Insurance Narratives, Laughter, and Story-Telling with Larry Nisenson! PART 1

Welcome back to another power-packed and witty episode of the Insurance Podcast!
Our terrific hosts sit down with Larry Nisenson, an insurance professional hailing from Princeton, New Jersey, to discuss his captivating story leading to a deep discussion about long-term care insurance.
As the conversation unfolds, Larry reveals his transition from a retail salesperson to a role focused on helping financial advisors and insurance agents navigate complex products through the art of storytelling. The discussion eventually moves into the challenges agents face when introducing long-term care insurance, addressing the reluctance some may feel due to the intricacies of these products. After the discussion, Larry provides the listening agents with comforting advice in the right direction.
The episode takes a thought-provoking turn as Larry discusses the prevalent issue of scams targeting the elderly and the lack of a robust support system for the aging population in the United States. He emphasizes the need for intentional conversations about long-term care, urging agents to break the cycle and address their own needs to avoid burdening future generations. 
📻 Tune in to learn more about elderly care in terms of insurance with a little bit of laughter and wit sprinkled all along the podcast with our amazing guest, Larry, and the hosts.

Join the Idudes to begin your journey of Insurance Awesomeness today!

The Insurance Dudes are on a mission to find the best insurance agentsaround the country to find out how they are creating some of the top agencies. But they do not stop there, they also bring professionals from other industries for insights that can help agents take their agencies to the next level. 

The Insurance Dudes focus on your agency’s four pillars: Hiring, Training, Marketing and Motivation! We have to keep the sword sharp if we want our agencies to thrive. 

Insurance Dudes are leaders in their home, at their office and in their community. This podcast will keep you on track with like minded high performing agents while keeping entertained!

About Jason and Craig:

Both agents themselves, they both have scaled to around $10 million in premium.  After searching for years for a system to create predictability in their agencies, they developed the Telefunnel after their interviews with so many agents and business leaders.  

Taking several years, tons of trial and error, and hundreds of thousands of dollars on lead spend, they’ve optimized their agencies and teams to write tons of premium, consistently, and nearly on autopilot!

LEARN MORE BY Registering for TUESDAY’s LIVE CALL With The Insurance Dudes!

Transcript

Larry Nisenson: 0:00

the wildest thing that has ever happened in my career involves me a New York Giants fan, taking six other New York giant fans to the giant Eagles game at Lincoln field, and essentially seeing six minutes of the game 15 minutes of punches and the balance of the time in the back of a police car. Yeah, I'd say that qualifies as the wildest thing. And I have to tell you, my agents loved it. My name is Larry nice. And Tim, were the short allies. I'm from Princeton, New Jersey, and I am an insurance to insurance dudes are on a mission to escape big hiccup by our agents.

Jason Feltman: 0:42

How? by uncovering the secrets to creating a predictable, consistent, and profitable agency Sales Machine.

Craig Pretzinger: 0:49

Hi, I'm Craig Pretzinger.

Jason Feltman: 0:51

I am Jason Feldman. We are agents. We are insurances. Whoa that's a story was it so what are your guys's Skipper

Craig Pretzinger: 1:05

going out and getting mad on the on the pitcher's mound like running out and getting rejected from the game? Is that what you did?

Larry Nisenson: 1:11

It's almost that bad. Except I told these guys not to show up in our giant jerseys you can see on blurred out behind me huge giant. And these guys show up we meet and they're all decked out in not just in a jersey, they got the face paint, they got their going in, they want to go in with a foam finger and not the number one figure if you know what I'm saying, right. Number one, yeah, I'm like, No, this isn't going to happen. No, no, no, come on. It's gonna be fine. It's, you know, six of us. We're gonna know. It was brutal. We drank and we drank and tailgated we went in. I don't even think we got the seat warm. By the time. It just started going down. And then we were out and we literally spent the rest of the time. It's not like the old vet where they had a jail in the basement. But we were like cornered with the police before they tossed us out. Like okay, guys. Thanks for coming was awesome. Great seeing you. Crazy stuff. Wow.

