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Insurance After Dark
Insurance After Dark
How to go 100% Virtual with your Agency
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We welcome Majda Baltic back to break down what it really means to run a 100% virtual insurance agency.
In the episode, Majda explains that “virtual” isn’t just working remotely, it’s a full operational model where AI, automations, and centralized systems handle quoting, servicing, and workflows so the business doesn’t rely on individuals. She also unpacks what being “digital” (paperless, cloud-based systems) and “green” (lean operations with lower overhead and higher profit) really means.
The episode sets up a live discussion with agents who want to learn how to scale, simplify, and build more freedom through a truly virtual agency model.
Learn more: majdabaltic.com
Thank you so much for listening! Don't forget to leave a review!
Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Insurance After Dark. For those of you that received an email about a very special episode where we were going to really break things down about what it means to go 100% virtual and you didn't apply to get on. Well, you're not gonna partake in this, but you still have the opportunity.
SPEAKER_07:You only get to hear it now.
SPEAKER_03:You only get to hear it, but you will have an opportunity to potentially follow up. We're really excited to have Maida Baltic back here. Um, she's doing us such a solid to be able to uh really share the information that she has about going virtual, and we have several agents on here with us. So we'll give them some time to introduce themselves in a minute. But Maida, if you wouldn't mind just giving us a quickie recap on who you are. You were on our episode recently that everyone keeps downloading. We're so excited about that. But tell us again who you are.
SPEAKER_02:So I am my name is Maida Baltic. I own several um finance-based businesses, one of them the being Midas Touch Insurance. We are one of the only 100% remote digital and green insurance brokerages in the United States who are structured for virtual uh operations, as far as I know. Someone challenge me on that or enlighten me. Share if you know of any others. But anyway, this is what we know so far. Um, I have sold billions of dollars in insurance, about$50 billion in insurance products. I specialize in high net worth individuals. We're licensed in uh all 50 states, we have access to basically every carrier for every product for any need. We sell all lines of service. Um, my business has been ran by one person for since 2018, and we've been able to scale from zero scratch business to 15 million in annual um revenue. So we have done quite a bit with not a lot of resources, and we are happy to share whatever strategies anyone is interested in to, you know, go take the same direction.
SPEAKER_03:Thank you, Maida. We I really love to hear that because I think it's just nice to be able to know someone like a real person that we can see and touch. And she's based out of California, so yay, everyone here is a California agent for the most part, or used to be. Um, shout out to some that I in Texas. Um, so uh Maida, I want to ask a question that I think needs a little bit of clarification. What does it mean to truly be a 100% virtual agency? And I love that you add green in there too, but can you can you from your perspective, from what you your experience, what does it mean to be virtual?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, so I think that this is a great question because I think that people misunderstand that having the ability to work remote means virtual. So I want to get this straight. So essentially having the ability to work remote means that you essentially have a remote team or you can work from anywhere. Having a virtual agency is not a location strategy, it's an operational business model. And so what I mean by that is in a virtual agency, everything that you do within your business is operated virtually. Clients don't speak to um people, they talk to your automations, your AI, your technology that you've um implemented within your business. That means to get a quote, to submit documents, to bind a policy, renew a policy, you know, request customer service changes. It could be anything to do with human touch that's now done virtually through AI and automations. Your team doesn't operate from different um, you know, you don't have different team members that basically pull in different products. It's essentially one system that services everything. So that if one person is out of the office or someone gets fired or someone quits, or God forbid something happens to someone, the system doesn't break. And instead of duct taping different programs together, Franken style style, you have one local place where everything is kept together. Um, being digital takes all of this from literal paperwork into a digitized process, meaning that your everything that you do is stored on a cloud, everything that you do is stored within said systems, within the automations, the workflows, and things like that. And so again, nothing breaks because everything is documented. And then, of course, being green is not just about saving trees, although that's a good part of it. Um, a bigger bigger part of it is being building a lean machine, so cutting costs on overhead, um, on your you know, office space, on your payroll costs, on your operating expenses, on all the things that otherwise come with analog work. So I hope that this kind of clarifies it. To me, these categories are all very different, and I feel like it's very obvious once you kind of understand the context behind it, but of course, we I'm happy to elaborate further.
SPEAKER_03:And I think I I I'm just gonna add in there that being green also means that you'll see more of that green, right? Because your processes are so are doing so well. I mean, ultimately, you guys, everyone's a business owner here. You want to you're already at a fantastic level with your business. You want to grow that exponentially to be freer, right? I think ultimately we all want freedom. So um, I would love, if it's okay, um, for, for example, Bryden, if you could say hello, you're welcome to share what agency you're with, what have you. But I would love to know why you're here today. And then um, after that, um, whether it's Sandra or Yadida, if you'd like to share, what is it that you want to take away from today and tell us where you're at now?
SPEAKER_00:Yes, thank you for having me. My name is Bryden Lazaro. I'm with BA Lazaro Insurance Services. Really, really excited to be on today's podcast. I've been trying to go 100% virtual for a very long time. Um, I've started with two or three different systems to help out with the sales process side of things. And then after going to ITC InsureTech two years ago, I saw um might have their uh speak for the first time actually. I got exposed to a lot of different companies that said they could automate the quote to bind process online. And after talking to four or five different companies, I found it was a little more expensive than I thought. And even after further research, I found that some of them have spent exponentially more than what my quote was and still haven't come up with a final solution for their clients yet. So I'm really interested in finding out what specific programs might be used to go fully automated, and more importantly, if we are to get to a point where we have a quote-to-bind system, what tools can we use to drive traffic to get clients there? That to me, I feel like are one of the big, big pieces to going virtual that I haven't been able to crack or find out um through my research throughout the years.
SPEAKER_03:Thank you. We'll make note of that and come back to it. Um, Sandra and Yadira, you want to go next? My name is Sandra.
SPEAKER_04:I'm super excited to be here. Uh definitely um well, I run a not virtual, now that you mentioned the difference between virtual and remote. I run a remote tax um firm and then I also run a remote uh insurance firm with uh with my husband. So what I want to take from today is one, you mentioned not talking to a client. It was everything AI, so I'm super excited about that. I want to hear more about that, how that it's possible. And if that changes completely how you get your leads or your clientele, because I'm pretty sure if there's like a market or a niche for it, and it should be market differently than when you have an actual office, and then also like all the tools um out there that we can utilize that you recommend. And one other thing that I was um that happens to a lot of business owners when they're trying to go online, it's I'm pretty sure there's a lot of mistakes we make and investments we make that we are not ready for it because we need to have certain processes in place if we want to go completely virtual. So those are main one of the main things that I want to take away from today.
SPEAKER_01:Hello, um, my name is Elita. Um, I have a um health, life and health practice first, and then I have a PNC office that I opened a few years ago. Um, and my what I would like to take away from here is how do you overcome the guilt of not being in front of your customer? Because we have, especially with the Latino community, um, they want to know that we're there, that they can just walk in, that they can pop in. And so I think the what I feel is guilt, or you know, that I'm they're not gonna be able to see me or talk to me. So I just, you know, I I want to get it all like Sandra said, I know there's a lot of mistakes that probably have already been made that you can that we can avoid. But um, for me personally, is and and that's what's held me back, I think a lot with is um, you know, not having that face to face with customers that have walked into our office for the last 13 years.
SPEAKER_03:I would love for Mike and Zyda to also share if that's okay with the Mike, do you want to go first?
SPEAKER_08:Oh yeah, sure. So um I'm Mike Compos, I'm with Best Buy Insurance. Uh I'm interested in this segment because I want to go 100% virtual. That's the goal. You know, we've been I've been trying to um sell policies online without an agent. Um we've sold some, but I would love to hear your ideas on how you actually do it 100%. So that's why I'm here.
SPEAKER_05:I think we spoke about um the changes out um making and I just I do have a location. Um let that time tell week here is Latinos. Um so it'll be interesting to know how do you deal with that. But we might be talking about different demographics, by the way. Um but I do wanna learn more about the virtual. I invested a lot in my website and uh a little wine online and and and all that, but it's been very costly. Um so I'm at a point where I have I want to make a decision whether or not or not open more locations, or if I should maybe I'm just doing the wrong thing. That's that's what I'm here to learn, hopefully.
SPEAKER_03:And I think Mina just like on your your general expression, like these are all things that you hear all the time, right? Let you take it from here uh so we can initiate this. And just a reminder this is interactive. If she's um as she's talking, if there's something that you're really burning to ask or say, um, by all means, just unmute yourself and say something because we want it to be back and forth.
