How Allen-Duncan Agencies Went From 212 to 285 Google Reviews in a Couple of Months
Rob, Second-generation insurance agent ·Allen-Duncan Agencies · Titusville, FL
Built Local Podcast with Clay Lawrence · · 24 min episode
The short version
Allen-Duncan Agencies is a second-generation independent insurance agency in Titusville, Florida that has been in business for about 37 years and grows mostly by word of mouth. Rob, whose mother founded it, says the agency had about 212 Google reviews because it waited for customers to leave them on their own. A couple of months after it began asking every day through Review Harvest, it had 285, with more impressions on a smaller marketing spend.
What other owners can take from Allen-Duncan Agencies
- 1
Have a person answer the phone. Use AI for the background work that gets clients served faster, not for the conversation.
- 2
Give each client one dedicated service agent who knows their story, so the answer never depends on who happens to pick up.
- 3
Ask every new client how they heard about you. For this agency the answer is mostly a mother, a cousin or a neighbor.
- 4
Do not rely on the goodness of people's hearts for reviews. Thirty-seven years of that produced 212.
- 5
Keep the daily review routine small: a five-field form during the day, one CSV upload at the end of it.
- 6
Post each new review in the team channel and name the employee. Recognition matters in a job where nobody pats you on the back.
- 7
Judge reviews by the quarterly numbers, not overnight. Look at impressions, page views and what you are spending for the traffic.
What is Allen-Duncan Agencies?
Allen-Duncan Agencies is an independent insurance agency in Titusville, on Florida’s Space Coast, about five miles from the gates of NASA. It has been in business for about 37 years and writes mostly personal lines: home and auto, plus business, flood, vacancy and builder’s risk policies.
Rob’s mother started it with his uncle after the family moved to Florida. They bought a small book of business and started very small, in a different Titusville office from today’s. Her maiden name is Duncan and his uncle was Allen, which is where the name comes from. She bought the uncle out many years ago and has been in control since.
Rob took a long way back to the family business. He worked there as a teenager, spent seven years in the Army and left as a sergeant, studied music production and worked in that industry, returned to the agency for about four years, then earned degrees in clinical science and worked for years as a blood banker in a laboratory. With his mother ready to retire, he came back. His sister also works there.
How does a local insurance agency keep clients for decades?
By putting a person on the phone. Rob’s pitch is direct: you can buy insurance online, but you will not get an advocate who makes sure you have the right coverage and understand what it will do in a claim.
There are six people in the office. Every client has a dedicated customer service agent who knows their story, how to reach them, and what they like to be called. A call does not go to a phone bank, and the answer does not depend on whoever happens to pick up.
The agency does use AI, Rob said, but only for background work that gets clients taken care of faster. “When you call, you’re not going to speak to our AI systems. You’re going to speak to us.”
Where do new clients come from after 37 years?
They call, or they walk in. The agency barely advertises: some light Facebook posting, a website, and some search engine optimization.
Rob asks every new client how they heard about the agency. Some say they have driven past the office in the old downtown for 20 years. Realtors, mortgage brokers and inspectors send people through relationships that formed on their own over time. But the vast majority give some version of the same answer: my mom told me, my cousin told me, my neighbor told me.
“You can’t buy that,” he said.
Why did a 37-year-old agency start working on Google reviews?
Because the next generation wants to grow, and word of mouth alone will not do it. With the founder stepping back over the next few years, Rob said the plan is to expand, which means getting back out into the community. In the agency’s early days that meant the biggest ad in the Yellow Pages. Now step one is the Google presence.
The agency had always tried to ask for reviews and never kept it up. Nobody had the time. After 37 years it had about 212, collected, in Rob’s words, by “relying on the goodness of people’s hearts.”
He went looking for a fix in ChatGPT and Google, came across Review Harvest on YouTube, and signed up.
What does the daily review routine look like?
It takes a form and one upload. Rob set up a simple online form with, as he put it, five things in it: the customer’s name, phone number and email, plus a little internal analytics, such as who on the team submitted it, why, and a rating of the interaction. He uses the internal answers to see what is driving reviews, whether it is customer service or new business.
At the end of the day he exports the entries as a CSV and adds them as contacts in his dashboard. Every day he comes in, he posts the new reviews in the team’s Slack channel and calls out whoever was named.
That recognition matters to him as well as the traffic. Nobody likes to do insurance, he said, so nobody pats the staff on the back, however well they take care of a client. Reviews do.
What would Rob tell an owner who is struggling to grow?
Outlast it. He has worked in several industries and heard the same thing from owners in each one: business is a war of attrition. If you have a good idea and the means to make it real, push yourself and stick it out.
In Rob's words
“You call here, you talk to a human being right away.”
“It's a war of attrition. And if you can just stick it out, eventually somebody's going to be left when the dust settles.”
“It's good to get our flowers. It's good for the employees to get their flowers and to see what's going on.”
“A happy employee is a productive employee.”
Review Harvest Client
What Allen-Duncan Agencies says about Review Harvest
Rob says the agency had about 212 Google reviews after 37 years because it relied on customers to leave them unprompted. A couple of months after starting Review Harvest it was at 285. Comparing the quarter before with the quarter after, he reported impressions rising from about 4,200 to 4,800 while the monthly spend for that traffic fell by more than the price of the Review Harvest subscription.
“I think we started at 212, we're at 285 right now. We've been with you guys for a couple of months.”
Rob on working with Review Harvest: “How This Insurance Agency Added 73 Google Reviews in 2 Months”
Questions this episode answers
How did Allen-Duncan Agencies get more Google reviews?
Allen-Duncan Agencies in Titusville, Florida had about 212 Google reviews after 37 years because it relied on customers to leave them unprompted. It began using Review Harvest and, a couple of months later, had 285. The daily routine is simple: staff enter clients in a short online form, and at the end of the day Rob exports the list as a CSV and uploads it so those clients are asked for a review.
Do Google reviews bring an insurance agency more business?
Rob of Allen-Duncan Agencies says yes, though not overnight and not as a direct one-to-one result. Comparing the quarter before the agency started with Review Harvest to the quarter after, impressions rose from about 4,200 to 4,800 and page views jumped, while the monthly spend to get that traffic fell by more than the cost of the subscription. He also says more people are submitting their information for a quote.
How does a local insurance agency compete with buying insurance online?
Allen-Duncan Agencies sells the advocate you do not get online: someone who makes sure you have the right coverage and understand what it does in a claim. Each client gets a dedicated customer service agent, so they speak to the same person every time, and a human answers the phone. Rob says the agency uses AI in the office, but only in the background.
Where does a 37-year-old insurance agency get new clients?
Mostly from referrals. Rob says that when Allen-Duncan Agencies asks new clients how they heard about it, the vast majority name a family member or neighbor, and others come from relationships with realtors, mortgage brokers and inspectors that developed over time. Some people walk in after driving past the downtown Titusville office for 20 years. The agency does only light social media and some search engine optimization.
How can a business use Google reviews to improve team morale?
At Allen-Duncan Agencies, Rob posts each new review in the team's Slack channel every day and points out which employee was named. He says nobody likes dealing with insurance, so staff rarely get thanked however well they do the job. Public reviews give them that recognition, which he calls a morale booster you cannot measure the way you measure a paycheck.
Need insurance in Titusville? Visit Allen-Duncan Agencies at allenduncan.com.
