RHS 091 - Rogue Risk Year One: Everything That Worked

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Yeah, that's

cool. So what's like, I mean, what's your like

ultimate goal, I guess, in this industry?

Can I say this one? Can I say this one?

Right now, right now, we still

feel like we ain't get what we want yet.

When we get a little press

and we really, really get to where we gotta go, that's when you know it's on. You know what I'm saying? Because right about now, I ain't bragging to nothing, but yo, the woo, the woo got something that I know that everybody wanna hear.
Because I know I've been waiting to hear. You know what I'm saying? But straight up and now, until we get to go, we gonna keep going.
Because we trying to do all this, we trying to make a business out of this man.

We ain't trying to, you know what I'm saying, affiliate ourselves with them fake ass A&R's and all that.

We trying to make our own shit.

So that when our children get older, our season, whatever, they got something for themselves.

We ain't trying to hop in and hop out like Quake, you know what I'm saying?

We out for the gusto man, and we gonna keep it raw, you know what I'm saying? We out for the gusto, man, and we gonna keep it raw. You know what I'm saying?

In a crude laboratory in the basement of this episode march 9th of 2021 it was a year ago today that rogue risk doors officially open. Now I work remotely.
We have a remote office, so there weren't any actual doors opened. We just kind of launched mostly maybe like social media stuff, and I started calling people and emailing people, and we were officially ready to do business.
We had our carrier appointments. We had agency management system.
we had all the things that an agency needs

to write business. And March 9th is the official day and it's been a year and we're still here.
It's very, very exciting. I would say, you know, we've done some things well, we've done some things that haven't worked.
And while I think previous update episodes I've spent talking about the things that haven't gone right. I wanted to take this episode, this special episode of the show, and talk about all the things that have gone right.
I feel like I've been this dreary kind of like, here's all the mistakes I made, and I can't cold call it, blah, blah, blah. And the truth is, guys, things are going really well.
I have to be honest with you. Like I wake up every day and yeah, this job is a lot of work.
We all know that, right? We know just being in insurance is a lot of work. And do I have things completely dialed in exactly the way that I would like them to go? Not even close.
I mean, my plans for Rogue, we're like, we're like still in the warmups of the plans. We haven't even gotten to the first inning.
The first pitch hasn't even been thrown yet for where I want Rogue to go. But the game plan is in place.
I feel like the players are starting to, they got uniforms, they're having a catch, you know, things are happening. We got a coach, we got a plan, we know who's playing first and who's playing short.
And all those things are exciting because to be able to operate this business, to be able to create a brand that I believe in, that's mine, that no one can take from me, that is representative of what I believe our industry can be and for my part should be. That's not a knock on anyone else's brand.
I mean, this is my version of the thing. And it's the beauty of our business, right? Is that everyone gets to have their version of the thing.
And the fact that Rogue is taking shape and people are starting to have feelings about it. And I'm not going to say every one of those feelings is completely positive.
I've been working by myself for 12 months. I've dropped plenty of crap on the ground that just hasn't gotten done.
But those things are changing. And so many things went well this year that I just want to take this episode and talk about what worked.
What worked? What as a startup agency, as a startup kind of digital human optimized agency. If you've listened to this show, you've heard me talk about that term and I wish I had something better.
I haven't really grabbed onto a better term than that, but this idea of taking the best of what we have in our industry from a digital standpoint and mashing it up against the best of what we have to offer from a human standpoint and creating an agency around that concept, man, so many things went right. And I just wanted to share those things with you.
Maybe some of them will help you in your business. Maybe some of them will just be interesting to you.
Maybe some of them will be like, Ryan, you are an idiot. Only an idiot plays an intermission from Wu-Tang Clan's The 36 Chambers to start a podcast geared at the insurance industry.
But if you think that, you probably, this is probably your first time ever listening to the show because we do that kind of crap all the time. So plus the Wu-Tang is forever and the rest of us are not.
So we just have to deal with that. All right.
So what went well? Where do we want to start? Well, first and foremost, I was blessed very early in starting Rogue, mostly from things I had done in previous lives, both the fact that I had worked for the Murray Group for a long time and then being with Trusted Choice and Agency Nation and kind of building Agency Nation into the premier media brand in the insurance industry. Sorry, everyone else, but there was a period of time for about two years where it was the best thing out there.
You know, I've had a couple beers and it's eight o'clock on a Sunday night. I'm okay saying that right now.
All right. It was an amazing platform.
So those relationships, I'm joking, guys, I'm joking. Those relationships that I built in those spaces in those time periods and all the amazing agents that are out there who were very supportive, made phone calls to carriers.
One of the things that I was able to do

