How I Made $1,000,000 PER MONTH in Insurance Sales ft. Madison Pimentel | Ep64

If you were, you know, 30-year-old John and you had to make your first decision on how am I going to start my recruitment journey, what does the next 90 days for you look like?

So I get to cheat. I'm kind of doing it now, right? Because my base shop, there really isn't one. You know, I mean, we have the agency, but direct, dude, I ain't done that in a minute. So we are, in a sense, doing it. Okay, not even in a sense, we are literally doing it. I'm just like, why not? Well, cool. I appreciate you coming back, dude. Well, uh, for those that watch, and welcome back to the Insurance Insiders Podcast. I don't know if he's going to show that free stuff we talk— sometimes he does, sometimes he doesn't. I don't know, Reese is in charge. But, uh, welcome back. We got, uh, we got, uh, another fun episode planned. I think we're gonna talk— I think we decided last time we're gonna talk about like some building shit. Yeah, flip the script and ask questions. Hey, have you seen your— have you seen your episodes like blowing up, dude?

Yeah, I've been— I've gotten hit up by a bunch of people, a lot of new followers.

Have you?

Yeah, I've gotten messages, at least like 20 to 30 people so far that messaged me to help them out. And I've gotten connected with my lead vendor. I'm connected with my dialer vendor. And, you know, John, genuinely, like, I'm just trying to help people because everybody can eat in this business. And, you know, people are so greedy. And it doesn't, you know, we're in this world to be fruitful, you know what I mean? Whatever way we can. Um, so all, literally all my connections is literally, um, and, you know, at your disposal and anybody that needs the help for it, you know what I mean? Uh, my dude, so I'm happy that I'm able to help all people. So that makes me feel good.

I like, I like seeing this. Like when I started doing this thing a while back, it's like, what, why am I doing it? I don't even know. You know, and now as it continues, we're watching it grow month over month, and every— it's fucking— it's crazy what's happening. And you know, I get— I get more following from it too, but it's wild, dude, watching now. It's flipped where the guests are getting more new following from the podcast than I— and we get ours, you know what I mean? But dude, the guests are getting more than we are right off the rip now, which is fucking cool to see. I didn't, I didn't know how it was going to play out, um, but it's dope. I don't even know how long I've been doing it. I don't even know what episode we're on. I don't pay, I just keep— I just show up and talk, bro. I, I, I think we're like a year into this one, roughly. I know we're around a year. I don't remember when it started exactly though, but anyway, you killed it. I love it.

I appreciate that, man. Yes, it's dope what you're doing, man. Yeah, you know, again, people are actually, you know, know what the hell they're doing on here and giving some actual advice.

You know, trying. We're weeding through people. We're learning because not everybody knows what they're doing.

That's true. That's true. And there's a lot of those that, uh, act like they do and give some, you know, facade advice.

Trust me, I've had them on and I'm like, oh, oh, got it.

What do you do? Yeah.

Um, kill it. What do you want to talk about, dude? What do you— I know you want to build. You want to stay in that? You want to play in that lane today?

Um, we'll see where everything goes, but I do want to definitely learn on, you know, uh, on the recruiting side of things. Uh, yeah, I gotta be obviously humble with myself. I'm good at sales, suck at recruiting. Um, now I never actually, I guess, had a game plan for it. I was so stuck in the weeds of like, you know, I gotta crush IP, I gotta, you know, be whoever's around me in sales. I was always my mentality, but I also know and understand that the people that are actually eating are actually successful and actually helping out people are the people that build and have, you know, a massive agency under them and, you know, changing, you know, one life at a time. That, that right there is gratification. Um, and I got a little bit of that just by literally, you know, um, helping out, you know, whatever, 20 people that contacted me, uh, between yesterday and today. Um, so if I'm able to do that at a larger scale, that's awesome because, you know, they get to eat, I get to eat. It's like, um, I remember Sean said it, this is like the only business that you can be selfish but selfless. Uh, I think that's the words he used. Like, you can literally want to recruit for more money, but like, in return they're gonna get more money.

100%.

Um, but I'm sorry, let me rephrase that. Um, you want to recruit, and as you were—

I heard what you meant to say. I don't know what you said, but I understand what you're saying. Yeah, but yeah, if you said it wrong I do that shit all the time.

Yeah, you help somebody, but you're actually helping yourself at the same time.

Yeah, you know, I was telling someone yesterday, someone was asking me about it because we're going to rebuild. I told you this, we're going to rebuild the agency for fun. I like when people win. Someone asked me yesterday, it's like, why? What's your plan to make— and quite frankly, hell, integrity gets paid on it now. It doesn't go to my pocket, you know what I mean? So some people like, why are you doing it? I'm like, dude, I love helping people win and make money, and it always works out for me. It just does, dude. It just works out. I don't even know how, like, exactly, you know what I mean? It's like, if I hire you, get an override, cool. But doing this podcast, I didn't have a financial plan with it. I was just like, yo, let me go help some people, and it's kind of working out, you know what I mean? It's like, so I've learned the more I do that, dude, um, that's a big piece of it. So it's cool you have that coming in because when I was new, that, that is not the mentality I had when I started building, and I struggled hard.

Yeah, yeah. But it's because of people like you though, John, you know, because you're doing these podcasts, but you're always in, you know, social media as well. And for new agents that just got started to see, you know, kind of like your lifestyle and what you're doing on a day-to-day basis, and they're like, oh damn, I want to be like that guy. He looks like a normal guy, you know, but he's over there doing $200 million plus with his agency. You know, um, they can't be rocket science.

No, that is definitely true.

I love it.

Where are you at with building? What, what made you change, like, the thought from just want to be a sales guy and make a bunch of money and win and be on the top of leaderboards to this? Like, where, what, what made the shift?

So I still wanna— I'm still wanna, still will be, uh, top of the leaderboard. I don't think that hunger will ever really go away. Um, what I do want to do is Like right now I'm investing a lot in different avenues to make my schedule more efficient. But as I get more of my time back, I want to double down on the recruiting side of things because I see that, you know, you can still write your whatever, $1,800,000 to $1 million in a year and build. Like, what's the issue with that? You know what I mean? People pick one or the other. I'm definitely doing both. So like for me, it's like I want to be able to have a more sustainable residual income coming in for my family. So I don't have to be like, okay, I have to work, you know what I mean? The next 6, you know, 6 whatever days so I can take the next 2 days off after that. And mind you, John, it might still be that mentality because I'm so competitive, but just the fact that I don't need to and just be able to, you know, get that residual income from people that are winning, you know, under me. That's where I— that's where I want to lead. Because obviously, I see your lifestyle, I see other people's lifestyle. And, you know, you have family, I have a family, a much younger— you know, I'm like, I'm 30 years old. Are you 40?

48.

Well, you're 48.

Yeah, buddy.

Yeah, man, you're a beast, man. So, you know, you're 40, you're 48, pushing 40. And I see that the lifestyle you live in is definitely a direction that I want to head to. And I want to make the right decisions, you know, early on, try to get me there.

I love it, dude. I love it. It's, it's definitely like the motivation to keep doing more hasn't left me. It's like you said, that competitiveness. And but what did leave is like you explain, like having to sell. I always try to tell people, dude, you can make a killer living in, in the sales side. You can make great money, but at some point you're bound to change your lifestyle to that income level. I mean, I know you do well right now and you stay humble and y'all don't splurge, but dude, 5 more years, you're gonna be like, we should buy a boat, or whatever your thing is, you know what I mean? Like, it's just a natural part of, part of having the income for a long period of time. Um, and I've seen if people don't build, dude, the stress of having to do $800 grand a year on your own pen. I don't— I would— I didn't— I saw that early and I'm like, I don't want that.

Yeah, I didn't—

I didn't like that piece, um, because I wanted the lifestyle, but I wanted the money. I wanted the time too, you know. And for me, I, thankfully, I was trained by some really good people who understood that. Um, and when it got to a point, dude, where the money— it just— all right, I got— who cares? I can live the lifestyle. I can live a good lifestyle. I can't fly around private all around the world, but I don't give a shit or want to, you know what I mean? It's like, but I have crazy amounts of time too. And that— when, when, when— especially the way some of us grew up, dude, with no money, the feeling when it became like Because again, when you— there was, there was a, there was a fast increase in revenue along the way, which was really cool and noticeable. As you know, it jumps a lot. It doesn't go like, right, I go from $22 grand and I make $23 grand and then I make $24 grand. And it— mine went from like $20s to making $40s to making $80s. Like, it was big spikes, right?

Right.