SPEAKER_02:Absolutely. I'm gonna try to start in the order that you went with Brighton first. And I took some notes, but um, if I forget to answer something that you asked for, please, like she said, interrupt me and let's dive deeper into it. Uh thanks first and foremost for the ITC um support. That was a fun event to go to. Um, of course, that event is filled with tech vendors. That's the purpose, that's the essence of the whole um, you know, seminar or web seminar. And I'm sure that you were approached by all different kinds of people for different things. And I think that this is something that we as agency owners struggle with because it feels like there are systems for everything, especially now, like probably the last six months, maybe even less, maybe the last three months, I also am being bombarded with different vendors saying we can automate this, we can do this kind of AI, we can do that. And everything is starting to be pieced together or sold on a solo basis. And I think that's one of the biggest things that I feel we have an advantage of within my ecosystem, is that instead of paying$300 for this service per month and you know,$500 for this one, and then$100 a year here, and then whatever that might be. Like I was saying, Frankenstein doctrine model piecing things together has not been efficient. You want those systems to talk to each other, and it's the bet the most time-saving way is for you and your team to access everything in one place. And of course, like Vera had said, being green equals more green. This is a part of that equation. Having more green on your hands, having more money on your hands means optimizing these systems together. So, you know, one of your questions was what systems do I use? I'm gonna be really transparent with you all on this podcast. I'm gonna tell you exactly what I use, and you guys can go directly to those vendors and buy the same things and structure the same, you know, type of operations and workflows. But I will be um, you know, honest. It's taken me several hundred thousand dollars over the last five years to get to the point where I'm at, not because that's what it should have cost, but that's because I was going through trial and error myself as I was on this digital journey. I started my digital journey like back in 2011, but I really went full force in 2018. And at that time, there weren't any systems in place within the insurance or finance space that did everything that could do everything I needed them to do, especially on the note of my business structure being accessible in all states to all clients, all demographics. You know, we there were some comments from different people on the call today that were like, maybe it's a different niche or maybe it's this or that. But the reality is this can work for anyone, anywhere, in any agency. It could also work in a CPA firm, it could work in a account, uh tax and a state planning firm, it could work for any business. And in fact, a lot of my customers on the consulting side where we do AI transformation and coaching for them are from other companies, from other industries, not based within insurance. So, to my point, um, the primary system that I use is called Go High Level. Go high level is a CRM system. They've been around for a few years. They're pretty game-changing because they essentially provide you a CRM that is a clean slate that you can completely customize to your own liking. I became the customer in 2018. I built an infrastructure within the um, you know, service within the first couple of years. Again, trial and error, trying to figure out what was needed, how to go about it, really laying out like a standard operating procedure of this is what I want to take place when a customer service request happens, this is what I want to take place when an onboarding needs to be facilitated, this is what I want to happen when someone's rates go up, when someone complains, whatever that might be. That took a lot of testing of different features and things like that. And then to elaborate on that, this is a multi-billion dollar software company that releases AI automations and you know integrations on a nightly basis. So what you do today can be improved by tenfold tomorrow. And I'm someone who likes to stay ahead of the curve. So I'm a little bit on that manic side of constantly checking the updates because I want to be as up to speed and most, you know, cost efficient, time efficient as possible. Also, a big part of all of this is, you know, being human-centric, because just because you use AI doesn't mean that everything needs to feel like it's ran by AI. For me, protecting the integrity of that human connection is very critical to my business. We all know that the only way to get referrals is by building relationships. And so if you strictly just rely on the AI, it's not going to give you the referral results that you need because you're taking that whole human relationship out of it. So Gohai Level is my go-to CRM. And I actually white-labeled the program and sell it through my own insurance um structured, you know, CRM. So basically I have my own CRM system through them. It's called Business Dibs. It's sold to all types of businesses, insurance being one of them. So if it's something that you don't feel like building yourself and things like that, we have a subscription model. It's just under$200 a month. You get everything exactly the same way that my business runs, you get access to the exact same things as I have access. And as I build out updates, they get pushed through that platform. But you can access Go High Level for less for I think it's$99 a month as their cheapest subscription model. And then you just have to build it yourself. So you can take that option too. And these days you can find virtual assistants to help you build, you know, programs and things. So if that's the route that you want to go, I can give you some direction on that end as well.
SPEAKER_00:That was gonna be my question in regards to if you did sublease like what you've created out so that other agencies could use that fully automated system. That's huge. They've offered that with other CRMs for sure. And I've heard of Go High Level. I feel like other agencies do talk about that. Um, and I've seen a lot of marketing, but I just haven't dove in into that specific system yet. So that's huge.
SPEAKER_02:It's a really overwhelming system, to be honest with you. And I think that because I chose this system, that's why we spent that several hundred thousand dollars. It was about$300,000 in a two and a half year time span that we spent on outsourcing coders and you know, different types of people who could help us to build these programs. Also, it was so new at that time. And then, like the fact that there wasn't a system in place in the insurance world that I needed to facilitate all these different things. I needed someone else to come on board and help me figure these things out. But I can tell you that I've been there for every step of the way. So, like now, my team, I have a uh team on the business consulting, in the business consulting agency that helps with AI infrastructure and things like that. We have almost 20 people working in the in the firm, and they make fun of me for literally being like the tech nerd that wants to know every step of the way. Like, I've learned how to code, I've learned how to do a lot of different things to get the system to do the things that I need it to. So oftentimes I will tell my team, like, I need it to do this, and they'll be like, I don't know if that's possible. I'm like, let me show you, it is possible. And it'll it might take me longer than it takes them, but once I kind of open up their mind to it, then they're like, oh my God, I never thought to use it that way, which leads me to a critical point that you don't need anyone's permission to, you know, evolve and to use these types of AI workflows and automations. Like you don't need your territory manager's permission, you don't need your IMO's permission, you need to just make that decision internally and say, okay, I want to work faster, smarter, I want to work on systems that are less time consuming, and you just need to commit to that. You don't need to go around asking for other people's approvals because the reality is that all the carriers are already using this technology and have been for years. The ones you'll I can tell you this firsthand. When I started my brokerage, I mentioned this on the last podcast. When I said that I was going to do this, I cannot tell you how many, it was like 60 different carriers that stood in in my way of doing it. Like they literally were like, okay, that's great, like that's cute, but what are you gonna really do to build this business? You know, they didn't see the vision. And so had I listened to those people, I would not be where I am today. They would just all, you know, they would have won. So what I'm trying to say is like, if you have an uh an urge to go into tech and if you have an urge to automate certain things, I encourage you to do that. As long as you're doing it on an ethical basis that, you know, is allowed within the industry. Make sure you don't break any laws and that kind of thing, go for it. Sooner than later, because eventually it's not the AI that's going to take over your jobs. It's the humans that are using the AI. So you're really competing against other people within your industry, but really the only ones that are the competition are the ones that are adept to this type of, you know, workflow. And so the sooner you jump on it, the more you'll understand. And it takes years of knowledge to kind of acquire that expertise, but you'll get there. So that's one point that I want to make. And I think, Braden, you also asked how to drive traffic. I kind of want you to elaborate on that. Are you asking how to get leads or how to get traffic?
SPEAKER_00:I'll go deeper into it. Quick question before that question. You had mentioned hiring a team. Are you finding people through systems like Upwork or Fiverr or Bricks when you're talking about building out these teams? Or are you looking through other sources of finding these types of people that can code that can build this out for you?
SPEAKER_02:So good question. I actually founded a virtual assistant staffing firm called Scalemate VA. Scalemate VA offers virtual assistance for any niche, for any employment opportunity that you can think of. If you need an executive assistant, if you need a coder, if you need a CRM specialist, if you need a social media manager, a video editor, whatever it might be, we offer the service. We also have like a free ebook I can share with Vera to post on their social. I can also email it to you after the call and that kind of thing. You can, I think it's actually posted on our website where you can learn how we hire, scout source, we how we scout, interview, and uh hire virtual assistants for ourselves, but also for these other firms that pay us to do that for them. So you have two options. You can follow that free guide. The free guide that I share is a literal step-by-step guide on the exact steps that I personally use and that my company, the staffing agency, uses to get these virtual assistants direct from source, or you can hire us to do it for you if you're more, you know, constricted on time and that kind of thing and you want to make the investment. The benefit of going with us is we give you uh six months of support. We onboard them directly into your agency so that you don't have to do the work to train them, onboard them, and that kind of thing. So we take you through like a discovery process where you become our client and then we assess your systems, and then we help whatever talent that you end up hiring really integrate into your business model, and then we support you through a six-month program where if you have any issues with that VA, we do free replacement, we you know train them on the different programs that you need on the different whatever systems that you want to use or lead generation, whatever it might be. So benefit is the support if you use us. If you go directly through the uh guide, you'll learn how to do it. Um, but you just have to do it all yourself. So both options are there for you.
SPEAKER_03:And mind you, while we're going through this, Brian, really quick, I'm everything will be in the show notes as well, and we'll include a lot in the email. So for those of you listening that you're like, oh, what did she just say? Obviously, you can rewind this podcast or check the show notes. They uh her contact information will also be available.