that most startup agencies are not is get direct carrier appointments. And that has paid enormous dividends for me.
Four of those relationships in particular, I want to call out, actually five of those relationships. I'm writing a fifth one down right here.
Five of those relationships in particular have been, I want to say, highly productive. First, I'm just going to touch on the personal side.
I have a tremendous marketing rep in my area for Safeco. And Matt Brisk, who I'm going to give a shout out to here, he has done a tremendous job.
He's been incredibly supportive of me. He's been understanding of the fact that we are a startup agency, that we are commercial lines focused, that our volume is never going to probably be, you know, we're never going to be an elite personalized agency, at least not in our foreseeable future.
However, we do work very hard to put consistent package business on the books, And we've done that to a certain extent. And Matt has just been incredibly supportive.
And he actually contributed to a fundraiser campaign that we had for the Veterans Miracle Center here in Albany, which is a tremendous organization, which provides kind of staples and resources, not actual staples, but staples to life for veterans in need in our area. And he didn't have to do that.
And he did. And I just want to give a quick shout out to him because I think that you have a misconception of what marketing reps can be from carriers.
And if you want to put someone up on a pedestal and say, here's someone who's doing it right, MapRisk is one of those guys. So four other carriers that I want to give shout outs to.
First is Hanover. Hanover was my very first carrier appointment.
They believed in me and what I'm trying to do. And it hasn't always been pretty.
I've had some ups and downs with them as I've gotten to know them. I've called them out many times on the fact that I can't get into their system via Chrome, that I still have to get in via some Windows browser.
And their technology is not amazing. Let's just put that.
Occasionally on the weekends, you just can't quote stuff. But that all being said, the people behind Hanover, the product behind Hanover, what they're trying to do, their willingness to work with you, they took on a couple commercial lines accounts of mine that were not necessarily like right down the middle for them.
And we had to talk about them and they believed in me and they took a chance on me. And I think they've been good profitable accounts.
They have been good profitable accounts, but they didn't have to do that. And a lot of other carriers wouldn't have done that.
So I have to give a huge shout out to Hanover first and foremost when it comes to the commercial line side. Next is Cincinnati.
Cincinnati does not give carrier or agency appointments out very regularly. And they believed in what I was doing as well.
And again, same type of scenario. I got some good wins with them.
I got some misses with them. And we're still trying to feel each other out.
And as my volume increases, my hope is this five years from now, they're incredibly happy that they took this risk on me. If they're evaluated today, evaluated today, they're probably like, ah, you know, whatever.
But I think down the line, especially with, you know, as we get into what some of the marketing things are doing that are working, I think down the line, this relationship will be a highly productive one for Cincinnati as well. And just want to say thank you to them.
And particularly Brian Sturdy, who was the guy at Cincinnati who took a chance on me. And I appreciate him doing that.
They've been incredibly accommodating. And it's just been great because other carriers have said, you know, said no.
And Cincinnati said yes. And that will not be lost on me ever.
It will never be lost on me. Chubb is another one.
I got into Chubb, was probably my third commercial lines carrier appointment that I took on, and guys, I'll just be honest with you. I know all the vets out there, especially those grizzled IAOA commenters will say, oh, you know, don't take every appointment.
That's

a mistake. Screw that.
Guys, if you're new in this business, take every freaking appointment

that you can get. Take them all.
Take every appointment because you got to put business

on the books and then let the chips fall where they may. Take all the appointments.
So I didn't

know what I was going to be able to put with Chubb. And frankly, I was just like, yeah, sure, I'll be able to write that stuff.
But however, Chubb has been an incredible resource for me. I have loved working with them, and they've been accommodating.
And man, if something fits their sweet spot, they are tremendous. Good product for an admitted cyber policy.
I really like their cyber policy. you know lay it up against, say, Evolve MGA or Corvus or Coalition or some of these others, is it as dynamic a policy? Maybe not, but it's pretty freaking good.
And if you're trying to package it up with a bop and comp and auto and you're going to put all that together, man, I think you've done a good thing for your clients with that policy. So I really appreciate Chubb.
And the last one is Guard. Guard came out of Jamie Murphy.
Their rep in my area was – she was listening to a webinar that I was doing on workers' comp. And she heard what I was saying and thought it fell in line with what they were doing.
And Guard has been a tremendous carrier for me. Absolutely tremendous.
I don't know what I, and frankly, I don't know what I would have done if I didn't have Guard, really. They're probably the dark horse.
Like Hanover, Chubb, and Cincinnati were all on my hit list. I hadn't even really considered Guard as an appointment when I first started kind of building out what I thought Rogue would be.
And they been absolutely tremendous so I just want to give a shout out to them as well. And there's others, Leatherstocking Co-op which is a co-op here in New York.
They really only write in upstate New York which should be the 51st state. I'd be okay if we seceded from downstate even though I love those people.
We should be two different places and Leatherstocking understands that now it's for underwriting reasons. And really, because all their claims adjusters work for them, they don't want to be spread too thin.
So leather stocking has been great. Dryden has been great.
New York Central Mutual has been great. Those are all domestics to New York and give them all shout outs too.
So I have been blessed by carrier partnerships and nurturing those carrier partnerships and being respectful, honest, upfront and transparent with those carrier partnerships. those carrier partnerships.
And frankly, I had to drop my traveler's appointment because the rep was not super to me. I didn't really appreciate the way the pressure,, understanding, you know, where you got Matt

Brisk and Safeco who completely understands what I'm doing.

I did not get that from them.

And frankly, you know, I basically said, if you guys are $200 more than Safeco, why should

I charge my client more?

Like, explain that to me.

And there was no response.

And couple that with the pressure that I'm getting and I just was not worth it. Don't need them.
I think they're a great company, nothing against them. I know many of you listening probably have huge travelers books, but guys, we all have to make decisions.
And in this case, I want to work with people who want to work with me. This isn't, you know, I'm not the old school agency owner who's going to beg for an appointment.

It's, if you don't want me, that's fine.

I'm out.

I'll go find people that do and work within the confines of those relationships because that's what a partnership should be.

And I know that's easy to say because I'm small.

Some of you got huge books and it would be a major revenue impact.

