How I Made $1 MILLION in Insurance Sales (And How You Can Too)

Do you want me to help you get to a new level? Remember old school Mario Brothers? If you went in the pipe the right way and hit the cloud the right way, you hit some magic level that nobody knew about. Yeah, it's like this works that way too. I don't believe you can get there without someone giving you the path or the cheat code or the way to there. I just don't.

I'll tell you right now, bro, you're going to get a ton of freaking value out of this show. So we're going to go ahead and get into it, y'all. I hit this gentleman up a couple of weeks ago and I was like, dude, I'd love to have you kick off 2025 with us. He's been on the show. Uh, before he used to run his own show within the Insurance Syndicate a little bit over a year ago now, I think, which is pretty crazy to think about how fast time flies. But y'all, we've got the man, the myth, the legend himself, the $200 million man. I know he don't like me saying it. What's going on, brother? How you doing?

What up, dude? I'm amazing. And bro, all I want to know is how do I get that CE exemption? I've got to be getting close, right? How does this work? I didn't know this was a thing.

A handful of states that do it. I don't believe Georgia is one of them, so you're— I think you're shit out of luck. Uh, but Texas is definitely one of them.

Mine's due this year, and I'm like, Amanda's upset because she has to figure out how to do it. Probably shouldn't say that live.

Yeah, right.

What do you do?

Absolutely. Well, it's good to see you, brother, man. It is good to see you.

I appreciate you guys.

Hanging out there in Atlanta, Georgia.

Yeah, I'm, I'm apparently getting ready for the snow apocalypse here. Yeah, is the rumor. I don't buy it, but that's what they say.

That's what they say.

They like to fearmonger.

Yeah, they do.

It's funny because we were just talking a little bit about that and agents having to endure weather as part of, you know, going to the office, going out in the field, etc., etc. Um, so I, I'm sure that there's Plenty of agents in the mid-Atlantic, if you will, that are using that as an excuse to sit on the curb for a little while and let that weather pass.

I remember driving out when, when we had our— what everyone knows as the big snowstorm here in Atlanta, however long ago, about 10 years ago, whatever. I was out in that selling. I was in the field that day.

You know, it's like one of my best recruits when I was doing outside sales, because when I was doing outside sales and sports promotions We did a full day of observation in the field on the second interview. So if they're looking for the position, they come in for the first meeting, meet with the manager. Manager's like, yeah, I like you. They invite you back for a full day of observation, send you out with one of the reps. I took this cat out with me. We were banging on doors doing a golf promotion, and dude, it had to be 34 degrees and raining outside, and we're going door to door in Austin doing it. I couldn't believe that I kept that dude with me for the whole 8 hours. And brought him back to the office and closed him, and he started the next day. Yeah, and he became one of my top—

I was gonna say no problem.

Like, he was—

if you can make that day, absolutely right.

Love it.

Most would have called out in advance.

Yeah.

Hey John, real quick, man, I typically wouldn't ask you to do this just because, um, I feel like obviously you've been involved here within The Syndicate for a while, but we've been growing, man. Uh, we're up to 8,500 members now, and so we, we just have some new members in here. So if you could, man, just take a few seconds. Obviously we know you and have known you for years, and a lot of people here in the group do. Uh, just let people know a little bit who John Wetmore is, what you're, what you're about, man.

I'm just some dude in Atlanta trying to do big things in business, bro, and help people win and win in the insurance business every day, man. I, um, you know, the stuff they want, certainly I've, I've, I've been in the business, ah, shoot, 12 years. I've had my license 14, but I've been selling 12 years. Well, I've been in the sales side, um, haven't actually sold though. I did sell $4,000 this week on my own, like I actually sold some on Posted and everybody's like, oh, I'm like, it's— I mean, it's not that hard. Yeah, but you know, sold a bunch of insurance after being really bad at this for a few years. Kind of got some mentorship and training and changed some things I was doing and learned how to sell at a really high clip, um, on my own pen on the life side. Started recruiting and hiring after, um, you know, learning how to do it at a high level. And, you know, I've had a lot of help, and all the ups and downs and turns and twists of this business have, um, gone in my favor in the long run because I haven't given up at it. And work on myself a lot, man. And we've, we've built a, a pretty good-sized agency, I, I, I'm told from others. And, uh, you know, we'll do— we do a couple hundred million dollars a year in life premium, life life and annuity premium, IULs, things like that, final expense, mortgage protection side of the business. Um, you know, we had a little over 5,000 agents sell policy last year in our group, and I, I, I get way more credit than I deserve because I have a ton of help, dude. I don't— I'm one guy. I do my best to give back and, and, and help people build, but dude, we have so many good leaders and managers and staff. And yeah, it's just— I'm so— again, I get credit because I started the thing in, in my agency, but right, you know, it's been a fun ride, dude. I was able to put out a book, and I, I I do tons of training and speaking, and I'm just trying to have fun in the industry, dude, with a lot of my buddies now.

And dude, that book, uh, blew up. Just the positive response behind that. What did that feel like? How did that feel? I'm curious on that actually, man.

It's, um, I wasn't quite expecting— I don't know what I expected to start other than it was like a— it was sort of a challenge to myself to do it, you know. I, I— y'all know me well enough to know I always give myself different personal challenges. I like to chase things. I like to do hard things. Um, and I've— I, I got a lot of people over the years, man, that were just like, you should write a book. And I'm like, what? I can barely read a book, much less should I write one, you know? But it just was a recurring theme in my life. And then it was like, as I started to develop the agency and my speaking ability and on stages and started to kind of build a story in the sense of, of, of what worked for me and what's worked to help other agents these, these kind of concepts kept coming together, man. And, um, it just kept being a recurring theme in my life. And I'm like, you know what, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do it one day. And it was always like one day thing, one day. And that one day thing was like for 5 years. And probably 2020, early beginning of 2023, I was like, you know what, I'm gonna do it. And I, I, I called a public— got connected with a publisher, paid them, and I'm like, let's make this thing happen, dude. And put it together, and it was, it was a hell of a journey. And making it so it was unique, it was, it was true to me, right?

Right.

You know what I mean? They wanted to change it and make it really like articulate and big word and change words and vocabulary, and I'm like, dude, everyone on the planet will know that's not me, right?

Yeah.

You know, so I'm, I'm most proud that it's, it's, it's truly me. Like, I actually— those are my words. Um, and dude, the feedback on it, I'm blown away by, bro. I get— I still— we— I get people buy it every day still, literally every day. I sign them. If you buy them on the website, I sign everyone that goes out. I, I can't help myself. I, I literally do a personal message, I sign them all, send them out. And dude, I get DMs. I think yesterday— I mean, it's getting crazy, dude, the branding and stuff. I think I had 15 DMs from yesterday from people I don't know. Probably 3 or 4 of them were surrounded around the book and the feed and the help it gave them and things like that, and the relatability. And people don't know my story, even though I share it, dude. I feel like I'm very transparent. A lot of people don't know the story, man. Man. Um, and I weave that in there as well. And I, I, I like that it gives people hope, dude. That's my favorite thing about it is people can look at me and go, dang, he, he figured it out after all that stuff, you know what I mean? And I want to give people that peace. So that's, that's my favorite part of it, dude, is it's people feel relatable and can relate to the situation that they're in now financially, whatever, mentally, you know, because I've been there, man.

So remind me the title of the book.

Do More Now, Get Better Later.

Do More Now, Get Better Later. I knew it had do more in it because that's the whole thing, do more with what.

