Elevate The Hustle

Elevate Teams
  • 5.0 (2)
  • Entrepreneurship

Elevate the Hustle is the podcast for independent insurance agency owners, entrepreneurs, and operators building something real. Hosted by Stanley Meytin and Dom Piccirillo, founders of an eight-figure company helping agencies scale with top offshore talent, the show sits down with the people actually building right now: agency owners, M&A and P&C experts, and operators who've hired, led, and scaled without burning out. Every episode is the behind-the-scenes conversation you don't get anywhere else: how they hire, how they lead, how they grow without creating more chaos. New episodes weekly. Want to see if a virtual assistant is right for your agency?  Learn more at elevateteams.io

  1. 3d ago

    Ep. 29: The Insurance Industry Runs on Relationships, Not Rates. Ft. Adam Urbania from The AC

    "Relationships close deals. Rates don't." In this episode of Elevate the Hustle, Stan and Dom sit down with Adam Urbania, part of the leadership team at The AC (Agency Collective), for a real conversation on why trust beats price in the insurance industry, and how a network built on relationships grew into a top-6 fastest-growing aggregator in the country, without a single acquisition. Adam breaks down: The four questions every agency owner should ask before joining any network: buy-in, commissions, exit clauses, and who owns the bookWhy The AC has no lock-in contracts, no buyouts, and no non-competes, and why agents who've left have come backThe five R's he lives by every day: respect, rapport, relationships, resolutions, and resultsIf you've ever felt like this industry pushes you to lead with the fee instead of the person, this episode is for you. Elevate the Hustle is presented by Elevate Teams. We place trained virtual assistants from Latin America with U.S. insurance agencies, so owners can hand off the admin and focus on growth. See if it's a fit for your agency: [link] 🎧 Watch the full episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/q7e5DRSu6kU?si=ioN5BvDb0zDEpPpA elevateteams.io | @elevateteams Real talk, real stories, and occasionally real bad language. 🌐 Website: elevateteams.io 📷 Instagram: @elevateteams 🔗 LinkedIn: Elevate Teams 🎙️ YouTube: @ElevateTheHustlePodcast Real talk, real stories, and occasionally real bad language. 🌐 Website: elevateteams.io 📷 Instagram: @elevateteams 🔗 LinkedIn: Elevate Teams 🎙️ YouTube: @ElevateTheHustlePodcast

    Ep. 29: The Insurance Industry Runs on Relationships, Not Rates. Ft. Adam Urbania from The AC

  2. Aug 17

    Ep. 28: Shark Tank's Nelson Brooks on Building a Billion-Dollar Party Empire

    "$225K for 10%. He left owing 32%. Still called it a win." In this episode of Elevate the Hustle, Stan and Dom sit down with Nelson Brooks, founder of Cabana Boys Events, who built an 8,000-party empire before Shark Tank ever called, for a real conversation on Shark Tank negotiations, scaling a service business, and knowing when to ask for help. Nelson breaks down: How he walked in asking for $225K at 10%, got countered at 40%, and negotiated down to 32%Why he applied to Shark Tank because growth had plateaued and shrunk, not because things were going greatHis plan to turn Cabana Boys into a billion dollar, franchised hospitality brandIf you've ever had to give up more than you wanted just to get the help you needed, this episode is for you. Elevate the Hustle is presented by Elevate Teams. We place trained virtual assistants from Latin America with U.S. insurance agencies, so owners can hand off the admin and focus on growth. See if it's a fit for your agency: https://shorturl.at/0epS1 🎧 Watch the full episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/kRp3O-RGja8 elevateteams.io | @elevateteams Real talk, real stories, and occasionally real bad language. 🌐 Website: elevateteams.io 📷 Instagram: @elevateteams 🔗 LinkedIn: Elevate Teams 🎙️ YouTube: @ElevateTheHustlePodcast

    Ep. 28: Shark Tank's Nelson Brooks on Building a Billion-Dollar Party Empire

  3. Aug 10

    "This 14-Year-Old Entrepreneur Turned a Dinner Idea Into a Real Business | Cody DeCoons Ep. 27