I'm not saying that you need to follow my lead, but I do have the opportunity here early in my agency's development to make these kinds of decisions. And I'm going to do that.
I want to work with people. And I think and carriers are made up of people.
I want to work with people and carriers that want to work with me, not that just are looking for revenue. And if I don't put a certain number of policies on the books in a certain timeframe, well, then they're just going to write me off as not a good fit.
So, you know, so that's kind of how that's worked. And that's perfectly fine.
I mean, I'm dialed in. I want to be 80 plus commercial, write and package personalized policies where it makes sense and where it's profitable for me and for my carrier partners.
So that's what I'm trying to do there. Okay, what else? Let's just jump to technology real quick.
Technology has, as I said, I think in previous update episodes about Rogue has been a pain point. I think now I'm really starting to hit my stride.
So I use today, I use NowCerts, I use AgencyZoom, I use Lightspeed Voice,ating Donna, that's my one big tool integration. Donna for agents is a big tool integration for me this year.
I mean, if I'm being completely honest, I do have a sponsorship partnership with them, but I developed that partnership on purpose because I wanted to use the tool. I got to see it firsthand at this event that Paradiso put on and I was absolutely blown away by it.
And am I big enough to utilize every aspect of it today? Maybe not. But what it allows me to do this early in my agency is to set my agency up for data to be driven by what's coming out of the numbers by the data that I'm getting.
And, you know, that is incredibly important to me. If you don't understand your numbers, if you don't understand what's happening inside your agency, then you're not going to be able to play at the same level.
And we're going to get to what that means from a marketing perspective in a few minutes. So Donna's coming, but my big ones are, are, are Lightspeed, are Agency Zoom and N and Nassar.
Now, if you know, I was a huge proponent of Better Agency. I still am.
I'm an enormous proponent of Better Agency. I think what Will and Nick and the entire team at Better Agency is doing is absolutely phenomenal.
I think that in the progression of my particular agency, we're talking about one particular agency and the way that I operate and what I needed based on certain aspects of how I run my business. Agency Zoom fit better today.
That doesn't mean I wouldn't go back. I think that if my agency was flipped, if I was a 70% to 80% personal alliance agency today, Better Agency is a tremendous option.
And things are doing with download. I want to be honest with the tools that I'm using with you, but I don't want you to take that as a knock on Better Agency.
I had long discussions with Will and Nick about it. I will continue to talk about them.
I'll continue to support them. I think the world of those guys and what they're doing and frankly, many of the changes that are happening in our industry today, both things I've seen from Applied, Vertifor, things that have happened in all these other tools.
I mean, there's changes happening inside of NowSearch right now that are driven because of how fast and how dynamic a better agency is. So I don't want anyone to read anything into this other than there are some particular nuances of my business that I made a decision, but that is in no way, in absolute no way a knock on better agency.
Frankly, I think that in another six months to a year, they are going to be a prime time player that is on the lips of every agency owner in the country. I just I think that.
So I just want to be clear about that. But I feel like I got a good mix of tech, right? I got Tarmica that I'm using for my commercial lines rating.
And they've added a bunch of workers comp carriers, which has been great. And then the other big tool that I use is Zywave and particularly their client portal.
When my renewal with Zywave comes up, will I stick with them? I don't know. I think their pricing is outrageous.
And if someone from Zywave is listening, I think their pricing is absolutely outrageous. I think the way they handle their business is a little strong army, but their client portal is a tremendous tool.
Modmaster is a tremendous tool. Those are the two tools I use the most.
I have their content tool, which is awesome for people who need help with content. So I think that tool is worthwhile as well.
It is a big investment. I don't want to knock them.
They have been critical. But I, you know, I do, they're not, they are very like, you know, you know, hey, this is exactly, this is the way you're, this is the contract you signed, which I get and I will stick to every contract.
I'm not trying to complain. I'm just saying like, you know, as life changes and agencies change, sometimes your need changes and they are on, we're like, Hey, look, you signed this like, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah.
And, um, I don't really love that part of it, but, uh, that all being said, I don't want to knock them because they have been a crucial part. Like their client portal is a big part of our value proposition.
And, um, and I highly recommend the portal if it makes sense financially and for what you're trying to do their client portal is a tremendous tool and I use it every day and we onboard clients into it and we walk them through what that client portal can do for people and it is really a tremendous resource it really really is so those are the big technology tools that we use we have no plans on changing in the near term frankly with, with some of them, we can't change in the near term. So that's what we're doing.
That's what we're going to battle with every day. And a few other things, we use Loom and Neoteric Agent for video proposals.
One of the guys I'm going to give a shout out to in a little bit is Chris Langell. And we use Advisory Evolved for all our website properties and we'll continue to.
There is literally no other option than Advisory Evolved. I know there are other website companies out there.
If they listen to this or you use some other website vendor, know that my personal belief is you are choosing to use a product that is not as good. Chris Langell and what he does at Advisory Evolved, it is the best website toolbox.
It's a website and so much more, the way, the speed that they load, the integration with all different tools, the form integration, how easy, they're just the best. And I continue to use Chris for all my website properties, which I have many, not just Rogue.
I just don't tell you guys about them because those are projects I'm not ready to talk about yet. So that's really my tech stack.
I'm trying very hard to keep it narrow. There are other things that I use, but I'm constantly signing up for things and then I get the credit card statement and then I'm deleting things and trying to get down to what is a core group of tools that we can use every day and build upon without adding extra expense.
Not the easiest thing to do because there's always another shiny object but I feel like the major pillars we've put in place and at this one year mark I feel very comfortable with them and we moving forward. So I feel like we're in a good place from a technology.
As much as maybe the last time I did an update, I felt like I wasn't in a great technology place. I feel like I'm in a very good technology place today and we're moving forward.
The next thing that has been very positive for our agency is our relationship with agency VA. So I took on my first VA.
His name's Nat or Tom. He goes by both.
And I call him Nat though. Nathaniel has been, you know, we got him.
He's young. He's on the more green side, got him in, I think, in August or September, and here we are in March, and I'll tell you, his development in that period of time has been, it's been ludicrous mode, like, he is, like, I'm taking him on full-time in April, so I just told them, hey, you know, I want him from, so he's been four hours a day, August or September, whenever he started to today, four hours a day.
And his work product has improved so much. He's been so conscientious.
He's been so willing to learn. You know, occasionally he'll, you know, he makes mistakes like anybody does.
And I don't see him making the same mistakes twice, certainly not three times. And it's been tremendous, very coachable, just has been an absolute pleasure to work with Nat, and I'm bringing him full-time on in April.
And he does two main functions. He does a lot of the repetitive service tasks, car changes, billing changes, COIs are probably the three biggest ones.
He also pulls all our commission statements and sends them to our bookkeeper from the carrier websites.

and then the other thing he does is build marketing lists for us.

