just drop in some details about yourself and see if you're eligible to save money when you bundle your home and auto policies.

Speaker 1 The process only takes minutes and it could mean hundreds more in your pocket. Visit progressive.com after this episode to see if you could save.
Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates.

Speaker 1 Potential savings will vary, not available in all states.

Speaker 2 When you think about businesses that are selling through the roof, like Aloe or Skins, sure, you think about a great product, a cool brand, and brilliant marketing, but an often overlooked secret is actually the businesses behind the business, making selling and for shoppers, buying simple.

Speaker 2 For millions of businesses, that business is Shopify. Nobody does selling better than Shopify.
With Shop Pay, that boosts conversions up to 50%,

Speaker 2 meaning way less carts are going abandoned and way more sales happening.

Speaker 2 So, if you're into growing your business, your commerce platform better be ready to sell whatever your customers are scrolling or strolling on the web, in your store, in their feed, and everywhere in between.

Speaker 2 Businesses that sell more, sell on Shopify. Upgrade your business and get the same checkout Skins uses.
Sign up for your $1 per month trial period at shopify.com/slash Westwood One, all lowercase.

Speaker 2 Go to shopify.com/slash Westwood One to upgrade your selling today. Shopify.com/slash Westwood One.

Speaker 3 Introducing Fidelity Trader Plus, the next generation of advanced trading from Fidelity. Customize your tools and charts and access them seamlessly across desktop, web, and mobile.

Speaker 3 For faster trades, anywhere you go, try the all-new Fidelity Trader Plus.

Speaker 3 Learn more about our most powerful trading platform yet at fidelity.com/slash trader plus.

Speaker 3 Investing involves risk, including risk of loss. Fidelity Brokerage Services LLC, member NYSE SIPC.

Speaker 6 In a crude laboratory in the basement of his home.

Speaker 8 Hello everyone and welcome back to the show.

Speaker 7 Today we have a tremendous episode for you.

Speaker 9 A conversation with Christos Provostalis, a former guest services manager at Walt Disney, turned to one of the best customer experience speakers that I have seen, maybe ever in my career.

Speaker 9 And I first heard Christos at Paradisos Mastermind in Utah.

Speaker 4 It was a phenomenal, phenomenal presentation, phenomenal conversation. The way that he approaches customer experience.

Speaker 4 Made me rethink some of the things that we do at Rogue Risk, made me rethink some of the things I do with this podcast and how I deliver really anything to the marketplace.

Speaker 4 And I took a ton of of notes after Chris Dos's presentation out in Utah. Spent probably an hour with him afterwards just talking to him about what he does.
And

Speaker 4 I think Chris was just a tremendous guy. I think he's got a wonderful story.
He's got a lot of value to bring to us. And it is such a pleasure to have him on the show.

Speaker 4 Before we get there, I just want to give you guys a big shout out. Appreciate you.
You know, this podcast is now on its own. We are no longer part of the agency intelligence feed.

Speaker 4 So if you know someone who was listening through the agency intelligence feed, they now have to subscribe right to the direct Ryan Hanley show feed to get it.

Speaker 4 So, if you're not subscribed and you're listening to this somewhere and you're not seeing it in your podcast player, the reason is you were probably listening it through the AI feed and you now need to resubscribe to Ryan Hanley, Ryan Hanley show feed directly.

Speaker 4 I know that's kind of a weird thing, but when you leave a network like that, this is just what has to happen. So, appreciate you guys, appreciate you for subscribing, appreciate you for listening.

Speaker 4 And if you love what you hear, we don't run ads, I don't run ads for the show. I do that on purpose.
I want this show to grow through organic, kind of word of mouth.

Speaker 4 I want it to grow through delivering value to you and you wanting others to hear it.

Speaker 4 And I don't want anyone to ever be able to take away this podcast from me and from you by running ads and being able to cancel it.

Speaker 4 It's going to grow on its own and it's going to be its own living, breathing thing. And that, to me, creates sustainability and longevity in the work.

Speaker 14 So

Speaker 4 with all that being said, I love you for listening to this show. Let's get on to Christos.

Speaker 13 My man.

Speaker 11 Christos, what's up, buddy?

Speaker 10 How are you?

Speaker 11 I'm very well. How are you?

Speaker 10 Nice to see you. Yeah, you as well.

Speaker 11 You as well.

Speaker 10 How's everything?

Speaker 11 I see you're, you're making the rounds, man. You're, uh, you're making it happen.
You're doing all the things.

Speaker 10 In your industry, yeah. In your industry, I'm doing all the you know, running the circuit, I guess.

Speaker 11 Yeah. Yeah.
Is that fun? You having a good time?

Speaker 10 Yeah, man. Just nice people.
I get to meet like um i was with mr merrill and his um son brett for a couple days they had me there for and just

Speaker 10 good people like just i learned just as much as they learned from me i learned from them um and just nice man i'm you're talking at insurance soup Yes, yep.

Speaker 11 Well, I'm actually MCing Insurance Soup. So I'm sure I will be able to drop some nuggets, but I'm not doing any presentation or anything.

Speaker 10 Oh, nice, man. Great.
My mom and I will be there.

Speaker 11 Oh, very fun. Oh, that'll be great.
Yeah. I'm looking forward to it.
Insurance Soup is a group that I have not spent a lot of time in or with.

Speaker 11 So it'll be a, you know, I think it'll be a new group of agents that I haven't spent a lot of time with. So I'm excited for it because, you know, and you're probably finding this out, like, you know.

Speaker 11 there's, I don't want to call them clicks because that's not exactly what it is, but, you know, there's kind of people that run in certain loops and those loops tend to stay together just out of the nature, you know, human nature.

Speaker 11 And I love when you can find like a new pocket of agents or people

Speaker 11 in our industry that you haven't talked to before, maybe aren't as familiar with you or your work. And

Speaker 11 that's always a fun thing. So I'm definitely looking forward to that.

Speaker 10 Okay.

Speaker 10 Excellent. Yeah, that'll be great.

Speaker 11 Nice, man.

Speaker 11 So, dude, I, you know, for everyone listening at home,

Speaker 11 I was, I heard you first at Paradiso's mastermind thing in Utah.

Speaker 11 And, you know, so everyone kind of knows.

Speaker 11 So I'm sitting in the back and I, I don't know if it's my ADHD or what it is, but like I, you know, I

Speaker 11 like can't be right into the group and I always kind of have something else going on. And frankly, and I please don't take this personally, a lot of times.

Speaker 11 I find, and I'm sure people find this with my own, I find other speakers to be really boring. So I just, you know, so I'm kind kind of like half listening.