SPEAKER_02:I'm someone who wants, like, I'm on the note of giving you as much information as I can for free because I wish someone would have done that for me. So if I can tell you exactly how I did it and you're successfully able to implement that, more power to you. Please do it. You should do it yesterday. But know that if you need the support, I'm also happy to help you. If there's or if you know someone who needs the support, you can always contact me and I can try my best to, you know, help you as much as I can, or we can book something through the agency and you know, we can do a full-on consulting scope. It just depends on your needs.
SPEAKER_00:One more question before the volume question was are you connecting everything with uh with these different coding teams and this outsourcing team using like Zapier or like API Nation, or is that not even you are okay, you are okay.
SPEAKER_02:Good question. I am, yes. So there are some third-party integrations you're going to need to facilitate the you know fully virtual ops. However, I will say that Go High Level is coming out, like I said, they come out on a nightly basis with upgrades. They have you can replace Zapier all together with Go High Level. You don't need to have them. My structure relies on Zapier because I want specific things that they have not yet deployed. But when that time comes, trust and believe I will be converting to the Go High Level one because it saves me another$400 a month.
SPEAKER_00:It's expensive per zap too. Sometimes it could it could get costly very, very fast.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, we do like 3,000 zaps.
SPEAKER_00:And they charge per zap sometimes, yeah. Yeah, 400 is like the base. Yes, yep, yep. Um to expand more on that question about creating traffic to go to the sites. I I have a site that is quote to bind for life and quote to bind for commercial. Um and there's not too many restrictions on my ads spend towards the life section of that quote to bind. But what I was specifically mentioning, like driving traffic from Google, I I spend a decent amount in like Google advertising, and we get decent returns. I'm trying to always get create better and better campaigns for sure. But um, maybe there's a different way I could be trying to drive that traffic. I I get a decent amount of calls coming in from that, and I imagine I do the same thing with with a quote to bind system.
SPEAKER_02:But yeah, so there's uh this is kind of a controversial topic, and I'm glad you brought it up because I will tell you, in the history of my business, I've never paid for an ad. I've never paid for advertising. Everything in my businesses is 100% organic. Many years ago, about seven, eight years ago, I hired this huge marketing SEO firm for a consultation, and they were I was lucky enough that they were pretty direct with me. And essentially they gave me the scoop on insurance. When it comes to insurance in particular, you have to understand that you're competing with the SEO of progressive insurance, state farm insurance, you know, GEICO insurance, whatever it might be. And these companies are spending thousands and thousands, hundreds of thousands of dollars a year on SEO. So the few thousand dollars a month that you're spending is never going to amount to something significant in terms of your rate of return in order to sustain that type of a business model. So it's critical that you get in front of clients, yes, but getting in front of clients using Google might not be your best alternative. And there are other ways that you can, you know, get traffic. Like, for example, I personally own like, I don't know, 500 different domains. I buy domains like Candy. Anytime I think of a name, I will literally get on my cell phone immediately and buy it. It's like 14 bucks to buy a domain. The reason I do this is because all these different creative methods of wording the search for look like lookingforinsurance.com or like insurance for teenagers.com, which by the way, I don't own these domains. Someone should look them up and see if they're available and you should buy them. Um, or like, I don't know, um skateboard insurance or whatever it might be. Buy up as many as you can. You can then backlink them to your actual website so that if someone searches these terms on Google, uh it will still populate your primary website. But because they search these actual terms that are within the domain that you routed there, that will still pop up in the search results. So that's like one tactic that I've used.
SPEAKER_03:Um, before you continue, can I just say, you guys, that's huge. I feel like I saw the expression on some of your faces and it it really lit up.
SPEAKER_06:I wrote it down. I already wrote it down. Yeah, I'm on GoDaddy right now.
SPEAKER_02:With that, hold on. Let's make a point out of this because this is really critical. If you have not purchased the domain to your actual name, you need to think you need to do that, like literally do it right now during the podcast. Go online and purchase your actual name.com.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Because at some point in time, you may need that. Even if you never use it, you should be the one who owns your own name and not someone else. And you don't want to fight with someone and have to pay, you know, two or three thousand dollars to buy a domain that you need for other purposes. And the other aspect of this is this too, like you have to think of your future. You're not gonna forever be an insurance agent or an estate planner or whatever it might be. Once you build this successful business and you exit, you need something else to rely on. And how are people going to find you if you don't own your personal domain? So you want to own your own IP, and that's an important thing to do. So make sure you do that. All the listeners too, like stop right now, go on the computer and buy it. If no one has bought it yet. Um, but yeah, there are other ways to you know advertise and things like that. So for me, what works is I have it it's crazy because I mentioned this on the last podcast. I have over 8,000 clients now. I've never met one of them in person. Not one. Ever. In the last, what is it now, almost 10 years? I've never met one person in person. I've never met one of them. Okay, I've I just met the first client on Zoom like three weeks ago. He's been with me for like nine years. I've never met him on Zoom or in person, but we just had a meeting because he's hiring my consulting firm. Through the consulting firm, I'm meeting people face to face. But in the insurance space, I've never done, I've never taken a Zoom call, I've never taken a Google Meets or whatever, no video conference calls, no in-p-person meetings. Everything is conducted over phone, text, or email. But 95% is over text and email because by the time that we get through our process, we've answered the person's questions to a point where when we offer the meeting, they're like, I don't even need the meeting anymore. I got all my answers, I'm good to go. So they decline the meeting at that point. So the reason I make a point out of this is because that tells you that the relationship aspect is the most critical point in this transaction. And how do you build rapport with people through social media? And so while this is like a tired old, you know, topic of like you need to post, you need to post, you need to post. I noticed that some of you don't actually have a good social media presence and some don't even have any social media at all. You should, especially with AI out these days. It's very easy for you to create an AI avatar. If it's a matter of you not wanting to be in on the camera, you can have, you know, an AI do the talking for you. It doesn't even have to be you. Or take it a step further, make an AI version of yourself. You could use that for marketing as well. For video content, picture content, static content, whatever it might be. Another thing that you should be doing to advertise is that's also free to you, is you have you're sitting on this gold mine of a client database. How many of you guys are sending out regular email marketing through like an email newsletter type of thing? Sandra's raising her hand. I think Briden, you were raising your hand too, right? Yeah, that that's amazing. That's what you should be doing. You should be giving people good information about whatever products it is that you're serving them with, but also you should be building those personal connections and share your story with them. You should be, you know, introducing them to more a more personal version of you because that is what connects people with others. So when they buy a product from you, that's one type of you know, aspect of the relationship. But the other aspect comes from them feeling like that they know you. And if they know you, then they're more likely, you're more likely to come up in conversation when their neighbor or a friend at a party or whatever has a complaint about their insurance agent. Like, my agent never answers. That's the number one complaint, right? I can never get a hold of my agent. Or like, why didn't my agent, you know, I had this claim, and why didn't he tell me, or why didn't she tell me about XYZ coverage, whatever it might be? These people are more inclined to share your information when they have that personal connection with you. And so the email list is another way of doing it. And then, of course, like I said, the social media posting altogether, that's how we get leads. I actually stay off of social media as much as I can because we get so many leads that were inundated for like weeks in advance that when I when we do slow down, I post once and then that generates like 30, 40 leads just off of one post. You want you want to get to that same point, right? So these are the methods that I use. I hope that that you know answers your question, Bryden.
SPEAKER_00:You had mentioned leads, um 30 or 40 per post. Who's following up with those leads? Are you talking about the one person that um helps run the book, or like your AI is following up with those leads via text, email, or even calling? And if so, calling, are you using any specific um companies separate from Go High level in regards to that?
