If You Can Sell Insurance, You Can Sell Anything ft. Tory Pachis of Amica Insurance

Summary

Marketing Vanguard — “If You Can Sell Insurance, You Can Sell Anything”

Guest: Tory Packis, CMO of Amica Insurance
Host: Jen Bruni, Adweek
Date: May 21, 2026

---

Episode Overview

This episode spotlights Tory Packis, Chief Marketing Officer of Amica Insurance, offering a candid insider’s look at the unique challenges—and immense opportunities—of marketing in the insurance sector. Tory shares Amica’s rich, referral-driven heritage, the evolution of its brand, what it means to play offense in an industry dominated by giants, and how a challenger brand can punch above its weight while remaining rooted in empathy. The episode explores leadership philosophy, leveraging partnerships, the balance between tradition and innovation, and the role of marketing in organizational growth.

---

Key Themes & Discussion Points

1. Amica’s History and Unique Distribution Model

[01:10–03:49]

• Founded in Providence, RI, Amica is the nation’s oldest mutual auto insurance company (119 years).
• Traditionally a “direct writer,” Amica bypasses agents; all policies are sold and serviced via its website or call centers.
• For its first 90 years, policies were available exclusively by customer referral, fostering a sense of exclusivity and long-term loyalty—a “membership club” ethos.
  • Notable Quote:
    “The only way that you could get an insurance policy from us was if you were referred to the company from a friend or family member in good standing.” (Tory Packis, 01:55)
• Customer loyalty is exceptional: the average tenure is nearly two decades, with generational customers treating Amica as a family rite of passage.

2. Tory Packis’s Career Path & Insights on Specialization

[04:03–07:37]

• Tory’s background: 27 years in insurance, initially eager for journalism before transitioning into marketing through graduate studies.
• Experienced across major insurers (Travelers, Hanover, now Amica) and roles (from mailroom to sales to management).
• On industry specialization:
  • Notable Quote:
    “If you can market insurance, which is an invisible product that costs thousands of dollars, that is government-regulated, that frankly most people don’t want to buy or see the value in until they have a claim, then you can market just about anything.” (Tory Packis, 06:48)

3. The Insurance Category: Massive Spend, Fierce Competition, and Breaking the Mold

[07:37–10:31]

• Insurance rivals auto and alcohol in ad spend (~$10–12 billion/year).
• Infrequent shopping cycles (every 3–5 years) heighten the need for brands to be top-of-mind; “mental availability” is paramount.
• High brand awareness correlates with more frequent quotes and fewer competitors per quote.
• Amica positions itself as a 119-year-old challenger brand, lacking the spend of industry behemoths but differentiating via creative strategy.
  • Quote:
    “There seems to be a very common playbook in our industry of using humor and jingles and mascots...we consciously pivot away and go in the opposite direction. We use very emotional, emotive advertising… empathy is our best policy.” (Tory Packis, 09:40)

4. Brand Partnerships & Modernizing the Amica Image

[11:08–13:49]

• Recent pivots to sponsorships:
  • Naming rights to the Amica Mutual Pavilion in Providence.
  • Official insurance partner of the Boston Celtics—with visibility through logo placement and deep value alignment.
• Focused shift to connect with younger, more diverse audiences, leveraging Celtics partnership to energize brand perceptions (“contemporary, innovative, cool, exciting”).
  • Quote:
    “We’re reaching a broader audience and we’re transforming what the Amica brand stands for.” (Tory Packis, 13:43)
• Collaboration with Celtics star Jayson Tatum, launching the campaign “Back to Zero,” tying resilience in sports to Amica’s core values.