Um, but when you— obviously we were able to sell the agency too. That was a big lump sum in one day, you know, man. That changed too, because then it was like, oh shit, that, that level of relief— I don't even know how to explain and verbalize that. You just don't have to look at your electric bill, like, you just don't. And again, it ain't like mine's gonna be $48,000 because I'm an idiot, but I don't know if it's $200 or $400 today. I have no fucking idea, right?

That's cool to me, right? Right, 100%, you know.

Um, and that, that took time though. Because in the middle it was busier for a long time, you know what I mean? It's like you got the I sell busy, but then— and then some people have the I recruit busy. But when you have both, dude, that, that stage is what you're gonna have to figure out how to go through, um, because it's a, it's a commitment of time and mental energy. Like, it's like, again, one of those things that's kind of hard to explain if you want to build it big. But you have so many good people around you, and the goal here is also like shorten the learning curve because I learned. I can look back now and go, who— I'm— hence the rebuild part of it. I can look back now and go like, you know, I see where I messed up a lot. So now I can pick like a crew. I know what I'm looking for. I know what I need. I know, you know what I mean? I know the parts that we missed and messed up along the way. So now as we do redo, I can, I can play the parts different. And you get to cheat in some sense and learn some of that, but you're still gonna have plenty of learning lessons along the way, dude.

You know, right, right.

I can get you there, you know.

Right. And then how do you— I guess, how do you attract, um, like, people? Like, how do you attract talent? And like, how do you even like, yeah, like, keep it? You know what I mean? Like, how do you do it?

Funny, dude. Again, I can look back over time right? And I can remember when I was new, the way I view attracting talent then and now is so different. I'm at a different place, you know what I mean? So I'm going to give you what I thought at your stage, but minus a couple lessons I learned. If I did it my stage today, which you'll get to, it's changed more as this thing has evolved and grown in social and marketing and stuff like that. It's gotten unbelievably easier, especially with the combination of I don't have to hire anyone, dude, you know what I mean? So I can be really picky, particular about who I work with directly, which is a freaking phenomenal benefit of, of putting in the work over the years, you know. Um, but at that stage, man, you know, at the beginning, bro, I was looking for anybody who breathed, quite frankly. If they had a license and they could pick up the phone, I probably hired them, you know. Um, I learned to really hate that, you know. And so for me, what I'll, what I'll ask you to figure it out, and we can certainly talk about my views on it, but what I found important is to really know, one, what value do you add to someone? Like, why the hell should they work with you? And what I've learned, dude, is like you have the best leads and you have the best training and you have great culture doesn't mean shit because everyone tells them that. Does that make sense? It's like the surface level answer. And not like, hey, what happens if you don't have insurance? I mean, you know, we'd probably be in some trouble and try to figure it out. That's kind of like that level, right? Um, and so I think that as, as you start to understand what value you add to someone, that to me becomes part of your quote-unquote presentation, if you will. You're, you're, you mean your fact-finding along the way. Like, so you add value to someone, fine. That's kind of step one for me, is like kind of really figure out that for you, you know. Again, for me, I can, I can take you from being broke as shit and really sucking ass at this thing to climbing out of a hole and teaching you how to hit, you know, $400K a year, $40K a month. I've I've done it with no money. I can explain that buildup. I can, you know, I mean, I like, dude, I've walked the walk, so I can tell you all the pitfalls, and I can explain all those things to people, you know. Um, and again, all the other stuff, I literally tell them, dude, best lead— like, we all have the same carriers, we have access to essentially the same fucking leads, you know what I mean? Can you have a preference on a lead vendor?

Yeah.

And one that works a little better? Yeah. But at its core, dude, there's there's no magic about running a fucking Facebook ad and getting a bunch of leads.

You know what I mean?

Anyone can do that. Um, yeah, the product's the same, the license the same, all things are equal there. And what I've learned, dude, is if you look in the industry, as you know, it's very easy entry. It's like the roles are reversed, right? And when someone has a license, they can basically go to anyone they want. They could get hired by 42 people today if they want to. Fair. So it's like you almost have no leverage in some weird kind of way because they want to know everything about you first, you know what I mean? What's your leads cost? What's your comp? How's the structure? What do I get if this? What if that? What if this? What if that? And they want to know all these things, and you got to compete in that noisy world. And that's not my jam, dude. I, Brian, begging for nobody. I just, I'm not, I'm not. I tried. I, I don't do well there. I hate it. I feel weird. Um, and I learned when I sell a lot, I don't have to, right? So you're in that position at the very least. So I would— right, after you figure out what value you add to them, you now have to go look at this thing and go, who are you looking for? Like, really, who are you looking for, right? And you got to be careful because our inclination is to go, I'm looking for someone like me. Well, be careful, there ain't many of you out there. They probably really don't want you.

You know what I mean?

Like, careful. Um, and so you have to decide, dude, literally who you want to be in the space. I'll give you a couple examples. Most of us go like, I want to have all high-end people, I want to have a short team killers. I mean, no offense, dude, how are you going to just find 10 killers and, and not hire anyone else? Along the way. Like, I can't predict who's going to be a killer still. I'm 13 years in, dude. I can't see it coming. I promise you, when I— I love you, but when I saw you, I didn't go like, he's going to be a killer, right? I have no way to detect that, you know. So I don't try anymore. I used to, based on what I saw as perceived potential. I see potential in a guy, he killed it over here, he made a bunch of money over here, he, you know, he's made calls before, he was the number one telesales guy at Solar, dude, none of that matters to me anymore, right? It's no different than you pitching best leads, best culture, best training. They're pitching their best shit too. So to me, it's like, who cares? Um, but at the end of the day, they are going to walk the walk and turn into someone. They're either going to be elite, they're going to be kind of near the top, they're going to be mediocre, or they're going to be at the bottom. They're going to be in one of those brackets, you know. So then you got to decide to what level of those do you want to manage? You know, you want to run final expense leads? Cool, dope. Do you want to run downtown Atlanta, or do you just want to stay in the suburbs?

Because they're different, right?

You know what I mean? Like, no, there's money in both. Say I've made money in both, bro. Yeah, but like, dude, working out in the burbs is a little easier in the final expense world. Different animal. You still deal with stuff, but a little easier, you know what I mean? Um, you got work, and not everybody can go downtown.

Absolutely not. You know, they know you're not from there, 100%, you know.

So I'm like, I'm good. I, you know, I, I can, I can move my way around downtown Atlanta. Um, but, you know, for you, those types of people, you now have to dictate who you're willing to work with. And for me, I was willing to adapt to each of them. But the piece I missed early is I set no boundaries. So if you were here or you were here, they all got the same access, you know what I mean? And if— meaning if they need something right now, dude, if they didn't, if they didn't attend a training call for 3 months, somehow I established the whole relationship that they could be mad at me if I didn't pick up the phone when I hadn't heard from them for 3 months. Like, I find that weird, but as you know, it happens, right? Now I look at me and I go, why did that happen? What do you think? Why, why would it get there?

Well, I'd say— I mean, I'd say since you were recruiting everybody, you know, everybody and their mamas, you just— you— I guess you were maybe in a, in a position where you wanted to see him win so bad that you had gave him the access because you're like, damn, I hired this dude, I don't want him to fail. So you would pick up even if you have— even if he's ghosting you for 3 or 4 months because you want him to win, maybe more than what he wants to win, you know, for himself. Yeah, I could be wrong, but that's, that's the way I piece of it.

And so then if you see, if you see that agent have frustration because whatever, I couldn't help him close a deal, he was sitting in right now, but I haven't heard from him for 2 months. Or he doesn't know what to do with Metformin, but he's been here 90 days and he just doesn't know where to get the underwriting guide. He's frustrated at me in this example. Do you know why he would be frustrated at me?

Well, I mean, your lack of training.

100%.

Yeah. And there was no— there was no structure right off the jump.

There we go. Now we're talking.

And, um, and then there was no clear, like, path or, or goal setting for, for the new agent.

Yeah, a big, big word for me in that stage is expectations.

Expectations. Yep.