I mean, the short concept of it is, man, is like, I was, I'm, I was an accountant before, right? You know, my, I had a corporate job, a corporate guy, come from blue-collar work, warehouses, restaurants. I didn't like that, so I got into, I thought getting into accounting would be cool because I'm, I'm good with numbers or whatever. Um, I'm pretty analytical, man, by default. I can overthink things. I can be kind of negative. And by— I roll out of bed more on that side of the world than like happy-go-lucky, you know what I mean? Positive. I just do. And I struggled in the business for the first few years because I overthought everything, and I just— I didn't put action behind things. I've learned now, you know, and I just made a decision one day, like, what if I just accept who I am in regards to like close ratio and my sales ability and those— you know what I mean? I was like a 40% close ratio guy. And I just— I would get frustrated, man. And I was always trying to find the magic trick. And I literally made a decision one day, like, what if I just do more now of what's working? I just accept who I am and I just do more of it, and I worry about getting better later. Like, what would that look like? Just— I wanted to know. And for me, it was a mental shift where I just shifted, like, training, knowledge, all the stuff, and then the work. And I just shifted it, dude. I'm like, I'm not going to give up on this. I'm just going to shift the priority. And I, I just went to work, dude, accepted who I was. And dude, I went out and cranked out nearly $500 grand in, in life premium on my own pen that year, and it literally changed my life, right? You know, I think it was just started teaching that.

Doesn't the work though, like— and it's so funny, it's not even you get better later, but yes, you're getting better over time, bro, of the work. It just started. Yeah.

And I didn't realize that piece of it when I made the decision. It was a choice to like just— I'm gonna literally forget about getting better right now. I'm just literally gonna table it for today and just go after it this year. This is 2015. And then what I've learned now is it's like a principle that you will get better later when you do more of something. It's like kind of common sense when I say it out loud, but I was one of those dudes that didn't really grasp that in the right way, you know. And just making it an active choice mentally changed the game for me. And that's, that's what I've trained on, dude. I'm not the guy getting up there— and I can teach sales, but I'm not the guy getting up there going, let me give you the 12 best sales tips to, you know, triple your income this year. Because I quite frankly, I don't believe it works if you don't put in the work. I just don't. And no one's ever proven me otherwise. Like, this guy doesn't work at all, but I gave him this phone script and his sales quadrupled this year. I, I've never seen that case study.

Yeah, um, real quick before we get going into some of the questions, and, and really I do kind of want to pick your brain, and this is maybe a little bit selfish for, for myself and Tony as well as all of our— but definitely for our members as well. I mean, we're, we're trying to grow, and I know we talked a little bit, um, a couple weeks ago when I'd reached out, um, but just what we're trying to do on the Clearview side, I know obviously what Tony's trying to do on the, the GoOvula side, like we're really trying to scale, um, and there's, there's so many pieces You already brought some of them up, right? It's like, dude, I started this thing, but I could not be doing it without other people. And so I want to get into some of that. But I think, you know, you hinted on it just a couple minutes ago about just that, your story, right? And how like, dude, guys, like, I have been there. Um, and I would love if you could just share maybe just a snippet of maybe like a holiday story, um, from when you were going through those rough times. Because I will say, even though I say happy holidays and I hope you guys all had an amazing Christmas and New Year and start to the some people hate this freaking time of year, or some people have a lot of hurt or pain, or maybe they're even just going through the freaking wringer right now where the new year doesn't even seem that exciting. Could you share maybe some, just some of your story, and hopefully they can resonate with some of that?

Yeah, dude, um, it's weird. I get like emotional inside when I think about, because it hits me like a ton of bricks, dude. Um, yeah, it's, um, it's wild, bro. Like, man, I mean, I grew up on welfare, dude, you know what I mean? Like, my mom was single mom, teenage mom, welfare. I had a kid at 16 on the way. I— government was paying for my housing when I was an adult, you know what I mean? I didn't live in a regular house, like a— what everyone knows as a house. My wife's baffled by the fact that when I went into— even when I lived in a quote-unquote house, you go in the front door and you share the house with multiple people, like a multi-family house. My wife can't even wrap her head around what that means. And I'm like, huh? That's all I— so I lived in apartment complexes my whole life. The nicest thing we lived in was a three-family house. You know, you share the driveway, you share the front door, you share— you know what I mean? Like, that's all I know, dude. Um, so to me, like, holidays were what they were, you know? But then as you start to get older, you start to see how other— some people live differently, they're going to provide differently, they're— you know what I mean? So I didn't know— I don't like remember my childhood being miserable. I was a happy kid. I enjoyed living in the hood, to be honest. I freaking had a blast. But as you start to age and you start to see what's possible, right, you know what I mean? When I tell my kids no all the time, I just thought that was life. Like, no, you can't fool— you can't have that. You get 3 gifts, bro. Like, that was just normal life to me, you know? But then you start seeing other people being able to say yes, and then you start seeing other people in the industry that have the same license and ability you do being able to say Yes, without looking at pricing, you know what I mean? And you just start seeing people get to live different, and I'm like, how would— how would— how nice would that be, you know? And I can, I can remember, dude, so when I grew up in Boston and, uh, a small family, my mom, two aunts, you know, nothing, nothing major. We don't have like a massive family or anything. And I moved to Georgia now 20 years ago, and, uh, every year for the most part I'd fly back up and we would do Christmas at it would rotate between my two aunts and my mom's house. It'd be family Christmas. It's usually right after Thanksgiving, a few weeks before Christmas, and we do it every year. And there's, you know, maybe 20 people there. It's nothing crazy— aunts, cousins, etc. And, um, early on when I first met Steph, she came up, um, she would come up with me and she's starting to get to know the family and things like that. Um, and I can remember, I don't know if it was 2013 or '14, but it was when I was in, in the business. And, uh, my first full-time year was 2014, so it's probably that year. And I go through the year and I'm doing okay, I'm mediocre, I'm paying the bills, whatever, you know. But holidays come, dude, and all of a sudden there's all these reasons why you can't pick up the phone and you can't go make sales and you can't go see clients, you know what I mean? It's like Thanksgiving, and I gotta plan the trip, and then we got holidays, and then I get the kids for their vacation, they're out of school for 2 weeks, and all the stuff, man. And I remember being at my aunt's house, dude, and I take— I would take a week off. The kids that didn't live with me, we either had them the week before Christmas and got them, uh, Christmas Day, or we'd— or we'd pick them up Christmas Day and have them till they went back to school. It was kind of one or the other, you know. And one of those weeks, we, we take the week off. I have everybody, we go up to, to Boston, or I was at my aunt's house in New Hampshire at this one specifically. And, uh, I go out there, dude, and you know, you have the time off and you have vacation, you're supposed to be with family enjoying it, and everybody's there and they're eating their appetizers and having their beer and their wine and then all the stuff, and happy and joyous and just, you know, I mean, everybody's having a good old time, just happy as can be. And dude, I don't really remember much of the Christmas party because all I could think about was the fact that I couldn't like know where I was going to get the money for the mortgage that month. And the car payment and the— you know what I mean? I'm like stressed over the Christmas gifts and like, how much can we stretch this thing to get— I'm like, I got 5 kids, I gotta figure out how to get all of them multiple— you know what I mean? It was just like, that week to me was like so stressful that I don't even remember Christmas, dude. I don't even remember hanging out with my family because all I could think about was the burden of the finances. And I had taken some time off, so I felt guilty, you know what I mean? I'm not— I don't have cash coming in. I don't have any pending policies. I can't go, I'm getting paid on Thursday. Like, I don't have any of that, dude. And I was miserable that week, bro. And I'm supposed to be up there hanging out with my family, having a good time, and I'm the, you know, independent contractor, self-employed insurance. And I'm just— dude, I was miserable because of finances, you know. And, um, I remember leaving there, bro, and I was like, this isn't how it's supposed to be. Like, I'm meant for more. My kids deserve more. My family deserves my attention, you know what I mean? Like, it's supposed to be a happy time. And I just— that, that started that thought process of like this doom. This was right before this concept I just talked about. I mean, it was like that happened right after that, that holiday season. And every time now, man, during, during Christmas, if I even think about— and I take time for my family, I have crazy balance in what most people would consider today, but I'm also like, I push, man. And even when I'm— I, I can start to feel a little complacent because we've achieved good things and I have money, you know what I mean? Like, I just— I never forget that year, and it motivates me because I'm afraid to ever live like that again. It scares the piss out of me to ever have that feeling in my life again. And I try every day, dude. That's what drives me. I want to be a provider to such a level that I never have to sit back and like feel guilty about taking time with my family, you know, because I'm worried about finances. And dude, that— I mean, that was only 10, 11 years ago, 12, you know what I mean? It wasn't that long ago, dude. And what has happened in 10, 12 years now is— it blows my mind, to be honest. I just— I can't even— I can't even wrap my head. But I know I've done the work, right? So I'm like, I remember the grind of it all, and people only see the headlines and the highlights, and I'm like Yo, come to my office. Like, just even today, bro, I got this. I was like, yeah, I'll get you, I'll make it work for you, dude. I am on video training from 10 AM till 3 PM today, and I don't have a break. Doing some type of team call, an event. I'm with Arturo. I have our, our, our, our Zoom today. I have some marketing. Literally, it's just who I am, dude. When I'm, when I'm at it, I'm going at it. Yeah. And it's, it's because I don't want to live that life again, dude. I lived it for 37 years. You know, and the last 10 has been an unbelievable ride, dude. So holidays are very different today.