5. Agency Structure, In-House Team, and Leadership

[15:02–17:49]

• Creative agency: Mother (Brooklyn, NY); Media: Razorfish.
• In-house organization features ~160 people, divided into five Centers of Excellence (brand/creative, media, analytics, digital, product).
• Tight integration between leadership and agency partners; all work revolves around five shared OKRs.
• Leadership philosophy:
  • Player-coach approach—sets vision, inspires, but empowers execution.
  • Quote:
    “I’d hope they’d say I’m inspiring, transformative, maybe a little impatient…a player coach where you try to rally the team and inspire them...but also give the players the freedom to execute on the game plan.” (Tory Packis, 17:16)

6. Playing Offense, Not Defense

[18:49–20:23]

• Amica is in “growth mode”—playing offense in a consolidating industry dominated by larger carriers.
• Service, empathy, and enduring relationships are fundamental; technology is leveraged, but “everything is human-led.”
  • Agency partners are required to listen in on call center interactions to absorb the empathy and expertise that define the brand.
  • Quote:
    “I think we have to play offense because otherwise you just get swallowed up and we don’t have the share of voice to play defense.” (Tory Packis, 20:13)

7. Growth, Target Audiences, & Balancing Tradition with Innovation

[20:42–23:35]

• National footprint, strongest in the Northeast, growing in states like Texas and California.
• Carefully evolving to attract younger consumers, while safeguarding the “secret sauce” of loyalty and exclusivity.
• Takes cues from emerging fintech brands to broaden audience and channel preferences—offering both high-touch phone service and superior digital experience.

8. AI and the Future of Insurance Marketing

[23:50–24:57]

• AI is being used for efficiency gains, not customer displacement.
• Example: AI tools transcribe calls and analyze conversations to inform product development (e.g., noting increased interest in E-bike insurance).

9. Opportunities and Growth Constraints

[25:29–26:27]

• If given one wish, Tory would invest more in marketing to improve share of voice and growth opportunity.
  • Quote:
    “When your share of voice is greater than your market share, that is probably the canary in the coal mine for future growth.” (Tory Packis, 26:09)

10. Rhode Island Culture and Community

[26:39–27:35]

• Rhode Island is described as “small but mighty”—tight-knit, great for raising families, and uniquely parochial.
  • Quote:
    “Rhode Islanders stick together. Everybody knows everybody...it’s more of a small community, I’d say.” (Tory Packis, 27:21)

11. Personal Inspirations and Recommended Reading

[28:02–29:27]

• Tory cites two foundational marketing books:
  • Building a Story Brand by Donald Miller—a reminder to make the customer, not the brand, the hero.
    • “We’ve been very conscious at Amica...the consumer is always the hero and they have a problem...our role is not to be the hero, it’s to guide them.” (Tory Packis, 28:24)
  • How Brands Grow by Byron Sharp—emphasizes broad category reach and excess share of voice for sustainable brand growth.

---

Memorable Quotes

• “If you can market insurance...you can market just about anything.”
  (Tory Packis, 06:48)

• “It’s fostered tremendous loyalty....I’ll even get letters from customers who say, ‘I’m the sixth generation Amica customer.’”
  (Tory Packis, 02:53)

• “We don’t have the budgets of some of those larger carriers...we consider ourselves one 19-year-old challenger brand.”
  (Tory Packis, 09:12)

• “Empathy is our best policy.”
  (Tory Packis, 09:52)

• “You just get swallowed up if you’re not playing offense...We don’t have the share of voice to play defense.”
  (Tory Packis, 20:13)

---

Notable Timestamps

• Direct model, exclusivity, and heritage: 01:10–03:49
• Career journey and specialization: 04:03–07:37
• Competitive ad spend and category dynamics: 07:37–10:31
• Sponsorships (Celtics, Jayson Tatum campaign): 11:08–14:55
• Agency partnership & in-house strategy: 15:02–17:49
• On playing offense: 18:49–20:23
• Younger audiences, fintech inspiration: 21:52–23:35
• AI integration & product intelligence: 23:50–24:57
• Investment priorities (“excess share of voice”): 25:29–26:27
• Rhode Island’s uniqueness: 26:39–27:35
• Book recommendations: 28:11–29:27

---

Conclusion

This episode offers a rich primer on the nuanced art of marketing an “invisible product,” exploring how deep heritage and customer loyalty can powerfully coexist with bold moves in media, partnership, and technology. Tory Packis’s insights demonstrate that authenticity, service, and a willingness to “play offense” are essential for challenger brands in mature, highly competitive markets like insurance. Amica’s story resonates as both a case study and an inspiration for marketers ready to lead with empathy and vision.

Transcript

[LinkedIn Advertiser]

Are your ad campaigns lighting up the dashboard but not the pipeline. That's bullspend and marketers are calling it out in dashboard confessions.