Yeah, you know, same thing in home. You do it really good when you're, when you're selling a lot. You lay the groundwork. Here's how it's going to go. Here's who I am. Here's how this works, yada yada. Give you a check, underwriting, social, blah blah blah, you know. So I had to learn, dude, if I'm gonna take all these different people, I have to set the right expectations for this dude. That if he ain't willing to do ABC, well, now there's consequences to that. I don't— I used to care that he didn't do ABC, used to bother me. I had to learn how to not care if you don't do it. However, if you don't do it from the way I termed it— so now again, you want to set what are your expectations for people that you're setting with people. Those are 3 big things: why you, who are you looking for, what expectations are you setting. If you can figure that story out, and it'll develop just like a presentation does over time, that's the kind of the magic to it for me, right? Because I— all the, all the stuff that I dislike or the stuff that frustrates me, I can then put that in the front end and make that my, in my interview during, during the recruiting part, you know what I mean? I can set those expectations in advance. So for me, if like I give examples. I'm like, when I was talking to a guy last night who kills it in car sales, and I'm like, dude, I— great, I don't know you from fucking hole in the wall. I don't know if you're gonna show up to trainings. I don't know if you're gonna learn. I don't know if you're gonna be good with people. You might suck on the phone. You might get— I don't know you, right?

Right.

I don't know what's gonna work out for you. I can tell you I can give you the path, but dude, I don't know. I mean, I just— I ain't guaranteeing nothing. Other than I can tell you what to do every day, you know, and you can convince me that you're going to do it. But the reality is, when it gets hard— I— and maybe it's not hard for you, maybe walking in is easy. Again, I don't know you, dude, you know. So for me, what I look for is people that are willing to work hard and learn the craft along the way. That's important to me. Otherwise, I get frustrated with people. I get annoyed if people are here and they don't learn their craft. It bothers me, and it makes it even more weird that they don't learn their craft and they get mad at their upline for no support. I'm like, I'm not trying to be an a-hole here, but every carrier has an entire training department. They'll train you till they're blue in the face happily. They love this shit, right? And I'm here for you, but you've been here— you're— if you're here 90 days and you don't know like a couple people's name at the carrier you're probably not doing a good job at learning your craft, right? If you don't know how to get on the phone and ask underwriting some questions after a few months, you're probably not doing a good job at like learning your craft. I look at this like you're trying to be a starting quarterback on a Sunday, and if you didn't study the playbook, what would the coach do to you?

Oh, you're gonna answer.

I make them in and they go, I'd get benched, I'd get fired, I'd get let go. I'm like, that's how I feel in this. I mean, I'm— again, you want to be mediocre, cool, but I'm just not really fucking excited to work with you. Just being really frank. I'm just— I don't— I'm just being honest with who I am, right? You know. Hey guys, just created something really cool, and if you want to be part of it, join the Discord group I just created. The link is going to be in here. It's a dope environment. You can chat with others that are kind of in the community. You can see beyond the curtain of our agency, have access to all kinds of stuff that we got going on, events, and my staff is in there. We have agents in there selling, me helping agents and sharing information. We're gonna, as we build this thing out, share everything out there with all of you guys. So again, follow the Discord if you want to be part of everything we got going on. Join it now. We'll see you in there. Hope to help you more. Now, if you only want to do it a little bit, cool. I have one rule. You can never complain to me because I'm going to tell you up front, if you only do it a little bit, it's going to suck. It's going to be inconsistent and you're going to hate this probably forever. The timing of lead advance or advance money, lead spend, your bills, vacation— the timing of it is never going to fall perfect if you're inconsistent. It's going to suck even if you make halfway decent money. The timing of the way this game works, especially the first year, it's gonna be brutal. So if you're not willing to go at it, again, I'm, I'm not offended in any way. I just, I'm just not going to let you complain and be negative. Is that fair? And I cover that shit because so many times over the years people would get frustrated with me and I'm like, dude, I have training, I have all this, we have all this, you don't consume any of it, right?

Right. Yeah.

And then they can still go like, you didn't tell me to consume it. All right, dude, if the, if the head coach of the New England Patriots gave you a playbook, would he have to actually tell you that you have to read it if you think you want to start on Sunday? Or is that kind of fucking common sense, right? You know what I mean? And I can, I can communicate with people appropriately because I'm, I'm setting expectations, I'm giving examples, I'm giving stories. And for me, I've just— this is the piece that's going to come with time is when you go through the BS, you're gonna go, damn, how did he get here? He'd been here 6 months and he's gonna pretend he didn't know what chargeback— how chargebacks worked, you know what I mean?

Right.

Like, where did I go wrong? So I look back at the beginning, I'm like, I messed it up, I got to cover that up front. So I'm covering advance money, I'm covering the way it's a loan, I'm asking them if they pay out, pay, take care of their debts. I let them know if they don't pay it, I have to pay it, and I ain't gonna be fucking happy. I cover all that shit. Why? Because it frustrates me when agents don't take care of it. It doesn't make it all go away, but at the very least, it's just like sales. If they tell you all the reasons they need the insurance and at the end they go, I want to think about it, or they backpedal, what do you do?

Damn, you hit them with literally everything you just told me, the why you need it, you know what I mean? You spit it right back to them.

So I do the same thing, dude.

Yeah, you know what I mean?

So I just get really clear on who they are, what they're trying to do. There's— we figure out again, for me at the beginning, man, I'm just trying to see if it's someone I want to work with. So my interview, even if they do ask me stuff, I'm like, dude, great question. Uh, Madison, do you mind though if I ask you some questions first to see if you'd be a good fit for me? Yeah, because what I love about this business is you're 1099 independent. You can do whatever you want, work wherever you want. Right? That's part of this process for you. You know what's dope for me? I'm also 1099 and independent, so I equally don't have to work with you either. So if we're going to work together, this better be mutual, right? It makes sense. And you are calling me, so I need to understand that you're a fit for me. Here's— and here's who I am, right? That's what I'm looking for, you know? And so my interview style, dude, is, is, is designed to weed people out as fast as possible. That just aren't a fit. I just want to know if you're not a fit. That's it. You know, no different than your approaches. Let me get them an appointment. That's it. I don't care about nothing else. I don't care about meds. I don't care about the history. I don't care about how much insurance they want. I don't care about— I just need them on the phone, right? Deal with all the— you know what I mean?

So, and just, just to double down on what you just said here, that you're literally weeding out, um, I know John now for 2 years, and my first 3 to 4 months I was dialing out of John's office And I remember hearing you and you would do these interview calls and you would literally say the same thing 2 years ago. I'm literally making it so hard for these people to not get recruited where I weed out all the idiots. Basically what you were saying, I weed out all the idiots and I'm literally, basically you said, uh, like verbatim, you're like, I'm literally basically telling them don't do it. And the ones that do do it, those are the ones that I take on. That small percentage is what you're looking for.

That's it.

Um, so you're literally making it really difficult for them to say yes, I want to get hired, basically.

Think about, think about the event we did, right? Does your wife do this shit with you?

No.

Okay, so pretend me and you wanted our spouses to do that run with us. And it's not their jam. Okay, I'm gonna give you two examples before we talk about it. And we go, how should we approach them and get them to come do it? Or you take someone like myself that does crazy shit, and this is just kind of like a, eh, how do you then get me to come do it? How would you explain them differently? You know what I mean? If we want the spouses to show up, how are we going to explain the day? Yeah, little baby, just a little baby thing in the field, bro. A couple obstacles, you can walk around them, no biggie, easy, no pace, we don't care. You explain to me, it's like, yo, we're gonna be up and down these hills, you jump over logs and climb in mud. And right, you mean like you're gonna, you're gonna, you're gonna pitch it different, right? Does that make sense?

Right, 100%.

Um, so yeah, 100%.

Yeah, that's a dope person.

And for me, for me, if— for me, if I didn't want Stephanie to come, how will I pitch that run? Yo, the ice bath at the beginning before we even get to the start line. You, you, dude, you had to get an ice bath to get in line. It wasn't even part of the event.

Yeah, yeah, she's like, I'm out, I'm out, right?

I'm doing that equivalent. You know?

Okay.

And so it's, it's just a mindset shift for me is go like, dude, I want, I want to— I want them to say it does— it's not a fit. I'm looking for that. I'm looking for two things. How quick can I get off the phone is number one, because for me, if, if I know that's what I'm doing, dude, I'm not trying to be mean, but like, I don't need to get into a ton of their personal shit right away if they don't understand leads, 1099s. Commission, dude, I don't care how many puppies they have. I just don't, right? You mean— so I don't feel the need to do that piece up front. And again, I can be cordial. I don't have to be mean. I don't have to— you know what I mean? I'm just doing my thing, dude, to make sure that we're a fit, um, you know. And so for me, at the end, once I go through all the hurdles, the more of them they jump over and they understand and I cover, the more they're in, the more I keep talking. Then I might get to know them a little bit more. Now give a— like, I was talking to a guy last night, um, two. One was a lineman where they climb up and do the electrical pole shit. Makes like $400 grand a year. Um, like, yeah, like switch the bulb, you mean? No, bro, outside the electricity. Like when your power goes out at your house from a winter storm, them damn electric lines, that they fuck with those. Okay, makes like $400 grand a year, but he works like 80 hours a week. You know. Um, and then I talked to another dude that is, uh, in car sales, right? And all along the way— and I don't know nothing about linemen. My cousin's one. I know they climb up poles and they mess with electricity. Like, it's kind of crazy what they do, you know. But at the same time, what we do is crazy, you know. And he's been doing that a long time. And I'm like, dude, I don't know, think about day one being, being a lineman, you know what I mean, relative to how you see it today. You climb up today, climb a pole with like, probably while talking on the phone with your wife at the same time and do the job. But day one, dude, you were probably wetting yourself climbing up near that electricity. You're gonna have those fears again because this is something new. Are you prepared to go through that stage?