SPEAKER_02:Excuse me. So no calls, everything is text and email, okay, or automated DM. Okay. So we have uh an onboarding process. So everything is run through form submissions, essentially supplemental apps. So I saw on some of your websites you guys do have forms enabled, but it's like give me a first name, last name, email, phone number, book a call. My point is, like from my business perspective, I don't want a phone call. Why am I getting on a call? For what? What's the purpose? I'm wasting my own time. I'm also kind of wasting the client's time because this aspect of the conversation the client is not interested in. Why did the client come to you? They came to you to save money. That's their only mission in life, right? They don't care who you are, what you do, whatever. That point has already been established because they've already reached out to you over your online form submission. So they want a price. How do we get to that result as quick as possible? Instead of sending them a form saying, give me your first name, last name, email, phone, and then I'll call you. Why don't you take it a step further and establish a standard procedure of what your intake process looks like for X given client? For example, an auto insurance client, for example, an estate planning client, for example, a CPA client, whatever it might be. Decide on the criteria of what your basic form collection should look like. Like for me, I don't work with anyone who won't provide me their copy of their prior declaration pages and pictures or copies of each person's driver's license in the household. That sounds crazy to a lot of you, especially the people that are listening, because everybody's like, for some reason, everybody thinks that they're, you know, they're gonna get ejected from their chair through the roof if they ask someone for a prior copy of their deck page. There's this big stigma of like, if I ask the client, they're gonna hang up on me, they're gonna hate me, I'm gonna die, whatever it might be. But the reality is that you're establishing authority. And a lot of your relationship and the success of your referrals coming in has to do with the stature of what you hold, you know, your composure within to and how you represent yourself to that client. If you have some sort of a standard procedure in place that you do not veer off of, that you stick to with every single client, it shows that you're established and that you know what you're doing. People can rely on that because it's consistent every single time. It's a very different experience working with an agent that's like this on under this operation, than an agent that you can just call up and be like, hey, I need a quote for a motorcycle. It's a 2022 Harley. Can you give me a price? Agent gives them a price, client changes the VIN number, whatever. Maybe they didn't even give a VIN number. They give the VIN number, price goes up. Now there's some back and forth of like, you said$50 a month, now it's$60. Like all these things can be avoided if you just establish some basic ground rules. And some of those rules, like I said, if they have prior deck, that that makes my job easy. I can see what they're paying, I can see what coverages they have, I can see who the carrier was. Just based off of looking at the deck page, I can immediately make some assumptions on who's going to be the best fit carrier-wise for this client. Nonetheless, I still run it through all carriers, and then I have talking points. So now if my price ends up being more or the same, I can point out coverage discrepancies that I see within their previous policy versus the one that I'm going to be offering them. Because it just so happens that 99% of people don't review their insurance policy on a regular basis, right? So whenever they got this policy with the old broker, they were in one part of their life. And now it's been a year, six years, 10, 30 years later, they're still carrying coverage that they had before they were married or when they got married or whatever. And now they have three property investment properties, and you know, they have multiple boats and this and that, whatever it might be. It gives me a talking point to say, okay, your coverage with the old agent, with the old broker was X, and I recommend this instead. That oftentimes will make me look like a more knowledgeable broker because I've pointed out something to them that their agent should have pointed out to them. And you know, no shame. All of us agents are in the same game. We're all trying to survive, right? We're all we don't all have time to talk with like me. I will tell you myself, I don't have time to talk to 8,000 people a year. Do you know how many calls I'd have to be on every single day to do that? So it happens to my clients too that have signed up with me years ago that I haven't had a chance to review their documents or their coverages. I mean, so it can happen to anyone, but this is a good talking point in the in the process of a sale. Or we can discuss, you know, the standing of that insurance company within the marketplace. Or we can talk about the fact that they told me they have two kids and it's the two of them. I have four driver's licenses on hand, but only two people are listed on their policy. That's a talking point. We know insurance companies are getting more and more strict about who's being listed on their policies and things like that for coverage to extend. It's no longer the hey, permissive use driver game, right? They're getting crazy on us with not covering claims at all if someone isn't disclosed. So these are some different things that you can do as well.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, that's huge. I really like that you pointed out that you have to have that authority with the client. I think that touches upon a little bit of what um Yadira mentioned about the guilt of interacting with the client. I think once you once you make that switch and you start training, you mentioned in the last episode you you have to train the customers too, right? That's huge. But hey, I wanted to give Sandra a chance. Um, she raised her hand, she has a question. Um, we want to make sure that it is open-ended. You guys ask your questions, put it in the chat. We want to get to everything, but go ahead, Sandra.
SPEAKER_04:Um I know you you mentioned you don't spend money on ads necessarily on SEO and all that. So I'm curious to know, like, you do newsletters and all that. How do you get those clients? Uh either referral bases only, or you're out there in networking and events, or what is your best strategy to get those clients?
SPEAKER_02:Referrals. Every single, like, do you have? I have to ask you this question when it comes to referrals, everyone says that they get referrals, but do you ask for referrals on every single sale?
SPEAKER_04:No. So every single sale, you and you have like a method of referrals already, like okay. Exactly.
SPEAKER_02:I ask for a referral on every single sale, and not me, right? My automations do. It sounds like it's me. But this is critical to your AI success, right? So I think one of the biggest themes within not just our group that we're having this conversation now, but within this transitional period of people attempting to apply AI, everyone seems to talk about AI and automations, and it's gonna do this and it's gonna do that. But the reality of it is it's going to give you more of whatever it is that you have now. So if your agency is, you know, being inundated with requests and complaints and whatever might be, you throw AI into the mix, you're just gonna get more of that. If your agency is structured properly from the get-go and you have systems in place and things, and we can elaborate on that, you're going to have more success. So, the biggest problem with this, that I will tell anyone whoever asks me, like the biggest advice is don't immediately jump to AI and automation. What you need to jump to is organization within your business, the structure within your business. You need to implement standard operating. You need to, like I keep I keep reiterating, reiterating this, but you need to get clear on your boundaries and your expectations. What are your boundaries with your clients? What are you willing to do? What are you not willing to do? What are your boundaries with your team? What are you willing to do? To do, what are you not willing to do? And what are your expectations of your clients when they come to you? What would make your job easier? Once you identify these things, then you can build standard operating procedures around these programs that are repeatable processes. And once we get to a point where we iron out, you know, what you have going for yourself, then you implement AI, and then that brings you success. So, like if in this referral example, one of your um territories that you're suffering in is you're not getting as many referrals as perhaps you would like. But then also you're not asking for them. So, like this is the answer to your question. Why aren't you getting them? You're not asking for them. Um, or you're not asking for them consistently. Let's say it, let's say it that way. Um, if we implemented some sort of a referral workflow for you, your referral increase would probably be like 3,000%. I'm not exaggerating on that number. If we sent out referral requests on a regular basis with every new client and all the old clients that you've already signed up, it's very likely that you're going to have a busy month ahead of you, if not a few busy months.
SPEAKER_04:And if you don't mind me asking, like, is that like something that you like, do you get a gift card when you send me a client, or you just get a little star when you send me a client? Or how do you send it?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, so like in the beginning of my career, I would send out gift cards. I did that probably for like five years or something like that. Um, but I've been doing insurance for almost 20 years. These days I don't. It's not that I don't want to, it's just that we're so busy doing sales that I kind of forget. And I have a running list of people that like send me things. I have tags and I can look up how many people have sent me certain things. So instead of sending them referrals per transaction, I now will share gifts with them sporadically, like a$50 Amazon gift card or like whatever, just to be like, hey, I appreciate your support in the business and things like that. Instead of making it referral specific, it's more like an exchange of, you know, it's your birthday and I wanted to give you a gift or something like that. It makes it more personal. So that's working for me right now. But yeah, I know it's not standard.
SPEAKER_03:I like that though, because it does take away the transic transactionality of it. So it it you mentioned you you nailed it, it makes it more personal. Sandana, did you have another question or anyone else?
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, and and while you while you were talking, you were answering a lot of the questions that I had here.
SPEAKER_02:But um one of the- I did also have notes for you too, on on your beginning questions, but why don't you ask me whatever you were going to, and then I'll get to that.
SPEAKER_04:Um, my question is what struggle still shows up for you today? Um, even though you're virtually completely that a regular agent goes through as well, like struggles.
SPEAKER_02:Um I think that this is a good topic. I have recently begun the practice of firing clients. I think that every business owner has clients they shouldn't be doing business with, people who come on board to begin with, and they seem like great prospects, and you close the deal and you made your commission, you made your profit, whatever it might be. Fast forward a few weeks, months, years later, and this is the same client who's now costing you most of your time. So I've recently, in the last, again, like probably six to eight months or so, I've started taking note of who those people are and I've started letting them go. So I've let go over almost$200,000 in commissions in the last six months, but I've made approximately$400,000 in commissions. And I would say that that's because I freed up my time from those people who were taxing and instead took on people that were easy to work with, therefore I could serve you know more. So this is a this is a problem that exists in every business, it's not just insurance, and it takes a lot. Like it's it's a very mentally challenging thing to do, especially because you have connection with these people. And how are you gonna, you know, how are you gonna fire them? What are you gonna tell them? And what are you making the right decision? Is there gonna be backlash? Are they gonna leave you a bad review? Whatever it might be, you know, it even me, like I lost sleep over it the first few times I did it. I was like, oh my God, am I making a mistake? There's agents out there that are looking for commissions of like a$30,000 account, and here I am telling this guy, like go somewhere else, you know? So I felt some guilt and things with that. But after the first few, it's gotten much easier, and now it's much easier to spot as well. And so now my response is becoming more, how should I say, easy, I guess. It's dealing, I'm dealing easier with the this topic, and it's easier for me to overcome that. And I look back and I'm like, I should have started this a long time ago. Like I was I was crazy to entertain all that heavy work and instead work smart. So I'm I'm glad to be in this position, and I think that that's a hard lesson to learn for every owner.
SPEAKER_00:I feel like you bring up a really great point there, and I would say like 20% of your clients do take up 80% of your time and to really document that and start getting rid of them is huge. I've had carriers say that these people are high risks and you gotta let them go. And I find it to where I can't just cancel policy. What is it that you say specifically when you fire a client? Because you can't just say, hey, they say they're gonna cut you and cancel it on the back. And like, what how does that conversation look?