[Tory Packis]

My boss asked for results so I opened my dashboard for the only positive sounding metric I had. Impressions.

[LinkedIn Advertiser]

Cut the bull, spend. See revenue, not just reach. LinkedIn delivers the highest return on ad spend of major ad NETWORKS. Advertise on LinkedIn. Spend $250 on your first campaign and get a $250 credit. Go to LinkedIn.com campaign terms and conditions apply.

[Tory Packis]

If you can market insurance which is an invisible product that costs thousands of dollars, that is government regulated that frankly most people don't want to buy or see the value in until they have a claim and you can market just about anything.

[Jen Bruni]

Hi everyone and welcome to the Marketing Vanguard podcast. I'm Jen Bruni with Adweek and I'm thrilled today to be joined by Tory Packis. He's the CMO of Amica. Tory, welcome.

[Tory Packis]

Hi Jenny. Thanks for having me.

[Jen Bruni]

It's exciting to have you here. I'm excited to learn more about you and Amica, but I'd love to start with the fact that Amica is based in what, the smallest state in the country, Is that correct? Small but mighty Rhode Island, The Ocean

[Tory Packis]

State Rhode island or based in Lincoln, Rhode Island.

[Jen Bruni]

I love that. So tell me about the history of the company because I think it's Rhode island roots make it unique and interesting.

[Tory Packis]

Yeah, so we're actually. Amica is actually a 119-year-old insurance company. We were founded in Providence, Rhode island and we are actually the oldest mutual automobile insurance company in the country, which is pretty remarkable. And we sell auto, home and life insurance. We are a national company and in the industry we call it a direct writer. So we don't distribute our products through agents. Everything we sell or service is either on our website or through our call center. So it's a unique distribution model and it's a company with a really rich heritage.

[Jen Bruni]

Has that always been the case, the direct selling model?

[Tory Packis]

It's always been the case. And fun fact about AMICA, the first 90 years of our existence, the only way that you could get an insurance policy from us was if you were referred to the company from a friend or family member in good standing. So for that reason, like we still have this brand exclusivity and club like distribution. It wasn't until the late 90s where management made the decision to expand that model and advertise nationally.

[Jen Bruni]

Wow, that's so interesting. So it was all like word of mouth, referral Based and marketing, like broad marketing didn't even come into the equation, so didn't exist.

[Tory Packis]

Yeah. We still have in our archives these referral cards that were handwritten and sent out to prospects from existing customers.

[Jen Bruni]

That's very cool. I mean, I think a lot of companies want to kind of get that now. That's something that a lot of brands and businesses crave, is feeling like they're actually like truly a membership club, if you will.

[Tory Packis]

Yeah. And it's fostered tremendous loyalty. I mean, when you look at our customer tenure, it's nearly two decades long, which in insurance is remarkable. Most auto policies are shopped every three years. Every home policies are shopped every five years. So to have a customer base on average that stays with you plenty years is quite special. And from time to time, I'll even get letters from customers who say, I'm the sixth generation amica customer. And here's a photo of my great, great grandfather in his first car that was insured by Ameca in the early 1900s.

[Jen Bruni]

Well, I was going to ask you about that. Like, is it the kind of thing where it gets passed down through generations? Because that's the best referral of all.

[Tory Packis]

Right. A lot of multi generational customers we have. It's almost like a rite of passage. I've heard from customers who said, we had a party when we realized we were accepted into amica. So it's an amazing culture and value proposition that we have.

[Jen Bruni]

So interesting. Very unique. For sure. So tell me a little bit about you now, because obviously with the Marketing Vanguard podcast, I always just love to learn about the actual human beings behind the titles. And I think you've been there since 2020, is that correct?

[Tory Packis]

I have. I joined in the middle of Pandemic.

[Jen Bruni]

Wow.

[Tory Packis]

And I guess maybe it's not all that interesting background, but I've been in the insurance industry for 27 years, my entire career.

[LinkedIn Advertiser]

Okay.