Now you're— now your problems are if your Never Flat AMG tire doesn't actually work on the side of the highway.

Only a few y'all know about that. Now, hey, I was like, oh, you know what we got to do this Christmas, dude? I'll share. It's kind of bougie, but I don't care. I'll just share it. You know, like Maddox is— Maddox only knows money. Um, You know what I mean? Like, he didn't grow up with the— like, the other kids, my older kids grew up broke as can be. They never saw that side of me. My daughter went to college, I think, in 2012 or '13. So like, as I was starting the business, she went off to college, you know. Next one was right behind it. The two in the middle kind of saw both sides. They saw the evolution and the change. Maddox, all he knows is us having money, you know, which— so I have to teach him different things, um, but You know, I have— I do have some nice cars, but I, you know, after a while I get bored and they don't— I'm not like a car guy. I just don't care that much.

Drive the truck.

Yeah, I mean, my pickup is my favorite truck, dude, and I've had it for almost 5 years. It's a nice pickup, but it's, it's my daily, dude. So Maddox has been bugging the crap out of me to get a Porsche, and I'm like, okay, why? We have like— I don't even understand. And he knows what he's like, you get the GT3 RS, and he knows all these things and the models and the He knows everything about them. So apparently I'm like, fine, fine, we'll trade in the— I traded in the Bentley and the MG to— I'm like, I'll, I'll get rid of these and get one for fun, why not? So December, like, I don't know what it is, you Porsche people know, it was like December 4th is when they opened up to where you could build it, right?

Yeah.

So I'm like, this year I let Maddox go on and build a custom Porsche, you know what I mean?

I'm amazing, dude.

So he designed— he got to design it. He picked literally everything. I'm like, you do it. He's like, what do you think about colors? I'm like, that— I'm not wired for that. That'll overwhelm me, picking, matching, all the— I don't— I can't do that. So he literally went in, dude. I let him go in and design it, do the whole thing. And, uh, so I go on, I go to buy it, and I'm like, well, then I find out Porsche doesn't work quite like that. You can't just go buy the night. That's not how they work. You kind of have to be in. Um, so we go, the dealer calls and they're like, yeah, so this allocation— you can only get so many, is the, is, is the way it works. And you have to kind of be a customer to get what you want. So we got him like a— I say him because it's mine, but you know, we got the, the Turbo S, the 911 Turbo S. So we just got, we just got— that was kind of like a different Christmas, bro, you know what I mean? It's like, and that's what this business can do for you. Um, and multiple— there's plenty of businesses can do that, but ours is really lucrative.

And you guys heard that, you guys heard the time frame. I want to, I want to go back to, because in case y'all didn't hear, maybe you're tuning in a little bit later into the show, the guy went from the story that he just told you, right, to where literally like not even remembering some holidays because of the financial stress, to literally 10 years later he's got over 2,000 writing agents and, and their organization does over $200 million a year, right? And if that, like, don't, guys, don't miss that. That is how freaking powerful this industry really is. That's why I believe in so much, and it's my passion, it's my job with Clearview, is dude, showing people this freaking opportunity. I feel like we do truly have that obligation. Um, you know, I know that you had a few people in your life that really should like, dude, come on, man.

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And so really, man, kind of, I was going to ask you like, how do you scale from $0 to $200 million? What? We're not going to go there. Um, but I— what I do want to ask you, um, one of these questions is how do you cultivate a strong team and company culture to support that significant growth? You hinted at it a little bit earlier, but even again in the virtual world, and you got 2,000 freaking people, and like, how do you still cultivate that culture where— I mean, there are agents that are coming back and writing every single month, and I know maybe you'll have one that'll trickle off, right? But there's guys—

always, always, always. Again, to be clear, you—

the—

we had 5,000 sell last year. We only have 1,800 to 2,200 a month. Yeah, so two-thirds quit in the year. It's just— it still happens. That don't go away, you know what I mean? This is— so I go, yeah, we had 5— we did have 5,000 get paid, but not every month, right? Because most of y'all don't believe in yourselves enough to keep going, you know? And it's like, I, I hate that part because that's the key. Like, no offense, dude, it's like, Tony, you've been around this business a long time and you'll say this too. Like, I look at this, I'm like, there's way more talented people that I've hired that have been in my agency, people I know that have done well, and they've just given up on themselves. They just quit. I'm like, all I did was outlast most people. I mean, I'm like, did I figure out how to get good? Yeah, sure. Do I understand I, I'm like, I have some talent here? Oh yeah. But that ain't what the magic was, I promise you that.

You know, I always felt like the magic is resilience. In a lot of ways, like, because so many agents, though, the first sign of adversity, yeah, and they fold. Yeah, card chair, man. Yeah, I spent 3 weeks training a girl in my office. Yeah, training her on everything. She was going to be solid. She was already a business owner. She understood that type of thing. I don't know where John's camera went, but I'll talk to the white circle.

But I hit the button by mistake.

But she understood, like, what it means to be a business owner, to be self-employed. She runs her own, uh, pet grooming business. She has like 4 vans. She doesn't have to drive them or do any of that. She has people that run all that. And she wanted to do something else, and she saw what Grace was doing. It was like, I want to follow that now. I got it. I see what's going on. Got her all trained. First day on the— first day on the phone, she made about 15 dials. And then walked out of the office. We've never seen her again.

Isn't that crazy, dude? What's funny, I don't know how well you'll, you'll see this, like the Do More, the acronym. Yeah, you see the R? Yeah, yeah, resilience, resilience, dude. I believe it's, it's a major part of this thing, you know. Um, so to answer the question, man, um, again, I can't go back to how much, how little of this I manage on a daily basis. Just being really transparent at this stage, right? You know, I mean, I'd be doing people such an injustice if I made it like I managed the culture of 2,000 people a month, because I don't.

You did start it, or you at least 100% you planted this.

Yeah, right.

Yeah.