Jason Feltman: 2:14

That is hilarious. Well,

Craig Pretzinger: 2:16

so what led up to that point, it certainly haven't been in brawls and in every stadium, you know, hopefully, or maybe I'm

Larry Nisenson: 2:24

not a brawler at all. But if you know anything about the Giants and the and the Eagles, it is Smash Mouth football all the time. And you have to know your place like I normally I, I live midway between Giants Stadium and Lincoln field. And I go down to watch the eagles on occasion for the giant game. I'm just not dressed all decked out. You know, you sort of sit there and you know, do a polite golf clap. Maybe if something happens that goes your way. But these guys were having none of it. And how obvious is it to see six guys in red, white and blue shirts amongst a sea of green and white. Like, it's not like we were blending in anywhere. And it was. It was it was brutal. It's actually the second football story I have. I won't bore you with a bunch of other stories. But I have a dip because story. That might be the funniest story, if not the while this story was I hired him to do a presentation for me, I top producers. And right before he gets on stage part of it. He's going to talk about leadership. We're in Chicago, we bring out 100 top producers, and he's coming to do a like a 20 minute 25 minute conversation about leadership. Right? And at the end of it, he's gonna sign some footballs and do like three soft tosses, into the audience for people to get signed Ditka footballs. And my hand to God right before he gets he gets on stage. He starts presentation and the phone rings in his pocket. He looks at he goes, I gotta take this call. He takes the call. And he doesn't realize that his mic or he doesn't care that his mic is still he's wired right? The lavalier is in and he starts cursing on the phone. What do you mean about this? What are you talking about? He's barking and screaming, he comes back. He's like, I gotta go do this thing. I'll call you in 20 minutes. And he comes back on the stage. Now these are financial advisors we have in front and he's sitting at the lectern, he raises his finger starts pointing his finger. He's like, let me tell you something. That was my daughter. And she just had her financial advisor stole money from her. And he goes off for 10 minutes about how he wants to get his hands and kill this guy. Right. Oh, meantime, I'm sitting there with the president of my division. And he's looking at me like Larry, what are I'm like, I don't know, it's Ditka. We have to what am I did? It's random. Right? So he goes and he does the thing and he starts to walk off and his agent must have reminded him. You gotta toss these footballs. Right? So he walks back on stage he picks up these three footballs. And there was no soft toss. He's firing bullets. bullets into the audience. knock somebody out. off the chair. You know, these were not 25 year old guys, these were bank brokers. These were a little bit and so anyway, it was a fiasco we get our we get back the evaluations when it's all over. And I'm like, oh my god, we're gonna get panned, they're gonna be like, what kind of trip is this? The highest rated part of the show? The entire four days the highest rated was Ditka yelling and screaming and firing those footballs into they go to the stage. I was like, Oh my God, how do you repeat that? But that's it's so great. Yeah. What's the likelihood of having two football stories as the wildest thing that ever happens?

Jason Feltman: 5:37

Wow. Yeah. So So Dick as a dica.

Larry Nisenson: 5:42

He lives up to the name in exactly the right way.

Jason Feltman: 5:49

Wow, that is wild. That is so funny. I can't believe I What are the chances of him getting that call? While he's with a bunch of financial advisors.

Larry Nisenson: 6:01

And by the way, who takes a call in the middle of a presentation? Right? You're paying good. I think it's probably

Craig Pretzinger: 6:07

the one call he would take is his daughter, right? 100%. It's like the one call.

Larry Nisenson: 6:13

And then you know, it was gonna be like this, maybe had a baby she knew he was on and he's like, don't call me so he sees it. It's an emergency. Right? Right. Whatever it is. It was an amazing coincidence. And it turned out that happened. That was in 2001 was 2001. So think about it. Here it is 23 years later, and I'm telling you, I can see him getting veins coming out of his face turning red.

Jason Feltman: 6:42

So that's exciting. Yeah. So did you ever think when you got into insurance, that you're gonna have such exciting stories?

Larry Nisenson: 6:52

No, let's think about what we expect the insurance stories to be. I was at Neshoba. And I had one too many drinks. I was I wore the wrong color tie to a presentation. What would be the crazy story? Never those stories for sure. And I have to tell you. When I think back on my career, it's almost 30 years I've been in this crazy industry. It's been nothing but the most fun I could have imagined in our career, which is kind of cool, because it's not what nobody thinks they're gonna have the most fun you could imagine in the insurance business. But it's it's awesome, great people, great business and always a plus, we get to help people out along the way. And who doesn't want to do that, right? Love it,

Jason Feltman: 7:36

how'd you get into it.

Larry Nisenson: 7:38

So what I found out really quickly, is I am a terrible retail salesperson, everybody needs to know their strength. I started out as a retail bank broker, asking, meeting with clients and asking for a check. And what I found out is I can appreciate how hard it is because I totally sucked at it. I was terrible. I felt bad. I loved the business, but just couldn't pull off the conversation with retail clients and started I had built a little bit of a group. And so I started spending time working with financial advisors and training them how to ask the right questions, and realize that what my strength was, was helping financial advisors helping insurance agents understand these crazy complex products that we have, and telling them a story in a way that was really relatable. And then let them do the job that I was not equipped to do. And I'm not ashamed to say it I think the world of retail agents who go out every day to talk to clients, this problem solved for them to help their families hardest job in the world the most satisfaction and definitely something I was not good at Wild.