[Tory Packis]

Graduate of University of Connecticut, majored in journalism. Really wanted to be a journalist, investigative reporter. And I joke that my first job offer when I graduated was with a small local newspaper to write obituaries for about $5 an hour. So that's when I decided maybe it's time to go back to business school and, you know, learn a different aspect of communications. So I continued on, got my master's at UConn in marketing communications, and like many graduates of UConn or in Connecticut, Hartford being the insurance capital of the world, sure. Landed a job opportunity with Travelers Insurance in the late 90s, where I spent a decade there. Spent Another decade at Hanover Insurance in Worcester. And this is my third insurance company that I worked for and hopefully my last spot.

[Jen Bruni]

So tell me about that. There's so much in what you just said that's so curious and interesting to me. Obviously just making the pivot from journalism to marketing, getting your master's in marketing, wanting to make sure you have that advanced degree to kind of move into something more tactical, frankly, tactically different. But that concept of being an expert in an industry, tell me about that. Where has that benefited you and where have you also felt like perhaps maybe it, I don't want to say hindered, but was something you needed to also stretch beyond as you wanted to make sure that you were as effective a marketer as possible. I mean, I've seen both, right. I've talked to CMOs who've come up, stayed in automotive their entire career, stayed in CPG their entire career to great effect. And then Obviously there's other CMOs who frankly have moved to vastly different industries. Everything from luxury skin care to quick serve restaurants to everything in between. So like, how have you thought of it as something that has benefited you, but also you've kind of worked to make sure you're also staying cognizant of the way other sectors regard marketing?

[Tory Packis]

Yeah, no, it's a great question. I mean, I don't know how many people really set out to say I want to start in the insurance industry. It's actually growing in popularity now and more schools are offering it as a major. I certainly didn't intend to pursue a career in insurance, but once you're in this insurance category, you tend to be stuck. And I think it's an incredible business. Staying in one sort of category or sector allows you to specialize and really understand it from the ground up. I was fortunate in one of my early roles in my career to work in a business center down in Knoxville, Tennessee. And I rotated through almost every job that was in that business center, including mailroom processing, customer service, sales. And I really learned what it takes to bring an insurance policy and coverage to life and have tremendous respect for the industry. I do have FOMO sometimes. I have friends that work in CPG or QSR as you mentioned. And I always wonder what it would be like to market a tangible product, something that tastes good or feels good. And I always think to myself, if you can market insurance, which is an invisible product that costs thousands of dollars, that is government regulated, that frankly most people don't want to buy or see the value in until they have a claim and you can market just about anything. Right. So I think to get back to your question, there's immense value in specializing in one sector. I think a lot of the, whether it's communications, marketing, human psychology, can translate to other industries as well.

[Jen Bruni]

Yep. What is it about insurance? I mean. Cause you're right, it's not tangible. But honestly, over the years and we, as long as I've been covering the advertising, marketing, media industry, it's like insurance category, they have long been the highest spenders. They've had the biggest marketing budgets. And by the way, I'm not going to call out all the different competitors, but we all know the big brands that exist in the insurance space writ large, whether it's auto, whether it's home or anything else in between. Talk a little bit about that legacy of the massive marketing spend that other companies have embraced. And I don't know where you are in the marketing spend journey, frankly, having really probably it sounds like not spent on marketing for a bulk of the company's time. Why is it such a competitive category and why is it such a hard thing to sell? But also it sounds like maybe the loyalty piece is something where once you get your customers locked in, you're not going to lose them. It's a very different dynamic.

[Tory Packis]

It's an incredibly competitive category, as you mentioned. And in fact, 2025, I think when the final numbers are all said and done will probably show it was the highest level of spend in the insurance industry on record. My guess is somewhere over 10 to 12 billion dollars all in right up there with automotive or even alcohol and beer. But why is so much spent on the category? I think there's a couple reasons. I think the product itself is not frequently shopped. It is, like I said earlier, every three years for auto, every five years for auto. So it's incredibly important that brands are mentally available when a consumer is there to shop. And there's a direct relationship or correlation in our industry between brand awareness and how often you are quoted, and not only that, brand awareness and how few competitors you're quoted against. So if you look at some of the highest spenders in our category, which we all know them, they're quoted most frequently. And the competitive set they're quoted against is much, much smaller than those that don't have the brand awareness. So for that reason, I think that's why you tend to see insurance in almost every advertising pod that there is available. We don't have the budgets of some of those larger carriers. In many ways, we consider ourselves one 19 year old challenger brand. And we have to find ways to sort of stand out and cut through the clutter, not only from a media standpoint, but from a creative standpoint. And there seems to be a very common playbook in our industry of using humor and jingles and mascots in advertising. And if you look at any of Amica's creative, we consciously pivot away and go in the opposite direction. We use very emotional, emotive advertising. We've come up with a tagline, empathy is our best policy and often get rave reviews from our customers that they feel proud to be with a company that sends the message that we do.