SPEAKER_02:I've said several I've said different things to different people. It's not one answer to every person, but a pretty generic answer that you can give is that we're unfortunately we're no longer no longer able to service your account, so we're closing your file in our agency. Going forward, you'll have to contact the carrier directly for any needs that you may have, or you can transfer this policy to another agency that can service you better. That's something you can say that's you know, not too.
SPEAKER_03:That's awesome. I feel like it's professional, it's direct. And um, yeah, I love that. I want to point out, Mike, you were trying to raise your hand, but it wasn't showing up, so we don't want to ignore you. I want to make sure we answer uh or have might I answer your question. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, I had a question when you're talking about routing um any domain that you buy to your primary domain. Now is that sharing the um the back pages to your um primary domain, or how's that work?
SPEAKER_02:You can reroute a domain to another, like you can forward a domain to a specific page. I forward those domains to my homepage of my main business that I want it to go to.
SPEAKER_08:Now, does it see your back pages to your primary domain, or does it just see that one?
SPEAKER_02:Oh no, well, once they're on your website, they click around, they have access to all the other ones. And then uh I had another one like one homepage to another homepage, just making it clear.
SPEAKER_08:Okay, I had another question. So, what does your workflow look like if you're all virtual? Like um, you know, like for for example, uh auto insurance client, you know, from from quote to bind to signing.
SPEAKER_02:So when someone wants a quote in my agency, whether they they call, text, email, whatever it might be, an automatic reply goes out that sends them a link to the appropriate form containing, you know, the supplemental application I've created, obtaining the information that we need. If it's P and C, it's gonna be prior policy records. It could, if it's commercial, it's gonna include loss runs, vehicle schedules, whatever it might be. Whatever, if it's life insurance, it's gonna require different things. If it's, you know, a bond, it's gonna require different whatever might be. So if it's auto home, deck pages, driver's licenses, email, phone, contact number, um, and then it asks them if there's been any changes on their policy they'd like to report that aren't already listed, and it submits they submit the form. Once the form is submitted, our process is that the form gets integrated into our CRM so that everybody has access to it. It creates a contact in the CRM. Um, it creates an opportunity, so like a sales pipeline ticket, so to speak, for that uh client and it deploys an automation to let the client know that we've received their shop request, their price shop request, and that their quote is underway. Meanwhile, it assigns the lead to one of our team members. It also takes that same data that they've submitted, the documents uh and the form, and it searches our cloud for us in alphabetical order to find the folder that already relates back to this client. If one exists, it updates the files that are on record with the more up-to-date files. It inspects them to make sure that we're not, you know, getting rid of something that we already need that we need and replacing it. Instead, it just replaces duplicate info. So maybe they had old driver's licenses before, now they've submitted something else, and they're updated driver's licenses or what might be. If that file doesn't exist, then it creates a folder for that person's name. It dumps the files in there, it creates subfolders to categorize those documents under like an auto insurance folder, driver's license, driver's folder, and then it labels the documents accordingly to driver's license mic, driver's license Sandra, proof of pride declaration page for auto insurance farmers, whatever it might be. So this is the process for the quote request. For doing the quote, our team members, the humans, do the quotes. Um, we're working on a process now of automating this as well. We've been testing for the last six months on efficiency to have this done by AI because there is capability to do that. I haven't leaned into that yet 100% because I'm not fully satisfied with the way that it goes, that it's going. So for the time being, we have humans doing the quotes. They will then, you know, do a price chop standard way, just like anyone else, using a radar, using multiple different carriers, whatever might be. Once they get the price, they fill in the price into the ticket of the pipeline stage. And that that triggers an automation to let the client know that their quote is now ready and sends them a price with a payment link, offering them to either sign up for the policy on the spot, or if they have questions, then they can schedule, they can respond to that via text or email asking their questions. Our team will then get notified if there are any questions or concerns and they get a chance to respond. If the AI doesn't pick up on the automation itself, if the client asks generic questions like what's the deductible, what's this, what's that, or will this cover if I drive to, I don't know, Mexico, for example. Like there's certain things that the AI can say, no, there's no coverage in place for this, or to add this type of coverage, we can update the quote and send you a new price or whatever might be. Or our human team will then respond. The person who's working on the lead will then respond to the customer and answer any questions that they have over text. And then it typically turns into a sale. Once the sale is completed, um, the we'll take the payment, or the client, like I said, pays the payment link. Um, once that's done, our team members will save the copies of the policies on record, um, either in the CRM system or on our cloud-based system. I prefer the cloud-based system because I am someone who feels like for I can trust Google more I use G Suite services than I can GHL. Why GHL at GoHigh Level is a multi-billion dollar company. What if they get acquired one day and some system change upgrade happens in the CRM and we lose all the documents that are in there? Like these are things that go through my manic mind. So I want a backup of those documents somewhere else. And so I put them on my cloud. Um, and then the custom then our team member moves their pipeline stage into an onboarding um automation where the client receives a YouTube video that gives them an introduction by me that talks about these are our preferred business hours. This is the best way to get in touch with us over text and email. These are the contact numbers. Our operating hours are this. If you have a claim, this is the procedure. If you have a customer service request, this is the procedure. We're in charge of your savings, but you're in charge of your policy. So while you might get mailers in the mail, know that we don't get those same mailers in our agency, meaning that when you get something in the mail that's alarming concerning whatever it might be, it's your responsibility to let us know as your agents that there's an issue with your policy so we can help you. This takes off the weight off of your plate in terms of having to, you know, tit for tat, watch every single step of their policy report increases and whatever, they'll let you know if there's a problem. If they get a mileage request, if they get a UM form, whatever it might be, now it's on them. That way, if they don't tell you and their rates change, it's also on them. So we're setting that expectation up front. Then we ask them for referrals, we tell them to leave us a review. Um, and then the file gets moved into a closed uh client account, and then that completes the process. Does that answer your question?
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, you sound like an API documentation.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, I wanted to just address a couple of quick points with Sandra because she had some uh questions in the beginning of the call that we didn't get to when we were just chatting. You were asking if the AI voice handles 100% of everything. Is that was that your question? I want to make it clear that the AI voice feature just came out like eight months ago, ten months ago. It's not something that I've been running my agency with it. That's it, the AI voice aspect is a new feature to my agency. Prior to this, when there was no AI voice, they would simply get an automated text reply or an automated email reply. So there was no AI voice involved. Now that we have ability to have AI voice, I've trained our AI voice with a lot of knowledge, you know, because you have to train voice agents and AI agents with the things you want them to do. So now the AI voice answers all of our calls. So does that answer your question? Yes. Yes. And when I say not talking to clients, we really have never talked to clients on the phone. I mean, look, there's an emergency, I'll call someone. If there's a claim, someone dies or something like that. Of course, I'm gonna pick up the call. I'm not, you know, completely appropriate. You're not a robot. Oh no, I get it. But it has to, I usually the way that I tell my team, like, does it make us money or does it cost us money? Anything that doesn't make us money costs us money. So cost, money activity should cost, um, I'm sorry, cost um causing activity should be managed by the AI and automations. Money-making activity should be managed by our humans. Then you had a question about like how does that affect how does the AI affect niche um clients? Like perhaps is this like now, does this mean that we have a bunch of Gen Zers and you know, millennials in our agency? No, you'd be surprised. We have a lot of boomers, we have a lot of Gen X. Like it's I think it's a pretty even spread. I think Gen X is, I'm sorry, Gen Z is the least amount of our clientele. It goes probably like any other agency these days, millennials, Gen X, and boomers for the most part. We have 80-year-olds that are act interacting with the AI just fine. It's not the AI that's the issue, it's the client that it, you know, the one that you get here and there that's like, I hate the AI. That person just hates everything about technology, period. It's not you. It's they would complain about the snapshot system, they'll complain about Big Brother, they'll complain about all these different things. So it's not a niche age group that can function under this operation. Everyone can function under if you make it easily able to access and if you make it easy to understand what's happening. I think that if you stick with generic prompts, then it throws off the experience because then they feel like they're no longer talking with you. So if you're someone who's more articulate and has a higher vocabulary, your AI should sound sound like that. If you speak more directly, like I do, on more simplistic terms, layman's terms, then your AI should sound like that. And that's what keeps that experience floating. So I just wanted to get to those, Sandra.
SPEAKER_04:Thank you.
SPEAKER_03:You're welcome. Thank you. And I want to make sure we get to Zyra's question and Yadira also if you have questions. Um, you guys don't be shy. You know, Maira, we're respectful of your time. We don't have much time left, so let's just make sure we we get to as many questions as we can.
SPEAKER_02:And I do have some notes and a couple and um Yadira and Zyra, and I think that's it for now. So if you guys have questions, please ask them, and I'll try to answer the things you said in the beginning of the call as well.
SPEAKER_05:Well, if you don't mind me asking, um, how big is your staff and how do you keep them motivated? Since you're not like looking at them, you're not in a because I feel like that is important for me, like being with them. I'm not there, you know, all the time, but having that contact with them, it's important. How do you do it?