So for me, it was like, how do we get there, man? When I changed my focus to how big can my agency be, how many agents can I have, how much volume can I do, what kind of spread can I have, what are my overrides this month, when I changed my focus to— and I did it because I was able to do it because I started selling so much on my own pen. I didn't need agents in the way I thought I needed agents to build a business and to change my revenue, right? Initially, I was like not making enough money, and I'm like, if I just get some more agents, I can make this much money. That's right. I did the math. I still have the math on my phone to this day. I keep it from what I was— the math I was doing in 2013. You know, and like, I even got to a point, just very transparently, dude, where I would— I was such an analytical accountant tracker of things, dude. I knew how much I made in overrides from every agent that was with me for each month. I looked at it, you know what I mean? And it was like, there was some kind of ignorance to that, you know what I mean? It was like, it was very selfish in my, my eyes looking back, um, because I think by nature I'd be like, all right, if I made $1,200 this month from this guy or $300 from this guy, well, this one caught— you know what I mean? I'm like, ah, just pour I'm muddying the water for me, you know. When I changed this thing, dude, to, to go make it happen for my family from a sales standpoint, and then I made an active decision, man, that I was only going to work with people who wanted to help their family as much as I want to help mine. I just— I— it's a better fit for me, my personality, the way it just— and I was like, you know what, I'm— my focus is going to be really helping people go from wherever they're at now to wherever they want to go, and I want to understand what they're willing to sacrifice in the middle. And then my job will be to guide them to make money. I will guide you, I will give you the path of the yellow brick road, I'll map it out, but you gotta be wanting to do the work, you know. And when I started changing my entire focus to how much can I help people get paid, and that was the driving factor— yeah, dude, how well did you do this month? How much did you go from $5 grand in your account to $10 grand? Did you go from zero to $400. Were you able to pay off that $600 credit card this month with 30% interest? How about— how's the car payment? Are you— are you caught up? Are you still behind? When I started working on that angle, dude, I started managing, helping people manage their checkbooks. I had this couple, husband, wife, they didn't pay a single bill in their life for like a year and a half without calling me for approval first on which one to pay because they wanted to manage their life right, you know what I mean? When I started doing that stuff, bro, we blew up, dude. I mean, we just blew up. And then I started— and some of those people that I taught that stuff, you know, some of our biggest leaders, dude, I remember having to teach one dude. He didn't understand what a mortgage was, like, in life. He was young, his first time. He just didn't unders— he's like, how's— what is a mortgage? How does it work? What does it mean? Like, he did, right? Like, he just didn't. And I'm like, all right. So I'm teaching them, you know, and I start teaching people how to actually make money. And then the next step became— I got to a certain point You know, we had, you know, 40, 50 agents selling, just me doing that and grinding and helping people and taking a lot of calls. And then I was like, dude, I can't take any more calls. I'm one guy, my phone's blowing up all day long. So I decided to hire some staff to help support it, right? And then I started identifying people who were also very like-minded and wanted not only to win for their family, but they wanted to help other people win. Those people are very easy to identify. There are some people who will help other agents whether they get an override or not. There are some people who will contribute to trainings and meetings and events and calls, and they'll do— they'll drop anything for you. Those became my people to dive into deeper and go like, do you want me to help you get to a new level? Like, there's— it's like, remember old school Mario Brothers? You know, if you, if you went in the pipe the right way and hit the cloud the right way, you hit some magic level that nobody knew about. Yeah, it's like, this works that way too. And you can't get out— you can't get— I don't believe you can get there without someone giving you the path or the cheat code or the way to there. I just don't. And so I just started being— making everything we did, dude, whatever systems, whatever process, whatever I was doing with staff, the things I was teaching, I just started copy and pasting them, you know. And guys that wanted to win, I would teach them how to speak to agents. I'm like, jump on the call, three-way. I'll get on and I'll speak to him and I'll teach you how to do it. Just listen. And I did, I just did a lot of that, dude. And I would spend time and I would travel and I go to people's office and we'd help them hire staff. And then Amanda started training their staff. So I'm like, why am I trying to teach this dude how to train staff? He don't do it, I don't do it, Amanda does it. Hey Amanda, will you help? So I started giving her upside to win in the business and make more money for helping build the agency.

Yeah.

And Amanda makes ridiculous money today. She's been with me 8 years, dude, helped me build this thing. You know, and it's like, I had an agent ask me yesterday if I could hire her as staff when they found out what I pay her, you know what I mean? Like, she, she does, but she's helped us build this. So then it started, her train staff, me train the agent, and we started going at it from that angle. And then I just, once I build that model helping someone get to 20, 30, 40 agents, I can copy and paste that over and over and over again. I never taught someone how to get 2,000 agents or 500 agents. I never taught that. I'm I'm like, let me teach you how to get 10, 20, 30. I can teach that all day long over and over and over again. So we've just duplicated, dude. And so a lot of people have took all the concepts, all the thought process, all the things we did, and they, they copied it, including culture, because that's part of it. You have 20, 20, 30, 40 people, bro, you better learn how to run a good culture, you know, your team calls and your resources.

Yeah, buddy, buddy. Yep, yep.

So that's the shortest way I can explain it.

I want to hear what your yellow brick road is. So if I'm that guy, then, and I tell you like, John, I really want more for my family. Yeah, yeah, I know I have what it takes. I believe in myself. Show me the path. What are some of the things you're going to tell me? What's your path?

Yeah, um, so it's— I always tell people this because everyone wants like a one-conversation answer, so I'll give you the best I can. But the reality is it's ongoing. Right, so I have people now reaching out to me to pay me for coaching, consulting, and all kinds of crazy— dude, it's turned crazy, bro, behind this. Like, we haven't caught up in details in a while. It's turned bananas, dude.

Yeah.

Um, and, and, and people are like, can you, can you, how quick can you teach me? I'm like, it depends where you want to go. I mean, it's like the yellow brick road's a long one. You— it's like, I always look at it like this, Tony. You've been to Atlanta Airport? Yeah. Okay, I don't know, you might have heard— I don't know if you've heard me tell this analogy before. I've given it a ton. So when you get off in Atlanta Airport, depending on what gate you get off in, you know, B gate, C gate, D gate, whatever it is, the, the train goes all the way to, uh, baggage claim, T gate, and it goes all the way— the other side is international, and there's however many stops in behind, in between. So it's baggage claim, T gate, A, B, C, D, I think F, international, whatever it is. And that train goes back and forth all day long. It never stops, right, in, in concept. But it does stop at, say, a gate. When you're ready to get on and go get your bags, what— the train stops. And what happens when the doors open?

Everybody runs, or in one direction or the other. You have a bunch of people run on the train, you have a bunch of people exit the train.

Correct. Not everybody gets off and not everybody gets on, right? Some are getting off, some are getting on. Does that make sense? And if, if the Yellow Brick Road— you picture like the Atlanta airport, the little tram, the tram Part of this ride, dude, is some people get off. They're like, I've gone far enough down the road, I'm out. And they get off. Ain't mad at you. You hit a ceiling, lob the lid, maybe you quit. I don't know what it is, but some people get off, dude. And then, crazy enough, new people get on and they take the— they help me take the train to the next stop, you know what I mean? Now I ain't getting off the train. You'd argue I'm operating the train, right? Does it make sense? But all along the way, dude, people get on and off that train. So for me, it's like an endless learning curve. You know, now I'm sort of driving the train, so I'm also trying to learn at the same time. Like, as you know, building something, we're the blindest of them all. Yeah, none of us know how to get to the next level, though we can teach people how to get to wherever we're at, right? You know, so for me, dude, it always starts with a base of, again, figuring out where they're at, where they want to go, and what they want to sacrifice. So I have some— I give out free tools. I can share them if you want me to, or not. If you don't, I don't care either way. But I give out free tools so people can do this stuff on their own. And it's really figuring out schedule and goals and figuring it out with your family. Like, where do you want to be? And it's literally— if you can— do you care if I share it? I'll give it out if you want. Yeah, you go to johnwetmore.com/resources. There's no catch.

Lily, if you could drop that, uh, website in the comments. Repeat that one more time.

Johnwetmore.com/resources.

Cool.