Right.

You know what I mean? And I, and I was doing things with car sales and just making them— it's like, if I can tie the thing they know to this thing where it's like a journey of getting better, that's kind of the phase I go into next. If they meet the basic couple hurdles, you know. And I'm really trying to understand who they are, like how they think, best I can. Because ultimately, dude, what I'm looking for is action. I'm just looking for them to take action on the thing. Because again, all I'm doing along the way is advising them what to do next. Do this, set up this, here's the leads, here's how many you should get, here's how many phone calls you should make, here's the product, here's— I'm just kind of directing the show. That's all we do as, as we're building, really. You know, um, and so I want to make sure he understands the roles. My role is to give you information to consume. Your role is to consume it. I'm not with you 99% of your life, even if I mentor you. 99% of this journey, dude, you're not with me, right?

Right, right.

So we have to understand the role. You're independent. Your, your job is to make this your profession. Mine is to help you skip some of the steps. Mine is not to beg you to do this. I ain't doing that, right? Mine is not to listen to you complain about your sister's fucking problems and why you can't buy leads. That's not my— that's not my role, right?

You know, um, and it's funny too, John, the way— because I'm dissecting, and this is— this is— this is awesome. I'm taking like a whole lot of notes, and, um, I'm dissecting the way that you approach, um, the potential recruit. And it's funny because that beginning part is just like when you're selling too, because it's like, for me, I don't— I'm very efficient. So it's like, no, you're right, I don't care about your 7 puppies, you know. I'm trying to figure out why the hell are you looking for life insurance, you know. This is— there's no, you know, oh, how, you know, how's the weather over there? None of that. Like, you know, uh, uh, personal building, uh, or relationship building happens in the beginning. Once I figure out, you know, that, you know, there's a need for life insurance, then I can go and be cordial, you know, as I'm doing the application.

100%.

You know what I mean? So it's funny that you say that because it's literally the same thing in sales.

And that's the piece that took me a while. It took me a while to figure out they were the same, right? So a lot of the skill set you already have. You are the person that can build. The question is, will you adapt and make it apply in the other arena? You know, I, um, I'll tell you, I'll give you another example. I was, um, I'm working with this young dude, Giovanni. I don't know if I sent him to your chat or not, but he works, um, and Zach and some of those other guys that went in there. I was having a conversation with dude Giovanni. He's 20, I think he's 23 now, um, sold like $300 grand last year, building, moved direct to me from some other company. And, uh, I'm teaching them some stuff and I'm teaching them how to like We have this group chat. We just built a Discord, right? So we're on WhatsApp. He's young and he's like, nah, Discord's way better. You can use it for all these things. So he's got me moved everything there. I mean, just got this little chat, the agency chat or whatever. And, uh, one guy posts like, um, 12 hours of dial. He's like, dial from 8 AM to 8 PM, 250 dials, whatever result was. It was minimal. And the guy knows how to sell. So he knows that wasn't a lot. And him and Giovanni are buddies, they're tight. It's like you and your— like, they're close. So he can fuck with him. Does that make sense? So he's calling him out in the chat, and I was like— and then, you know, and I did it in a way where I was like, hey dude, obviously just work on the efficiency, you know what I mean? Obviously took 12 hours to do 200, just focus on the day, dude. He's like, yeah man, I missed that, I messed it up. Giovanni jabbed him, nothing mean. But buddies. And I said— and we're texting offline outside of the group, and he, he texts me something he wants to say. And he's learned enough around me to know, like, just be intentional, dude. And so he's like, I sent something and it was kind of soft to the dude. He goes, you can be direct with me, him, man, he can handle it. And I'm like, I know, I'm trying not to scare a new agent away. And he goes, bro, he's been doing this 5 years. I said, I wasn't talking about him, I'm talking about all the people that are watching us in the chat. And he was like, never fucking thought of that. Yeah, I was just treating him like a buddy because he's my buddy. I'm like, cool. Steve, who just started yesterday, doesn't know that. Yeah, Steve's afraid to get on the phone. Steve's afraid to ask questions. He ain't gonna ask no questions if he sees you getting beat up in this group. Stuff like that, dude, I missed early. You know what I mean? I'm like, oh, that's better. I could play it better here.

That's, that's heavy on me. Well, you just said, because, um, as you can tell, I'm very just outspoken and I love to have a good time and joke around and stuff. So when I'm— when you see in my Zoom, I'm, you know, on our Zoom, like, there's no filter.

It's different live too versus chat. Does it make sense? Video's different than chat. Because text can be taken way out of context very easy. Demeanor, at least you get to see some— there's a little bit more leeway the way y'all run it, you know what I'm saying? But nevertheless, be intentional, right? So hey, when you bring a new agent in, probably be a benefit to be like, yo, we're just boys in here, we cut up, we might give each other shit. Like, you're gonna be okay with that? That should be one of your things, right? Does that make sense? Because that's your environment and that's who y'all want. That's one of the pieces of what you're looking for, someone that can handle that shit.

Right, 100%. Like, someone won't close the sale, I'm like, oh man, you know, get them next time. I'll literally be like, damn, bro, you got baked.

Yeah, 100%. Yeah, correct.

You got baked. Oh, you're gonna eat a donut today? You know, so we keep it so real and it's fun.

Yeah, which is cool. That should be part of who y'all invite people into. It shouldn't be a shock that they come into that. Right, you know what I mean? And there's just lots of things like that along the way, dude, that it's that setting expectations thing for me became so important. Part— like, when I look at the book, dude, you know, when you go to Do More, remember the acronym, the E is for expectations. It's just, for me, I was so bad at them. And I'm, I'm super oblivious, dude, to shit. You know, I miss, I miss signs. I don't know if you saw the post I put. I posted a picture of my fucking trash my kitchen last night— yesterday. Oh yeah, yeah, it's because like Steph, like, you know, the trash piled up and she didn't touch it. Then she took it out and put it next to the thing, and then she left it at the front door, and then she took it. And I missed all the little signs. I only saw the last one before it clicked. And dude, I caught myself laughing out loud in the kitchen. She's like, what are you laughing at? I'm like, I missed your 42 signs that you didn't— like, my bad.

That's funny.

Yeah, so for me, I have to just be really clear about those pieces because I'm— I know my, my faults, you know what I mean? And that causes frustration with people along the way. My own fault. Your faults are going to cause you, for other people, frustration, right? So the ownership is part of the acronym too, and O is ownership. So it's like, it is what it is, dude. I ain't perfect. Please don't fucking— please don't hear that from me. I'm just telling you I can teach you to make a bunch of money in life insurance. That's it. I ain't— I'm nothing more, nothing less to you. If we build a friendship, cool, but like, I don't— don't ask me for a lot. Like, not in a mean way, but like, yeah, I'm not the guy for marriage advice for you, you know what I mean? Um, so I just—

I don't know, dude. I think if you fall in— for me too, I was like, I, you know, I'm sorry, I don't have no secret sauce or secret leads or secret dialers, secret— there's no secret. I just work hard. But like, you know, people are like, oh yeah, but I work hard too. I'm like, well, you know, my level of working hard is completely different than your level of working hard. And for me, it's like, since I come from the restaurant business, you know, that is hard work. This is nothing. So like me slaving here is nothing. This is the cakewalk, you know, because I got that perspective. And for me also building a business, it's like, I fall in love genuinely with their journey, not the outcome, and the outcome will come.

Correct. Yeah.

Same thing goes for the gym, you know, you eat good, you work out, eventually you get to where you want to get to, you know. Yeah. And go ahead.

No, please.

Yeah. Um, so my, my question for you, man, is if you were, you know, 30-year-old John and you had to make your first decision on, you know, how am I gonna start my recruitment journey? What does the next 90 days for you look like? And you have nobody under you.

No agents?

Yeah, so you have no, no agents.