Speaker 11 And all of a sudden, like you said something, I was like, oh, oh, I really like the way he put that together. And I was like, oh, wow.
Yeah. No, that's good.

Speaker 11 And geez, that's like a really engaging story. Now, then all of a sudden, like you had 100% of my attention.
And I was like, geez, this guy is really good. And I really liked the way your style.

Speaker 11 And it was very authentic and real. And storytelling was great.
And, and then very tactical, practical takeaways and, and wonderful, absolutely wonderful. And then, um,

Speaker 11 you know, we, we connected him back to I'm telling the story so the people at home know, I know, you know, know, you were there, but like, we connected him back and we started chatting.

Speaker 11 And like the rest of the conference is going on and Crystal Center just in the back rapping. And I was like, you know, I was like, dude, how much, how much did you get paid to do this?

Speaker 11 And, you know, he told me and I was like, you need to like triple that number. I was like, I was like,

Speaker 10 you're way too good.

Speaker 11 I was like, you're way too good. And your story is way too much power and what you're delivering for that.
And mostly because,

Speaker 11 dude, I just think you have an incredible message.

Speaker 11 So, you know, I'd love, and I know people are starting to get familiar with you a little bit in the industry, but, and I'm sure as you continue to grow, you'll interact with even more groups, but I'd love to just start with like, you know, we don't have to do the whole thing because I want to talk to you about a lot of different topics, but maybe just like the

Speaker 11 50 cent tour on a little bit of your backstory and kind of what. what your thing is that you are bringing to the market.

Speaker 10 So,

Speaker 10 you know, I was a former guest service manager for the Walt Disney Company for years, and I had the pleasure of working at their flagship resort, the Grand Floridian Resort and Spa. And

Speaker 10 I learned a lot working for the company through their internal

Speaker 10 education arm, but I also learned a lot from my executives at my resort

Speaker 10 because they had to be really on top of their things.

Speaker 10 Every day we're serving, you know, a governor is coming in with their family and COO of Intel is coming coming in, a first lady of Mexico, Tina Faye, every day.

Speaker 10 Someone, so we really had to be on top of what we're doing. And I learned how to think when it came to customer experience.
That's what I learned.

Speaker 10 And my family and I own.

Speaker 10 a restaurant going on in our 30th year now.

Speaker 10 And

Speaker 10 everything I learned, I took to our family business when I rejoined. My brother owns and operates the restaurant.
And I was able to join him for a few years.

Speaker 10 And then I had a successful exit at the end of 21.

Speaker 10 And then that's when I was really cranking. I've been speaking for a few years, but a couple of years ago, I was speaking in just in Connecticut.

Speaker 10 Last year was New England, and this year has become across the country.

Speaker 10 And I teach people. what human connection really is and how do you really connect whether it's your your customer your employee your family member um and i really get to uh

Speaker 10 deep. The class is really deep.
You know, we talk a lot about emotion, what emotion really is. I thought I knew what it was.
And then I was like, well, I don't know what it really meant.

Speaker 10 We talk about perception, how people see things and how people understand things. And then I talk about self-awareness.
A lot of people, Ryan, are not self-aware.

Speaker 10 They're not aware of how they come across.

Speaker 10 Some do, some don't. And they have to, we have to figure that piece out first before you learn how to be able to serve and take care of your clients.
So

Speaker 10 that's what the class is about. I basically teach you all the things that I learned working for the company and things I learned along the way in my hospitality

Speaker 10 journey.

Speaker 11 Yeah. And,

Speaker 11 you know, I'll just give the plug now. Guys, if you're, if you're looking to improve your customer experience, Chris, this is a no-brainer to bring in.

Speaker 11 So just, I'm going to, I'm not going to bury the lead on why he's here today.

Speaker 11 today but i i would like to jump in because uh to some of the the three topics that you just brought up and and this is where i want to spend the most of my time because one of the things that i

Speaker 11 uh

Speaker 11 i asked you a question um

Speaker 11 and during your presentation um mostly because i can't help myself when i have a thought i really struggle with not expressing it but i said you know you we were talking about emotion we were talking about leadership we were talking about self-awareness And,

Speaker 11 you know, I struggle with

Speaker 11 this concept of how much, like,

Speaker 11 how much of yourself do you accept versus how much of yourself do you change? Right. Like, like, there's, there's this, you know.

Speaker 11 you know, you read self-love and you have to love who you are and all those things. And, and, and I believe that to be wholly true.

Speaker 11 At the same time, I think that sometimes that's used as an excuse for, well, I'm just this way and you have to deal with it. Right.

Speaker 11 And I always struggle with how much, how much of myself, because I tend to be a very lean forward, you know,

Speaker 11 I have pretty, pretty hardcore ADHD. I'm, I'm, I talk fast, I think fast, I push, I'm competitive.
Like that's a big part of who I am.

Speaker 11 But at the same time, those aren't always effective leadership skills or those are not always effective effective leadership strategies. And I think the question I posed to you was like, you know,

Speaker 11 I'm going to butcher the question in essence, but I was like, you know,

Speaker 11 is it okay to be an asshole? Like, you know what I mean?

Speaker 11 Yeah. And I got a ton of feedback on that, right? A ton.
People are like, people, people, and I'm talking like a 360-degree range of questions about my question.

Speaker 11 And I, and I, which made me think that it was interesting, if not, I'm not sure if I properly posed it to you, but,

Speaker 11 but it was like

Speaker 11 that part, you know, and I think it plays into customer experience, right? Like, is this just who we are and deal with it, or just who I am and deal with it?

Speaker 11 Or is it, hey, I'm going to love myself because it's who I am today and I'm going to build. And how do I know which pieces to build upon and change? So I'm sure there's like 15 questions in there.

Speaker 11 Take it where you will, but that's kind of where I wanted to start.

Speaker 10 I remember when you asked that. And if

Speaker 10 first of all, I was like, what's this question? I'm like, oh, now, listen, when it comes to self-awareness right we're

Speaker 10 we all have i think a little bit of self-awareness and then some people that are self-aware just like you said before some people actually know they're an asshole and they know that they come across like that now that's on them right now if you're okay with that with yourself with your business, with your customers, and you continue to grow and you continue to flourish and your employees are happy and everything is positive in every way.

Speaker 10 You know, I don't, who is to say, do you need to change? Are you not? Are you asking for feedback from your closest people?

Speaker 10 You know, not a lot of us, I mean, you could ask from feedback from someone you hardly know because you're going to probably get the answer that you actually want.