So those are really what he's doing and I want to expand both of those areas,

both his list building capabilities as well as some of the service tasks he does. And I think he's fully capable.
We've also, this is very recent, we're still in the testing phase. We're about three weeks in.
I think we're starting week four today, or this week, I think is week four of recording this, of an appointment setter. And what I'd say is the first couple of weeks, mixed results as we get scripting down and how we want to talk about it and how to use things like insurancexstates.com, which is a tool that we use for finding prospects and targeting prospects.
But last week, we set our first appointment. I'm listening to the calls.
Appointment setter is getting much better. This week I hope to have two or three appointments.
And the beauty of agency VA in particular, and it's not like you just want to be changing pieces in and out, but if the particular VA that I have isn't working for what I'm trying to get them to do, I can go back to them and say, guys, you know, and this is a conversation I've already had is like, hey, if I need to start having more appointments set, then I can substitute someone in. And what we've started to do is test some of that.
And like I said, calls have drastically improved, set an appointment on Thursday, which was a, which would be a nice appointment, be a couple thousand dollars in revenue if we were to put that one on the books, which essentially pays for more than a few months of service. And we start to get that ball rolling.
So I feel very confident in that. And just, you know, my relationship with Wes and Ben aside, Lally, Helen, who does my books, you know, Agency VA also helps me with my books and Helen is her name.
It's just been a godsend for me really. Gotten me through these early days and I will only continue.
I know you hear me do the promos but I use them in real life and they are the horsepower behind my agency which has allowed me to write more business and kind of focus more on sales in order to bring on my first full-time person here in the States. Her name is Sarah Sloan.
She lives 10 minutes from here, from where I'm sitting, and she is going to be the customer experience face of our agency. And what I mean by that is, you know, answering phones, issuing business, onboarding clients, and she will be a huge part eventually of Roguress 365, which is the bedrock of what this agency is built on.
My entire philosophical belief on what an agency should deliver in terms of value-added services in addition to just placing business is this concept of Roguress 365. And I hired Sarah.
Yeah, I call her an account manager, but that will most likely change. I want her to be the ambassador of that program.
I want her to implement that program in a way that our customers feel are blown away by the experience that they're getting from their insurance professional. And also she's detail-oriented, which is the yang to my yin, because I am the least detail-oriented person in the world.
So the agency VA was a big part of allowing me to get enough room to write more business, to be able to bring someone like Sarah on. So just a huge shout out to them.
And that has worked very, very well. 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.
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It helps me bring more guests in. 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, but they all check out comments, ratings, reviews.
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Listening as much as I do creating the show for you. All right, I'm out of here.
Peace. Let's get back to the episode.
So let's get on to, I want to spend the last part talking about how we've driven business and in particularly content. But before we get there, I want to give just like a series of shout outs to people, individuals, I am not going to be able to name everyone.
So if you're not on this list, I apologize and just text me and go, Yo Hanley, you know, what the hell, and I'll shout you out on a future episode. Because if you're willing to do that, then you most likely did help me and And it's just 8.25 on a Sunday and I'm talking very fast.

And I don't mean to skip anybody in any regard

because so many people have been incredibly, incredibly helpful.

And if it's not obvious, I am an emotional guy.

I probably make too many decisions based on how I feel about things. Certainly doesn't help my crypto investments.
Big shout out to Jeff Shee for starting the insurance investor crypto Facebook group. I don't know how you get in it, but I'm in it and I love it.
So these are just some people. And these are in no particular order except for the last one.
I want to give a big shout out to Seth Zaremba. Seth, he's on his own journey with Neon, which is obviously a project that I'm incredibly supportive of and can't wait to be a part of both as a customer, as a client at some point.
But man, when I talked to that dude, there's just something about him. The very first time we met, we just clicked in terms of, you know, we're different humans, but our passion for relationships and what we do and people and trying to be better as humans I think is mirrored in each other and every chance that I've gotten to speak to Seth, he's been so incredibly supportive of Rogue and I just get these random texts from him like, you know, keep going man, you're doing the thing.
And it just seems like it's almost like he's like dialed into my brain sometimes. So huge shout out to Seth.
Jack Wingate, Jack and I have become, you know, not that we didn't know each other, but we I'd like to say maybe he'd say no. But, you know, I'd like to say we've become buddies over over these last year.
We talk about so much stuff. And we have regular calls all the time just wrapping the business and what's going on and talking through things.
And sometimes it's just venting and bitching. And sometimes it's really working through very tactical things.
And sometimes it's sharing different processes and Jack's been a huge

help to me and I just want to make sure he knows that. You know, I probably got, hold on, hold on, I'm going to take a quick sip of this beer.
I got probably one of the best phone calls I've ever gotten and something that motivates motivates me to this day from Scott Howell, you probably know him as the intelligent half of the Insurance Guys podcast. And he calls me randomly on my cell phone.
He's like, Hanley, this is Scott Howell. I just want you to know, man, I got a credit card with $12,000 on it.
And I'll hock the whole thing for cash and send it to you if you need it. Because if you fail, we all fail.
And then he hung up the phone. And I gotta be honest with you, that has motivated the shit out of me.
And in every aspect of that, that is who Scott is. And, you know, I just, you know, I love Scott.
And we probably don't talk enough. But the dude, you know, if you go back and listen to my interview that I had with him on this show, if you scroll back in the episodes, it is one of my favorite interviews I've ever had on this show, by far.
Top three. I don't know what the top three are, but that