    14 years old. Already failed 10,000 times. And he's just getting started. In this episode of Elevate the Hustle, Stan and Dom sit down with Cody DeCoons, a 14-year-old entrepreneur who built Sports Sitters, a real, paying business, from scratch, to talk about failure, patience, and what it actually takes to build something before anyone thinks you're old enough to. Cody breaks down:  – How a dinner table idea during COVID turned into a business connecting high school athletes to teach younger kids  – The $2,500 grant he almost deleted, thinking it was spam  – Why recurring revenue beats one off sales, and the pricing lesson every founder learns the hard way If you've ever waited for the "right time" to start something, this episode is for you. Follow Sports Sitters:  Instagram: @sportssittersnj  Website: sportssittersnj.com Elevate the Hustle is presented by Elevate Teams. We place trained virtual assistants from Latin America with U.S. insurance agencies, so owners can hand off the admin and focus on growth. See if it's a fit for your agency: [Calendly link with UTM] 🌐 elevateteams.io 📷 @elevateteams 🔗 LinkedIn: Elevate Teams Real talk, real stories, and occasionally real bad language. 🌐 Website: elevateteams.io 📷 Instagram: @elevateteams 🔗 LinkedIn: Elevate Teams 🎙️ YouTube: @ElevateTheHustlePodcast

    "This 14-Year-Old Entrepreneur Turned a Dinner Idea Into a Real Business | Cody DeCoons Ep. 27

  4. Aug 3

    How to Scale a Family Insurance Agency Through 20+ Acquisitions ft Marc Duffy | Elevate The Hustle

    He lost his father at 26, inherited a family business he wasn't ready for, and turned it into an 80-person insurance agency with 20+ acquisitions. In this episode of Elevate the Hustle, Stan Meytin and Dom Piccirillo sit down with Marc Duffy, who took over his family's insurance agency at 27 and scaled it through M&A into one of the largest independent agencies in Greater Boston. Marc opens up about the moment his father passed away in 2011, the guilt of "not pulling his weight" in the years before, and the wake-up call that forced him to grow up fast. He also breaks down the mistake that almost derailed the business early on (trying to grow 10x in a year), the exact formula he uses before buying any agency, and why he still believes independent insurance agents will win in the age of AI. What you'll hear: – Taking over a family business at 27, right after losing his father – The biggest mistake he made trying to 10x growth in a year – The 3 non-negotiables he looks for in every hire – His exact due diligence formula before buying an agency (20+ deals and counting) – Why he believes AI is an opportunity, not a threat, for independent agents – What he'd tell his 22-year-old self about patience and building for the long term Behind this show is Elevate Teams, helping insurance agency owners scale operations, build offshore talent, and grow without burning out. Book an intro call: https://calendly.com/elevateteamsllc/introductory-consultation?utm_source=spotify&utm_medium=marketing&utm_campaign=podcast Follow Elevate the Hustle for weekly conversations with insurance agency owners, M&A experts, and industry leaders building serious businesses across the U.S. Connect with us: Instagram: instagram.com/elevatethehustlepodcast LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/elevate-teams Marc Duffy — Duffy Insurance, Greater Boston, MA #insuranceagency #entrepreneur #familybusiness #mergersandacquisitions #insurancepodcast Real talk, real stories, and occasionally real bad language. 🌐 Website: elevateteams.io 📷 Instagram: @elevateteams 🔗 LinkedIn: Elevate Teams 🎙️ YouTube: @ElevateTheHustlePodcast

    How to Scale a Family Insurance Agency Through 20+ Acquisitions ft Marc Duffy | Elevate The Hustle

  5. Jun 16

    How to Launch an Insurance Business With No Roadmap and No Guarantees

    Insurance agency owners: How Greg May launched a specialty casualty MGA from scratch with his brother, said no to the opportunity three times, and bound their first policy in under five months. Want to grow your insurance agency without burning out or selling out? Book an intro call with Elevate Teams: https://calendly.com/elevateteamsllc/introductory-consultation ═══════════ In Episode 25 of Elevate the Hustle, Stan Meytin and Dom Piccirillo sit down with Greg May, co-founder of May Specialty, a growing MGA operating in the excess and surplus lines insurance market. Greg spent years building one of the top specialty casualty teams in the country at Allied World before a private equity firm found him and offered him the chance to build his own business. He said no three times. Then he said yes, wrote a business plan with his brother on a deck in Long Beach Island, New Jersey, and launched May Specialty in 2021. They bound their first policy in under five months. Then they kept going. Greg also talks about the weight nobody prepares you for when you hire your first employee and realize you are now carrying his family too, why he built May Specialty with one P&L across the entire country from day one, and the moment a stranger in Newark Airport recognized his brand and he knew it was real. Oh, and he almost became a high school history teacher and football coach. That story is in here too. ═══════════ What you'll hear: Why Greg said no to the opportunity three times before finally going for itHow he and his brother launched May Specialty and bound their first policy in under five monthsThe weight of hiring your first employee and being responsible for their familyWhy one P&L across the entire country was a non-negotiable from day oneThe stranger in Newark Airport who recognized the brand and what it meantGreg's advice for agency owners sitting on the fence about betting on themselves═══════════ Subscribe, drop a comment, and share this with a founder who needs to hear it. 📩 Want to be on Elevate The Hustle or collaborate with us? Apply or connect here: elevatethehustle@elevateteams.io ✅ Connect with us: Instagram: / elevatethehustlepodcast LinkedIn: / elevate-teams Stan's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/stanleymeytin Dom's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/dominicpiccirillo Greg May: greg.may@mayspecialty.com | mayspecialty.com About Elevate Teams: We help insurance agency owners scale operations, hire offshore talent, and grow profitably. Book an intro call: https://calendly.com/elevateteamsllc/introductory-consultation Subscribe for weekly interviews with insurance agency owners, MGA founders, and industry leaders building serious businesses in the United States. #insuranceagency #insuranceagencyowner #independentinsuranceagency #insurancepodcast #MGAinsurance #agencyowners Real talk, real stories, and occasionally real bad language. 🌐 Website: elevateteams.io 📷 Instagram: @elevateteams 🔗 LinkedIn: Elevate Teams 🎙️ YouTube: @ElevateTheHustlePodcast