Speaker 10 But when you ask it from the people that are close around you, your right-hand person at work, your partner, your parent, your closest relative, that's when you get the real feedback.

Speaker 10 Now, do you change? Listen, that's an answer only you answer. Do you want to? Is there a benefit to it? Is there not a benefit to it? Do you enjoy the way you are?

Speaker 10 Is it a detriment to your personal life and professional life? Is it not?

Speaker 10 Do you scale it back to be assertive instead of aggressive? Do you,

Speaker 10 you know, I would love to be able to give you an answer as to like, oh yeah, you have to. You don't.
That all depends. That all depends on all those things that I mentioned to you.
But

Speaker 10 I have met some people that don't know how they come across. And when you let them know, they're,

Speaker 10 they think, you know, they usually thank you and they say, thank you. I didn't know that.

Speaker 10 And then some people are like, oh, no, I know I'm that way. And I'm like, oh, okay.
If it doesn't bother you to

Speaker 10 be that, at least you know that's the way you come across. So

Speaker 10 I know I didn't give you a straight answer because there isn't a straight answer. Yeah.

Speaker 10 You know?

Speaker 11 Yeah, no, I think, I think it, and that's fine. I think that,

Speaker 11 you know there probably isn't an answer i think that the the conversation is so important though so much of us

Speaker 11 we want to be a thing

Speaker 11 and

Speaker 11 it is almost impossible to feel 100 that thing and so we're always kind of striving for it especially people who are trying to improve and it's very hard to know like even when you've had a certain amount of success being a certain way it is very hard to know which pieces need to you can continue to improve on and which pieces are part of the building blocks of what's got you there.

Speaker 11 That's that's a very hard thing, I think, to wrap your head around.

Speaker 11 I think, especially for leaders and especially for individuals in the insurance industry, you know, the you know, kind of my brothers and sisters in arms here, because they were successful for a long time doing business a certain way.

Speaker 11 And for most of them, the world has changed during their tenure. And by change, I mean faster communications, things like social media.

Speaker 11 You know, if you were kind of a hard ass or didn't really have much of a personality,

Speaker 11 but you were a really good insurance agent, 15 years ago, that didn't matter. People came to you because you were a really good insurance agent.
Today, we live in a more touchy-feely world.

Speaker 11 We live in a place where one social media post can change people's perspective. And,

Speaker 11 you know, we have to kind of

Speaker 11 cultivate that image to a certain extent. And I think that's a very challenging thing for people.

Speaker 10 It is.

Speaker 10 They have to know how they come across and they have to know they could be great at a certain thing.

Speaker 10 When I work with some leaders and I work with their staff, I'll say, hey, listen, some of these people are so they have such a high IQ and so intellectual, but they have a very, very low EQ.

Speaker 10 And they're probably meant to work on the computer in the corner of the room and not talk to anybody, at least your customer.

Speaker 10 But maybe you can convey, you can have someone else to be able to actually be the frontline person with your client, because this person is so intellectual and so great at what they actually do, but they can't, they come across in a way with no malice, just

Speaker 10 you tend to see this a lot with super high IQ people, very intellectual.

Speaker 10 They lack certain social skills and they lack

Speaker 10 be able to pick up on social cues on themselves and on other people. So those people are very important in the workforce, but they're just not meant to be able to speak to the consumer.

Speaker 11 Yeah. Yeah.
I think the self-awareness is a very difficult thing.

Speaker 11 I might be,

Speaker 11 it is especially difficult as well when you're interacting with someone who maybe you give feedback to or ask for feedback and you give feedback to and they don't accept it, right? You're like, look.

Speaker 11 I know you see yourself as X, but you're coming off in the world as Y. And they're just like, nah.

Speaker 11 You know, I mean, it's, that's a a very difficult thing to work with too, especially team members or someone you're trying to mentor or build in their career.

Speaker 11 It is such a roadblock when people are unwilling to see themselves for how the world sees them. And I think, I think it's okay to have a good, strong

Speaker 11 self-view.

Speaker 11 But if that view is not based in reality,

Speaker 11 you're going to continue to run into roadblocks over and over and over again.

Speaker 11 And it really impacts your ability to connect with people because they're, you're expressing in a way that is disconnected from what they're seeing. And

Speaker 11 it is, that's a tough thing. It's a, it's a very, there's always a disconnect in that communication and kind of the human connection piece.

Speaker 10 100%, man. 100%.

Speaker 11 Yeah. If I was a good podcaster, I would have framed that as a question instead of a statement.

Speaker 10 Okay. So

Speaker 11 let's talk about, let's talk about what

Speaker 11 emotion is. So I,

Speaker 11 in my own life talk think

Speaker 11 express emotions i'm i'm um a very expressive human being uh it has been emotions have been something i've struggled with uh so i'm interested in what are emotions and i and really i'm particularly interested in you you even said in your in your kind of your intro that emotions were not what you thought they were so i'd love to know both what they are and how that differs from what you originally thought they were

Speaker 10 you know I didn't know that they were. So, emotions control the quality of your life,

Speaker 10 whether you know it or don't know it, or accept it or don't accept it.

Speaker 10 I didn't know that they were so powerful.

Speaker 10 They're really powerful.

Speaker 10 So powerful that, I mean, just over 100 years ago, Dale Carnegie, one of the most famous

Speaker 10 self-development authors of our time

Speaker 10 said, understand when dealing with human beings, you're not dealing with creatures of logic, you're dealing with creatures of emotion.

Speaker 10 There is no decision that we make in our life without the input of emotion.

Speaker 10 And if you think you're making an actual logical decision, that means you'd have to be listing a never-ending list of variables and and coming up with a logical conclusion.

Speaker 10 So, us as human beings, we're taught to add emotional input in there.

Speaker 10 Whether you say it's your gut feeling or you did your research to come up with that, every single decision has emotion put into it.

Speaker 10 You know, emotions, I say this in the class, you know,

Speaker 10 the the receptors in our brain that are responsible for the intake of alcohol and narcotics are the same same receptors in our brain that are responsible for where all of our emotions lie.

Speaker 10 So the same way you act when you're emotional is the same way you act when you're intoxicated. You say or do something that maybe 12 to 24 hours later, you regret.

Speaker 10 You know, they're very, very powerful. And I can tell you this.

Speaker 15 What's up, guys? Sorry to take you away from the episode, but as you know, we do not run ads on this show. And in exchange for that, I need your help.

Speaker 15 If you're loving this episode, if you enjoy this podcast, whether you're watching on YouTube or you're listening on your favorite podcast platform, I would love for you to subscribe, share, comment if you're on YouTube, leave a rating review if you're on Spotify or Apple iTunes, etc.