episode is in the top three. I just think so highly of Scott, and he's just an amazing dude.
And that phone call, to this day, this is like back in February that he called me, or March. I can't even remember.
I can't remember if I had actually officially launched the agency when he called. And it just was so meaningful that he would do that.
And that has stuck with me. His partner in crime, Bradley Flowers, has been also tremendously helpful.
That's diminishing the affection that I have for Bradley and our relationship and, and, uh and and uh and all the shit talking we do off offline about all the technology vendors that we use because none of them seem to get it a hundred percent but um uh we've exchanged a lot of information with each other and just bradley's been amazing and as who's just a year or so ahead of me, you know, being able to say, hey, man, when I was at that point, you know, Bob, Bob, here's what was going on. And, you know, think about this.
And, you know, here's how I do this. And really just across the board, guys, you guys, I love you guys.
Like our insurance community is so amazing. I will never leave this industry again.
I feel shameful that I ever left it in the first place. And frankly, I probably wouldn't if I was in a hurry and we don't have to get into all that.
But I just, I, you guys, all of you, the notes, the emails, the calls, the, hey, did you see this? What are you thinking here? Keep going, man. I just, thank you.
That is so meaningful to me. And I don't know, maybe that sounds, I don't know if that sounds selfish or what.
It just, I don't know. I just appreciate it so much.
Like, you guys have been so amazing to me in general. I don't know how I'll ever repay you.
I try to add as much value as I can through this show and other ways just to say thank you. I hope that comes through.
I hope that it comes through. I do try.
And I hope that that comes through. I want to give a big shout out to Raghav from Tarmica.
I mean, they were very early on in 2020, they became the title sponsor of the Ryan Hanley Show and introduced me to Tarmica. And I learned all about this tool and what they were doing.
I've talked about it a million times. I've told you guys about it and what he's doing, his belief in me and my ability to help him in terms of designing the tool and talking about the tool and then connecting him with people who could give him the input to make Tarmica better.
He didn't have to do that. There's a million people that he could have connected with and formed a partnership with, and he believed in me.
And even though he's a young punk kid who drinks better whiskey and scotch than I do, he's way smarter than me. And I just appreciate what he's doing at Tarmica, his belief in Rogue and in me.
So I want to give him a shout out. L'Angelo is always, despite the fact that he's from Jersey, will always be my homie.
Chris has done a lot of solids for me, way more solids than I have done for him. And I'll always be a believer in advisory involved.
And he just, you know, he's just always been incredibly supportive. And it's very meaningful.
Let's see. Let's keep going here.
I'm kind of saving some. Matt Namoli can't speak highly enough.
This is one of the busiest dudes in our business and he's always got time to take my call

or text. And, you know, the way that he views the world in terms of his disposition is very different from mine in the most positive way, where I am out over my skis, 120 miles an hour, you know go, he, he under, he's willing to understand that mentality and package it in a way that sometimes, you know, anchors you a little more to center and, and, and without, you know, reducing the opportunity for upside.
If, if what I just said makes sense. And, uh, I appreciate him so much for that.
Um, it's, he's repositioned me on some things or at least cauterized, if I'm saying that word correctly, my vantage, my viewpoint on certain topics and I don't know if it would have been possible if coming from anyone else, if that makes sense. I want to give a huge shout out to Sydney.
Sydney Rowe, obviously there's no other Sydneys. There's just Sydney.
I think she's become, you know, she's become one of the few one name only individuals in the insurance industry. It's just Sydney.
My relationship with her is she has blossomed and her role as a chief marketing officer of Neon has become less, it's certainly not, well, it's not anymore kind of boss employee. But I don't know that it was ever that the way that she spoke to me when we did have that relationship.
You know, maybe it was like brother sister type of thing, which is weird to say for someone who lives in Minnesota and you've only

never even lived in the same state as them. But it is very much a peer to peer relationship today.
And we have very long conversations about all different kinds of topics on a regular basis. And she continues to push me as much as I try to push her.
And the day that she realizes her whole value, her full value that she's able to, you know, I don't know what the, the day that she decides to take the governor off, what's possible, will be an amazing day for all of us. And she's just, my relationship with her is very important to me.
So I want to give her a big shout out. Chris Paradiso, Paradiso and I have had a very long relationship.
We'd known each other for a long time, a decade at least. And during some of my big eye days, I couldn't have as strong a relationship with Chris because Chris and the national big eye at least don't get along super well.
I'd imagine not so much because of anything Chris has done. But, you know, Chris is – he is – if there was like a – I mean this in the most positive way.
If there was like a godfather or like a Don Corleone or probably a Michael Corleone because I'm sure there's someone like before Chris, right? So there was a veto, right? And then Chris is like the Michael Corleone of the insurance industry. I mean, dude's got his hands in everything, but at the same time, he lives by a code that I envy.
And I mean that in the most purest and honest sense, not in a negative way at all. I mean, it's something to aspire to.
The way that he stands by his belief structure, the way that he operates, the way he treats his people, both with dignity and respect, but that he commands a certain amount of performance from them and how he's true to things like the flag and veterans and his community.

It's a lot to live up to on a day-to-day basis if you follow him closely. And he has been, you know, in this time, he's been one of my biggest supporters.
and someone who has just been instrumental in both kind of tactically getting to where I am here at a year and psychologically. My mental can go in a lot of different directions and I work hard to stay focused on what's important and Chris is an anchor in the storm and having lived it and survived it to a certain extent

and then still having the ambition to keep going.

And he is a very aspirational person for me.

And it's just a pleasure to call him a friend and be able to text him and have him share his thoughts with me. And just a huge shout out to Chris.
Mick Hunt. Mick Hunt is a brand new friend from 2020.
Didn't know Mick. Met Mick at Billy Williams' agency thing.
Billy, I'm so sorry if you're listening to this. Um, uh, what was the name of that thing? A million dollar producer, $10 million producer training that he did back in February.
This is before we even launched. This is more than a year to go.
And Mick is sitting behind, I'm sitting next to Cass and Mick is sitting behind me and we start talking and he's saying some things. I'm going, Jesus, who the fuck is this guy? Man, I love the things that he's saying.
And then he said some more things. And I'm like, dude, like, I love the things you're saying.
Who are you? And then he starts telling me everything he's doing. Because, you know, maybe in some of my hubris, I'd like to believe I know a lot of the PTPers, primetime players in our industry.
And the shit that he was saying, I was like, God, this dude freaking knows his stuff. And I loved it.
I mean, I was eating it up. So we went to lunch, and then we spent more time together.
And now, despite the fact that Mick is a Patriots fan, I consider him a friend and someone who I believe in so much. And his company, Premier Strategy Box, like I'm not there yet that I'm, you yet that you need their services per se and some of

the things they do. But in terms of a consultant, someone that I call probably once a month or, hey Mick, this is going on.
I'm doing this. What's happening here? How would you reposition this? Here's my follow-up sequence.
What would you do there? God, man, he's been instrumental and just and um and supportive and uh so mick has been absolutely tremendous i just can't speak

highly enough about Mick. And, you know, it wasn't until a year after we got to know each other, he became a sponsor of the show.
Just because I said, Mick, like, dude, I mean, I'm talking like, I want to talk about you more, man. Like, let's in and in, you know, I don't know.
It just, I just think very highly of Mick.