[Jen Bruni]

That's great. Do you market to corporations as well as individual consumers?

[Tory Packis]

We're entirely B2C.

[Jen Bruni]

Got it.

[Tory Packis]

Auto, home and life insurance. I will say we have strategic partnerships that allow us to tie into the customer base of other entities, but for the most part we're B2C.

[Jen Bruni]

So Tori, from a brand strategy point of view, what are you doing in terms of brand partnerships? I mean, obviously so many brands, especially insurance brands, you see them partnering with sports organizations, athletes, et cetera. I do think there's some unique things you have going on and would love for you to share with everybody something super exciting in your world right now.

[Tory Packis]

Yeah, if you look at our media plan years ago it was your typical channels of direct mail and paid search and some television advertising. It's only in the last few years that we've seriously delved into sponsorships. And the one that started it all was we acquired the naming rights to the Ameca Mutual Pavilion here in Providence, which used to be the Dunkin Donuts center. And we signed a 10 year deal there that was really for us to anchor to the city that we founded in 119 years ago and was a great source of pride for employees as they're commuting back and forth to the office in Lincoln to see our name on the side of the building. That was in 2022. And then what quickly accelerated was another opportunity to be the official auto, home and life insurance partner of the Boston Celtics. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think we'd be able to be associated with such a storied franchise. But it checked so many boxes for us. From a business standpoint, we wanted to grow our presence in the northeast and that's one way to do it. If you look at live sports, that's where all the eyeballs seem to be totally nowadays. And we also, you know, I spoke about this earlier, but we wanted to Connect with a younger, more diverse customer than the classic Amica customer. And you look at the NBA, it's one of the fastest growing sports or leagues, and its customer base are young consumers. And there's no greater franchise in the sport than the Celtics. And we got to know them and their executive team, and we just saw so many shared values between us. So we've been able to really borrow on the brand equity of the Celtics by having our logo on their jerseys. And that logo travels everywhere, whether they're playing here in Boston or they're half across the country. Consumers are seeing amica. We're seeing a lot of interest in our brand. More unique visitors to our website, we see branded organic searches up, and all of it can really be attributed to our partnership with the Celtics. What's also really cool is we have a brand tracker where we measure things like awareness and familiarity and consideration, but we also look at brand attributes. And once we started partnering with the Celtics, we saw brand attributes like contemporary, innovative, cool, exciting that were typically low for us as frankly, an insurance brand are now, like, at all time highs for us. So we're reaching a broader audience and we're transforming what the Amica brand stands for.

[Jen Bruni]

You're making it hot. That's awesome. I love it.

[Tory Packis]

Yeah.

[Jen Bruni]

Good for you. Yeah. No, you can't deny it's made it visible in a very new and unique and widespread way.

[Tory Packis]

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention we also partnered with one of their star players, Jayson Tatum, who basketball fans out there might remember last May in the Eastern Conference semifinals, went down with an Achilles injury, which was devastating because that was one of our true brand ambassadors or partners that we've really signed on with. But immediately after that injury, our team started working with him, and we said, wait a minute. We're in the insurance game. We're all about comebacks. Right. We help policyholders who have a setback with their auto or home get back on their feet. And there's a lot of creative storytelling that we can do in partnership with Jason on what his road to recovery looks like. And just last week, we launched a campaign called Back to Zero, which is a call to Jason's number zero. And it's all about starting from beginnings and how do you get back on your feet? So we're excited to launch that.

[Jen Bruni]

It's real stories. Well, congrats on that. That's awesome. You work with agencies. How are you set up from an agency construct standpoint?