Jason Feltman: 8:55

Yeah, I love the idea of like, it's so funny. Like, it doesn't matter how boring the topic or yeah, let's go with just just boring how boring the topic could be like the power of a story. It's incredible how much you can get through with that. And I think a lot of I think the good insurance agents naturally have that, right. They have that ability to be able to tell stories and talk and then the ones that do have a hard time don't see the difference. And maybe the the agents that are really good at telling it they don't even realize it's like kind of their superpower 100% 100%

Larry Nisenson: 9:30

They're super out and they tell it in a way that great ones tell it in a way that nobody feels like they're creating a story for the benefit of a sale. They're just having a conversation. They're telling people who need some information, a story that translates that information to understandable digestible bits and gets at whatever is the motivator for action. Right? It really isn't when you see you could see two people in a crazy way tell this Same exact story. And one you're like, oh my god, I would buy this thing in a heartbeat. This guy is genuinely sincere. And the other guy could read the same story and you're like, No, it's just it's not resonating and the great ones are truly amazing at it for sure. Yeah. By the way, was not one of those great ones. ShamWow Billy.

Craig Pretzinger: 10:24

Billy Mays? Yep.

Jason Feltman: 10:27

Billy jet was a champ. Wow, Shama was the guy that that I think he slept with a hooker and got remember

Craig Pretzinger: 10:36

it? Sorry. Yeah, you're right. Oxy clean. I'm thinking.

Jason Feltman: 10:41

Yeah, Billy basil. Remember the shot? I don't know what. Sorry. Sorry.

Larry Nisenson: 10:48

No, go for it. Don't go. Sorry. Let's hear it. Do. You can't bring up a hooker? Billy Mays. I know and not go with the story.

Jason Feltman: 10:56

So if you if the ShamWow guy, what's his name?

Craig Pretzinger: 11:00

Was ShamWow. Just like the towel that worked really good. Yeah, right.

Larry Nisenson: 11:07

You could use it for anything. You could wash your car and then clean the big done dishes with it. It was amazing. Right?

Craig Pretzinger: 11:11

Plug the horn the boat? Yes, that's right.

Jason Feltman: 11:14

Yeah. And he always it was Vince was his name Vince. No, Vince. Gosh, I believe his name is Vince. look him up. Look up. ShamWow guy. I think his name is Vince. And he got like, he has a mugshot all over the internet. So I love that commercial. Remember that has ShamWow guy. And he's like, always, He almost seemed like irritated like this. There's this. I always thought it was the funny, funniest commercial. And he did a few of them. And that was such a huge infomercial. But then looking back, I remember looking back and all of a sudden, in the 2000s or something that his mugshot comes up, and he's all tore up. And it's something about him with like a hooker. And I don't even know, like someone down. It

Larry Nisenson: 12:04

wasn't worse than wasn't worse than a Gary Busey mug shot, which might be the most classic of every motion of any motion I'd ever done.

Craig Pretzinger: 12:14

That is a good one. Yeah.

Jason Feltman: 12:17

That is a good one. All right. I totally derailed us.

Craig Pretzinger: 12:21

That's okay. You know, something about the old folks, I did not know, I will be at some point one of those folks, but I'm not

Larry Nisenson: 12:30

God willing, we're all going to be one of the old folks. I mean, the alternative really isn't very cool. So let's, let's hope the younger folks so that Yeah, exactly. And I do, unfortunately. So what's happening is boomers do they're in a lot of trouble, I'll be honest with you. And here's why they're in trouble. Got we know the statistics, I don't want to get caught up on statistics. But right there 60 Is 50 60 million people over the age of 65. There's 10,000 a day that are turning 65. By 2030, there's going to be 70 plus million people over the age of 65. And less than 5% of them are prepared for a long term care event. If it happens, and think about what our financial advisors and life insurance agents do. They're amazing at solving the three biggest challenges of adulthood, right and sort of your finances, they help they do an amazing job helping people save for retirement, figure out how they want to retire, Soccerway, max out your 401 K, put some other money away, buy a house and try your best to accumulate as much and they do a great job of that, right. And then when somebody gets into retirement, either through the benefits of life insurance or through a financial advisor, they then start to get into the income phase. And they do that in the right way. They draw down there in the right method, whether it's a 4%, withdrawal, whether it's using a life insurance, for tax free income, whether they're using some strategy to live in retirement for amazing job. And for those that are fortunate enough to have money left over at the end of the journey between our life insurance and financial advisors. They do an incredible job of wealth transfer. Those are the three stages of sort of somebody's financial life, what they do a really poor job on is talking to people about the single biggest impact to that retirement savings with it, which is a long term care event. Right? That doesn't matter whether use the conservative number or 50%, or the slightly aggressive industry number of 70%. Some big number of those people are going to have a long term care event, and they're going to need somewhere between 7080 90 100 $200,000 to pay for that event. And there's this enormous misnomer this terrible belief around that group that Medicare covers that expense, and it doesn't. So there's this tsunami that's coming. We know it. I know it. Many in the industry are trying to raise the red flag as quickly as we can, because we see around the corner. And we're just we have not for lots of reasons, which I'm always happy to talk about. We've not done a great job of creating education and awareness, so that people can decide how they want to do it, maybe people aren't going to do anything, maybe they're going to self insure, maybe they're going to say it's okay, I don't care if I don't leave my kids any money, I'll run this thing out to I don't have a nickel left. And I hope that before I die, the last check, I write bounces, and I've done my job, and there's nothing wrong with it. That's cool. If that's what you want to do. We only want to make sure that people understand that this is coming for a large swath. And for those that want to plan for it, we want to help companies, agents, producers, everybody who's in the value chain, recognize that there's modern ways to cover the long term care expenses. That's what we're trying to do just create awareness of the situation, and the fact that there's more modern solutions that most people are thinking

