This week, we began teaching about 30 newly certified NFL contract advisors the fundamentals of player representation. Our focus was on giving them everything they’ll need for their first year of working with players.

Our topics this week were money on Tuesday and recruiting on Wednesday. We were joined by Christ Turnage of UA Sports on Tuesday and Aston Wilson of Agency1 Athlete Management on Wednesday. Next week, we’ll focus on training and combine prep on Tuesday and building your scouting network on Wednesday.

Here are a few highlights from this week’s sessions.

• Wednesday night, I knew we would be discussing how to make contact with prospects, so I reached out to several new and newish agents for ideas on what to say that evening. Obviously, social media is key, but just bombing them with DMs probably won’t work. “When you see something happens big for them, you have to leave a congratulatory note . . . birthday, baby shower, engagement (fiancé), family member events . . . You have to acknowledge those things to build rapport,” suggested one agent. “I also have used a (WhitePages.com) subscription before to pull numbers and email addresses,” said another contract advisor. The key is to use social media to let the player know you’re rooting for him. “The kid we’re (recruiting now) was a kid who followed us on Instagram,” offered one agent. “I never messaged him. He had a good game . . . and I messaged him, ‘big win.’ He responded right away and I knew we had something.” One more piece of advice: “Make sure you are strategic with your target. UDFA/potential Day 3 guy and you may get a response.”
• I hoped that the cost of representing a player would have declined (or at least stayed the same) since I wrote this post in 2015. What I found, unfortunately, is that it has risen to the $12,000-$14,000 range. Of course, you can sign players without any investment, but you get what you pay for.
• Having legitimate contract advisors with years of experience has been a tremendous part of the program. For example, Chris had great advice on how to save money on rental cars. Aston had great advice on how to get a player into an all-star game (and make sure the player understands who got him there). Their contributions are part of the reason that, though we promised hour-long sessions, we went 90 minutes on Tuesday and a full two hours on Wednesday.
• You’ve got to be able to walk away. That’s one of the main takeaways from Tuesday.  “I had a defensive end that I was recruiting,” Chris said. “I think he was gonna be a high PFA at the time. He said, ‘hey, this first-year agent is offering me a $10,000 signing bonus. If you can match, I’m gonna go with you. I said, ‘I’m not gonna match that, based on where you’re projected. I’m not doing that. He went with the first-year agent and he didn’t get drafted and he got cut off the 90 and he never played again. So that (agent) dropped 10 grand on him to get him, but it wasn’t worth it.”
• Chris on holding the line at billing the full three percent on every contract: “My background is in banking, and they always told us not to compete on price. . . if you train your (potential) client that you’re going to compete on price, guess what: they’re gonna leave you on price as well. So you have to provide value outside of price.”
• The temptation, as a new agent, is to sign someone from FBS (or even Division II or III) as your first client, but Wednesday, Aston said he doesn’t recommend it. “If you’re signing a player who’s not at an FBS school, he’s gotta be the best player you’ve ever seen play football,” Aston said. “Don’t think, ‘oh, I’ve got this diamond in the rough at James Madison.’ Don’t do that, because the odds aren’t in your favor.”
• By the way, the feedback from our sessions so far has been fantastic. “Mannn these sessions have been priceless,” said one participant. “A lot of the questions I had or was unsure about have been getting answered or put to bed.” Said another: “Neil, great session last night. Really informative.”  

If you’re reading this and you’d like to join us, even if you’re not certified yet (but especially if you are), we’d love to have you. Cost is $350 (no tax), and you’ll get each of the two videos from this week as well as a chance to join us for both sessions next week. For even more information on our New Agent Basics course (and ITL), sign up for our weekly newsletter.