Literally a form, you fill it out, you'll get an email within minutes. Um, and it's, it's, it's some worksheets that you can download and print. And I have a couple videos that explain exactly how I went through the process. This isn't like I made this up, this is what I used. I've just shared it for a decade. So always start there, Tony, because I used to decide where people wanted to go. I'm like, oh no, you have to be a top producer, you have to hit this number, you have to be this, you have to run this many appointments, you have— I, I decided And then I'd be frustrated because people didn't hit the goals that I had for expectations, right? So I started this process to figure out where you want to go, and then I can guide you there. Because a guy who wants to, you know, somebody that wants to make $80 grand a year and do this kind of little bit and make sure they have all the time for their kids and they make every game and they want to go to church on Wednesday night and Sunday and they don't want to work weekends, dude, the path is slightly different than a guy who's like, I'm all in, bro. Oh, 24/7, I got nothing, I'm in, right? A guy who has no money versus a guy who's got a few grand, different little slightly different path. Yeah, you mean I'm like, all right, you get off at B gate, go up the stairs, hang a left, the thing's on the right. You got the thing? No, you stay on the train for a little longer, you go down this road. It's so— it's— there's slight variations, you know. It's like sales. When I hear that question, and again, don't take it offensively, but I, I like It's like, how do you sell a policy? Does it make sense? It's like, is there structure? Sure, but it's really based on the situation, you know what I mean? How well can you identify problems? What are people trying to solve? How much coverage do they want? How serious are they about insurance, you know what I mean? Do they want all the benefits or they just want the cheapest thing possible? Do they want to build cash? Do they not? Do they want supplement? Do they not? You know what I'm saying? So it's like, I gotta kind of mold it, dude. Um, but I've helped so many people with the path that I, I know how to guide them, dude. But that's always the base, man.

Yeah.

And then for me, it's being coachable and then doing the things you say you're going to do. Once we figure out that path, if you agree to it, I'm like, all I ask is you do what you say you're going to do. And if somehow you can't, life throws you a curveball, the least you can do is communicate with me. Right, versus ghost me, you know what I mean? It's like, so can you be coachable and can you do the things you say you're going to do? And then I slowly guide them towards the things they want to do, and I can dive in the details. And certainly, like, you know me, I mean, you got to start with phone script and teach them things, and you got to teach them sales. And maybe they communicate well, maybe they don't, right? I got some people that come in and they know how to communicate really well, but they can't open a computer. Does it make sense?

Yeah.

And then you got the over-analytical techie guy who can automate everything but you put them in a room with a, a stranger and it's like they got cotton balls in their mouth and they can't speak. Slight variations on how I do it, right? You know, but at the core, dude, I'm trying to take people from here to there based on what they say they want to accomplish. Makes sense.

Go, go one layer deeper on that train. I really like that analogy and just kind of the imagery and what I'm picturing there. And kind of something that I've learned even just kind of in my evolution of this property and casualty stuff. And like, I mean, I'm selling franchises now. Yeah, like when we first met, John, I was— I mean, my contract was 15 pages long, brother. Like, hey, throw me some cash and let's get going, let's do some business, baby. And now— and but what I've learned, especially now that I'm on this franchise side, and that's the only con, we're not doing anything with the old contract or anything like that, it's like getting to see people get onto the train at different stages as well. You know, maybe, maybe they didn't even start with me at point A, but man, I'm at point C. Maybe some dude's giving up, but then man, this guy who's never even been in, he's already coming in at this stage. And then it's like seeing like how to navigate that. And it's just been really cool to see where like some people aren't even in this industry, but man, they are playing at a high level. Sure. And I catch them at that gate and I'm like, dude, get on, get on the train. Yeah, come on.

Um, sometimes you got to build a new gate, dude. Yeah, like maybe your thing's under construction, you got to open a new one. It's like, hey, I got too much going on, I need to, I need to open up a new section over here, right? I mean, go to Atlanta Airport, things under construction every day. Yeah, it never ends.

Or to your point, hey, you guys get on Amanda's train and then you got— or, and then the salespeople are going to be on my train, and then now we have 3 trams running, whatever, right? Correct.

And that's the beauty of it. We just built these in multiple cities. So like, it started in, in— for us, it started in Atlanta, sure. In my office. I was doing all the stuff, and then at some point someone was in Charleston and she was like, can I— I'll build an airport. Yeah, I mean, I'm like, all right, dope. So I used to travel to Charleston all the time. I mean, I was in Charleston non-stop in 2014, '15, '16. That's where I went non-stop, right? And then, then someone that I met in Charleston moved to Charleston to learn how to sell. Taught him how to sell, but he's from Colorado. I'm like, y'all, what if I teach you how to do it? And he was like, yeah, where will— I'll build an airport anywhere. Where should I go? I'm like, well, I have a lot of parts laying on the ground in Ohio. If you go there, I'll meet you in Ohio and I'll teach you how to do it. So we started building in Ohio, and then I started traveling to Ohio to teach this dude how to build up there. He would get people to events and I would teach them how to manage the stuff, you know. And all these people, I want to be clear, dude, they learned from more than just me. Right, does it make sense? I did my best to be a part of it. But so we started teaching, we started building in Ohio, and I would travel to Ohio and sell, and I would teach him how to do that. Then I was like, you know what, I'm gonna build another one of my own. I started traveling to Utah on my own, and I'm gonna find someone. So then I started flying to Utah and selling out there and teaching people and just doing interviews and trying to build out there. Then the dude that went to Ohio was like, I want to move back home to Colorado, I want to build another one there. We got someone to take over and run the one in Ohio. He's like, I want to build one in Colorado. So I started traveling to Colorado and started helping him build another deal there. Then all of a sudden someone came in Florida and Texas at the same time. Now I'm like, damn, I guess I could all go all three places. And so now I'm like Platinum whatever, Delta, you know what I mean? I get all the— so I start traveling to these different locations to teach these basic concepts. And then what happened that really blew us up, bro. That got us to like $2.5 million a month, that concept, just doing that, you know. Um, and it was a grind. It took probably— it— we, we hit that at the end of 2019, right? So 2015, made the change. Um, we were probably— I did $1 million for the year on my team in 2015, and I was almost $500,000 of it, right? And so by 2019, the start of that year, I was doing like $800,000. I a month. We had, you know, whatever, 80, 100 agents, whatever it was. And so in the, in the middle was— in the middle that year is when I started— some of these other locations started really popping, right? And then they started identifying people and doing the same thing as me. So now the dude in Colorado's like, yo, I got a guy in, uh, I think he was in like Wyoming. I don't know the states. I think it's Wyoming or something up there. He's like, I got a guy out here and I got a dude in over here. I'm like, cool, go do what I just did with you. I mean, you watched me do it, bro. Right? Go do it. And you kick them out of the nest and teach them how to do that on their own. So now there's— there ended up being like 5 or 6 of us planting seeds everywhere. Yeah. And that's what made it blow up, dude. I mean, it took it to a level— literally, it became to where I could have quit and it still would have grown, you know what I mean? To some extent, right? I obviously— I, I can drive it because I, I do know what I'm doing. But it's like, they weren't gonna stop at that point. They, they saw it, it was the kind of—

right?

Yeah, they're like, got it, dude, you know what I mean? You start teaching people how to make, you know, $10,000, $20,000, $30,000, $40,000 writing, then you start teaching people, I'm like, yeah, I can get you to $100,000 a month, here's how you do it. And you start teaching people how to do that, and then they start teaching people how to get to $30,000, $40,000, $50,000, $100,000 a month. That next layer deep, it's a wrap, it's over. It's over. So it's like, learn it, okay? Teach it. Teach someone to teach it. It was a game over after that. When I learned that concept, I'm like, got it.

The most important part there, I think, that you were talking about— again, to kind of still stay with the imagery of the airports and the, and the, uh, the trams and everything— is, you know, when you're first setting up an airport, okay, great, yeah, whoo! And then sometimes, like, it's like, well, shit, I'm trying to land a plane, dude, and nobody's running the airport. Like, you got to actually run the airport.

I'm not sure how to build one, right? 100%.

And that just goes back to your philosophy of do the freaking work, man. I'll show you how to get better later, man. But we got at least for the foundation and then start adding the tracks and all those things.