Speaker 15 This helps the show grow. It helps me bring more guests in.

Speaker 15 We have a tremendous lineup of people coming in, men and women who've done incredible things sharing their stories around peak performance, leadership, growth, sales, the things that are gonna help you grow as a person and grow your business.

Speaker 15 But they all check out comments, ratings, reviews. They check out all this information before they come on.

Speaker 15 So as I reach out to more and more people and want to bring them in and share their stories with you, I need your help. Share the show, subscribe if you're not subscribed.

Speaker 15 And I'd love for you to leave a comment about the show because I read all the comments. Or if you're on Apple or Spotify, leave a rating review of this show.
I love you for listening to this show.

Speaker 15 And I hope you enjoy enjoy it listening as much as I do creating the show for you.

Speaker 4 All right, I'm out of here. Peace.

Speaker 15 Let's get back to the episode.

Speaker 10 The people that have a lot of emotion in their life, they have a disproportionate amount of chaos in their life because emotion and chaos actually go hand in hand. So

Speaker 10 I just learned,

Speaker 10 and I just, you know, I learned that

Speaker 10 also that large companies

Speaker 10 like Disney

Speaker 10 sell emotion. They don't actually sell necessarily a product or service.
So, large actual companies sell emotion. So, you have to know and understand them.

Speaker 10 And the emotion that Disney sells is happiness. And you have to know and understand what your company sells in order for you to sell it.

Speaker 10 And when you figure that out, your job is to evoke the emotion that you want your client to feel.

Speaker 10 So, that's my little take on emotions and

Speaker 10 what they are, what they aren't.

Speaker 10 I,

Speaker 11 this was the part of your presentation when I was kind of like, every single insurance agent, every single insurance organization, every single company needs to hear this, right?

Speaker 11 This, this was what like kind of pushed me over the edge when I was listening to you.

Speaker 11 And I was just like, this is, this is something that I had, I had never really wrapped my head around it in the way that you package it.

Speaker 11 And obviously, I don't want you to tell the whole thing because I want people to pay you to come do workshops for them.

Speaker 11 Um, but I this idea that you sell emotion, I think when you hear it, you're like, Yeah, that makes logical sense, but we don't

Speaker 11 do that, right? We're like, we sell insurance and it's protection, and here's the price, and you need these products, and or I sell t-shirts, and I got all the different colors, or I, you know, and

Speaker 11 this, this, this idea of figuring out what emotion

Speaker 11 your product, your service evokes, and then figuring out how to position your product in a way that it actually does that.

Speaker 11 It feels like absolutely what you have to do. Like it feels wholly right, like just intrinsically before you really dive into it.
It feels intrinsically right.

Speaker 11 And then, but it also feels very complicated. So if I'm sitting here and I'm like, wow, you know, I hadn't, what, what emotion does my product sell?

Speaker 11 And look, there's a lot of insurance agents listening. There's a lot of people that don't sell insurance that listen the podcast too there's both um so like

Speaker 11 when we're when we're when they're first sitting down when they're first starting to wrap their head around this concept because to me this is the this is the meat and potatoes this is the this is the really good stuff like what is

Speaker 11 what do you start thinking like where do you start with that idea um where do you start thinking through how can you start to get a sense for what the emotions are that your product actually evokes

Speaker 10 so the name of my class is called what What Do You Sell?

Speaker 10 And that came from

Speaker 10 a meeting. It wasn't even a meeting.
And when I'm at an executive came into my business unit at Disney when I was working there and asked me, he said, Chris, what do you sell?

Speaker 10 And I was like, you know, I was a restaurant guest service manager. And I just pointed to the menu and I started going off the list.
And I was like, this guy can't read the menu.

Speaker 10 And then he's like, Chris, I can read the menu. What do we sell as a company? And I was like, oh, shit, this is not going to go well.

Speaker 10 So then I said, we sell theme park tickets, we sell hotel rooms, we sell merchandise. He goes, it's not what we sell.

Speaker 10 I was like,

Speaker 10 and he went through his whole thing. And at the end, he's like, Chris, understand, we sell an emotion, but you have to know and understand what we sell in order for you to sell it.

Speaker 10 How do you, you thought we sold flatbread pizzas and theme park tickets. And that's where your mindset is.
He goes, we sell an emotion. We sell the most desired human emotion there is.

Speaker 10 We sell the emotion of happiness. And that's when, when you know and understand what you sell, your job is to evoke the emotion you want your client to feel.

Speaker 10 When I work with realtors, I do a lot with realtors and lenders. Let's just say a bank.

Speaker 10 As a lender, I go, do you sell money?

Speaker 10 Or do you sell a sense of creating wealth? You ever talk to your customer and say, I just want to let you know. Buying a house is one of the three biggest things we do in life.

Speaker 10 And you are able to afford to buy one and in 20 to 30 years when your loan is paid off you're either going to have an asset that really appreciated and you'll be able to keep

Speaker 10 or you'll be able to pass it on to your family and help them create their wealth

Speaker 10 that's what you sell you don't sell money

Speaker 10 Every bank sells money. When you actually have that one minute, simple, genuine conversation, that's what you sell.
And insurance insurance in your field, Ryan, insurance is boring, right?

Speaker 10 Like I have so many insurance policies with my family's restaurant and me personally. And even when I talk to my insurance agent, like, I'm like, oh man, you know, I love them.

Speaker 10 That's why I'm still with them. But their job is not to sell me insurance.
Their job is to sell me, in my opinion, safety and security. I need to hear from them.

Speaker 10 Listen, it's your job at your family's restaurant to sell as much food as possible it's our job to make sure that nothing happens to any of your assets and if they do you make sure that you're covered that's my job to do that's how you sell safety and security not necessarily going through the whole policy and be like hey listen you should probably get this coverage and you should probably do that let them know that you're emotionally invested in them because When people are emotionally invested in you, they become less critical and less objectively observant about you.

Speaker 10 When I know that my insurance agent is so into making sure I'm protected and I feel that, I'm never switching. I feel safety and security.

Speaker 10 I can't feel the insurance policy. That's not what you sell.
Now, there's some companies that actually don't know what they sell. I've actually sat down with a couple of CEOs that were very

Speaker 10 I give them a lot of credit. You know, I sat down with them after I did the class and they said to me, I thought we sold this.
You just made me realize that we don't sell that.

Speaker 10 And they're like, we need to change the way we think. We, we sell this.
And I go, yeah, your product is probably going to tend to evoke an emotion that you want your client to feel.