[Tory Packis]

We have a creative agency. You may have Heard of, They're called Mother in Brooklyn, New York. They do some fantastic work and they're really known for standout creative storytelling. They helped US rebrand re platform back in 2022. First logo change in 30 years. You know, completely rebuilt our brand platform from the ground up with that new tagline. And we recently have switched to Razorfish as a media partner.

[Jen Bruni]

Very cool. So when you think about your in house resources, how are you staffing to make sure that you have everything you need in house to sort of accommodate and work best with your agency partners?

[Tory Packis]

The people and the organizational alignment I think is critical to the success of our business, especially as our remit has grown here at AMECO over the last few years. In my organization, not only do we handle marketing and communications, we also have product development and digital experience in this area. So there's a total of 160 or so individuals. We're set up under five, what I call centers of excellence. So I have this incredible leadership team that has a leader for each of those coes, someone who manages brand and creative, another who manages media. We have marketing, data, science and analytics. We have a digital chief digital officer and a product leader. And we all come together to work on solving the problem of how do we build amicus brand, how do we solve our customers problems through product design, how do we optimize the funnel all the way from the top to bottom. And with each of those areas, we have liaisons to our agency partners so that they're connected in terms of our business objectives. The one common thread that ties our organization together is we have five okrs, objectives and key results that are designed to be our scoreboard to let us know if we're making progress. But also they're intentionally designed to have some healthy tension between them which allows us as a leadership team to sit down and review results and make strategic trade offs in some of the decisions that we need to make.

[Jen Bruni]

How would your team describe you as a leader? What's your leadership style?

[Tory Packis]

Oh boy. I hope they would describe me as inspiring, transformative, maybe a little impatient. But for me, I have four children and I've been coaching them in sports all of their lives. And I kind of consider my leadership style as almost a player coach where you try to rally the team and inspire them for what we can be, what the vision is, how we're making progress on it, but also give the players the freedom to execute on the game plan. So I'd hope they'd say I'm inspiring.

[Jen Bruni]

Call some audibles. Yeah, it's funny. One of the questions that I used to ask in this podcast all the time, and I've kind of gotten away from it, but I should do it again is because I played soccer growing up, but I loved it. I think I'm saying to you, I actually went up to Storrs, Connecticut for the Connecticut Soccer School back in, in the 80s, and that was such a wonderful experience. But I would ask the question, okay, imagine yourself on a soccer team. You're on the field. What position are you playing? Are you the striker who's trying to score goals at every turn? Are you midfield line, trying to kind of be the connective tissue between the defense and offense? Or are you a defensive player protecting the goal from competitive onslaught at every turn? So anyway, that's typically the question I had asked and you answered it, which is coach, which I have also gotten. But. But it's an interesting dynamic when you think about it. I mean, I just feel like there are very offensive leaders and there are very defensive leaders and it's which one do you gravitate to? Because both are valid.

[Tory Packis]

Yeah, I don't think we have the luxury of playing defense given our market share and our position in the industry. I think we are in growth mode trying to transform this company for the next generation of Ameca customers. There's so much consolidation happening at the top of the insurance category that I think we have to play offense. Because if you're not playing offense and you're just protecting your base, the other carriers that have bigger budgets, deeper pockets, more sophisticated pricing or algorithms or underwriting just based on their scale can gobble you up. So we have to play offense. And another reason is we have a very different value proposition than I think the entire industry where insurance tends to be commoditized and you see a lot of price messages. Our whole value proposition is anchored on service and our mission is to create peace of mind and build enduring relationships. Yes, we are investing in AI and technology, but everything is human led here. Our call centers, I encourage our agency partners when they come and visit us to everything you should do is spend few hours putting on the headset and listening to our reps, our frontlines, how they handle service, sales, claims, calls. And they come out blown away with the knowledge, the experience, the empathy that they deliver. And that's really become the foundation of our campaign, our external campaign. Going back to your question, I think we have to play offense because otherwise you just get swallowed up and we don't have the share of voice to play defense.

[Jen Bruni]

I'm sorry if you answered this. Are you nationwide or are you more

[Tory Packis]

regional at this point we are national. Company say almost half of our business is in the northeast. So that's where our brand awareness is the highest. But our largest state was Texas. California is up there. We do have sizable book of business in the Midwest and west coast.

[Jen Bruni]

Where do you want to go from here? I mean, as you think about expansion, as you think about growth, how is that defined for you?