SPEAKER_02:How do you manage that? Great question. So in the insurance brokerage, I only have one staff member, one producer. Um, in the and we don't have any customer service reps. We really I've kind of already touched on this, but in my opinion, and this is like a hot take, be prepared. Don't fall out of your chair now when I say this. You have to look at it like this your insurance carrier collects 100% of the premium. Of the 100% of the premium, you get a measly little commission that's about 10 to 20% at best. So, what the hell is the carrier doing with the other 80%? Let's call it 80%. Well, one, they're paying their CEOs, they're giving bonuses, they're doing all those things, but some of the other things that they're doing is they're supporting you with their customer service centers. Are they not? They provide you 1-800 customer service phone number access, right? They also provide you with an e-portal, they provide you with like the e-signature with the customer can log in and manage their account and all those things. And while this is where the big controversy comes in, there was this big topic a few years ago that was running within the insurance broker world that was like, no, don't refer your clients back to the carrier. The carrier will steal them from you, or like don't tell your client to log to download the app from Progressive to get their ID cards or whatever it might be, because then the client loses their relationship with you. Make your own app instead. I'm completely against that. Like, I have no problem with that. None of my clients, my clients don't care. My clients know that their relationship with me is based on one type of transaction, and then they just use that company to fulfill these services. So my clients won't leave me if I send them to the 1-800 customer service. I will structure the conversation in a way where I'm like, look, I'm a licensed sales agent. The carrier provides a customer service to you to manage your account. If you call them and you have any issues, come to me and I'll escalate it for you. But if they're generic requests, go to them directly or download the app and you know, request a change, whatever might be. This is not to say that I don't take customer service requests in my office, but this is to say that those basic things, like can I get an ID card? Hey, can I add a card to my policy? Whatever might be. I would rather receive those notifications via email and have my team look them over, make sure that they're good to go and move on, instead of spending minutes, hours, whatever, weeks with the client going back and forth to resolve these issues. So that's I think a big thing to know. Uh, what else was your question? I'm sorry. Well, you you you're telling you you only have one.
SPEAKER_05:So I was trying, I was asking how do you keep on motivating, you know, between them. So that makes it easier.
SPEAKER_02:So I I would tell you that I think that part 50% of the motivation comes with not having to deal with people. Because at the end of the day, is the fact is that when you're in sales, you like helping people save money, right? That's the point of why you're there. So if you give your team member the ability to shine in the skills that they love the most, they won't have a reason to hate their job. The reason that they start hating their job is because they get stuck doing a million other things that they didn't sign up to do, like the customer service, like the paperwork, like all the stuff, you know, that's more difficult. The stuff that's easy to make mistakes on, like the stuff that they get into arguments with over the client, or, you know, whatever it might be. They get negative feedback and things like that. It's nice to put your team in a position where they have success on a daily basis so that they're happy to return back to the workspace. One of your other questions was how do I manage the ver the remote? Aspect of the team because I have these other businesses, and none of my businesses involve in-person work. My entire all the six companies that I have, they have employees that work remotely. Some of them are international employees in different countries. How do I manage these teams in terms of like making sure that they're working and things like that? I will tell you this. One, it's very obvious when someone's not working because the work will reflect. Eventually, it might be a few weeks, it might be a few months, you will see mistakes start to happen. And as those mistakes surface, it's very easy to track back and see if in fact they're following directions and implementing the things that you've asked them to, or if they're dropping the ball. That's one way. But I guess that the more important thing in this is that you have these systems, like we've been talking about. The big theme of this conversation needs to not be how do I use AI, but how do I use systems, how do I make systems to make sure that my track is, my work is able to be tracked. If you have certain expectations in place, like this is what happens when a client comes in, this is what happens when a client leaves our office, this is what happens, you know, and it's a step-by-step way of doing things that's clear and repeatable between you, your staff, the new person that just started working there a week ago or whatever it might be, then it's easy for you to backtrack and see if those things have been done. And if they haven't, you can address your team and you know, with a concern. If they have been done, it will reflect accordingly. And that's how you'll know if your team is working. I'm completely like you're you should. If you want to hold, if you want to micromanage, you cannot be a remote or a virtual agency. You have to have the ability to let go of things. And this is one thing I wrote down for Yadira. When you are the CEO, you need to be thinking of what other people can do for you, not what you can do. So, like one of your questions was like, How do you deal with the guilt of not being able to help your clients? You have to reframe, you have to reframe your identity within business to understand that you are the person that's like the shining light. You are the person that's offering the authority, the knowledge, the respect, the you know, education, whatever it is, the problem solving that they're coming to you for. Your clients already respect that. That's why they're there, that's why they're doing this transaction with you. Your clients don't actually, there's like some misconception. Your clients don't like seeing you do paperwork. Your clients don't like you doing small tasks. They just come to you because they're most comfortable with the trust that you've built with them. So it's not a problem of your clients not being used to dealing with other people. The problem is that they're not used to dealing with other people because those other people don't operate the way that you do. And that's a system problem. So you haven't successfully yet been able to make your team a clone version of you, so to speak. And that's hard to do. Obviously, you can't mold everybody's personality to react exactly the same way that you do, but there's systems that you can put into place. Like I'll tell you one. I built out an AI agent that we're offering to our ecosystem of companies and our subscribers that essentially they can chat and ask any question that they would normally ask me, and it will respond like I would respond. So it's not just for our customers, it's for our team too. So now instead of our team taking the, you know, leap and trying to give the customer whatever information they want, they first run that question through the AI. It gives them a response of what I would say, and then they answer the client's question. And so now the client is feeling more comfortable in terms of feeling like, even though I spoke to Johnny, they sounded much like what Maida would say, if that makes sense. And so that over time builds that consistency for them to kind of ease off of Yadira or Sandra or Maida or whatever might be, and they understand that hey, they can work with other people in the office and still get the same result, if that makes sense. So I hope Zaya that that also kind of leaped into what your questions were.
SPEAKER_03:Galita, do you have a follow-up or Zayra yourself?
SPEAKER_01:Uh for me, it's more like um I was saying, and customers don't really deal, I don't really deal with day-to-day customers, but we have so many walk-ins. And my fear is if we were to go virtual, they would just feel lost and not, you know, contact us or uh, you know, call us and they would just go elsewhere. So that's that's kind of what I meant by guilt. Not necessarily me, but just like my staff as a whole.
SPEAKER_02:Okay, thanks for clarifying. So that's also a very important aspect to touch on because when you make the decision to go virtual, it's not a matter of you saying, today I'm gonna go virtual and tomorrow we're no longer taking appointments or walk-ins. This is a process you're going to have to take over the next 12 to 24 months. 24 months, I would say, is what it's going to take for your clients to fully get used to this concept. 12 months, 50% of them participate in the way that you want them to. So once you decide to go digital and remote, green, virtual, whatever option you choose, you then need to craft some sort of a communication from the founder, from yourself to your clients. And that should be mailed, like by snail mail, regular mail. It should be emailed, it should be posted on your um website as like a news announcement. You should do an email blast, but you should also have that in the part of every signature, every receipt that you give to people. So that, like as an announcement, by you know, December of 2026, we are no longer taking walk-in appointments. That way they're being hit with that every single time that they have a transaction with you. And like I said, give give it up to two years to fully transition to that business model because you'll have people who maybe you haven't spoken with in 18 months that'll, you know, have this encounter where they'll like show up to the location where you were and they'll kind of panic and be like, oh my God, where are you? I came to see you today and you weren't here. They missed that communication. You're not going to be able to get 100% of the clients on board, but you'll get a majority of them. And I would say probably maybe even like 80, 90% of them will understand what's happening by this two-year mark. And then those few that end up calling you out of the blue that are like, I didn't know you guys weren't taking them, or whatever. At this point, you'll be so practiced within that new business model, it'd be easy for you to explain to them what happened and why you made this decision. And to be honest with you, a big part of this conversation can be led back to the economic ways that the world operates these days. Like it's not feasible for a lot of a lot of brokerages that are going out of business because they can't make money. Why can't is it that they can't make money, or is it just that rent is going up, insurance is going up, the cost of labor is going up, and that we're just not able to make enough to pay all those in-person physical expenses. If you take those out of the picture, like most brokerages that we work with, their overhead lies somewhere between$100,000 and$200,000 a year. It cuts down to about$14,000 a year on average. That's a huge difference. Now you're taking home that extra money. So when you phrase it to people like this, people are generally reasonable, people are generally good people. Like everyone, you know, nobody wishes bad on anyone. That's not how the world works. Like generally speaking, everyone is very empathetic to one another. And when you're a business owner, especially if you've put in the grit and the years of working with someone and building that rapport, explaining to them that we've made the decision to go digital because of the, you know, inefficiencies within the systems that are currently within the insurance market. The insurance market has changed drastically in the last couple of years, and it's put us in a position to make some hard decisions where we're now taking the lead on digitizing our records and making sure that everything is done electronically. We're gonna take the next phase of this rollout, it's going to be us vacating our physical office space and meeting with you virtually and remotely and operating, operating on this new business model. For example, that's another way that you could say it. Like if you need more help elaborating on this, I'm happy to talk to you more about it. But I think that gives you some good ideas.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, definitely. Thank you. And you know, we got a little practice during COVID, right? We had to do a lot of stuff over the phone and and virtually. So yeah, I think it's just a matter of, like you said, just getting people used to the idea.