Yeah. I mean, I use this language in my world all the time. I had a meeting with my staff yesterday. Like, I had a big focus in 2024 on marketing. Because I did a poor job at marketing myself. I don't sell myself well. I don't pitch myself well. You ask— people ask for me an intro and I'm like, I'm some dude in Atlanta. I just don't— it's not my thing, dude. Um, but I, I realized it was a really bad business choice. So 2024, I'm like, dude, I need to go heavy on marketing. I need to be intentional.

Not just brand awareness and everything.

Like, yeah, bro, I mean, you've seen how many events I've spoken at. Oh yeah, how many times did I give out a QR code or collect people's info or have a dat— zero. I'm just giving it out, dude. 10 years I'm giving away information. I didn't have an email list. I didn't have anything. I didn't— social, I'm like, I mean, I hate social. I'm not even on there, you know. Certainly I've started building that over the last few years, but '24 was like, yo, we're gonna focus.

Yeah.

And so we started putting pieces together. I had to learn it. I'm getting in there doing automations. I'm figuring out how to like build funnels. And I didn't even understand the difference between a funnel and a website. I'm like, I don't understand the difference. Why is it called a funnel? It's still a web page. I don't understand.

Yep.

Does that make sense?

Yeah.

I can barely still explain it to this day, but I kind of get it a little bit more now. I'm like, you're good at building that.

You're good at building that shit though.

Now I am. Yeah, I've done it a lot. Yeah, right. So we get all the stuff coming in and now we're starting to see— all right, we start looking at our CRM, we just go HighLevel, and we start looking at stuff and I'm like, oh, it's not organized at all, it's just names. And we send them emails and texts, sure, but like The opportunity, the pipeline, we had nothing. So I sat at home this weekend, worked all day Saturday, Sunday to organize that. And then I started looking at all the automations in the flow. What do we send people when? And I'm like, it's pretty good. My team's done a good job with this thing. You know, I had some ideas. They build some of it. I build some of it. And I started tweaking some stuff and I sit down with them and I, we start going over numbers and, and planning for 2025. And I'm like, dude, I can, I can really see where we're making money now and where we're not. Where we're spending quality time, where we're not. I'm also willing to give away— some people are like, you should have a low-level coaching. I'm like, I ain't wired for that. I'm just $97 coaching a month. I'm not wired for that. I'd rather give it out free. Now people want real coaching, dude, I'm expensive. Why? Because I don't really want to do it a ton. I don't want to have 27 calls a day coaching people, you know what I mean? So it's like I had to build that funnel intentionally, you know, because I don't— I do want to make revenue from all the things I do. So I sit down with my team yesterday and we start diving into it and I start showing them some stuff. And they've been focused on building some other systems and onboarding and recruiting stuff we do. And I'm like, hey, so we did a lot of marketing in 2024. Now you know what we're going to do in 2025? It's time to get better later, baby. We got to fix some stuff now. Like, we got a lot of people, we have a lot of contacts, we can see how many are buying. I know the ratios now. I'm like, all right, now, now we got to be intentional. We're just kind of throwing it all out there last year. Now we're going to start fine-tuning. Oh, we're gonna, we're gonna explode this year. Just personal branding, the biz, all the stuff. Yeah, you know, and it's— I literally tell my staff like, all right, we're at the get better later stage. It's time to get better at some of this.

Yeah, you said the word focus, man. Uh, we talk about that a lot here in just in our morning meetings and like your— how important like your focus is, like to really be focused on something. It's funny, we're sitting here talking about the phones, um, and well, and one of our new franchisees, uh, you talk about meeting somebody in a different stage in life. I mean, the guy is just so freaking sick, impressive, owns his own mortgage, uh, mortgage brokerage, his own real estate brokerage, and he's got his own fucking bank. And then yeah, the guy needed an EIN and everything to set up, uh, for the franchise and stuff to actually get the agency license for his company. He's got some in with the Treasury and literally had an EIN and already had his agency license within 48 hours. I was like, what the— I mean, damn, dude, that's a thick connect. You can just whip up companies in 24 hours and already had the bank account set up, all this. Well, so he's not involved in the insurance side, he just understands that it's the missing piece. So his son Mason, um, yesterday was his technically his second day. First day we did House of Dreams, goals, systems. Hey man, here's just kind of what you're going to be using, make sure you know how to make the phones work, all this. And then yesterday, man, his first day on the phones. Cold calling truckers. That's where I started him. He doesn't have carriers yet, so it's just, hey, you're calling and just getting submissions, and then we'll quote it together and stuff like that. And it was— it's so funny, his focus. Like, he was so scared to get on that damn phone. And once he finally got on the phone, it was okay. I saw him take the action, great. But every time, man, he like— somebody would pick up, he'd just like look back at me, and I'm like, dude, keep your eyes on the script. Like, you gotta— and like his phone, yeah, like back here. And he would just lose it, man. And then what do you know, the one time I said, if I see you freaking turn around and look at me one more time— so we went like, I like left the room and I was like, you just need to stare straight at this freaking screen. And it was like call 161, dude. He got his first full submit. I don't know how. I mean, this guy gave him all of his personal information, y'all. And then Mason goes, all right, thanks, man. Have a great day. Didn't tell him that we're gonna quote him or anything. Like, I mean, this dude just gave us like date of birth, all this shit. And then Mason just like, thanks, man. All right, see you.

That was it.

And I'm like, dude, I can't believe the guy didn't say, uh, like, are you— like, in the day that we live with the scammers and stuff, dude, we quit over $30K second day on the phone. Well, set first day on the phone, second day in training, and it was just, dude, he just focused. And sometimes we get so distracted. I mean, John, you've been around, and so have you, Tony. There's shiny objects everywhere. Yeah, I can just take your focus away from that.

Yeah, 100%. 100%. It has to be a daily thing, dude. And it starts with that, starts with activity, it starts with reps. Like, you got to go into this thing understanding you have to build a skill set. You're not going to build a skill set in anything in life without reps. Yep. You're not. And so you have to have a willingness and you have to do the reps. Pick something. I'm gonna be good at golf. My kid— any of your children— this is what's funny, I was like giving analogies. I'm like, can you imagine, like, if your kid wanted to, you know, like Maddox wants to go to college and play baseball and get a scholarship currently, you know? And I'm like, imagine if when he's taking ground balls, if he was like, yeah, I just keep missing ground balls, I want to quit baseball and just somehow get a scholarship. I just don't want to— I don't want to do this piece. Everyone in here be like, what would you tell your kid if they came home and they wanted to quit a sport because they had a bad day at the sport, right? What would you say? What would you say? Everyone knows the answer. It's— again, you have a friend, a nephew, a cousin, you know what I'm saying? It's like, you know what I'm saying? It's like we all go like, dude, it's just part of it, man. Get back out there and keep trying.

Absolutely.

You know, again, you want to get a degree, you want to be a high-level degree, a doctor, you know what I mean? But even like getting my cheesy accounting degree, dude, like that was a pain in the butt, and I had to sacrifice, and it was inconvenient to my schedule, and I had to read books I didn't want to read, and I had to study stuff, dude. Why? It's like, why am I studying biology when I'm getting an accounting degree? It makes no sense to me. Yeah, right, because you have to take certain classes for some unknown reason. But I, I couldn't have been like, I don't want to do that. They'd be like, all right, then no degree, bro.

Right, right.

Funny enough, weird story, short version. In order to get my bachelor's degree, bro, I took 4 years to do my last class, the final 3 credits. Do you know what it was that I put off for 4 years? If you had to guess, one class I put off—

risk management or something, uh I don't know, bro.

Public speaking.

Oh, no way.

I put it off for 4 years. I didn't want to do it. I'm like, I ain't talking, I ain't talking in front of people. Huh?

That was part of your degree plan?

Yeah, like prereq or something, or was it?

I don't know.

Yeah, interesting.