[Tory Packis]

We've been very selective historically in terms of who the amica target customer is. I think it's going back to our referral days. You have to be associated with a customer in good standing and the whole concept of like birds of a feather flock together.

[Jen Bruni]

Yeah. And you don't want to lose that. Right. I mean there's such an element of that that's important.

[Tory Packis]

Right. We talk a lot about how do we preserve the Ameca classic customer, the secret sauce that got us here, but also build a company that is something that young people or younger people see as the aspirational alternative to to the geicos, the progressives, the state farms that are out. We talk about enormous growth opportunity both upwards. Maybe there's a higher value segment, a customer that historically would go to an independent agent for advice that has grown up with the Internet and feels the confidence to buy insurance on their own through a direct carrier. But also like on the downward side, connect with a younger consumer and build awareness with them so that they see Amiga as an option.

[Jen Bruni]

It's interesting because I was going to ask you about the younger consumer. Obviously every day you're getting a new target aging into your lens. What other industries do you look to? My mind goes to Fintech for example, financial services companies that have like a chime or something that is sort of positioning itself as an alternative to more traditional financial services, money management companies and brands to great effect. It's tough to be all things to all people and yet you need to be a preferred choice for the next generation that's coming in. So that's a. That right there is quite a balancing act.

[Tory Packis]

Yeah. And we talk about ultimately should be up to the consumer in terms of how they want to engage with us, whether it's over the phone or online or a mix of both. But you want to be able to build an exceptional experience in no matter what channel that they work with us in. And I think historically we have been a very call center phone centric organization that you know, over the years is where you can best deliver the empathy and the level of service that we've offered. But where we're doubling down in now is in how do you demonstrate exceptional customer service and empathy in the digital channel. And some of the companies you mentioned, you know, Chime, sofi is another one which we happen to share a brand partner with SoFi and we're starting to learn little bit about their business as well. You look at Robinhood or other smaller investment companies that are trying to disrupt the Fidelities and the Schwabs of the world. So I think there's a lot to learn from both those businesses. We're in an interesting spot where we don't want to lose the secret sauce of what makes Amica's culture really strong, but also built for the future to attract that younger consumer that has different preferences.

[Jen Bruni]

Yeah, no, I love that. So. So as you sit here now and you think about AI and all the things would you say that this category is probably. Is insurance one of the more insured categories to AI disruption because of the reasons you outlined before?

[Tory Packis]

Yeah. And I don't know about disruption, but I think what you're going to start to see is tremendous efficiencies in the business where we're starting our AI use cases. We have a chief data officer who leads our AI area and we've really started within our claims and our sales organization. Very simple things like can you transcribe after call work in notes into a system without having to manually type them, which, you know, you start adding that up over the weeks and days. That's hours of time that can be better spent on coverage counseling with consumers within my team. One great use case that I love is we built an AI tool that allows us to query the millions of phone conversations that we have with customers. We remove PII from it and we can query on like what products do they ask about? What products do they ask about that we don't offer?

[Jen Bruni]

Yeah, the intelligence piece is huge, right?

[Tory Packis]

Yeah. That started to lead to like product design where we're saying, hey, we're getting calls on E bikes or motorcycles that should maybe move to the top of the roadmap because we're not solving a need that our customers have today.

[Jen Bruni]

Yeah, above that. I asked this of most of my guests, but what is the one area that you wish you could invest in more? What's the one thing that's kind of keeping you up at night that you feel like if you could just get an unlock for X, that's what's going to spur unique brand and business growth? It could be a tool. It could be resources, it could be an org design, it could be team. What's the one thing that you feel like you want access to and have access to, but would love to have more access to in order to be successful?

[Tory Packis]

Yeah, I hope this isn't a cop out, but I would say additional marketing investment. I think we're doing a lot of work right now to optimize the funnel. We have a media mix model that we're continuing to refine. We've switched to media agency partners that are helping us get better access to premium inventory at a more efficient rate. There's a lot that we're doing investing in the digital funnel itself to convert more of those leads that are interested in Amiga. But if I look at as a direct writer, what we're up against is competitors that have enormous budgets and our share of voice is anywhere from 2 to 3% on average. And I'm a big believer in the whole excess share of voice. When your share of voice is greater than your market share, that is probably the canary in the coal mine for future growth. So that would be maybe the one cop out answer I'd give you is just additional investment in marketing because we have so much momentum at our back.

