Modernizing A Billion Dollar Company

**Scott Howell** (0:01)
What do you feel like insurance agents need to do in terms of branding themselves, their agencies, the carriers they represent?

**SPEAKER_2** (0:08)
When you are marketing something you're not in control of, you're not in control.

**Scott Howell** (0:13)
The very last thing I do, I get agreement from them, and then I end the call with making damn sure whatever I say I'm going to do gets done.

**Bradley Flowers** (0:25)
How many hours did your team spend last week on policy reviews, quote comparisons, lost run extractions, now multiply that by what your producers cost per hour. That's the number that Out Market eliminates. The reason that I love Ascend is they're the only vendor focused on helping agents automate all of their manual finances and accounting practices, which is really the boring stuff, but that's really where the rubber meets the road in terms of profitability to your agency.

**Scott Howell** (0:51)
We're going to write business with carriers that make it easy for us to write business with.

**Bradley Flowers** (0:57)
If the conditions have to be right for you to succeed, your success is conditional. It's not real success.

**Scott Howell** (1:03)
Play like champions, man. Here we go.
Insurance agents from around the world, welcome to the Insurance Guys Podcast. My name is Scott Howell, your fearless host and leader, Insurance Agency owner and insurance evangelist for I Protect Insurance and Financial Services based out of Huntsville, Alabama. And before we get started on today's episode, please help me welcome, he is a six foot three sophomore from Southern California, a parade first team, all American rivals, five star recruit. He is the founder and CEO of Out Market AI. Ladies and gentlemen, please put your hands together and welcome my new co-host, Mr. Vishal Sankhla. How are you, Vishal?

**Vishal Sankhla** (1:52)
I'm Ben Gates Scott. Thanks for having me on the show.

**Scott Howell** (1:54)
Thank you for being here. Guys, we have a co-host, Bradley Flowers. Hey, Bradley.

**Bradley Flowers** (2:00)
Hey, everybody. I'm proud to play third fiddle today. It's fun.

**Scott Howell** (2:05)
Bradley Flowers, we have an outstanding episode. As you well know, for the past 817 years, we have been helping insurance agents any way we can. It is a three-legged stool, and today, ladies and gentlemen, today we have a very special guest, a man that can help everyone listening to this. You need to pull over on the side of the road, be safe about it, make sure you put your blinker on, pull over on the side of the road. We are about to have a great American on this podcast, but we're also going to have a very successful insurance agent and CEO that I think you guys are really going to want to listen to, his perspective on the industry today, how he got here, where he sees the industry going. I am so excited to have him on the show. But before I introduce him, Bradley, I have a story to tell.

**Bradley Flowers** (3:01)
Okay, I'm scared.

**Scott Howell** (3:03)
Guess what I've been doing for two hours today?

**Bradley Flowers** (3:05)
CE.

**Scott Howell** (3:06)
No, meeting with auto owners to discuss eye protect insurance, getting a contract. I intentionally did not bring your name up.

**Bradley Flowers** (3:14)
Probably a good idea.

**Scott Howell** (3:15)
Yeah, smart, smart. I had a great meeting today. We've already done this once. This is our second go around our previous auto owners rep. Shout out to Katie. She was transferred or took another position within the company and moved up to, I believe, the Missouri area.
But we had a great time today. We met with our Alabama rep here, the new Alabama rep, and we'll see what happens. It's just one of those things. Auto owners is one of those companies that they don't move quickly. They're very intentional about the things they do.
And it's not going, you know, it's a little bit like a progressive job interview. How many interviews did they say they did at Progressive? Nine?

**Bradley Flowers** (4:02)
Yeah, it's about what I'm going through right now is we're interviewing people. I've got 16 candidates and I would hire all of them.

**Scott Howell** (4:08)
Damn.

**Bradley Flowers** (4:08)
I want to do that. Just find out who wants it, you know.

**Scott Howell** (4:11)
Bradley. Bradley. It's just money. Just hire them all.

**Bradley Flowers** (4:15)
That's what we're gonna do. Yeah, we're just gonna do that.

**Scott Howell** (4:17)
Ladies and gentlemen, I want to bring our very special guest star on today. I'm so excited. As I say every week, this podcast is a three legged stool. We have technologies such as Out Market AI.