Mick leads me to Billy Williams. Billy and I do not speak enough, but I am a member of Billy's community, whatever it is, whatever his coaching program is called.
And I'm sorry, it's just late, Billy. But Billy Williams is, if you don you don't know Billy Williams one you've been living under a rock two his program his process being in his mind space you know I get these emails from him I get all the videos and webinars and just having Billy in your head makes you a better producer.
It makes you a better insurance person.

I don't care if you work for a carrier.

I don't care who you work for.

Captive, direct, doesn't matter.

I don't care what you're doing.

I don't care if you're hawking Liberty Mutual renter's policies

out of some call center in West Bumfuck, Iowa.

If you're listening to Billy Williams,

you're gonna be better at that job.

And Billy has been awesome too.

And the other thing about Billy is Billy will just lock you up straight. up straight he'll just be like okay everything you just said is bullshit and here's where you need to get your mind to and uh you need that in your life and billy is that guy so uh big shout out to billy williams all right the last two people that i'm gonna shout out and i hope this has been informational to you and i and i have a ton of value coming from a content perspective.
I know we're already at like 40 minutes, so you may be 10 more minutes. Give me 10 more minutes.
I'm going to drop a ton of value on you. I promise.
10 more minutes total, not this part and 10 more minutes. Just 10 more minutes total.
Okay. David Carruthers.
I had no idea who David Carruthers was up until

IOA, whenever that was, April or May or June. When did we do? January.
January. So it's been a little more than a year.
Jeez, I'm way off. January of last year, IOA, Cass says, Hanley, I got this dinner happening

you're coming

so I've learned that when Cass says, Hanley, I got this dinner happening. You're coming.
So I've learned that when Cass says that, you just don't ask questions. You just do it for a bunch of reasons because you freaking never know what it's going to be.
But it's always good. And at the minimum, you always have an amazing story.
So I said yes. And Carruthers ended up being there.
And a bunch of guys. I met Todd Tams there, and I met McDonough there, who've also become buddies.
Mike McDonough is a national treasure for our industry. The workers' comp renegade, the things that he does, McDonough has been awesome.
I actually don't want to share with you what McDonough has helped me do, because a big part of Rogue Risk 365 exists because McDonough walked me through it and someday I'll be able to repay him for that so he's another guy that should be on the list but um but so Carruthers was there too and that's where I met him we just chatted for a little bit and whatever's all good it wasn't really much but then afterwards we started talking about and now you know I mean Carruthers is just instrumental I mean, one, I just like him because he pushes me to be better because I've never met anybody so bulldogedly determined to move mountains than Carruthers. Like he just is.
He's just a force of nature, and he's always thinking three steps ahead. And it forces me because fuck Carruthers, I'm not gonna let them get that far ahead of me.
It forces me to think three steps ahead. And, and I love that, right? You are who you surround yourself with.
And if you surround yourself with people that are hard chargingcharging, smart, good people but are also ambitious,

you know what you're going to turn into?

A hard-charging, good person who surrounds himself with good people that is ambitious.

And I'm just not going to belabor Carruthers, but he's just been – he'll listen to this and hopefully or won't.

But I just think the world of the guy and I have no idea why he has been as helpful to me and as kind to me and as thoughtful to me as he has been. But it has meant the world to me.
And I just want to say that for everyone to hear. So and guys, Killing Commercial is as good as advertised.
Just in case you were wondering, Killing Commercial community is as good as advertised. It just is.
So you can choose not to join, but don't do that because you think you're not going to get value. Do it because you either don't want to do it or you don't want to write middle market or you don't want to write commercial or you're cheap.
But the value for the money is there and the content and and the access to others and the access to the other agents in the community is wholly worth it. I just, just want to put that out into the world.
Okay. The last one is Cass.
So last person, and again, anyone who I didn't mention, please, please, please don't take this. You know, because I could also mention Chad Eddy at Indium.
Chad's tremendous. I should have mentioned Chad.
Chris Klein at Westfield. I mean, so many amazing, amazing people who've just been, like I said, instrumental in getting to here and feeling so good about being here.
Right? I mean, that's the key. I feel great about being where I am right now.
Chad Eddy is another guy. Chad Eddy at Indium has also been amazing.
You know, Ayers has been amazing. Nick Ayers has been amazing.
He's helped me a lot with different things. And if you ping him and he'll walk you through something or, you know, he's helped me with copy on a bunch of things.
Ayers has been amazing. He's helped me a lot with different things.
And if you ping him and he da da da and he'll walk you through something or he's helped me with copy on a bunch of things, Ayers has been amazing. So shout out to Ayers, everything he's doing.
I mean, just so many tremendous people. So if I left you out, please just, I'm trying, we're way long.
But I got to talk about Cass just for a second. I'm going to keep this very brief.
Cass was given a very raw deal for a long time by institutions in our industry because he wasn't a model citizen. And what people did not realize at that time is that we didn't need a model citizen.
We needed someone like Cass who was going to say crazy shit, some of which made complete sense, some of which was absolutely bananas. But we needed it, and we needed someone who was going to blaze the trail for all these thought leaders, everybody.
Everyone who has a podcast today, you can thank Cass. Everybody who is getting paid to speak, everyone who's getting paid.
I mean, I'll take some of that credit too because I was with them too. I mean, whatever.
But it's Cass. I mean, this dude did it, right? He was pot committed to making our industry better and he didn't care who he pissed off and he pissed off a lot of people.
And some of this stuff he said, they deserve to be pissed off. And some of it, he wasn't right, but it didn't matter.
We needed him and he was there for us and he pushed. And the dude has just been, again, he's another one.
I have no idea why Cass is as supportive of me as he is. I don't necessarily understand it.
I would love to believe that I'm as committed to him as he is to me, but I don't even know if that's true only because he has been amazing. So his insurance mastermind is another no doubt community that you should be in.
None of you MFers listen to this, don't have $100 a month to spare for his insurance mastermind thing that he does or whatever it costs. And the people in it are amazing and Cass is amazing and being exposed to him and the other people in that group are worth it.
They're absolutely worth it. And I just don't know that I would be here if it wasn't for him.
If it wasn't for him texting me when I was running the fitness company saying, hey, man, the industry misses you. Or hey, what do you think about this? I know you're not in this space, but what do you think about this? And drawing me back in, keeping me connected.
No one else did that. He did that.
And he deserves that shout out. And he's a big part of how we got here.
So, okay, we are 49 minutes into this episode. I will keep this under an hour.
So thank you to everybody. Thank you to you listening to this show.
I want to hit on this piece. We're going to talk more about this in the future.
And if you like this, guys, if you like what I'm about to talk about this, I'm going to get super tactical on you for a few minutes here. But take another swig of this Fiddlehead IPA I got going, which is delicious.
If you like this very tactical next piece of the episode, then just let me know, right? I don't ever ask for this kind of stuff on this show for whatever reason, but like leave a rating and review or send me a DM or whatever. I don't know.
You know, I'm trying to beat out Carruthers and Cass in the podcast listenership thing because both of them, yap, yap, yap, yap, yap. And I think they forgot who the godfather of this whole game was.
And I refuse to be beaten on this. So all that stuff is good.
Again, I'm playing and I'm meandering. But okay, let's get very tactical for a second.
Okay. So one of the pieces of Rogue Risk that has worked incredibly well is my content strategy.
So you can say anything you want about my cold calling skills, about my networking skills, whatever. I am a freaking gangster when it comes to creating content.
I just am. And I'll take any of you to task when it comes to content strategy.
Now, that being said, I want you all to do this. I only say this in such an egotistical way and an arrogant way because not enough of you have listened.
I've been telling you how to do this for so long. I want you to do it.
I would relish the competition. Come get me.
I got freaking

