MRL #099- The Death Of The Old School Producer

While scrolling LinkedIn last week I saw an interesting post.

To paraphrase:

“Old School Producers are dying. The way things have alway been done don’t work anymore… yada, yada, yada…”

Per usual on social media, an unnuanced and polarizing point of view.

Big suprise.

The truth is, there is nuance to this argument.

So, in this newsletter, with the help of our friend ChatGPT, we will compare and contrast Old School Producers vs. New School Producers.

And then give you our nuanced take on the issue.

You know…

The kind that’s actually applicable in the real world.

Let’s get started.

#1. Prospecting Methods

First on our list is prospecting.

I prompted ChatGPT to compare the two schools of thought on prospecting—Old Scool vs. New School—and here’s what it spit out:

While I’d love to tell you creating content is all you have to do, it’s not.

As you probably guessed, we lean heavily in favor of “Old School”.

There’s no way around it, if you’re not being brought in on deals or being seeded an existing book, you’re gonna have to cold prospect.

It’s not sexy, but it’s the truth.

Creating content on the other hand is sexy.

(No wonder everybody’s trying to sell Producers on it)

Give a Producer an excuse not to pick up the phone and he’ll gladly jump at the chance with his credit card in hand.

But the reality is:

In the real world, building lead generation through organic content is slow.

That’s not to say it’s not worth doing.

We believe it is.

But content is best viewed as an investment in tomorrow.

While cold calls pay the bills today.

#2. Communication Style

Next on our list is communication.

Here’s what our AI overlord ChatGPT had to say:

For us, it’s “all of the above” on this one.

However your prospect or client wants to communicate is what’s best.

Have a boomer contractor who wants to meet eyeball to eyeball?

Meet eyeball to eyeball.

Have a millenial CFO who likes using Zoom?

Use Zoom.

You, as the Producer, should take an agnostic stance to communication and tailor your delivery to each individual client or prospect.

Succesful Producers will be fluent and effective at all of them.

#3. Specialization

Next we have specialization.

Here’s what Dr. Robotnik had to say:

Again we say some of “both”.

In the beginning, having constraints around what you chase can be beneficial.

It’s much easier to get traction when you go an inch wide and a mile deep.

But as your technical expertise grows, and as your book grows, other opprtunities will present themselves in other industries.

Take them.

You never know where pulling on a loose thread may lead you.

It might just lead you to a completely new industry that’s ripe for the picking.

But if you passed on it, you’d never know.

So our take is this:

Do both. Start small. Get traction. Then broaden as your expertise and opportunities allow.

#4. Branding

Next we have branding.

Here’s what ChatGPT thinks on the matter:

Again we’re going to say “both”.

But with one caveat.

You don’t need a personal brand online to carve out a regional or national footprint.

You can do that with your phone.

Lots of Producers prospect in multiple states.

Think about it this way:

Pick a niche. Start locally with cold outbound. Expand it geographically as needed.

Meanwhile, build up your LinkedIn or YouTube presence with the understanding it’s not going to pay off for 5+ years.

The reality is:

You have time to do both.

#5. Technology

Last but not least we have technology.

In it’s infinite wisdom, ChatGPT said:

We’re gonna favor New School heavily on this one.

If you are making the amount of cold outbound you should be, there’s absolutely no way you can manage it all without a CRM.

If you have an agency worth having there is no way you can manage it without an AMS.

At this stage in the game, technology is a must.

To what scale you implement and use it is up to you.

We’re still fans of analog in some use cases.

But technology as a whole is a must.

An Interesting Tangent On Technology

I don’t think AI will replace mid-market Producers ($10k-$100k) any time soon.

But if I was a small shop that relied heavily on small personal and commercial lines, I’d be concerned.

Insuretech has already eaten up a considerable amount of that segment of the market and it’s only going to increase in the coming years, and at an exponentially faster rate.

If I was a small shop relying on small revenue deals ($2,500 or less) I’d try to go upstream as quickly as my expertise, and infrastructure allowed.

AI will replace us in our lifetime (in my opinion) but the complexity and nuance of the mid-market creates a moat that will insulate us from AI, at least for a while.

Worth thinking about.

The Bottom Line

Binary thinking—an either/or approach—is a fool’s errand.

It blinds us to the good and bad of opposing points of view.

The reality is:

Both Old School and New School have their merits.

We suggest a both/and approach instead.

Take what works from both (in the real world) and apply.

A better way to think about it is:

The Old School way isn’t dying, it’s evolving.

That may not make for a catchy LinkedIn post, but its the truth.

Ok, that’s enough for this week.

Next week we tackle:

“Why 90% of Producers Fail (And How To Beat The Odds)”

Thanks for reading.

Kick ass take names,

Maximus F. Revenue IV

(Micah & Trey)

P.S. If you’re not being handed business and looking for a step-by-step system to build a book-o-biz from scratch, then check this out.

This is literally the process Micah has used to build not one, but two $1,000,000+ books in ~5 years each.