So I get to cheat. I'm kind of doing it now, right? Because my base shop There really isn't one, you know what I mean? We have the agency, but direct, dude, I ain't done that in a minute. Okay, you mean we moved— I was giving people out, I was helping DAP, I was the direct— we don't have a ton, ton like direct base shop, old, you know what I mean, that way. Um, so we are in a sense doing it. Okay, not even in a sense, we are literally doing it. I'm just like, why not? So, um, and again, I get to cheat because I have the knowledge. So if you want me to pretend I don't have the knowledge, it'd be a totally different answer. But with the knowledge I have today, dude, I'd have Amanda, bro. I'm like, I gotta hire me an Amanda, you know? I need a right hand. I need someone staffed for me. I know you have some VAs, dude. If it's me, I got a staff that's sitting in my fucking right pocket all day. Just me and someone. I gotta have at least someone. To run this shit with, you know, because I need someone to do all the stuff that I can't be doing. If I'm doing the recruiting, what is all the other stuff that has to happen? Think about all the pieces, you know what I mean? What does that look like for you? You, you hire me today, then what? What do you do now, right?

Because if I hired you today, I mean, I would literally, uh, put you through my Zoom and, um, train you as we go. I'll give you a script. It's a first step, pretty much.

Yeah, that's pretty much contracted or licensed or—

oh, okay, my bad. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I got an admin for that. So yeah, yeah, so, so yeah, so she'll, you know, get you contracted.

Can they handle the flow?

Um, what do you mean, like my admin? Like, yeah, can they handle—

I don't know, I don't know what you have for admin full-time. Is it the same dialer or is it someone else?

No, it's someone, um, from Connecticut.

Cool, dig it.

But she's, um, she, she's, um, I think the sister of, uh, Nadia.

So she's at like corporate Connecticut, literally? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's a no-brainer, dude. So yeah, I'd have that whole process set up, you mean? What hap— when I hire someone, what happens next? And I'm a whiteboard guy, so I whiteboard the shit out of it. You know, all right, some— something happens next. Now what? Meaning, how do you let her know someone's hired? Do you have a form? Do they text you? Do they email you? Do they send you their license? Do you write it all down? Do you fucking fax it? Do you text it? Like, how do you get it to your assistant?

That's important. So, yeah, I text it to her.

Um, I used to too, you know. Now, bro, if I hire someone now, I'm like, yo, email Amanda your state license and your driver's license. She'll get you set up. I ain't texting no one shit no more. In the middle, I used to have a form, so a little form on my— on— we, we create a little landing page, like a fucking little single website page, and I would fill it in because I was in the field selling, you know. I mean, you're on the phone, fine, but I had a little form that we created. And this is— you can go anything in between. You text her, cool, then she has to then take that information and put it in the system and send an invite. Or send the pre-license course or whatever it is she's sending depending on the stage, right? So for me, as that started going more and more, I wanted to be more and more efficient about it. So at the beginning, I'd send it to Amanda, she did her thing. Then, for instance, like with class, say if I hire someone and they got to go in class, right? Or let's say you do. What, what days does your staff work?

Monday to Friday.

Okay, what time?

Um, I have her 9 to 2, and then I have another admin that does, uh, 2 to 5.

Okay, so if you hire someone at 8 PM on a Friday night and they have to get in class, what happens there?

That would be a Monday thing.

I was like, I ain't okay with that. Why? I mean, Dude, I don't even have to explain why here. I'm just not. It's— that seems long. Why? It's a canned email you send for everyone. It's the same fucking email. They get the same email, right? So I went— I go to a man, I'm like, how do we make this automatic? What if we build a one-page form? Back in the day, we used JotForm, free on Google, whatever, any of those. Now we have a little bit more. We have a dope system today, but Yo, when I hire someone on Friday night at 8 PM, 9 PM, I should be able to fill in their name, email address, the comp I want, and if they're licensed or not. And if it says unlicensed, it should automatically send them the invite to class. Why can't I do that? She's like, no, no, I got you. So she built it, you know what I mean? Like, I like looking at stuff like that. Yeah, just all— and all along the way, that's how I look at things, because I ain't mad at her typing it in. But do you really want to pay her to do emails when she could be doing something in addition to that? You know, when you're only bringing in one or two, that don't matter. You start bringing in a bunch and she— you got— you hire 10 people today between you and your crew, she's like, bro, I'll get to that one, I got 12 more emails to type up. I, I wasn't okay with that. That seemed really sloppy to me from a just a business, you mean picture or something in the kitchen, probably works as stupid, you know what I mean? You do it this way and you're like, nah, we slide this thing out here and we put it here with the ticket, or whatever the shit y'all do in the kitchen to make things flow faster, you know what I'm saying?

Yeah, yeah.

Um, so for me, I just— you'll see, that's just one tip, but you'll see things like that all along the way. And anytime there's any kind of traffic jam with time, just because it's just sitting waiting for someone to get to it. I want to go like, how can we, how can we condense that time? Because at scale, dude, that's like a massive amount of money. When I get people paid quicker, they stick, you know what I mean?

Yeah.

And if I gotta wait 3 days just to get them a code, you don't think they're gonna be looking at other shit all weekend and Googling stuff and watching other people's videos and watching other podcasts and potentially talking to other people? And you know what I mean? Like But if I wanted to get hired with you, my personality, I don't want to wait till fucking Monday. You know what I mean? I'm like, can I have it now?

I'm laughing because this is so funny because it's literally like sales is exactly the same way. You get a lead that just filled in a form, correct? You get in contact with that dude as soon as possible or else he's gonna fill out another form.

You think?

Yep, yep.

Seasons.

Okay. Yeah, that's fire, man. That's fire.

Get effing paid.

Get effing paid.

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So what do you do then from, um, obviously you have Amanda, she's the GOAT, you know, of operations, but what do you do from a recruitment standpoint? Like, are you just launching ads? Are you doing like, um, like in the beginning? Because obviously now it's completely different, you know what I mean? You have a whole, you know, uh, system, a whole audience. Now it's completely different. But, um, as you started out, like, what, what, what were you doing to kind of get the, you know, the ball rolling?

Mine was, well, I attempted to do warm market first. I didn't have a big warm market. I moved around a lot in my life. I've had, I've lived in like 25 different places and I had kids real young, so I don't have a tight circle of people. There's, there's not a lot of people in my circle. Um, but I was with some people in the mortgage industry for a minute, you know what I mean? Some people I worked with that just hated their jobs, so Yeah, I went to a dozen or so people, tried to recruit them. None worked out long term. A couple started with me at the beginning. I didn't love that path. Um, you know, I was taught like, call everyone in your phone and pitch them. I hated that. It gave me the ick. So I was on ads like day one, dude. Back in the day, I was running free Craigslist ads. Every night, dude, all kinds of cities. I'd run an ad even when it went to $25. I don't even know if Craigslist's worth a shit today, so don't take that as like that's the magic. I'm just telling you my journey.

Yep, right.

$25 for a Craigslist ad, dude. I'd post them every night. In the morning I'd wake up, I'd have 5, 10, 15, 20 resumes. I just pick the phone, start calling them, dude. That was the initial, um, you know, do my best to figure out how to weed them out. You know, now obviously that would look very different. It'd be a lot easier. Um, the progression of it became, all right, how many people can I get through? Then when I started realizing I interview people and— have you been interviewing at all?

Uh, no, like I've had— it's a warm market, honestly.

Yeah, yeah. So you're gonna find out, you're gonna learn. It's like, it's like, I don't know, dude. You book an appointment and you go to their house and their front door is made out of a cardboard box, you know what I mean? Like, and you don't find out till you get there. Some of these things you're going to find out when you get there with agents, and you're going to realize, dude, when you do a couple interviews and you talk to someone who just woke up and doesn't remember who you are and you got to convince them where you work again and who— what's your name— you're going to get annoyed. It's like, dude, this is a fucking pain in the ass. Yeah, so Weeding through that to find a decent human with a decent conversation takes a lot of reps. It taught me a lot though, so I like the journey. But pretty quickly I realized, like leads, if I just get more of them, I can now weed them down further before they get to me. So the next iteration of that was another single landing page with a video, 5 minutes. Here's who I am, here's what I'm looking for, here's who I'm not looking for. Here's how this works on a basic level. Here's how you get paid, independent, 1099, leads, commission, blah. Here's my story. I'm looking to help some people who want to win. If that's you, apply here. And then they would book on my calendar, and then I would only talk to those ones. And then the other ones I started giving out to my agents. Hey, you call them, do what I did. You start just like we give out old age lead, like you got Braden calling leads.

Yeah, you know what I mean?

It's same concept.

Yeah.