SPEAKER_02:But I will say that because I'm glad you bring that up, I think one, COVID was great in the sense of giving people this practice run of for first-time exposure to kind of not having that in-person access. But on the other hand, you've now reverted back to the old model. So now, like, there's some whiplash, right? First it was like old model, then new model, then old model again. So now when you go back into this new digitized model, it's important that you not only train the customers, but first come up with what's what your boundaries are going to be. So you don't want to end up back where you were in COVID because during COVID, you didn't know what you were doing. You were just going like rolling with the punches. You were just taking the appointments that you needed to take and you were surviving, right? Like if clients wanted to meet with you on Zoom, you were taking those calls. If this was this, if this was that, you were just doing what you needed to do to keep survive that moment in time. But today you're not in that survival mode. Today you're in a position where you're doing this for leverage. So today you should be asking yourself, okay, what justifies a Zoom call? Is an endorsement a Zoom call? Is a payment a Zoom call? Is a coverage question a Zoom call? You know, you need to set some boundaries so that you can set clear expectations. And with that letter that you have that announcement that you make, it should follow. Like these are our new operating procedures. If you have a question about your policy, do XYZ. If you want to add a vehicle or have a new policy to add, do XYZ. If you have a referral to send, do XYZ. Whether that includes those form links that I was talking about or texting a certain line or contact this person who's in charge of this, whatever that looks like, you need to set those expectations from the beginning and iterate and reiterate, like, you know, repeat over and over and over until you pull the plug. And then when you give yourself that uh cutoff date, make it a hard stop. Like, do not make exceptions. That's probably also one of the biggest parts. If you say January 1st of 2028 is the last day that we do this, or is the first day that we're implementing digital, don't make it the third, don't make it the tenth, don't make an exception for John who's been with you for 20 years, or whoever that you know is making you feel bad. It is what it is. At that point, if they don't want to operate with you under the way that you want to run your business, then they're no longer your client. Let them go to someone else. Thank you. You're welcome.
SPEAKER_03:Mayda, I do have a, I think, two questions that I'd like to in the chat. One of them, speaking of the AI agent, when your team asks and potentially clients too, how often are automated messages being audited for accuracy? Weekly. Weekly. Okay, awesome. And then because oh, sorry, go ahead.
SPEAKER_02:Let me just add to this. Every single so there's up I was speaking with actually with Vera before this we started the podcast today. Everything that I participate in is recorded, and everything that I record, I then use the port of my participation to train my AI. So I use the transcript to collect the data that I've shared to make sure that my AI is up to speed in my voice, my tone, my cadence, my knowledge, and that kind of thing. And because I'm ever evolving and changing things and learning new about new products, new methods, new ways, it's important to keep that AI up to date. So it usually takes us once a week to update whatever has happened in the last week.
SPEAKER_03:Okay. And then the question, I guess ballpark, because I think everybody would be different. What would be the total monthly cost for going 100% virtual? What would that be?
SPEAKER_02:I think that the best way to answer that is to tell you that it depends on in which part of the journey you're in. But I would say we have an at the guesstimate number of about$3,000 a month. That's typically what it costs. That's including the cost of a virtual employee that, like a VA, a VA that's sourced for internationally that will help you to upkeep these systems. And then, you know, that can become leaner the longer you stay with it or increase in cost depend depending on which directions you take. But that's roughly what it costs to run a virtual assistant or virtual agency. I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_06:That's not it's not too crazy.
SPEAKER_03:No, it still seems less expensive than having the overhead of locations and no one she said 3000 and was looking at their rent, like, oh shit.
SPEAKER_02:And that's like the best way, like, right? If you give up your lease, how much are you saving? You're already saving this. Or like you want to hire a new employee. That's the thing, like, don't immediately jump to hiring a new employee. Get a system in place like this so that you don't have to hire a new employee. Instead, use the employee that you already have to give them things that make you money.
SPEAKER_07:Yep. Yep. I actually have um I have two questions, and I'm not sure if anybody else has this concern, but these are just kind of two questions I had, like I wanted to ask you from the beginning. But since Vera didn't give me the opportunity, I'm just gonna do it right now.
SPEAKER_03:That's right, I didn't. It was about the agents first.
SPEAKER_07:So, okay, so in the beginning, I mean, obviously, we all started in the insurance industry as far as uh um having an agency, having a staff. I mean, so I'd ask you, you know, how big is your staff? So obviously we have staff. Now, we all can probably have an idea what our own personal stress level is. What happens if the employer doesn't show up? What if he's running late? What if, you know, the customer, what if this, what if they're not answering the phone, or what did you say? So that stress level compared to going 100% virtual, you know, how does that stress level compare? Is it less? Is it the same, or what?
SPEAKER_02:So much less. That's not even a topic of conversation. Automation and AI will never call in, will never let you down, ever. It will always do exactly what you told told it to do. It's basically error-proof. The only time that it malfunctions is if there's some sort of a system outage within the softwares and things. But generally speaking, it does exactly what you asked it to do time and time again.
SPEAKER_07:Okay. And then I have a second part of the question is that okay, the stress level is less, right? But since you are, and again, you're the first person I know, not that that's 100% virtual. Not remote, you're 100% virtual, right? Is how does that liability look? You know, as far as we bring that up. You know, as agents, we have to be careful in what we say, what we do, do you get a signature? Did you send this out? What do you mean he texts you? You didn't text back, and he says so much, right? But when you go 100% virtual, how's that liability connected to stress kind of look?
SPEAKER_02:I'm so glad you brought it up because I was going to bring this up before we get off the call. The liability is reduced, I would say, by almost 100%, because I have auditable systems that have everything in writing. Every call it has a transcript, every text has a log, every email has a log, every timestamp is linked to every team member, every transaction has a note, it has a time set. Like everything is there, everything is documented. And I I don't know if I've ever said this on if I said this last time because it's a popular quote that I like to say all the time. I tell everyone this that I come across. If it's not in writing, it didn't happen. And under your current models, there's so much that's not in writing. All those phone calls your team members are having and the crazy things that they say sometimes that you're like, what the did you just say, don't ever say that again?
SPEAKER_06:Right?
SPEAKER_02:Like there's there's a method to the madness. I think I saw a question come through that's asked, you know, how often do your systems go down? Because with this documentation of everything, while it reduces your liability, because everything is documented and has a thorough, consistent um workflow that doesn't involve human error, there is that aspect of like, well, software issues sometimes do take place. I've been doing this for eight years. One time I had an issue, and the one time that I had an issue, honestly, it was caused by me.
SPEAKER_07:Man.
SPEAKER_02:So I mean, it took me like a couple weeks to fix it in terms of get getting fully restored access to all the pre pre prior stuff. But I disclosed that at the beginning of the call. In the beginning of my journey, I really had to trial and error and figure all this out myself. Now I'm in a good position where this has scaled to a large operation with literally no overhead, basically. Um, that these issues don't arise anymore. You know, I don't have these beginner mishaps. So our systems really never go down. I I I can say almost never.
SPEAKER_07:Right. And this is my last question, I promise. Is that, and I think this will go into maybe piggyback a little bit in Yadira's um question was at an agent, and you know, he saw our post, he and it's an agent that you know is local to me, so he was always coming by and everything. And he he threw something at me and he said, Look, I understand 100% great and everything, but let me ask you something. What if what if the Wi-Fi goes out, power goes out, okay, and and your client's trying to get a hold of you? Now, you ever thought maybe your client just might say, you know what, did they go out of business or what? I'm just gonna go to their office right now. Like does that everyone?
SPEAKER_02:Well, let me ask you, let me ask you this. So, what if the Wi-Fi goes off at your office? What if the power goes off at your office? What are you gonna do? You're just gonna sit there for eight hours all day. Most agents are gonna tell their team, go home. There's nothing we can do.
SPEAKER_07:Yeah, no, no, no. I agree. I agree.
SPEAKER_02:Or the ones that are still sitting there, if they happen to have a person come in office, sure. But what I do, this is an easy remedy. I post a banner on my website. I talk about it on social media. I'll say, like, we're experiencing a power outage or whatever might be, right? Like maybe it's a weather-related problem or whatever. Yeah, you can you can easily remedy these things.
SPEAKER_07:Right. Okay, now I thought you were gonna say you have a generator just as a backup, but never mind.
SPEAKER_03:Also, I do, yeah, I know. I was gonna say you can get a generator, but it's important to remember that Facebook has outages and you know what I mean? Like in general, life goes on.