I have no idea. That was the final class I took, and I, I— so I went— I didn't get my degree till I think 2009. But I started my bachelor's probably in '03, and I literally— I went 2 years full-time to get my— 2 years full-time to get my associate's in accounting, and I did 2 years back after that full-time at night to get a finance degree. And I moved to Georgia, and I left one— I moved to Georgia in '05.

Oh man.

And I didn't get the degree till '09 to take one class, public speaking.

Wow. That's funny, looking, looking back at it now. Hey man, I know you, I know you have a training, um, coming up, so I want to be respectful of your time. I would love to— man, if you could close out our show, this is one of my favorite things I've ever heard you, uh, talk about or speak on. Um, it's just so powerful about how you would dial, uh, when it comes to, uh, Maddox. And that— remember that? And just, I think it's so powerful, dude.

I do everything based on that.

Yeah, you know what I mean? It's like, share some of that though because it's powerful.

Yeah, I have to, um, I, I, I kind of led to some of the way my inner thoughts are by default, you know. Um, I always say like, I was in a parking lot the other day, a couple weeks ago, and I'm driving through like a grocery store parking lot trying to go to this, this health food store on the other side of it, and I'm driving through. And this will just lead you into who I am as a person by default, the way I'm wired. And you know, usually when you get in front of the grocery store, there's speed bumps, so you have to kind of slow down. They force you to slow down so all the old ladies crossing with the little shopping carts, they make you stop. And I have to get to the other side of the grocery store, so I'm driving the car and I'm slow rolling. And, uh, you know, I don't stop, but I'm slow rolling. And I'm— this guy starts to cross out and he's looking at me and he starts making these hand motions And I'm like, I hit the speed bump and I'm, you know, 30 feet from nowhere near the guy.

Yeah.

And I'm go over the bump and he's walking across saying he's— his mouth's moving and he's— his hands are flying. And inside, bro, I'm boiling. I start to boil, right? And I'm like, what the hell is this dude pissed at? Like, what? I'm nowhere near you, bro. Like, get out of the way. And I'm like, inside I'm losing my mind. He gets past the road and he starts to pull in towards where his car was with his little cart, and he's looking back like this, and he's doing again like this. His mouth is moving, dude. I slow down, I roll down the window, and I'm like— he goes, dude, I love your car, I just wanted to see if you want my parking spot, I'm leaving.

Uh, it's like, damn it, uh.

Yeah, my wife would have assumed what he was doing, that he was trying to be helpful, and she'd have waved and said hi. They would have had a— they'd probably had lunch together, you know what I mean? Where I'm like, I'm just by default, dude, I'm mad, I'm angry, I'm negative. I just— I'm wired that way, so I have to fight it. Does that make sense? I'm emotional. I get, I get frustrated. I want to kill someone this morning. I just— it's— I'm— I, I have to really focus on it, dude. It's hard work every day of my life still. Right? So for me, I had a hard time with the phones. I didn't like people telling me no. When they said they didn't fill it out, I wanted to prove them wrong. I wanted to, like, you know what I mean? I wanted to win the mental battle on the phone. I wanted to win the argument. I wanted to be the one that hung up on them before they hung up on me. And I'm like, I was just bad, dude. I had poor manners. I just wasn't good with it. And so those are the reasons I started looking at, like, I didn't put in a lot of energy and effort, and I wasn't making a lot of dials because I was getting the negative side of things. And I, I read this quote on a— I stole it from a podcast. I didn't plan on sharing this, and I'm going to get to your answer. Um, it said— I got it from Chris Williamson. If you've never listened to Modern Wisdom Podcast, it's bomb. He said, the more somebody complains, the less accurate their perspective of the world is.

Hmm, interesting.

So as I was complaining on the phones, dude, I had an inaccurate perspective of what calling leads was like. Yeah, does that make sense? I had an inaccurate perspective of what the industry was like because I was complaining non-stop. So of course I had a bad perspective, just like I did in the parking lot, right? And so I didn't have a lot of effort, a lot of energy. I wasn't making a lot of dials. I, you know, I mean, I've got 40 dials a day and I'm pissed. And then I started thinking like— and I, I share this with a lot of people, and you can word it the way you want. I'm going to word it the way I worded it for me. Does that make sense? Some people think it's a lot, and I'm a lot, so sorry. But for me, I started going like, if, if someone kidnapped Maddox, right? And at the time when he started, he was 9 months old when I started the business. He's 13 today. If someone kidnapped Maddox and the only way for me to find him was to call these leads, would I be emotional if someone said they weren't the one that had Maddox? Call the next lead. Would I be emotional if they told me to fuck off? Would I? Now I'm emotional about Maddox, but I— do I care what this person says to me at all? Do— would I, would I start earlier in the day, or would I be like— and no offense to you, like, rule followers, that I'm not saying break them— what, what does the FTC say at the time I can start dialing? Would I, would I care, right? Do you know what I mean? Like, would I, would I— what time would I start? Would I take lunch break in between the same way I do now? Would I let my buddy call me and be like, yo, can you help me load my truck? I, I need to put a dresser in my truck. Can you come over and help me? Hey, we have a barbecue Saturday. Can you, can you make it? Hey, you want to go get hammered at the bar? How would I handle those things if Maddox was missing? How emotional or unemotional would I be about the process of finding— you know what I mean? Like, how late would I dial? How many— would I be afraid to call someone 3 times in a row if they had Maddox, right? Would I care what they said? And for me, dude, I don't. Not trying to be mean, I'm not gonna like be— I'm not gonna bulldoze people in a mean, rude— I'm not saying that, but like, would my emotions be different? Of course, you know. And so I still, I still like, oh, what could I get out of myself? I do crazy, um, physical things now. I hike mountains like an obnoxious amount of times. I'm signed up to like do 3 marathons in 3 days, and I'm not a runner. I actually hate running. But in July, I'm doing 3 marathons back-to-back days in, in the mountain, like trail mountain marathons.

Yeah, man, nice, right?

Because I like to challenge myself, dude. And I go, if Maddox were somewhere in the mountains, would I be able to go 26 miles 3 days in a row? Right. I mean, 3 miles an hour is a pretty slow pace. I can do it in 9 hours.

Do that shit.

I'd have like 25 or 15 left over. I have plenty of time, you know what I mean? And for me, it was a way to get out of my own head, dude, and stop being emotional about things that I couldn't control anyway. I mean, you can control it if you behave properly, but it was like, some people are going to tell me to fuck off. I dialed this week to test some leads, dude. John Wetmore got told to fuck off this week. Dialing final expense leads. Like, it's part of the game, dude. And just for me, man, I just had to take my emotions to a new level and my willingness to challenge myself to work more and push more because I wanted big things, dude. And that stupid little exercise helped my messed up head push through emotions that would have otherwise stopped me, you know. And maybe that works for you, maybe you got to find your own thing. But if y'all think we don't have issues, if y'all don't think we think negative or emotional, or the day goes perfect, you've lost your ever-loving mind. I'd argue I have more problems and issues than most of y'all on an everyday basis. Every day something goes wrong in my office, every day. But I've become someone who can be non-emotional as possible about them. I can always look for the solution and I can find how can I get better. There's this frustration, I'm unhappy with the result. Maybe I had the input, maybe I didn't, but I'm unhappy. There's this like, right? So I go, what can I change to control that? Always, no matter what the situation, even if the other person's wrong, even if the leads were a scam or they sucked or whatever, like, what can I do different to control this? You know, and it starts with up here for me, dude. And that's— that was my weakness. So I had to— I had to— but we're aware enough and we're smart enough to know that we think stupid. The brain is nuts, dude. So now when I think stupid, I know it. And all I've done different now is I catch it and I don't let it linger. Yeah, most of y'all still let it linger and it carries on for days or weeks or months or some— I got hit— guy hit me up yesterday, dude. He's been licensed as long as I have and he ain't dialed in 7 years because he overthinks the phone. I'm like, well, you got to get over that, you know? And so you just got to find what drives you through. And again, I'm— that's what always worked for me, man. And I still— I still— excuse me— look at things that way through Maddox. If Maddox were on the line, what would I do, right?