    How to Launch an Insurance Business With No Roadmap and No Guarantees

  6. Jun 9

    What Every Stuck Insurance Agency Owner Gets Wrong About Growth

    In this episode of Elevate the Hustle, Stan Meytin and Dom Piccirillo sit down with Kim Ades, founder of Frame of Mind Coaching and one of the most respected executive coaches in the entrepreneurial world. Kim started selling back massages on Cape Cod at 10 years old, built simulation-based assessments that tested every measurable trait in high performers, and discovered that emotional resilience beats all of them. She has since coached hundreds of business owners and executives across the USA using a journaling-based methodology that gets inside how a leader thinks and changes it from the inside out. She also shares the story of an emergency appendectomy, a CT scan that found a mass on her kidney, and a Zoom call from a friend in a hospital gown with stage four bladder cancer and six to nine months to live. And what she built from both. ═══════════ What you'll hear: Why emotional resilience is the single biggest predictor of success for any insurance agency owner or independent agent The journaling method Kim uses to surface the hidden beliefs quietly running your agency without your permission Why most agency owners come to Kim wanting to grow their revenue and leave realizing the work starts with them The two journaling prompts that will show you exactly what is getting in the way of your growth What great leadership actually looks like when everything around you is out of control How to build emotional resilience as a muscle regardless of where you are starting from Subscribe, drop a comment, and share this with an agency owner who needs to hear it. 📩 Want to be on Elevate The Hustle or collaborate with us? Apply or connect here: elevatethehustle@elevateteams.io ✅ Connect with us Instagram: / elevatethehustlepodcast LinkedIn: / elevate-teams Website: / https://elevateteams.io/ Stan's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/stanleymeytin Dom's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/dominicpiccirillo Kim Ades frameofmindcoaching.com linkedin.com/in/kimades Real talk, real stories, and occasionally real bad language. 🌐 Website: elevateteams.io 📷 Instagram: @elevateteams 🔗 LinkedIn: Elevate Teams 🎙️ YouTube: @ElevateTheHustlePodcast

    What Every Stuck Insurance Agency Owner Gets Wrong About Growth

  7. Jun 4

    How to Actually Grow an Insurance Agency ft Ryan Hanley

    In this episode of Elevate the Hustle, Stan Meytin and Dom Piccirillo sit down with Ryan Hanley, 20-year insurance industry veteran, founder of Rogue Risk, board member at Linkora, and one of the most polarizing voices in the independent agent space. Ryan grew up collecting recyclable bottles at 5am to make $40 before school, got fired from every corporate job he ever had, and somehow became the person the industry tried to silence and couldn't. He built Rogue Risk from scratch, launched it seven days before New York shut down in 2020, and grew it into the fastest growing small commercial agency in the country. He generated 20 to 25 qualified inbound leads a day from YouTube alone and closed them above 80%. Then sold it. On the same afternoon he signed divorce papers and a new apartment lease. Ryan also gets into why logarithmic growth is within reach for any established agency owner right now using AI, why most agents are using their best people as data entry clerks, and how a woman calling him cold after reading his blog for three months changed the entire direction of his career. Oh, and Ryan got blackballed from the Big I national conference twice for telling agents the truth about digital marketing. He kept going anyway. ═══════════ What you'll hear: – How Ryan went from cold calling out of the phone book to generating inbound leads on a $100 budget in 2013 – Why independent agents are not behind because of regulation and who is actually responsible for throttling innovation – The human optimized business model that let CSRs close qualified leads above 80% at Rogue Risk – How Ryan built and sold his agency on the same day his marriage ended and what he would do differently – Why AI makes right now the best time in history to have an established independent insurance agency – How Linkora is solving the data problem that is holding agencies back from actually leveraging AI to grow Real talk, real stories, and occasionally real bad language. 🌐 Website: elevateteams.io 📷 Instagram: @elevateteams 🔗 LinkedIn: Elevate Teams 🎙️ YouTube: @ElevateTheHustlePodcast