accounts all over the country because you guys don't do your job from a content perspective. So listen to me, guys.
I have produced since March of last year, 150 YouTube videos. I've produced 120 blog posts.
We did in the last two weeks, 47 inbound leads just on our website form. That doesn't count.
YouTube, you know, direct calls, direct texts, and direct DMs through Facebook from YouTube videos, from social media. Add those in, it's another 20.
That's like freaking 60 or 70 leads. The exact number is escaping me, but it's like 60 plus leads in two weeks.
Now, are all those amazing leads? No. All you middle market sons of bitches, are you going to go, ah, we don't want that crap? Yes.
But guys, I've only been doing it for a year. And if you put a small business person, an inbound, an inside salesperson on this stuff, you're going to write it.
Right now, I'm writing, let's see, my last thing, on just the website form fills, I'm at 17% close ratio. So 17% of the business that comes in through my website form is closing.

Or no, that's not true.

No, yeah.

17% quoted, 13% close ratio, and the contact rate is like in the 30s.

I think that's it.

I'll figure out the exact numbers.

But that's where we're at.

I don't know if that's good or bad.

I want it to be better. My gut tells me it can be better.

Some of that is if I don't have time, I just don't get to them.

That's why I hired Sarah.

Some of that is not great fits.

Some of them are commercial auto and, you know, God, I'd love to find a carrier who

wants to write business.

I mean, if I had a carrier who like really wanted to write business, I would be putting

business with them left and right, but everyone's taking their appetite and narrowed it right

I'm going to be... wants to write business.
I mean, if I had a carrier who like really wanted to write business, I would be putting business with them left and right, but everyone's taken their appetite and narrowed it right down. So it's like, God, you know, you can't, oh wait, they don't have four years of non-loss experience with a commercial box truck.
Well, we can't write them then. It's like, so, so yes, some of it is new businesses.
of it is you know the harder to place risk that's always going to be the case at the beginning because those are the people with problems if writing a commercial cleaner was easy they you know they wouldn't be going on to google as much but my point saying that all is to you is there will come a day inside the next 24 to 36 months where Rogue Risk is a national agency that we have an inside salesperson who's just hammering inbound content-driven leads all day. That's what they do and probably multiple people.
And while everyone else is buying leads on pay-per-click because they can't get out of their frigging way and create content, Rogue's going to be dominating. Because you know what our cost of acquisition is for a YouTube lead? It's basically 15 minutes of my time.
So let's say I'm going to pull out my cell phone and do a little calculation here on my cell phone while we talk. Let's say that an hour of my time, I think this is low.
Carruthers would be like, oh, my time's worth $10,000 an hour or whatever. Say, you know, Bradley, oh, I don't get on an airplane for less than $400 million.