Um, okay, so, and then I just could take the cream off the top. In a sense, it didn't make them amazing necessarily, people I was going to hire, but dude, they did watch a video and they did click on my calendar. I'd rather— right, I'd rather talk to them. You know, you can get to a point where you do a webinar and you put 100 people on a webinar. You could do it live, you could do it recorded, add a little link, click here if it's you, click here. You know what I mean? So those are different progressions, any and all of them. Once I hired someone, in my head, dude, and not like an over-the-top, you have to recruit kind of, it kind of way where I want someone to come here and think that's all they have to do, but I am going to navigate their warm market. I'm gonna, I'm gonna find out who they know for sure, you know what I mean? Hey dude, as part of this, seems like you're trying to do big things and kind of get out of the hole. My guess is you hang around other people that think like you and are trying to, trying to make some extra money. Hey, along the way, dude, I'm hiring. I, I help train a lot of people to make a lot of money in the space. If you got any buddies or friends or anything that also would be interested in making some extra money, you open to connecting with me? Because I can train them while I train you.

The referral question, that's dope.

Just leave it at that, dude. If it gets in— and sometimes I might be like And honestly, if they sell, you'll make a couple bucks every time they sell a policy. That's about as deep as I get into agency override, any of that. Now, if they ask or if they know, I'll go deeper if it makes sense. But for the most part, dude, I'm just like, who do you know? Hell, I'm gonna take the time out of my day and my family and my life to train you how to make the money I'm already making. To be clear, which is a nice leverage point a lot of people in the space don't have. They're recruiting to make the money. They don't already make the money, right?

Right, right.

So I'm like, the least I feel like you could do is introduce me to other people who also want to make good money, because I want to train them at the same time. And it— dude, it worked. I still use it to this day, dude. You know, some of the— all, all of the biggest teams we have came from depth for me. Any of the killers you know in my group, they all came from— I did not hire any of them. Not one of them, but I hired the person who hired them typically, or a couple above them, you know what I mean?

Yeah.

Um, and I was just— I just focused on that, dude, because I knew the power of warm market. I'm not confused by that. I just didn't have one. That doesn't mean I can't use yours, right?

Just tap them.

Yeah.

And just—

and just begin— begin building relationships with people. And thankfully, the dude who mentored me taught me to treat everybody like they're direct to you. So I didn't look at it and go, what spread do I have? I can't talk to that guy, you know what I mean? He's 4 in depth. Just because I wouldn't be here. I was 4 in depth from the guy that helped me ultimately, you know what I mean? I was hired— there was a guy and a guy and a guy, and then this guy hired me. Um, but the dude here, Mike, helped me along the way. And he came down, he had really no spread on it, but he saw I was doing a lot of big things, I was working hard, I was curious, I wanted to learn more, and he kept pouring into me, dude. And without that, mean you ain't talking. So that process of not only help build their depth but dive in there and actually work with the people, that, that was a lot of the, the magic, dude. Especially early, because the guys recruiting, especially in the style I was doing it, a lot of them didn't want to build anything big, and most of them were afraid to train, didn't know how to train, they didn't have a— it wasn't their thing.

Yeah.

So I was like, cool, it's my thing, you bring them to me and get out of the way. And if they do well, you'll get paid, right?

That's simple, simple math. And it's, it's crazy too, John, because like you obviously understand the whole, the, you know, the dApp and you know how that, you know, that works. Um, but like for me, I'm ignorant to it. So it's like anybody comes into our Zoom, I treat them like my own, you know. Yeah, I always help no matter what. Um, so it's a good mentality to have. 'Cause you're right, you know what I mean? Like, you don't know, you know, you give, you know, not to get something in return, but you just don't know where that person is gonna be, you know, tomorrow, and then what he's gonna mean to you tomorrow, you know, and vice versa. Yeah, man. Now this is super dope, man. I learned a lot. Learned a lot. I know we're kind of close here, right?

Up to you, you're the one out here selling, bro. I was smart enough to build in padding because I talk a lot.

Yeah, I do have, um, some, some, some, uh, a couple real questions that everybody, you know, um, deals with when it comes to the whole recruiting side. And I, I think I already know what the answer is, but I just kind of want to hear your perspective on it. When it comes to like chargeback like management, right? People are— even myself, like, I've gone through a couple of, you know, idiots that I did okay for a little bit and then, you know, just left a nice little bill for me. So, you know, how do you manage the whole chargeback scenario? Because obviously you're hiring a bunch of people, which your risk is a lot higher of, you know, getting a return, you know, getting charged back. So how do you kind of mitigate that?

Yeah, one, I think the initial process is— for me, I've learned that every business has the equivalent of not only chargebacks but roll-ups. They all, they all have it, you know what I mean? Like, if you go as simple as, I don't know, dude, we saw a tractor-trailer tipped over on the side of the interstate the other day carrying who knows what store shit. Someone's taking a hit. I don't know if it's a driver, I don't know if it's an insurance company, I don't know if it's the retailer. Someone's taking a hit because they ain't selling that shit. Does it make sense? And then you could go like I don't know if it is the insurance company. That's kind of like a roll-up, you know what I mean? They get some debt they didn't plan on having. It's kind of built into their business model if they're smart. The problem is what happens in our space is most people do two things wrong. They don't build it into their business model, and I'm not saying accept them all, and they don't do anything to prevent them, right? So if we go like, let's take a situation you have a real one. You mentioned a couple. Pick one that you want to— that you're open sharing, um, kind of where it ended.

Um, so I had, I had an agent that, you know, had a $30,000 month and then about 2 $30,000 months. And then I was pouring in a lot into him and a lot of my time because it was like one of my first agents.

Agents.

And I just wanted to, you know, see her win. And, you know, all my time I'd be in a mid-pres, you know, just literally mute my clients to like help her out type of deal, you know. Um, you know, so that, that's the level of like energy that I had towards her because I wanted her to win. So, but what ended up happening was that, you know, months, you know, months went by. I can see that she was kind of like, you know, becoming— made in a way What was that?

I said fading away.

Yes, yes, yes. Fading away. And, um, that's the correct word, actually. And, you know, she was investing already a lot of money into the business. She was getting some return, but I knew that if you have a bad week or bad two weeks like that, and, you know, that's gonna— for any top, you know, anybody that's producing at a high level, that's going to hurt you. And if you're just starting out, the first, you know, six months, you got to keep that same activity level. So I saw the activity declining, activity level declining. Moving around too much. You want to stay stable, especially that first year. Even if you have the money, you want to stay stable because there's nothing like being in your own environment and working. And I saw the signs. And then I got a call 3 or 4 weeks later, I said, hey, I'm not going to keep doing this. I just don't see myself doing this anymore. Yada, yada, yada, yada.

Did she have debt at that point?

Um, at that point, I don't— she had her own personal debt.

Um, but I mean, I mean, carrier debt?

I, I don't know. I don't think so. I don't honestly— I don't, I don't know. I know it all rolled up afterwards.

Um, so do you see the first problem?

Yeah. What is it? I should have, uh, a tracking of like—

I didn't know if she had debt.

Yeah, I should know.

Where do they— where do you— where can you see if she has a chargeback every single day on a whim, anytime you want?

Uh, America will be telling me.

Yeah, you can see it. Yeah, any given time you want. You see when she gets paid, you can see her balance, you can see when there's a chargeback, you see all of it. Yeah, right. So now we go— let's rewind. All right, so she got a couple months later, hey, I'm out. She's already potentially has a debt, right? She's already like deep down a hole. So for me, a couple things that I think of— you explain the consistency of it. One, this is one of those upfront things I talk about a lot, meaning if you have a big month, okay, and then you slow down the second month, no one's confused that on the second month it sucks because you sold less. What's the other big factor in that second month that no one really thinks about?

You're spending the same.

It's one piece. And two, is a big one.

Uh, potential, um, chargebacks from the month prior to the bookends. Correct.

So you got a big month of chargebacks coming, right? So if you normally sell 20 and you sell 40, whatever your chargeback rate is, you're getting it on 40. And then if the second month you drop down and you sell fucking 14, not only are you short on the sale, even as 20, 30, whatever the number is, it don't matter. When it's less you're making less and you're getting a bigger wave on the back end of cancels, right? So it's kind of a double whammy if the timing sucks, which happens a lot, you know. Um, and I was, I was always taught, dude, if you— you're gonna have a few chargebacks every week, but if you only sell a few policies, those will be the few chargebacks. I was taught the business that way. So if I only ran 3, only made 3 sales, dude, Cat was like, hey, remember what I told you? Hey, if you only make 3, how many we expecting to charge back? I'm not saying it's normal. And those that on the internet like, I have no chargebacks, dick, F you.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, does that make sense?