Speaker 10 So you selling your product evokes some type of emotion. Tap into that emotion to get that from your customer.
So

Speaker 10 It's my long-winded answer to,

Speaker 10 you know, and there's some insurance agencies and there's some lenders that might be just sell sell money and that's their thing and there's some of them that might sell a sense of accomplishment some of them might sit say to them hey listen i just want to let you know not too many people can afford to buy a house you should be really proud of yourself maybe that's what they sell every company even within the industry is different they just have to

Speaker 10 they just have to actually know and understand what they sell yeah

Speaker 11 I wrote down when I was listening to you in that moment, and this is something I'm working into my business every day now.

Speaker 11 And I still, you know, you just have to bang the team over the head with it over and over and i tell stories and we're working on it and our messaging i uh

Speaker 11 so i've used protect you know protection security all those kinds of things and i think those are good words but the word that i wrote down when i was listening to you in utah and it kind of changed my viewpoint on insurance and and that's i mean i've been doing this for 17 years that's saying a lot and i think it speaks to the quality of your message is i wrote down the word sustainability And the reason I wrote down that word was

Speaker 11 when I was thinking about insurance, I was like, what does protection mean? Well, when I think about protection, I think like a shield, I think like a bodyguard out in front of the business, right?

Speaker 11 If the flood is coming, you know, Moses parting the water, this house, you know, stays or whatever, right? Like,

Speaker 11 and

Speaker 11 I

Speaker 11 was like, we don't sell that. Because if the flood comes, the house is gone.
Okay.

Speaker 11 If the fire happens, the building's gone. I'm not a firefighter.
Firefighters protect. We don't really protect.
And we don't really sell safety, maybe a little bit.

Speaker 11 You can do risk management stuff on commercial lines. You can help people make their business a little safer for sure.
But

Speaker 11 again,

Speaker 11 safety is kind of an illusion in a sense. You know, the universe is going to do what it does.
And you can be a little safer for sure. Yeah, there's risk management things you can do.

Speaker 11 But again, it's kind of on the business owner to have a safe business.

Speaker 11 So what do we do?

Speaker 10 Well,

Speaker 11 when you have the worst day,

Speaker 11 we make sure you sustain. We make sure that you get your business back.
We make sure that

Speaker 11 you get that thing back that you had. Because I'm not going to be there throwing buckets of water on your business when it's on fire.

Speaker 11 But what I am going to do is make sure that an insurance company with a check that is appropriate shows up and hands it to you and says, rebuild. You're still in the game.
You're still in the game.

Speaker 11 It's a, it's a, it's a, it's a extra life. It's a, it's, if there's a video game, you go, cha-ching, I got another life.
It's back, right? Here it is.

Speaker 11 Like you thought you were done, but it's not game over yet. You, you had the right insurance.
So now you have to keep playing the game. And look,

Speaker 11 sustainability is a tough word. It's, I don't love it from a marketing perspective.
People don't don't necessarily think that way.

Speaker 11 I have to think of maybe a better, easier way of describing what I just described to you. Although sustainability is the actual word that I think of.

Speaker 11 I just, it's tough to market the word sustainability. However, that concept has really changed the way that I think about insurance and really the way that I've started to position.

Speaker 11 You know, I started talking about it like,

Speaker 11 we're the foundation upon which you grow your business, right? We're, we're, we, we help you sustain. You can't branch out and put an addition on your business

Speaker 11 unless you have insurance, unless you know if something shitty happens, you're going to get the thing back, right? You can't reach, or otherwise you're going without a net.

Speaker 11 And that's fine if you want to play that game, but that is, you are rolling the dice there. And that's a whole different thing, right? So, like, we don't protect.

Speaker 11 We, we don't provide safety necessarily. I think we do in a, in a, in a ethereal sense, but not in a real sense, right? There's no security.
We're not, I'm not, I'm an alarm company.

Speaker 11 But what we do do is we help you sustain. We help you get through your worst times.
New Orleans exists because of the insurance industry, regardless of what mainstream media writes about it.

Speaker 11 The only reason New York, New York, New Orleans exists today is because of the insurance industry. The only way that city was put back together was because of insurance money.

Speaker 11 And we help that community sustain.

Speaker 11 And,

Speaker 11 you know, not me personally, but the industry as a whole. And

Speaker 11 that was wholly changed. That is an entirely, that is a mindset shift that I had listening to this thing that you did in Utah.

Speaker 10 Okay. So I guess you say sustainability.
Yeah. I understand what you're saying.
But in a sense, yeah, you're, you're making sure that they're going to be okay. Yeah.

Speaker 10 You're going to make sure that they're, they are safe in a way, meaning like if

Speaker 10 that happens and you're, you'll be back. You'll be back.
And this is not your last day, you know?

Speaker 10 So in whatever way you phrase it or you know whatever verbiage you use you have to let them know that this is not the end you know you have to know and in whatever way you express that and show that and all of us communicate in a different way and all of us you have different communication style than i do and you also will communicate different to each of your clients depending on how they receive it and how you

Speaker 10 you know how you view them and uh what relationship you have with them so they need to understand

Speaker 10 in your industry because they don't want to think, I don't want to think about insurance. That's the last thing I want to think about.
I want to think about growing my business constantly.

Speaker 10 It's the only thing I want to grow. You know, I don't want to deal with them.

Speaker 10 You know, I've built a relationship with my insurance agent that I'm like, you do what you need to do when you send me the email that we did, you know, because that's.

Speaker 10 that I don't, you know, I'm not into it. I don't understand it.
Well, just make sure I'm very well protected from every single angle.

Speaker 11 Have you had anyone push back on this idea? Have you had anybody, after you do this, you break this concept down? What do we sell?

Speaker 11 And have them go, nah, nah, that's not it. Have you had anybody push back or have you converted? You know, when people hear this, do they start to

Speaker 11 think of their own buying decisions, their own buying habits, the products they use, and they kind of put themselves in that place? Or have you had anyone push back on you or

Speaker 11 question this concept?

Speaker 10 No one's really pushed back on it.

Speaker 10 There's some people that have asked questions, I've asked them,

Speaker 10 you know,

Speaker 10 some of them that are asked some pointed questions, they're like, well, how did you come up with this conclusion and this and that? And I said, oh, wow, you're wearing a Rolex watch.

Speaker 10 And they're like, yeah. And I was like, wow, I'm like, you know, I have a watch on that's about $20.
And I go, why did you?

Speaker 10 Why did you buy that? And they're like, well, you know, I told myself at the 10-year mark, if I still had my business and and if I hit a milestone,

Speaker 10 I need to buy this for me. I want to buy this.
So I said, how do you feel? He goes, I feel very accomplished. And I go, well, Rolex sells status and success is what they sell.