Um, you know, let's say, let's say my time is worth 300 bucks. So 15 minutes, what is that? 15 plus that's 25 percent so we're gonna to do 300.
That's 3,000. 300 times 0.25.
That's 75 bucks. So 15 minutes of my time, one video costs me 75 bucks of soft money, right? It's time cost, not a hard cost.
I'm not actually paying any money for really any of it because if you take the website cost and you break it up over all the pieces of content, it's time cost, not a hard cost. I'm not actually paying any money for really any of it because if you take the website cost and you break it up over all the pieces of content, it's minimal, you know, a dollar or two.
So we'll just say 75 bucks. So every lead that comes in, the very first lead that comes in, cost of acquisition is 75 bucks.
The second lead that comes in is $37.50. The next lead that comes in, you know, you can see how this works.
And that's incredibly low, especially considering that most of the direct competitors like employers has this direct option now, which I think is a mistake. I think that I think all these, these carrier direct options are mistake, even though all the insure tech guys on Twitter would disagree with me i think they're mistakes i think they're just not utilizing their agency plant well um or well enough although employers does a great job that that's not a knock i know i know a little bit about it they're doing some testing or whatever but still the cost of acquisition they're probably paying 75 a click 75 a click my total cost into the into the into every opportunity i get from that particular video and the subsequent blog post, which are two properties, is $75.
So that means eventually I'm going to get to pennies. The cost of acquisition is pennies.
Think about that. Think about that.
Really wrap your head around that idea and what that can mean for your agency. That's the power of content.
So what is working? Video content works. Here's how you do video content.
You set up a screen. Crowley's doing a great job with this.
You set up a place where you just, like, I just have a simple backdrop, a backlight. I have a camera and a front light.
And it's set up all the time. And I come up with five, six, seven topics.
I write them down. And then I turn the camera on and I blast out the videos, three to five minutes.
They're templatized. I do a hook, a little hook in the beginning.
It's basically a sentence or two, what the video's about. I do my little bumper.
Then I do my kind of standard intro. Hi, my name is Ryan Hanley.
I'm the founder of Rogue Risk where we do insurance differently, specifically by giving you knowledge and information to make the right insurance decision. And then I answer the frigging question that the video is about.
And then I turn it off. And then I do another one.
And in a morning, on a Monday, I can blast out eight or nine of those before you guys have even finished your second cup of coffee. Then at night, like at this time when I'm doing this podcast, obviously, but normally here, I'd be just producing the videos.
They take two seconds to produce. I have a standard template.
I just pop the first part in, break it up, put the bumper in, put the answer in, put the bumper on the end, produce the video. I mean, we're talking no time.
And I have it on a computer here and my work computer computer is over next to me, so I can be doing regular work while my computer is rendering the video. And then I upload it to YouTube.
I mean, we're talking – this is easy stuff. This is easy stuff.
Then you take – you want to get really gangster? Okay, here we go. I'm going to give you the full spectrum.
None of you will actually do this, but this is what I'm doing. So then I take that YouTube video.
I send it to Rev. I get the transcription.
Then I create a blog post. I change the title just a little bit.
Same major keyword, but the title is a little different. Then I do two to three sentences, four sentences as an intro.
I input the video. After that, call to action.
Then I take the transcript, lay the transcript out. All I go in is massage it so that it looks, it's a little readable because sometimes when you talk it's not readable.
So just boop boop boop. I'm doing a little formatting, some little option, some moving things around so that it looks nice.
Bam! Put another call to action in the end for Rogueless 365. Slap on my The Rub, which is basically my conclusion, which is standardized.
It's basically two sentences that are different, particular to the topic, and then a standard closing with another call to action. And whack! Now I got a YouTube video that's optimized for the keyword and a blog post optimized for the keyword.
I share the YouTube video immediately when it's released, 6 a.m. every single day.
I have another YouTube video going out. And then every workday.
So every workday, almost for 2021, I've had a new YouTube video and I'm using this exact process. So then I put that out, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and then linking to it.
And then like a couple days later or a week later,

I share the blog post.

That's the transcribed, embedded version of that video.

Whack, that goes out a few days later.

Now you've shared all that content twice.

It looks like you're being incredibly active.

It's the same piece of content.

People are like, oh, you're all over the place.

Well, yes, but it's a templated process. This is not rocket science.
I'm answering standard questions. So then your next thing should be, where are you getting the questions from? Okay, so I just type keywords into Google, and I see what blog posts or what articles or websites are ranking for those, And then I see what they're ranking for and then I just answer the question better.
And unfortunately, the only carrier that's really doing SEO well is the Hartford. And a lot of that is just because they have a massive amount of backlinks.
I don't know if they had a backlink strategy that's been around for so long. Most of their content is well formatted, though, light on information.
So that presents an opportunity for me to start to fill in, especially like in so so where nationally, maybe certain keywords are really tough to get to. Regionally, they're easier statewide, even easier.
And in your local community, they should be freaking no problem for you to get on the first page. So, you know, unless you're in like, New York City, or Atlanta, or Chicago, or one of these major metropolitan areas, and then then it's just going to take time.
So, you know, you stack that up with consistency. And what you're telling Google is, you know, you're telling them, I answer questions that people have, send more people with questions to me and I will answer them.
And then if they start doing like clicking on your links in your videos or clicking on watching multiple videos or clicking through to your website and then filling out a form or clicking on multiple articles and then filling out a form, well now all you're doing is sending Google all these signals that says, if you send people here, they get their problem solved, which is all you can really do. And that's really my content strategy, is to answer freaking client questions like I told you guys to do in 2011 in San Francisco at my very first speaking gig for the Big Agents National Young Eye event, which is where I met Cass's crazy ass and all this nonsense started 10 years ago.
So I know I give you guys a hard time about the content, but I hope none of you do any of this, if I'm being honest, because a big part of my strategy long term is to be the largest resource for insurance content on the web. I think I have a good shot at it.
Certainly it would take a dedicated carrier budget to come at me because I can do this forever and it's already producing results. And once we start to streamline the process on the back end of writing the business and then delivering Rogris 365 to these people who come in, so they're like, oh, I found this guy.
He seems pretty personable. And eventually I'd like to have other people in my business come out and come through.
And they're like, oh, wow, this sales process is pretty good. And man, these people are knowledgeable, and they send me a video proposal.
And that's awesome. And then, jeez, I get this Roguirus 365 thing.
And this is nothing. This is more than I could have ever expected.
And then they never leave. And then, you know, that would be really cool.
And that's where we're trying to go. There's a lot more to Rogue than just that.
But that's a good first look for right now now, for what's reasonable, you'd think I'd be crazy if I gave you the full vision.

I think I'm crazy when I talk about the full vision, but that's where we're going.

I feel really good about it.

You guys are a big part of that.

I love you guys for listening to this show.

Thank you so much.

If I can help you in any way, if this has been helpful, let me know. I'm always here.
You hit me, slide into my DMs Thank you so much. If I can help you in any way, if this has been helpful,

let me know. I'm always here.
You hit me, slide into my DMs wherever you find me. I don't do

TikTok or Snapchat. I'm not as cool as Scott Howell and Bradley Flowers, but LinkedIn, Facebook,

Instagram, Twitters, whatever. Hit me up.
Ryan at Real Grisky. You can always hit me up there too.

Happy to help you guys. I appreciate you.
I love you. I'm out of here.
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