Like, cut it out. It's not— if you don't have them, fine. You're telling me you ain't prepping people for them? Because if you're the unicorn that never gets any, which I, one, don't believe at all, two, that's not common, you know what I mean? So even if you go, it should be 80%, fine. Most agents aren't prepping for the 20 to fall off, much less the 30 or 40 they probably get when they're new because they suck at this, right? You know, so I think that's, that's one of those early conversations to have, you know. Um, but then when I look at it when we're there, it's like, all right, rewind. What would have led— what are some signs that you could have seen earlier that would have led you to know she wasn't doing well, right? You have them, you see them. She's spending the money, she's not running the appointments, or not putting up the numbers. So then the question is, what do you do at that stage about it? Are you having conversations? It's a different conversation if you know how much debt she has at each carrier, right? I can— yeah, because now, now you didn't really map out a plan for her to wipe out the debt, which sounds like common sense, but it's really not, you know what I mean? It's like, all right, maybe, maybe again you catch her when she has $1,200 versus when she has $4,000. A different conversation, similar but still different. Even if it's $4,000, I can back into it and be like, all right, I know you're worried about the debt. Hey, let me ask you, you've been around long enough to know this. How many policies will it take for you to wipe out— if I said you have to wipe out the $4,000 right now or they take away your license and put you in jail, how many apps do you have to close to wipe out the $4K? $12K, $2K, $1K, whatever it is. I don't care what the number is. Yeah, the earlier I catch it, the better. Yeah, let's just ask him how many apps would it be. How many do you think based on your plan? How many? Wipeout 4K, how many apps would it take?

2 or 3.

Okay, let's say 3, and I'm gonna round up to make it even harder and say 4. How many presentations do you have to make on average to write 4 apps?

Um, at least I say so 6 to 8 put me at 2 apps at least. Um, so, you know, 12 to 16.

12 to 16. Okay. If you had to, everything on the line, how quick could you book 16 appointments, presentations? Like, how quick can you knock that out if you had to?

Yeah, no, 100%, without a doubt.

How quick?

Now.

You know, I just went through that too, John.

I was like, hold on, I haven't freaking written this carrier in ages. No one's about to terminate me. Let me get busy.

100%, dude. So I'm like, Bro, if you can do it in a day or two or three or four or five or six, why are we freaking the fuck out? Yeah, I got it, sucks, but it's not like it's going to take you— like, you want to go get a doctorate degree, it's going to take you 12 years, 14, whatever the time is. But you can knock out this debt in a few days or a week. So one, why are you overcomplicating this? And I can have that conversation and see where they're at earlier. You know what I mean? If it gets further down the line and I have that conversation, they don't do anything about it, I can go, hey, have you worked out a payment plan with the carrier? What?

Huh?

All right, call the carrier. Tell them you got debt, you want to fix it, can you work out some kind of payment plan so you're not fucking getting terminated? You know, if you communicate with them about the money, like when your rent is late at your apartment, do you ghost them? Or are you in a better situation if you tell them?

Right.

All right, so why don't you open your mouth and tell them and commit to something? Work out a payment plan, bro, and then when you're done with it, send it to me, because they're going to keep blowing me up until you pay. So send me the payment plan you work out, let me know, and then we'll make a plan on how to attack it. Give them that to do and tell them to come back to me so now I can work on the plan. Let's say they still let it go sideways and I still fuck up and I still keep letting them go and still keep digging the hole and they have $8,000 somewhere, right? What if you got— if you got debt, you just said it, so if they didn't pick up on it, it's fucking easy to figure out. If you got debt at Americo, what do most agents do when they sell a policy?

When they— if they got— they'll go sell it somewhere else so they can get paid.

Okay, so when you look at your leaderboards, do you pay attention to that stuff? Does it make sense? I know you don't— you're not hiring it, but you certainly should.

Yeah.

Meaning if I'm looking at your issue paid, bro, and every month you do 80% of your business with AmeriCo, and suddenly this month you write 80% of your business with Transamerica, I'm like, yo, he's ducking. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, I can be like, yo, hey dude, quick question, Madison. Um, obviously it's a debt thing. You know, we've talked about a couple times, um, so I got good news and bad news for you today. This is a shitty conversation, by the way, and I'm sorry we have to have it, but the carriers want to terminate you. Why? Well, you know why.

You have—

you owe them money, and much like credit cards, they all talk to each other. So like, if you don't pay Amex, what happens to your Discover card? They shut that shit off, right?

Yeah, yeah.

Okay, insurance works same way. If you don't pay AmeriCo, Transamerica don't want to work with you. I don't want to work with you. So they want to terminate you today. I'm doing you a huge favor. I got you 2 weeks. You have $8,000 debt at AmeriCo. You got 2 weeks to take care of it. In the meantime, we got to put you on as earned with all the other carriers. The only one you can write with now is the debt you have. And now again, if it's a certain— if it's a— if it's a person I've been working with, dude, I'll forewarn them of this as a possibility. Does that make sense? Yeah. As earned everywhere, the only where you get advances where you have the debt. And if you want to stay in this business working with us, you have to pay off that debt to be able to open up the other carriers. No different than, again, you owe Amex money. If you don't pay them off, Discover ain't giving you a new credit card. And I'm the person that's signing off on it, so I'm responsible. I'm not signing it. I'm not signing off on an open line of credit for you to jump from carrier to carrier to accumulate debt. You've already proven you're not paying it over here, so you put me in a position now to— I have to make this call. And again, for me, I've already had these conversations, so it's not a shock. I've had to have it when it wasn't discussed before, and it sucks, but I was willing to do it, you know. So now it's part of my initial, and I see that shit coming early. So again, Um, if we rewind even earlier than any of this debt, you start looking at lead spend, a number of appointments booked, you can tell early that, that they're going down the wrong road. And I've never found an agent, dude, not once, bro, that's going down this road that their activity is also amazing. I've never seen it. I've never seen it. You know what I mean? Yeah, like Easton, he had amazing activity and no sales, but there was no room for debt yet. It was too early. I've never seen someone hint down that chargeback problem road that's killing it with activity, right? And coachable and getting on calls and asking questions and calling for help and being in the live Zoom dials. They're never doing all that shit. So when they're not doing all that shit, that's the first sign. And the minute they go to, I'm buying leads and I don't sell enough, I'm paying attention, dude. They have debt when they're new. Hey, Mary canceled. Have you looked at your commission statement yet? Keep in mind, you're barely looking at yours. They definitely ain't looking at theirs. Yeah, you know what I'm saying? So I'm teaching them to pay attention to this shit early. I'm going to teach them how to call the client. I'm going to teach them how to see if it was just an NSF or if they called and actually canceled. Maybe it was another agent came in behind him. Who knows what the cancellation was for, but I'm going to teach them how to manage it, you know what I'm saying?

Right.

And, and so it's hard for them to get down that open gate of Never Neverland debt that you allowed them to get into. They had to get through so many obstacles that you just kind of went like this with. Yeah, you know what I mean? You see the signs, but you don't really do anything about it or know how to talk about it, or So I just dive in deeper earlier, and I don't pretend it's not there. It's just, it's a part of the fucking game, and you have to learn how to play this game or you will get eaten alive, right? You know, and it's not like it's bad. It's, it's money you didn't earn. They're giving you money you didn't earn, and you're spending it, and you're confused that why when they canceled you can't keep it.

Yeah, right.

Imagine this. You have a pair of shoes that you buy at Walmart and you want to return the shoes for the money and you want to keep the shoes. That ain't how it works.

Yep.

You know what I'm saying?

Yeah.

And so for me, dude, it's a lot more about management up front and just not being willing to let someone get— go down a road because— and Here's the last piece I'll end with on it. There's some people that do it because they just don't work enough and they get in hard times and they get emotional and they get down on themselves and they just fucking give up. There's those people.

Mm-hmm.

There's also the crooks who are scumbags and they've learned how to manipulate things. What I'll tell you about them, dude, is trust your gut because those motherfuckers tell really good stories that make you feel empathetic towards why they're making mistakes. They will tell really good stories. If your gut tells you they're a scumbag, dude, cut them off. That's, that's where I messed up. I started listening to this. I would call and ask why, and I no longer call and ask why. Does that make sense? It's like sitting with a 70-year-old mortgage protection, yo. I'm going at them, buying time. Time replay, you know what I mean? I ain't— I'm not hovering on term and whole life. I know what I'm pitching. And so when I'm dealing with these things, it isn't like a— I'm not really looking for story time. I'm not looking for reasons why, really, especially the further down the line it gets, you know, um, because they will— again, when people do shady shit and you ain't looking, it's really easy to get through, you know. But they do dumb things, dude. They'll write, you know, 4 20-year cash backs in one day. Or every policy today is max face amount, or, you mean, you'll see, you'll see.