[Jen Bruni]

Love that. What's one thing people don't realize about Rhode island as a place to be based? We started our conversation about the fact that you're based in Rhode island, but what's one thing you want people to know about it? I'm a big Rhode island fan.

[Tory Packis]

So, yeah, I got to tell you, I'm not originally from Rhode Island, I'm from Connecticut. And I've only been living in this state for five years. I moved my family here from Massachusetts when I took this job. It's just such an incredible place to live and raise kids. You've got the beaches, you've got great sports scene, you've got incredible food. What's funny about Rhode Islanders is, you know, if you have to travel from one town to the next and it might be like a 15 minute commute, a lot of Rhode Islanders act like they have to pack a lunch or a sleeping bag because it's just so far. So it's very parochial. Like everyone kind of stays within their hometown. I live in East Greenwich, which is maybe 40 minutes from the office. And sometimes people can't believe I commute 40 minutes one way. And I said, I've commuted a lot farther than that. It's funny. Rhode Islanders stick together. Everybody knows everybody. A million people in population, all the kids. I have two boys in high school and everybody knows everybody in high school in Rhode Island. So it's a small. More of a small community, I'd say.

[Jen Bruni]

It is a special place. It's very unique and I think there's nothing like Rhode island spirit. And it's small but mighty small. So that's a fun sort of culture to be positioned in. It's a great place. Last quick question. Who do you admire? What other brands do you admire? Who is a CMO that you know well and I should invite them on the show or it can be somebody you don't know well at all, but you just think the work they're putting out in the world is so extraordinary that you'd love for me to have them on the show to get to know them better.

[Tory Packis]

I've had a chance to listen to many of your podcasts. You've interviewed some great CMOs and humbled to be on here. I'll give you two authors of books instead.

[Jen Bruni]

Perfect.

[Tory Packis]

That have made an incredible impact or impression on my approach to marketing. And maybe you've had them on the show, I don't know. Building a Story Brand, a book by Donald Miller has been one of the most influential books for me. I mean the premise, it's been written before the Hero's Journey. The premise is the consumer should always be the hero of the message and the brand should serve as the guide. And I think too often in creative you see the brands shout themselves as the hero. And we've been very conscious at Amica as we're building creative. The consumer is always the hero and they have a problem. Could be internal, it could be external, it could be philosophical. But our role is not to be the hero, it's to guide them, to help them solve that problem. The other is I kind of mentioned in the beginning excess share of voice. But Byron Sharp, I know controversial in the marketing field, but how brands grow has really impacted my view of where Amica is. Given our market share, given our size, given the competition, given our appetite. And this idea of bringing in as many in market category buyers and investing in brand at a level of excess over our market share has really made an impact on me.

[Jen Bruni]

Excellent answers. I would love to have both of them on the show so I will reach out. And in the meantime, Tori, this has been a pleasure. It's been wonderful getting to know you. We have some fun things in common and I'll be excited to watch as the Amica brand continues certainly through this year and beyond and I look forward to our next conversation. So thank you so much.

[Tory Packis]

Thanks for having me. Johnny. Thank you for listening to Marketing Vanguard, part of the Adweek Podcast Network and Acast Creator Network. You can listen and subscribe to all of Adweek's podcasts by visiting adweek.com podcasts. Stay updated on all things Adweek Podcast Network by following us on Twitter Dweek Podcasts and if you have a question or suggestion for the show, send us an [e-mail] thanks for listening.

[LinkedIn Advertiser]

Are your ad campaigns lighting up the dashboard, but not the pipeline? That's bullspend and marketers are calling it out in dashboard confessions.

[Tory Packis]

My boss asked for results, so I opened my dashboard for the only positive sounding metric I had.

[LinkedIn Advertiser]

Impressions Cut the bull spend. See revenue, not just reach. LinkedIn delivers the highest return on ad spend of major ad NETWORKS. Advertise on LinkedIn. Spend $250 on your first campaign and get a $250 credit. Go to LinkedIn.com campaign terms and conditions apply.