Speaker 10 And I said, you bought right into it.

Speaker 10 And they looked at me and they go,

Speaker 10 oh, shit. And I go, because it's how they make, how it makes you feel.

Speaker 11 Yeah.

Speaker 10 So I said, you know, so whatever way, if you're wearing a $10 t-shirt and all of your t-shirts have Superman on it for some reason.

Speaker 10 There's a reason that you wear that because it makes you feel a certain way. You know,

Speaker 10 I've had some people that are new into the workforce

Speaker 10 that

Speaker 10 just didn't get the concept, didn't really question, but they're like,

Speaker 10 I'm, you know, and then I find out, I'm like, well, they're like, we just graduated college. Our boss told me we had to be here.

Speaker 10 Like, we understand it, but we're like, we, and I'm like, well, you haven't experienced enough life to be able to, but I've never had anybody that said, you know,

Speaker 10 I've had someone say to me before in the middle of my,

Speaker 10 in the middle of a class,

Speaker 10 kind of like a Orion moment,

Speaker 10 say,

Speaker 10 it's kind of easy to make people happy at Walt Disney World, though. Don't you have like other examples? And I said, you know, and I have to think about this, right? Because

Speaker 10 I'm like, is it easy to make people happy at Walt Disney World? I mean, the the expectations are this high and I can't pull Mickey and Minnie out of my pockets, right?

Speaker 10 So that's what, you know, I started using examples from our family business of what we did to create such an amazing little business, small business that, you know, has revenues exceeding, you know,

Speaker 10 over a million dollars in a 1,200 square foot space.

Speaker 10 So.

Speaker 10 I had to give real life examples of things we did that are not, that made them go, oh, okay.

Speaker 10 And I said, it's not it's not necessarily what you do for companies right and i can't i can't stress this enough it's not necessarily the product or service that you sell like it it almost has nothing to do with it it's how you make your customer feel during and after the transaction how do they feel about you you know we Our pizzeria was in this pizza contest in our state.

Speaker 10 And one of the most popular news channels ran a pizza contest. And they ran it according to La College Basketball with brackets.
And it was 800 pizzerias nominated. And then we were at 64, 32,

Speaker 10 16, 8, 4. We ended up third.
And it didn't have to do with taste. It had to do with people voting.
Now, do we have the best pizza in Connecticut? I don't know. It's actually a subjective question.

Speaker 10 People were sending us texts and emails and customers and family members, and acquaintances, and people across the country be like, we're voting for you. We're voting for you.

Speaker 10 So, what do we sell at a restaurant? I mean, why did that happen? It didn't happen because we have the best pizza. It almost has nothing to do with it.

Speaker 10 It's how we make people feel when they come in. We want to make sure that they feel like they're part of our family because I could tell you this.

Speaker 10 I'm not a part of their family. Our customers are a huge part of mine, huge Huge part of mine.
Cause we can't do the things we do in our life without them.

Speaker 10 And I make them and we make them understand that.

Speaker 11 Yeah.

Speaker 11 You know, you think about Harley Davidson, right? You're a badass. You're a free spirit, right? You think about, you brought up the example of Rolex, you're accomplished, you're successful.

Speaker 15 Bentley for cars.

Speaker 11 right uh uh you know go to go to uh everyone's favorite guy to hate andrew tate and his popularizing Bugattis, you know what I mean?

Speaker 11 And what that means to be some elite a-hole, you know, kind of thing. Like, but put a bit of status symbol at the same thing.
Like all these things, everything.

Speaker 11 And, you know, I've spent a lot of time thinking about this.

Speaker 11 Again, you're, you're, I've been waiting, you know, so everyone knows Christoph is a hard guy to get on the podcast. He's very,

Speaker 11 he's a very in-demand man. No, I'm kidding.
We just haven't hooked up yet to be on the pockets, but I've been waiting for this because it was, it was a very,

Speaker 11 your, your presentation really was very, very meaningful to me.

Speaker 11 And I spent a lot of time thinking about these concepts because, you know, I was like, you could almost, you could almost start a business based on the feeling you want to create for people and then back into the product.

Speaker 11 You could say, I want

Speaker 11 people to, I want people to feel patriotism. I'm going to start a t-shirt company.
I want people to feel

Speaker 11 unique, you know, like a, like,

Speaker 11 you know, like a unique and special. I'm going to start a whatever.
I mean, it literally doesn't matter. You could start a

Speaker 11 beaded bracelet company that has some sort of slogan on it that, you know, makes people say, hey, this is the tribe that I'm with. Like, like, I, it doesn't matter.

Speaker 11 You can, you can back into all of it

Speaker 11 if you

Speaker 11 if you if you understand what you're doing. And I, and I hadn't wrapped my head around that.
I hadn't.

Speaker 11 wrapped my head around around that concept of it quite literally is the emotion first and the product second. And I think that it does end up happening the other way most often, right?

Speaker 11 Someone creates a product, they figure out how to create emotion around it, but you don't need the product to start the business. You need the emotion that you want them to feel.

Speaker 11 And then the product really could be whatever could be a derivative of the emotion.

Speaker 10 100%.

Speaker 10 100%.

Speaker 10 You know,

Speaker 10 I use the example of Nike.

Speaker 10 Their slogan is just do it.

Speaker 10 And I was asked, you know, at Disney from my executive, like, what does Nike sell? And I go, sneakers.

Speaker 10 That's not what they sell. And I go, what are you talking about? He's like, what's their slogan? I said, just do it.
He goes, they sell motivation and inspiration is the only thing they sell.

Speaker 10 I said, how do you feel when you put those on? I said, when you ever see a commercial during the Olympics made by Nike,

Speaker 10 you're on the verge of tears. It shows someone that had some type of hardship, that was able to pass the finish line, that was able to do that.
They're like, that's what they sell.

Speaker 10 Why are they the leader?

Speaker 10 And I was like, okay. And that's when he said, like, large companies, real large companies focus on emotions.

Speaker 11 Yeah. You think about like.

Speaker 11 that movie that just came out about Michael Jordan and Nike the air or whatever it is.

Speaker 10 What a great movie.

Speaker 13 Yeah, great movie.

Speaker 11 Great. The whole thing was awesome.
And uh, you know, you think about it, like people wanted to fly, so they bought Jordans, right? I mean, that's what you did.

Speaker 11 You wanted, you thought that if you put Jordans on and you jumped up into the air, you were Michael Jordan. That's what you thought.
You thought you could dunk.