Yeah, dude. Yeah, they're running, like, multiple carriers.

Yeah, yeah, you'll see, you'll see a bunch of apps go through at the same time when logistically it couldn't work out that way, you know. I mean, they submit 4 e-apps at 8 AM. It's like, wait, what? Granted, today the carriers watch a lot of that stuff, which is cool with the technology. They're, they're obviously a lot more aware than they were when I was new. Um, but I'm, I'm trying to stay ahead of it, dude. And I have a rule, I tell everyone this, bro. If, if a carrier has to call me about you because they believe that you're doing something inappropriate, unethical, something you shouldn't be doing, if they even have to call me about it, I give them permission in advance to terminate you without my approval. They have 100% approval to terminate you without asking, because I'm going to say yes. I'm not going to fight for you if they think you're doing something shady. I'm not fighting, right? You know, and so I let people know that, dude. I'm not the guy that's going to bail you out because of A, B. I'm just not, bro. Yes, I've tried and it's burned me. I've been burned. And again, do I understand that unfortunately lumping some good people into a bucket? Yeah, I, I definitely understand I'm doing it.

Yeah, right, right.

But let's see where you're at now to define that, because that's how I run my operation.

Exactly.

You know what I mean? So if my return policy is different than yours, so be it. Don't shop.

Exactly. Yeah, exactly.

So, and I just stick to my guns, man, at this stage, you know. And I certainly, again, I can leave some leeway to make an executive decision if I want to one way or the other, but for the most part dude. I just— I had to learn how to, how to foresee it and do something about it and navigate it with them. And if they don't do the thing— my— I always tell people this: if you put me in a position to where I have to make a difficult decision, it's not going to be a difficult decision. If you put me there, I'm gonna make the decision like that, bro. It ain't gonna be that hard. You know, and I just— I'm like, so don't put me in that position because I— you ain't gonna like what I do, you know?

Right. And John, before you close out, just one final question. If you had to, um, right now, because I am trying to build.

Yeah.

And obviously right now I have a couple— I have a couple people on there. May have one that's It's doing very well right now, um, starting out. But if I want to really like, you know, put the throttle on this and, you know, start, start actually focusing on the recruiting part and actually add it to my schedule, what is one activity that you'd say is, you know, most, one of the most important activities that you would— Aha.

Can you see it?

That's it. Yep. That's it.

Yeah.

What's it say?

I want you to see. Hold on. This one right there.

Do you know what that one says?

I know it's blurry.

Post.

You know how many it says?

No.

13. No one knows you do this, bro.

Yeah.

You're so good at this. You have such a cool group around, cool vibe, good, good desire to help people. You know what the hell you're doing. You know what I mean? You're like actually trying to help people win. And you don't tell nobody about it. No one sees the journey. No one's coming along with you guys on those trips, on those vlogs. I know that you got the video guy and you do the little clips, but like, share your journey, bro. There's people out there on social right now, on TikTok, Instagram, doing all these things about our space, and they make no fucking money. And but they're talking about it like they do. Yeah, you know what I mean? And you're killing it, dude. Sitting in a closet by yourself, you know what I mean? It's like, so if I could give you any piece of advice, man, with, with all the talent you have already, is I'm, I messed up on the marketing side of this thing early, um, and I wish— again, I, my excuse is social media in 2015 wasn't what it is today in '25, which is valid, but the people who did it blew the fuck up in those 10 years. You know, a lot of the big names that we all know today in this— any of these spaces, they've been doing this marketing thing for a long time. Yeah, I started dipping my toe in probably in '17 or '18 with a video here and there. I've been really focused on it for probably 4-ish, like heavy 4 years maybe now, and the dividends I see from it I'm like, whoo, I messed that up, boy. So I got Giovanni now, bro. Um, watch this, I'm gonna show you, show you live on this thing. We got him. I'm telling him the same thing. I'm telling everybody I'm working with the same thing. Marketing— this thing can— you, you know what an IMO is, right? Someone taught me this once and I didn't, I didn't, I didn't hear it the way I hear it today. You know what the M stands for? Uh-uh. You know IMO and you don't know what the M means?

Uh-uh.

Marketing. Ah, Insurance Marketing Organization. That's what we do. We are marketers at its core. That's how we get our leads, you know what I mean? And like you said, sales is no different than building. So the question is, how do you get your leads for building? You, you need to market yourself, bro, because marketing does it, you know? Um, check this, like, dude, hold on, let me find one of these other ones. Giovanni's out here right now. He went and got— hold on, let me, let me show you a picture. I got so many videos. He's— we've been sending back and forth. Um, he got those, uh, here we go, check this out.

Hit play. I don't—

it's, it's speaking back in Spanish. So those glasses he's wearing, dude, he, um, he's out in the field. Watch, let me show you today's. He's out in the field, bro, recording, recording himself in the field with those glasses, and we're gonna put it— we're gonna document it and put it on our social.

Oh, that's fire.

Yeah, he's out in the field, so he's about to back— he couldn't get to the door, so he's going to bang on the window to get into an appointment. So I just made $1,000 in an hour. How you doing, dear?

Good, how are you?

Good. How was Bible study?

It was good.

That's good. Once it's inside— yeah, come on. Don't want shoes on or off? Either one of two options. Um, they're looking to get new discounts and new benefits, as in save some money a month, or looking to raise the coverage. Okay, I'm not— I'm not raising coverage because you got $12,000, which is $80 a month, or $1,599. Circle the one that best fits your budget. Perfect. Okay, so we'll do this one to get you a couple more thousand dollars in coverage. Okay, so I just helped Miss Mary out, and she's paying $88.02. Times that by 12, the insurance companies are going to pay me $1,056.

That's funny.

Yeah, so we're gonna take stuff like this and we're gonna chop it up and put his content out because no one's doing real deal what we do behind the scenes. Yeah, people sharing leaderboards, they're showing highlight reels at lock-ins, they're doing speaking events, you know what I mean? But no one's like showing the thing. And so he got—

he's coming up for that too.

Yeah, he went above and beyond. He went and got the glasses so they record. You can live stream with them. And with the piece you couldn't hear, he, um, he asked it to ask a question in Spanish. So if he comes across someone that's Spanish-speaking, he can't speak Spanish, it can do the translation with the client for him through the glasses.

It's the Meta glasses or whatever. Facebook is getting crazy.

Yeah, dude. So I'm like, yo, and he was same way. I think when I started talking to him, he had one post ever. And I'm like, what are we doing, bro? Put this out there, you know? And that's, that's— yeah, you want to come make what I'm making, come do what I'm doing. Here's what I do. And he's going to show himself out in the field walking indoors and trailer homes and thing, you know what I mean? Like, he's not going to share people's personal information, but he's going to put enough out there that they understand what he does to make his money, right? And I think if you add that piece, dude, and you get your crew doing that and y'all become the crew that's making what y'all are making on the internet, in the space, and you want to help people, they won't be able to keep up, dude. You'll have so many people to recruit, it'd be stupid.

Hey man, you know, so I appreciate you, man, for real.

All right, homie, go make it happen. Holler if I can have the race, the race in September. Maddox— Brayden just asked me about it. Oh, he Would they invite you to one this weekend or something?

Yeah, they invited him to the one in, uh, in Texas.

He goes, hey, I graduate high school Friday, I want to sleep in Saturday. I'm not graduate, I, I finished the year, it's my last day of school. He's like, I'm sleeping in.

He's a killer though, he's a killer.

He is, dude, he smoked all of us out there.

Yeah, he did. He's—

we're signed up to the September one. I have the date, I'm not traveling that date right now, but I have— fuck, dude, I have, I have one right before and one right after it. And so I just have to like mentally see, like, dude, is— because that's a big one. Yeah. And so in August I have the, the, the climb Mount Everest thing in, uh, Canada, and then in October I'm going to Aspen to do it again at a mountain there. So I just have to make sure my old, my old ass body can handle it all. I'm tired just prepping for this thing, dude. I'm wore out.

You should, you should buy those glasses.

Oh, I should?

Oh bro, that'll be fire.

Sometimes I should listen to my own shit.

That'll be fire.

I'm gonna get Reese on it now. I'm gonna do something.

Yes sir, yes sir. Well, hey man, John, I appreciate it, man. Take care, my brother.