SPEAKER_07:In closing my question, I from what I got from the guy, again, going back to I think some agents, it's like the fear of someone just saying, All right, well, never mind, I'm just gonna look for somebody else. The fear of losing clients. And I get it, I was just like, you know, but I I can see it in his in his tone that it was just like, I can't afford to lose any customers type of mentality.
SPEAKER_02:So well, you're gonna lose them anyway because you're not adapting to the speed and pace that other people are.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So that would be my thing to him. It would be like, look, you have agents with less knowledge, expertise, and authority in the space doing more than you are. I can speak to 50 clients at the same time. I can speak to 8,000 clients at the same time with one click of a button. You can only take one call phone call at a time.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So who's the one that's losing? Is it the person, you know what I mean? So the fear, the the fear mentality is so hard to overcome. I hear you on that. Like, I work with a lot of insurance agents, and that's definitely a thing that we have to work on on a regular basis. But the reality is it's never not going to feel fearful. It's ne it's not like if you wait 10 years from now, you're not going to be scared to make the transition. You're going to be scared no matter what.
SPEAKER_07:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:It doesn't get easier. It's like having a kid, or maybe even getting married, or I don't know, getting a dog. Like it doesn't, it's you're still scared every single day that you have it because it's a big responsibility. But the outcome, the positives, much outweigh the negatives.
SPEAKER_07:Did you ever get any uh and maybe you didn't say this, any any um any crap from marketing raps or carries that you don't have a physical location?
SPEAKER_02:I do have a physical office spot, but nobody goes to it. Oh, in person Yeah, it's like an office suite, it just sits empty, it has a desk and a chair, and I don't take their appointments there because I'm not there. I'm it's literally it's in Utah.
SPEAKER_07:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:I'm I'm I don't meet with them there locally and we just only conduct like Zoom check-ins every once in a while and it's not open to the public. It's there for my team to quote unquote utilize if they want to work in the space, but nobody wants to go to the office. Your team is looking at it like you know, a pay increase, so to speak, to be able to work from home. So nobody's jumping in their car rushing to go to work in an office space.
SPEAKER_06:For sure.
SPEAKER_03:It really feels like there is quite I think now it's going to be a matter of overcoming certain like internal limitations. Um obviously there's a financial aspect to it to it, but I think um everyone is committed to at least if you're not necessarily there, you're committed to getting there because this world is changing and the market is shifting so fast that I don't know if you're really gonna stick to a non-remote virtual digital agency, I'm not sure that there's longevity in that anymore.
SPEAKER_02:Not sustainable, like we talked about, the cost of everything has increased around us, but the business has not kept up with increasing our pay to that same degree. So what we've seen is a discrepancy in how much we make versus what the cost of living and owning a business is. And so if you can't change your commissions and you can only take so many clients, what are some other things that you can do to cut down on your expenses? And that would be the overhead and operating costs of that manual tax. I say manual tax, manual labor, like working with your hands and taking, you know, having a notepad and scanning and uploading and sending out regular mail and you know, buying ink and whatever, setting appointments, meeting with over coffee with someone. It's not to say that you can't do these once in a while, but it's critical for the survival of your business for you to take steps into this direction. And when you get ready to do that, do not sign up for automations in AI. Get a coach or a consultant. This is one of the things that I offer through the consulting agency that's going to help you with your infrastructure and build the machine. You need to build a machine that's optimal to transition into the type this type of workflow so that you can successfully take the leap and then see a return on your investment. If you jump this step and you don't, you know, set up a functioning machine that works, whether you're there in Hawaii having surgery or what might be, it's not going to work. I'll tell you, I had in the operations of my agency, first of all, I started my agency in 2018. It when I I mentioned this on the last episode, I went through business identity theft, fraud. I was scammed from a franchise situation. And that took me about a year to get out of, year and a half or so. By the time that I reopened my location, it was January of 2020. COVID happened in March of 2020. I I had long COVID. I suffered from a really severe case of COVID. And because I was one of the earlier cases, they weren't doing like breathing machines and things at the time, but there were a couple of critical days where I almost passed away because of COVID, because I have underlying conditions. I have a severe asthma condition. So anyway, this happened to me. My agency ran during that entire time. Shortly after that, in February of 2021, I had a severe accident and I needed a total reconstruction of my knee. So I lost the ability to walk completely for nine months. I had to relearn how to walk and do the whole thing. It took me nine months. So I obviously I couldn't drive because of the same reasons and things like that. So again, having been remote at that time was critical to me. Then I had a baby the following year. And now I have a baby again. And so I'm mentioning these life circumstances because while all this crazy shit was happening behind the scenes that would mostly, you know, put most people out of a job, put most people out of the office, no one in my operations ever knew that anything was wrong. They just thought they thought I showed up to work every single day and that things went seamlessly. And we scaled. Every year we doubled. The first year we quadrupled in size, then we doubled and doubled, and we've been growing about 30% since then, every single year. So all these mishaps, and still somehow I was able to build this large organization with one team member, is all because of this infrastructure and these systems that I have in place. It's not the AI. The AI came afterwards. Once you get to the step of AI, obviously, like we talked about, there's ways for you to do it in a cost-effective way. You don't have to use, you know, the applied systems and the this and the that. There's a lot of fancy things you can sign up for, but signing up for programs isn't going to solve your problems. It's the work that goes in behind the scenes. So it's important that you work with someone that can help you systematize all of your processes and for efficiency and help you with, like Mira said, your mindset and shifting your role from the CEO into the CEO role itself and no longer the producer role. You're not the producer. You were a producer before you opened the agency, but now you are the CEO. You need people to do things for you, including your clients. Your clients should be 50% responsible for the work that is your work to accomplish. It's a mutual working, you don't work for anyone. You help people, but they need to do some of the work. You're no one's babysitter. For whatever reason, in the insurance space, we've allotted this, you know, leniency to clients that are like, I don't know what my deck page is. You're 47 years old. Let me give you instructions how to find it. Get on the website, go to the document center, click download on the PDF, email that thing to me. Take a screenshot, send it to me, text it to me, whatever it might be. Like, you know, don't take on more responsibility than is necessary. You need to make sure that you have the right resources in place before you take the leap, but taking that leap will change your life 10 out of 10. Absolutely, you will increase your income. You will increase the freedom and time that you spend with your family. You have the flexibility to basically work whenever you want. I work 12 hours a week with all the things I have going on. I'm about to give birth in like three weeks. I'm pregnant with my second one. So all of these things are functioning while, like literally, while we've been on this call, my business has sold three policies. I keep getting alerts on my computer. We made$40,000 in commission today. So just some points to you guys to kind of motivate you into that direction. And then I guess I want to end this with a final point of when we I was talking to Briden. If you need help with virtual assistance, we'll be sure to share the how to get your own virtual assistant free guide that you can source your own VAs. But if you need help with that, I'm happy to help you too through the virtual assistant staffing agency.
SPEAKER_03:Amazing. I really want you to share your website though, where they enter the Maida world. Uh, can you recap and then we'll also put it in the show in the show notes?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, so easiest way to see everything that I have going on is visiting my website, MIDABaltic.com. That's M-A-J-D-A-B-A-L-T-I-C.com. It's just my first name, last name. And there you can read about the companies, the different products we offer, and all the different solutions I have in one place.
SPEAKER_03:Thank you. And you guys, we want to be really respectful of Maida's time. So we're gonna wrap. I really encourage you to reach out to her post this um episode. Um, Brighton, I know you have a lot of questions. I'm sure some of you are gonna sleep on it and will have even more. Um, please reach out to her. She has a slew of of um ways that you can contact her. Um, what's your favorite way of being contacted, though, Maida?
SPEAKER_02:Text. Text me anytime. I'll give you my phone number, 310-990-6778. Text me anytime. My phone number is all over the internet.
SPEAKER_07:Um, just when we thought we had a hookup, it's like it's all over the internet.
SPEAKER_02:And it is my real number, and you will receive most likely an automated reply based on what you ask for. This is awesome. Yeah, but text me.
SPEAKER_03:I love it. Yeah, I know. Well, thank you. Carlos, do you have anything else you want to add before we wrap up?
SPEAKER_07:No, I'm good. I think um, I know we probably have some more that we probably gonna follow up on all this good stuff because I know this just opened up. I mean, to me, it answered a lot of things, but it also opened up a whole different world. Um, but I know I love it. But I'm I'm good. I'm good right now.
SPEAKER_03:Amazing. And uh just so you know, Maida and us, we're already kind of spitballing what we can do in the future to help more agents. So uh please follow up with her. Uh, for those of you listening, again, you'll check it out in the show notes. Thank you, everyone on this uh Zoom recording right now. Thank you so much for your time. I'm so excited. Whatever it is that you decide to do, I know you guys are gonna do something because um I'm just excited for you. So please share your stories, your journey, your questions with us and Maida. And uh thank you again, Maida, for your time. We really, really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_07:Big time. Thank you.
SPEAKER_02:Thanks for having me, guys. Thanks for everyone for participating. Thanks, guys.