Speaker 11 You thought you could do all the things that he could do just by having those sneakers on. And it sure they were a status symbol too, I'm sure, to a certain extent.

Speaker 11 And they showed that, you know, whatever you had taste, but man, it didn't matter how cool you thought you were when you had him on. What you really thought was, I can dunk, like I can, I can jump.

Speaker 11 You know what I mean? Like, that's what you wanted. You wanted to be able to do the iconic flying from the foul line.

Speaker 11 Like, you're, you're picturing yourself with the shoes on in the air as if you're Michael Jordan. And I don't care, basketball fan or not, you couldn't help yourself when you put those things on.

Speaker 11 You know, it just was,

Speaker 11 it, uh, I, man, I think that you're so dialed in.

Speaker 11 And I think that, you know, I think in the insurance industry, the obligatory nature of some of the products allow us to get away with not, not doing this, right?

Speaker 11 And I don't mean that in any way other than

Speaker 11 I think that we've been able to skirt by in some regards some of these, some of these thought experiments and some of these concepts, because some of the products are mandatory and then, you know, people just have to have them.

Speaker 11 So it doesn't feel like you're selling emotion.

Speaker 11 you know, you look at the best salesmen and women that you come across, especially in insurance, they don't even talk about the product. They literally, they don't even talk about the product.

Speaker 11 They don't even, they don't, you know, you can have, you know, X mod tools and three comparison chart this and, and, um,

Speaker 11 and, you know, I, I have this process that I take, that I take my sales team through. And I've shared a little bit around.
I call it our one call close process.

Speaker 11 And we don't even talk about price. Literally, you don't mention price.
You don't mention it. And the entire process, people are like, well, people price shop online.

Speaker 11 I'm like, no, no, they're not price shopping. How many, how many individuals in the world go, you know what I'm going to do today, Christos?

Speaker 11 I'm going to call five insurance agents today and see like what's going on. That's, that's what I feel like doing today.
That is the last thing in the world that anyone actually wants to do.

Speaker 11 They just, they don't, they, they, but they're searching for trust. They're searching for someone that feels like they're going to deliver, right?

Speaker 11 They're, they're, they're searching for whatever that emotional connection is that they, in, that they particularly are looking for in that relationship but but

Speaker 11 so much of our industry just defaults to you know product and price product and price product and price so okay so say i'm a product and pricer

Speaker 11 and uh

Speaker 11 and you know my

Speaker 11 let's say i have a board of directors that mandates that i install the uh uh the the what do you sell method but i'm a product and pricer How do you start to dig in to change my mentality to start to see the way the world sort of to see the world from your view, assuming that there is a problem, right?

Speaker 11 Now I'm not just killing my numbers and hitting a thousand percent growth every month and figured out some, you know, like I need to change.

Speaker 11 I have to improve, but I've been a product and pricer for 30 years. How do you start to dig in and start to break that shell and get them to understand this process?

Speaker 10 Getting to in terms of like teams or like the end consumer?

Speaker 11 Yeah,

Speaker 11 like this, this business unit

Speaker 11 leader, you know, they need to improve. And it's been mandated on them that they come to your class and they got to turn production around and they got to think differently.

Speaker 11 And they've been told, hey, look, this method over here, this is the method that's going to get us there. Being a product and pricer, it's not getting it done.

Speaker 11 How do you start to change their mentality?

Speaker 11 right you know to to to start to see this what are what are some of the core concepts that are gonna that you think start to crack that that that product and price mentality and start to get thinking emotions first?

Speaker 10 First of all, they have to be open to it. They have to be open-minded.

Speaker 10 I could tell you how to, you know, when you meet a closed-minded person, because they don't stop talking and they don't let you

Speaker 10 talk at all. They're closed-minded and uncoachable.

Speaker 10 So first of all, when before I even do this class for companies, when a company will hire me, I will actually ask them, because at the end of the day,

Speaker 10 my job is to make sure that the company, the leader and everyone really gets a lot out of it. But I ask a lot of pointed questions and I ask, how long has your employees been there?

Speaker 10 How long have they been doing this? Have they been doing this for 30 years? Are they uncoachable? Are they closed-minded? And I said, because if they are, I'm sorry.

Speaker 10 but you're going to pay me for no reason. So I'm not for you.

Speaker 10 And let me tell you how much companies appreciate that and i said because i'm not i don't want to just come and talk for 90 minutes it what is it going to do and then some of them say i need to give you a call back and some of them will call me back a month two months later be like so you made me realize that we needed to actually change some people here that because if we're going to be bringing in education and constantly feeding our salespeople with and giving them their tools, they have to be open to it and they have to be open to learning.

Speaker 10 So they've actually changed people around put people in places um and then they'll end up bringing me in so when i'm coming in i'm already going to be in a space that people are excited to hear me they're excited to learn and they're excited to learn a new way of thinking uh on just on a deeper level uh because at the end of the day i don't want to waste the company's money on me when it's it's not gonna.

Speaker 10 And let me tell you, for anyone that's listening, if you're a speaker, if you do things like that, be so honest with the company that hires you. It's going to come back to you tenfold.
I promise you.

Speaker 10 And they'll tell all their friends.

Speaker 10 So I think that's the, that's the biggest thing is just be open-minded to wanting to learn a different way.

Speaker 10 Cause if you're stuck on price and you're stuck on product, there's nothing that I'm going to tell you that's going to, you know, you have to be open to wanting to receive that information.

Speaker 11 Yeah.

Speaker 11 What part of this conversation have we not discussed yet? What are you sitting there going, man?

Speaker 11 You know, we, we've, we beat up this part, but there's a whole section of this that we haven't got to yet. Is there anything we haven't touched on?

Speaker 10 I think

Speaker 10 the whole class has to do with how we connect, right?

Speaker 10 And I deal with a lot of salespeople that are really good at sales, right? But they're some of them are assertive, some of them are aggressive, but some of them are really good listeners, right?

Speaker 10 And I at least share, you know, I'm not going to tell you, I don't provide you with scripts and, oh, if someone says this, this is your, that's not what I do.

Speaker 10 I just teach you a different way to think.

Speaker 10 And one thing that I bring up in my class is: um, when you're having a conversation with your client and they're talking, obviously, listening is one thing, but there's something called, Ryan, if you know if you've heard of this, the term called like attracts like,

Speaker 10 um, it's called the law of similarity, right? So, people tend to want to do business or build a relationship with someone they like, someone that they have commonalities with.

Speaker 10 And I'm not talking crazy commonalities. While they're talking, at the end, when they're done, you say, oh, wow, your son goes to karate.
My son goes to karate. Oh, you guys go to this school?