Yeah, yeah. I see my wife has adopted some of that mentality because because I see it just in how hard she works. Because the way she views it is her family back in Colombia is on the line.

Yeah, yeah, yep, right, 100%.

Everything that she can create, the abundance that she can create, affects them. And if she doesn't do it, it affects them. 3 of them work for her. If she fails at any level, it affects them. Yep, right. So, and, and watch how hard she works. And I'd said That's her drive. And she gets the reward every year because she gets to go play Santa Claus during Christmas every year. Takes two giant suitcases full of clothes, toys, shoes, everything for all the nephews, nieces, and kids. So I mean, it's— she, she's starting to experience that reward as well. Plus, again, three of them work for it, and they make more money, have more freedom than would ever otherwise be available to them in Colombia.

Yeah, I love it, dude. I've heard some of the story before. Last time there weren't three on payroll, so it's cool to Yeah, growing. She's growing it.

Absolutely. Well, dude, John, I know, I know we're holding you late, man. I know you're booked back to back.

Um, all good, bro.

Real quick, what's— what, uh, I know you said you're— so now we're getting better at marketing this year. Is that the main focus for this year? What's next for, for y'all?

Yeah, man, we're gonna— I mean, my goal is to continue to just help people get paid to a new level, you know. I'm helping a lot of agencies and companies and stuff like that build. So when the focus for me is how can I help other people build their side Certainly I can market, but if I'm not, if I'm not staying true to that piece, one, I don't really want to do it. I just, I'm, it's, it's not, that doesn't drive me anymore. The money part doesn't, that comes with it, you know what I mean?

Right.

Um, so I'm gonna stay true to that because it's worked for me for 10 years. I mean, people do reach out to me to help them make more money, like, let's not sugarcoat that, you know. So if, if that's the driving factor for me, um, and then certainly we're going to get better at targeting and identifying my ideal person to work with. You know, you start seeing it's like, all right, how can I, how can I speak to that person better? How can I find more of my people and the people that mesh well with me and fall, you know what I mean, and enjoy learning from my style? And, you know, so we're just going to kind of continue to fine-tune this thing and, and figure out where I can add value because I, I have a bunch of staff, man, that I want to do really well. I don't want it to just be Amanda that and the others are It's not like I don't pay them, but I want them to hit— I want them to be— I want to be like, yo, I want all my staff over 6 figures, dude. Yeah, you know, um, and we're working on it, man.

So that lack of selfishness is an amazing lesson in this industry. You know, it shouldn't come as any surprise to anyone that this entire industry is based on helping people, helping people get the right insurance they need properly, ethically, compliantly, helping people get what they want out of this business, provide for their family.

It's somewhat, somewhat cliché to some people, but here's the thing, dude, if you ain't putting in the work, I'm gonna cut you off in a second and watch you drown. It's just who I am, dude. I'm not— I don't, I don't have the energy if you ain't in it. I just don't. So I'm like, I'm not the like pat you on the back, go get them, tiger, it'll be okay tomorrow. I mean, I help people, I will a little, but I only got so much of that in me, dude. You know, so for me, I need people that have— they want it, like, in their actions confirm they want it. Because everyone's words— you know how many people a day tell me they want it? Today's my day, dude. I hear that every day, bro. All right, you know, so I have to have some kind of— yeah, you know, boundaries.

Go find— go find you a thousand Zach Trudowskis, dude. Yeah, dude's a freaking killer.

And there's— they're out there, dude. There's people who are You ever heard Mylett say like, you're— I don't know how he words it, he words it much more elegantly than I will, but he's like, you are the most best equipped to help the person you used to be. Yeah. Does that make sense? I find that to be really true in my world, and so I can help a wide range of people. I try to be really dynamic, but my sweet spot, you know, there's people with their back against their wall ready to go to work and do what it takes. That's my sweet spot. You know what I mean? Um, and so I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna focus on that, dude, a lot, you know. And all the other people, I love you all. I give it out for free non-stop, so stay on, stay on the train. It's just a different train, you know, because I'm like, I'm not charged. I just, I don't have the energy to run that, bro. Just, I'm giving it out. Get on the train. I can— I, I give out so much free content, dude, it's stupid, right?

Well, y'all, as we, as we close out, check out, uh, johnwetmore.com. Um, There's plenty of ways that you can contact and sign up for stuff with John. And like he said, he's got all kinds of free content and resources and stuff out there. Um, Lily, if you could go ahead and drop that in the comments. John, is there any other way you'd want them to reach out outside of— I mean, they can contact you through the website or Facebook or any preferred way.

So like, I actually answer my DMs. Like, some people are like shocked that I respond. I'm like, I actually— like, yes, like, it's actually me that answers the DMs. It's not my team. Yeah, you know, so I like when people certainly share things with me. I like when people tag me and stuff. And you know, I mean, I don't mind, I don't mind people hitting me up direct. Um, you know, I might not all answer you all in 4 minutes, but I literally answer everyone. I've even learned recently that a lot of people go into the requests thing in Instagram, which I didn't know existed. I went yesterday and I had 15 of them in there. I'm like, oh boy, I should probably answer these people. I'm voice chatting with Pete, you know what I mean? I'm like, love it. So I, I do that. I do I do, I do like it, but you better be ready to work if you're gonna hit me up.

You're definitely one of the gems of this industry. Absolutely, man. Been blessed that I've had a chance to meet you, hang out with you, become a friend. So, uh, thank you. Same way, brother, that you've made on this industry. We all appreciate it.

Yeah, my man.

And within the Insurance Syndicate, dude, I love, I love having you on. I was like, dude, I gotta have you. Last time we went for an hour and a half, so we gotta— all right guys, we're getting better. We're only going for an hour 15 now, uh, but it's like, dude, I could just keep going, man. I mean, the conversation is just so good. I'm— I learn every single time I get to speak with you.

Uh, do it some more, bro.

Yeah, absolutely, man. We should— we need to talk some shop about some, uh, so maybe some in-person Syndicate stuff. Um, yeah, maybe even go down to Old Kennesaw, use those offices. Yeah, that would be fun.

We got a whole studio I'm sitting in. You can do whatever you want in here. Love it.

Well, Mr. Merwin, go ahead and close us out, my man. Yeah, yeah.

Thank you again, John Wetmore, for coming by. Thank you guys for tuning in as always, man. We do it every week.

All right guys, thanks for watching the entire video. I hope you got a ton out of it, and more importantly, I hope you implement some stuff. Um, for those that want to get a deeper dive into learning the business, learning sales, learning how to build, learning— you just— just more details about how to get to the next level, um, and, and want to dive in further with us, I'm having an event coming up at my office, uh, February 27th, 28th. It's a 2-day event. You can go to the link, click it to register. You can always go to JohnWetmore.com/events if you happen to be watching this after it passed or want to see any of the other stuff we got going on. You can go to the events page always. There are a couple ticket tiers for people to come in. 2-day entry, basic level package, you get all the stuff, full 2 days of content. You can join there. And then there's a— there's another tier, executive level, where where we're having a private mastermind at my house after. I'm gonna do some networking. There's some high-level people, 7-figure people coming to that. So if you wanna learn just to another level, feel free to grab the executive ticket. And there's a lot of people coming. I get messages every day for people that wanna attend. And some people aren't, haven't yet registered. So we are going to raise the prices soon because we can only handle so many people in the office. So if you haven't registered yet, get on, I think February 1st, my team is, is raising the prices. And then if you, if you use a code YouTube— thank you for watching the whole thing through— you actually get a discount. I believe we did 15% off of the code. So hope it helps. Click the link. We'll see you there. Later.