    How to Actually Grow an Insurance Agency ft Ryan Hanley

  8. May 26

    Stop Growing Your Agency Alone | How to Build Connections That Drive Revenue | Jon Spaugy

    Insurance agency owners: How Jon Spaugy spent 16 years building one of the most connected networks in the independent insurance world, and why the agents who stay personal are the ones who survive what's coming. Want to grow your insurance agency without burning out or selling out? Book an intro call with Elevate Teams: https://calendly.com/elevateteamsllc/introductory-consultation?utm_source=youtubeeth&utm_medium=marketing&utm_campaign=podcast ═══════════ In this episode of Elevate the Hustle, Stan Meytin and Dom Piccirillo sit down with Jon Spaugy, Navy veteran, lifelong hustler, and the man behind ABU, one of the most recognized independent agent associations in the country. Jon started selling candy out of his gym bag in junior high, watched radar in the Navy, and somehow ended up becoming the person in the insurance industry that everybody knows. He built ABU from scratch 16 years ago with one idea: get agents and companies in the same room. Their first meeting pulled 200 people. He has done seven cruises, dozens of conferences, and took the whole thing national to Vegas, where the Big I sent him a cease and desist the moment they noticed. He took it as a compliment. Jon also gets into why AI is going to expose the agents who never learned to actually connect with people, why the independent agent is still as strong as ever, and what vendors keep getting wrong about conference ROI. Oh, and Jon has a condo in Vegas with no blinds and an orange chair pushed up against the window facing the strip. That story is in here too. ═══════════ What you'll hear: – How Jon built a national independent agent association from zero with no financial backing, just hustle and relationships – Why the independent insurance agency is still the strongest force in the industry – What vendors get wrong about conference ROI and how to think about it the right way – How AI is reshaping independent agencies and which agents get left behind – Why going back to grassroots and face-to-face beats every digital shortcut – What 16 years of bringing agency owners, carriers, and vendors together teaches you about community and trust ══════ Subscribe, drop a comment, and share this with an agency owner who needs to hear it. 📩 Want to be on Elevate The Hustle or collaborate with us? Apply or connect here: elevatethehustle@elevateteams.io ✅ Connect with us Instagram: / elevatethehustlepodcast LinkedIn: / elevate-teams Website: / https://elevateteams.io/ Stan's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/stanleymeytin Dom's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/dominicpiccirillo Jon Spaugy, ABU United linkedin.com/in/jon-spaugy-857056a abuunited.com | 909-809-4451 LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram About Elevate Teams: We help insurance agency owners scale operations, hire offshore talent, and grow profitably. Book an intro call: https://calendly.com/elevateteamsllc/introductory-consultation?utm_source=youtubeeth&utm_medium=marketing&utm_campaign=podcast Subscribe for weekly interviews with insurance agency owners, industry connectors, and business leaders building serious businesses in the United States. #insuranceagency #insuranceagencyowner #independentinsuranceagency #insurancepodcast #agencyowners #elevatethehustle Real talk, real stories, and occasionally real bad language. 🌐 Website: elevateteams.io 📷 Instagram: @elevateteams 🔗 LinkedIn: Elevate Teams 🎙️ YouTube: @ElevateTheHustlePodcast

    Stop Growing Your Agency Alone | How to Build Connections That Drive Revenue | Jon Spaugy
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Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
2 Ratings

About

Elevate the Hustle is the podcast for independent insurance agency owners, entrepreneurs, and operators building something real. Hosted by Stanley Meytin and Dom Piccirillo, founders of an eight-figure company helping agencies scale with top offshore talent, the show sits down with the people actually building right now: agency owners, M&A and P&C experts, and operators who've hired, led, and scaled without burning out. Every episode is the behind-the-scenes conversation you don't get anywhere else: how they hire, how they lead, how they grow without creating more chaos. New episodes weekly. Want to see if a virtual assistant is right for your agency?  Learn more at elevateteams.io

Information

  • Creator
    Elevate Teams
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    29
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Elevate Teams
  • Show Website
    Elevate The Hustle

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