Speaker 10 My son just graduated from that school. And when all of a sudden you have commonalities, a bond starts to form, whether you know it or don't know it.

Speaker 10 And you take that and you build from that. People really want to work with other people that they have some similar interests and/or characteristics, behaviors with.

Speaker 10 So that's the only piece that I like to talk about a little bit in terms of sales is like, not just listen. Listening is great, right?

Speaker 10 And not interrupting, but also being like, oh, wow, we have this in common because that makes you real, that makes your customer realize that.

Speaker 10 oh wow, they're a human being on top of selling me whatever product or service they're doing. So I think it's really, really important to understand

Speaker 10 the law of similarity.

Speaker 10 Absolutely.

Speaker 11 Yeah. And I think your lesson around choosing who to work with is very important as well.

Speaker 11 You can create this emotion-driven product and all these things.

Speaker 11 But if you're, if you're marketing or trying to shove someone who doesn't appreciate that emotion or isn't looking for that particular emotion down that funnel, they're not. going to be interested.

Speaker 11 They're not going to want it because it's not what they actually, you know, I think a lot of times we try to try to round peg a square hole or, and, and,

Speaker 11 and, and then we, you know, we, we push back on the process.

Speaker 11 And it's like finding, you know, I, I always, I didn't say it the way that you said, and I think the way you've positioned it is better, but I used to say what, you know, and especially with marketing, like you get out what you put back.

Speaker 11 If you put out price shoppers, if you put out price shopping content into the world, you get price shoppers back.

Speaker 11 If you put out a certain type of emotion into the world, you get a certain type of emotion back. And

Speaker 11 we have to be very cognizant of what we're putting out into the world because that is exactly what we get back. The world, the world and individuals is going to mirror what we put out.

Speaker 11 And if you're not getting the type of customer you want, it is most likely because you are not putting out into the world what the type of customer you want wants.

Speaker 10 100%. Because like you said, you put out price tools and price tools and price tools.
Guess what you're going to get? Price shoppers. Yeah.
You put out just facts and figures.

Speaker 10 Hey, everybody, just want to let you know, make sure during a storm you do this, this, and this. Useful information.
What type of value are you adding to their life, right?

Speaker 10 You're going to get those type of people. It'd be like, you know what? I understand your price is this opposed to that, but

Speaker 10 you're constantly educating me. You're constantly giving me information.

Speaker 10 Like, I feel a lot more safe with you than, you know, and if you even end up being a little bit more expensive, it's so much worth it because you put out what you want to receive, right? Yeah.

Speaker 10 It's just anything in the world.

Speaker 11 I think it's tremendous. Hey, man,

Speaker 11 I've loved our conversation. I think that what you were doing is absolutely wonderful.
I hope that more people in the insurance industry will reach out to you.

Speaker 11 If they want to do that, if they've listened to this and they're like, geez, you know, I got to get one of these workshops in, or I'm an event planner and I'd love to have you speak.

Speaker 11 What is the best place to connect with you?

Speaker 10 They could just go right on my website. It's christospeaks.com.

Speaker 10 It's C-H-R-I-S-T-O-S

Speaker 10 dot com.

Speaker 10 Or they could just call me 860-428-9314.

Speaker 10 I'm about three months out booked,

Speaker 10 but I'm reserving things right now for January, February, March of next year.

Speaker 11 It's awesome. Dude, I think that, like I said, I love the work you're doing.
I love the message. I think it's vitally important to the insurance industry and all industries.

Speaker 11 And if you're trying to better the way you speak to your customers and the way you interact with them, I think bringing christos in is is an absolute must guys i appreciate the hell out of you and i wish you nothing but the best my friend thank you very much thank you so much for having me this was really really nice i'm going to shabbo's

Speaker 7 Close twice as many deals by this time next week.

Speaker 16 Sound impossible?

Speaker 13 It's not.

Speaker 4 With the one-call close system, you'll stop chasing leads and start closing deals in one call. This is the exact method we use to close 1,200 clients under three years during the pandemic.

Speaker 4 No fluff, no endless follow-ups, just results fast.

Speaker 7 Based in behavioral psychology and battle-tested, the one-call close system eliminates excuses and gets the prospect saying yes, more than you ever thought possible.

Speaker 4 If you're ready to stop losing opportunities and start winning, visit mastertheclose.com.

Speaker 5 That's masteroffeclose.com.

Speaker 13 Do it today.

Speaker 17 Wix is the website builder that just keeps on giving. It's giving.
I just built my whole site in under an hour. It's giving.
I actually made that. Whoa.
It's giving.

Speaker 1 Our sales are through the roof.

Speaker 17 So whether you need help expressing yourself or just need something to make your life easier, Wix has you covered. Try it out at wix.com.

Speaker 12 My place in tech changes every day, but I don't fear the future because I'm with the leader, Plural Sight.

Speaker 12 Their online learning platform has the hands-on, expert-led courses I need to master new tech skills and create bigger impacts.

Speaker 6 So I can learn quickly and stay ahead.

Speaker 12 With Plural Sight, I don't fear what's next. I embrace it.
Tap in at pluralsight.com and see for yourself.

Speaker 14 Lowe's knows that saving is always top of mind, especially this season. That's why we've picked some great deals for early Black Friday.

Speaker 14 Get free select DeWalt, Cobalt, or Craftsman tools when you buy a select battery or combo kit.

Speaker 8 More tools? Why not?

Speaker 14 Plus, we've got select pre-lit artificial Christmas trees starting at $59.98 because it's never too early to think Christmas. Get Black Friday prices without the crowds.

Speaker 8 Lowe's, we help.

Speaker 14 You save. While supplies last, selection varies by location.

Speaker 6 AI agents are everywhere, automating tasks and making decisions at machine speed. But agents make mistakes.
Just one rogue agent can do big damage before you even notice.

Speaker 6 Rubrik Agent Cloud is the only platform that helps you monitor agents, set guardrails, and rewind mistakes. So you can unleash agents, not risk.
Accelerate your AI transformation at rubrik.com.

Speaker 6 That's r-u-b-r-i-k.com.

Speaker 18 If you love to travel, Capital One has a rewards credit card that's perfect for you. With the Capital One Venture X card, you earn unlimited double miles on everything you buy.

Speaker 18 Plus, you get premium benefits at a collection of luxury hotels when you book on Capital One Travel. And with Venture X, you get access to over 1,000 airport lounges worldwide.

Speaker 18 Open up a world of travel possibilities with the Capital One Venture X card. What's in your wallet?

Speaker 4 Terms apply. Lounge access is subject to change.
See CapitalOne.com for details.