MATTHEW BLACK

Some of our best hires were totally unqualified on paper. They always had the same qualities: entrepreneurial, high agency, smart, mission aligned, and they got shit done. If you’re hiring, especially in early stages, seek out & bet on these people. Don’t over-index on resumes.

AI changes the economics of how to grow an insurance agency. Five years ago, a carrier asking you to grow your book faster meant: “Give a ramp budget and timeframe.” Today it means: “Cool. We can spin up the volume tomorrow.”

AI has officially democratized growth for insurance agencies. That's what we're seeing with our @hiremav customers, they can move faster, scale quicker, grow a more profitable business - all for less.

"Only a $5B exit"

The idea that you need 100 reps to build a successful insurance agency is becoming a thing of the past. Modern agencies are now leaner, more efficient, smarter with their dollar, and growing fast with the right AI technology. @hiremav @internethillary

What is AI texting is doing that human call centers can't? Besides the 24/7 365 experience (that's a given), the infinite context window on customers, that ability to make conversations more valuable are where things really get interesting. @internethillary @hiremav

If you're an insurance agency that relies on lead buying, I want you to be the first to know about the biggest opportunity for growth I see in the new year - paid advertising inside of ChatGPT. 👀

Speed to lead doesn't suddenly matter more. The market has changed. Insurance customers are now comparison shopping constantly, and every delay hands the customer to someone else. If you're not fast, you're already too late. 🏎️

One of the most powerful things about AI texting is something a lot of people miss: infinite context. It's now the customer's expectation that you know who they are and what they're looking for before they ask. If you're missing that relevance, they'll probably look elsewhere.

@Bi11Leou @rohitdotmittal Oh how the times have changed!

@madebyblack @rohitdotmittal Kidna depressing considering it used to be 40M 😔

you raised $8M at a $40M valuation you ground it out for 4 years and got to $2M ARR while burning money or breakeven at bast solid product. customers renew. team is competent some money still left in the bank you have revenue. you have profit. you just dont have the growth rate that returns their fund so now youre stuck your VC ghosts your emails why? because youre growing 15% not 150% cant raise because youre not growing fast enough cant sell because the pref stack means you walk with nothing cant shut down because investors wont write it off (they have you marked up in their next fundraising deck) cant keep grinding because youre burned out and own very little of your company by normal business standards you succeeded by venture standards youre a zombie and theres no infrastructure to help you exit no broker wants to touch a $2M ARR company with $8M raised no acquirer wants to deal with a messy cap table no investor wants to have the honest conversation hundreds of founders are stuck in this exact position right now we need new paths for founders to exit companies that work but dont scale

@Bi11Leou @rohitdotmittal 7.5x for a 2M ARR startup growing 15% is a pipe dream. 3-4x is optimistic assuming a strategic wants to touch the deal.

Sorry but when you say "cant sell cause the pref stack means you dont get anything" how does this happen? More than 90% of seed deals are with 1x liquidation preference & non participating, which means that even if you sell for like 15M, the investor gets 8M and 7M is split between the founders, still a lot of money... Are you saying that it is impossible to sell for anything more than like 10M?? Not sure how acquisition pricing works.

What a way to close out a huge week. A monster quarter of work, plus our leadership quarterly and a board meeting packed into two days, then the team got to celebrate the LV Grand Prix from a rooftop off the Strip. Couldn’t be more proud of this crew. 🏁🍾 PS - we’re hiring 😎

These ads won't be the same as anything we've seen before (unless you were there in the early days of Messenger ads, too). They'll be conversational and programmatic, not just clickable. 👉 Drop me a follow to stay up to date on what's coming, and how you can be ready.

#OpenAI is working on their ad network, and I want to give all insurance agencies first-mover advantage, like all of the affiliates and drop-shippers had in the early days of AdWords.

It's no secret LLMs (like #ChatGPT) are replacing SEO, but a much bigger opportunity is in the works - paid advertising. If you're an agency that relies on lead buying, this is something you'll want to keep your eye on..🧵

Had a great time meeting our local tech community, hosting our first #VegasPy meetup and kicking off #GlobalEntrepreneurshipWeek with @techalleyevents at @hiremav HQ! Looking forward to next month.

We're stoked to be hosting the @TechAlleyEvents #VegasPy meetup at Mav HQ tomorrow! Dan and @madebyblack are looking forward to meeting our local tech community and python engineers - FYI, we’re also hiring one 👀 See you there 🤘

I was also a perfect parent before I had kids. No parent of actual kids would ever make a post like this.

Stop wasting time and money on poorly qualified leads—it's time for an upgrade! Two days till our webinar, hosted by Scott, Jake, and @madebyblack, reveals how boberdoo’ and @hiremav come together to strengthen your lead generation workflows. Register: hubs.la/Q03SrSsz0