34 posts found
12/31/2021 · 5 min read
Craig closes out 2021 with a personal accounting of the year — what built, what broke, and what the honest version of the lessons looks like before the new year begins.
12/29/2021 · 5 min read
Jason takes a hard look at 2021 — the wins, the misses, the surprises, and the lessons that are actually going to change how 2022 is approached. This isn't a highlight reel. It's an honest autopsy.
12/27/2021 · 5 min read
The first step in the 2022 Six Step Success framework isn't a tactic — it's the mental and strategic foundation that determines whether all the other steps work. Craig makes the case for why starting here, instead of diving straight into tactics, is the move that actually produces different results.
12/24/2021 · 5 min read
Step 2 in the 2022 Six Step Success framework is about building the operational infrastructure that allows an agency to grow without the owner's direct involvement in every function. Jason makes the case for systems as the prerequisite for real scale.
12/17/2021 · 5 min read
Marketing for insurance agencies doesn't mean doing everything — it means doing a few things well and consistently. Craig breaks down the 2022 marketing framework, from channel selection to budget discipline to the metrics that tell you what's working.
12/15/2021 · 5 min read
Training is the variable that separates agencies that grow from agencies that grind. Jason lays out why most agencies under-invest in training, what a real training program looks like, and how to build one that produces lasting performance improvement.
12/08/2021 · 5 min read
Hiring is the one decision in agency management that amplifies everything else — including mistakes. Craig covers the hiring framework that belongs in every 2022 agency plan, with specific attention to the mistakes that keep agencies understaffed or badly staffed.
12/06/2021 · 5 min read
The sixth step in the 2022 Six Step Success framework is the one that everything else sits on: the business itself. Jason breaks down what it means to build an agency with genuine structural integrity rather than just growing revenue on a shaky foundation.
11/24/2021 · 6 min read
Not all data is equal. Craig breaks down the specific data points that matter most in an insurance agency, how to read them, and — critically — how to turn what you measure into action.
11/22/2021 · 5 min read
If you're making decisions about your agency based on gut feeling and approximate memory, you're operating blind. Jason makes the case for building a measurement culture that turns vague intuitions into actionable data.
11/15/2021 · 5 min read
Agents who know exactly why they're building their agency make better decisions under pressure, stay consistent longer, and recover faster from setbacks. Craig unpacks why purpose isn't a soft topic — it's a business fundamental.
08/27/2021 · 6 min read
Every decision in your agency that touches client acquisition or conversion is a hypothesis. You believe the email subject line works. You believe the call script closes better. You believe the landing page converts. But do you know? Or are you just assuming?
08/23/2021 · 5 min read
Momentum in an insurance agency is the most valuable asset you can build and the most dangerous force you can lose control of. The runaway train is exciting until you realize you don't know where the tracks go.
08/20/2021 · 5 min read
There are moments in every agency owner's career when the evidence seems to point in the wrong direction. The numbers are soft. The market is hard. A key person left. A carrier changed appetites. In those moments, the thing that keeps you moving is something that can't be found in a spreadsheet.
08/16/2021 · 5 min read
Every significant growth move in an insurance agency looks crazy until it works. The agent who hired before they could afford to, who committed to a marketing channel before they saw the results, who held a pricing line when every instinct said to fold — they all looked reckless from the outside.
08/13/2021 · 5 min read
Price is the most common objection in insurance and the most mishandled. Most agents either fold immediately when a client pushes back on premium or they deliver a defensive monologue about why the price is justified. Neither approach builds the relationship.
08/09/2021 · 5 min read
If your team can't make a move without asking you first, you haven't built a business — you've built a dependency. Being the answer to every question in your agency feels productive until you realize it's the thing most limiting your growth.
08/06/2021 · 5 min read
Strip away all the noise and there are exactly four ways to grow revenue in an insurance agency. Everything else is a tactic in service of one of those four. Knowing this framework changes how you allocate time, money, and attention.
08/02/2021 · 6 min read
Legacy is one of those words that gets attached to expensive buildings and charitable foundations, but for most insurance agency owners, the legacy question is far more immediate and far more personal.
07/30/2021 · 5 min read
A manifesto isn't a mission statement dressed up in dramatic language. It's a declaration of what you believe, what you stand for, and what kind of agency you are committed to being — and when it's real, it changes everything from hiring decisions to client conversations.
07/26/2021 · 6 min read
The biggest threats to your agency's growth aren't the competitor down the street, the carrier that non-renewed your book, or the lead vendor who sold you garbage data. The most dangerous enemy is the one operating from inside your own head.
07/23/2021 · 5 min read
Running an insurance agency will test your patience, your marriage, your ego, and your ability to function on five hours of sleep during an E&O audit. The life lessons that hold you together through all of it are worth talking about.
10/16/2020 · 6 min read
Jason Feltman's solo Coffee Talk connects the dots between Greg Offner's disruptive strategy sessions and the practical operational question every agent eventually asks: how do you turn disruption into an agency that actually sets you free?
10/09/2020 · 6 min read
In a solo Coffee Talk, Craig Pretzinger makes the argument that every insurance agent has one asset that no competitor can duplicate — and most agents are leaving it completely unused.
10/05/2020 · 6 min read
Craig Pretzinger's Motivation Monday solo takes a turn most agents don't expect: gratitude isn't just a feel-good practice. Deployed correctly, it is one of the most durable performance advantages available to an agency owner.
10/02/2020 · 6 min read
Jason Feltman hit the wall. Not slowly — fast. In this solo Coffee Talk, he gets honest about what it feels like when the pressure of running an agency builds past the point where you can ignore it, and what to actually do about it.
08/07/2020 · 7 min read
The most dangerous person in your agency might be the one who needs to be the smartest person in the room. Craig's Coffee Talk on why letting go of ego isn't a spiritual practice — it's a business requirement.
08/03/2020 · 6 min read
The agencies that are scaling aren't doing more of the same — they're doing fundamentally different things. Craig's Motivation Monday on what it actually means to think differently and why your agency's survival may depend on it.
07/31/2020 · 7 min read
The hardest discoveries aren't in market research or competitive analysis. They're in the mirror. Jason's Coffee Talk on what agents find when they stop performing and start looking.
07/27/2020 · 7 min read
Fear is the most expensive operating cost in your agency and it never shows up on a P&L. Jason's Motivation Monday framework for moving through fear and building a mindset that nothing can derail.
07/20/2020 · 7 min read
Every few years someone announces that insurance agents are finished. Insurtech, direct-to-consumer, AI — the threats keep changing. Jason's Motivation Monday take: disruption doesn't kill industries, it kills the people who refuse to adapt.
07/17/2020 · 6 min read
When your agency is struggling, the instinct is to look outward — bad hires, slow market, lousy leads. Craig's coffee talk flips the script: most agency problems start in the mirror.
05/20/2020 · 7 min read
Agency owners don't have a production problem. They have a time problem. Jason breaks down why taking time to organize your time is the highest-leverage move in your business — and why most owners refuse to do it.
05/06/2020 · 6 min read
Compliance isn't paperwork. It's the foundation your agency either stands on or collapses under. Craig breaks down the science of staying clean in an industry where a single violation can end your career.