Jason Feltman: 16:13

about. So what are those opportunities? And how can agents have those conversations that are needed in order to shed light on that?

Larry Nisenson: 16:21

Look, it's a hard story to talk to people about let's establish from the get go. Nobody wants to talk about their mortality, right? Worst of their mortality is nobody wants to talk about morbidity. Nobody wants to talk about being disabled. Nobody wants to have an unpleasant conversation around that. But that's what we signed on for right? What we signed on for in this crazy industry is not just stories about Mike Ditka, and the Philadelphia Eagles, we signed on to have hard conversations about prepping people. And there's plenty of resources out there to help agents and advisors educate their clients on what on what and how they can prepare, right, they could go to the tried and true places that are you know, places like AARP, they can go to Lt the AI LTCI organization which helps around long term care, they can go if they're an independent agent, they can go to any of their carriers that they're working with. Everybody has plenty of information around the education of this, what I would say the biggest challenges is that agents generally in my experience, and they're always agents that prove me wrong, which I love to see, agents are reticent, right, they're hesitant to want to talk about something they're not a resident expert in. And the long term care insurance space is super complex. It's complex, because it's got bad headline risk for people who own a policy and their premiums are going up. There's headline risk, because carriers are leaving the marketplace. What. So I get agents not wanting to talk about it. My advice to them is, if you want to go back to your back office, if you want to go to your IMO or your wherever you do your business through and just get some education, that's awesome. If you want to go to an independent site, right, my company site, we do not sell a product, I want to be super clear, we are in the business of helping people figure out the financing of aging. Right? So never stopped.com is where we talk about modern solutions around how to finance your aging, you can go there, you can just do a Google search on long term care, modern Long Term Care Solutions, there's plenty of places and the products that are out there are amazing products. These are products that blend life insurance and long term care and annuities and long term care. There are new disability based products that's that sort of bridge into long term care, their short term care products, there's so much out there. And the price point these days. What every carrier that I've seen is looking to do what we help carriers do is create customized products. So even somebody who doesn't have a ton of disposable income can put a solution in place, even if they're just dipping their toe in the water. For us. The key is just having agents and advisors have the conversation, because I really don't want to turn this into a downer at all. I'm an upbeat guy, but there is a cautionary tale to be told. And I told this story I was asked to do. My previous life I was the Chief Commercial Officer at Genworth financial big long term care, big life big annuity player, and I was asked to do a presentation in front of a group of compliance officers for some broker dealers, wire houses and planning firms. And I said to the person who asked me you're not going to like my topic. Um telling you, you want me to speak happy to do it, but you're not gonna like the topic. And the topic that I spoke about was around the litigious nature of society. And the impact on Eno insurance for firms and agents and advisors that don't present a long term care protection story for their clients, whether the clients buy it or not. If you say that you're a financial planner, or you tell the client, you're doing holistic planning, or you're involved in holistic planning, and you go through with a client, those three stages we cover, and you haven't had a conversation, just to cover yourself that says, By the way, are you aware that 50 To 60 to maybe 70% of people are gonna have a long term care event that could really invade the savings that you've worked your whole life to do? If you don't have a sheet of paper in your clients file that says you at least had that conversation, the wrong beneficiary is going to ask for that and say my clients lost my parents rather lost 2030 40% of what they had saved for. And that advisor or agent could find themselves in trouble. So if for no other reason as a K, why a KYC or protection, start to educate yourself a little bit and tell a story to your aid to your clients. Send them to a site if you'd rather than go on their own because you don't feel comfortable, or find a resident expert to help you have those conversations just to protect you and what your clients nest egg is that's sort of the advice I've been giving over the past few years.