How I Started A BILLION Dollar Business! ft. Stephen Odom | Ep8

We were growing like crazy. We went from $70, $80 million in sales to $1 billion, $2 billion in like 3 years.

What?

It was fast.

What's up, y'all? John Wetmore back with another episode of Insurance Insiders Podcast. Got my buddy Stephen Odom here. Good dude. Met funny enough through Maddox's baseball coach is your attorney.

That's right.

We're buddies and we're at an event one day. Kid's bouncy, uh, the bouncy house thing down off Barrett. And he's talking, we're just shooting the jazz, and he starts talking insurance lingo, you know what I mean? Like, lingo comes out of his mouth. I'm like, why did you say that word? I don't remember what it was, you know what I mean? Like, I was looking at my guy's issue paid number, whatever it was. And I'm like, what made you say that? And he starts, then he starts explaining the industry to me. And I'm like, Dude, I'm in the industry. I know what the word means.

Yeah.

And then shit, I think a couple weeks later, man, we were sitting at lunch.

Oh yeah. He texted me that day and he's like, hey, I got a guy you need to meet. Yeah. And I'm like, what's his name? And he said, John Wetmore. And so I was like, cool. And then I did what everybody does, right? Go to Google, go to Facebook, go to Instagram.

Yeah.

And I'm like, wait a minute. He— this is like my spirit animal. I think I texted you that. You did.

Yeah.

I'm like, you're like everything you say on your Everything, your videos, just all the stuff, our conversations, our lunches, our dinners that we've had together. It's like, man, I feel you. Like, I agree with just about everything you say when it comes to this business.

It's been neat getting to know you. Obviously now you run Impact and got to visit your facility. I appreciate you coming to mine, first of all, because I think this is the first one. We only started this podcast. I think you're probably, what's he, probably number 8 or 8 or 7 or 8. Only one in person so far. Okay, which is cool.

There we go.

Built it all out before we— yeah, so it's, it's fun to have you here, but I appreciate you coming. And, uh, I got to see your facility a couple weeks ago. I told my crew I want to take them up.

Yeah, anytime.

You know, we, we sell some insurance, but I'm a vision guy.

Yeah.

And your place is like, yeah, smokes. TV, legit TV studios. And, you know, so I'd love to hear more, dude. You start wherever you want, but you've been in the business a while.

Yep.

And again, what's it, 55,000 square feet?

Yeah, 55,000 square feet. And, um, really, you know, it's a— we made the— well, we started off in a townhouse.

Yeah.

In 2011. So, uh, this week I got recognized for my 13-year anniversary because I resigned April 15th of 2011 from previous company and then put in my 2 weeks notice. And so May 1st was our start date for Impact. May 1st, 2011. So just— and it was funny, we started in a townhouse and we moved into about 5,000 square feet. I don't know the exact timeline. I wish that— that's the type of stuff if you journal.

Yeah, I wish I did that too.

Then I'd know it for sure. But moved into 5,000 square feet probably like 6 months later, 3 to 6 months, pretty fast. And then we upgraded to, uh, 15,000 square feet.

Is that the one I went to first?

That was 30,000 square feet.

Got it.

Yeah, so we went, we went townhouse, 5,000 square feet, 15,000 square feet, about 29,000 square feet and then the big move to 55,000 square feet. Yeah, it's been a good, a good run.

How many employees are in there?

We've got 127, I think, today.

And then how many agents? Because all the agents are 1099 like ours, right?

Yes.

How many agents? Roughly.

Roughly. So there's advisors that are contracted with you, right? And then there's advisors that are agents that do business with you. Um, this year we'll have about probably 600 or 700 good customers, good, good producing advisors. We probably have 1,000 that will like give us a piece of business, and then there's probably 2,000 that are contracted. And so explain the model.

Yeah, it's so different than anything I've ever seen. For me, you know, I mean, to be clear, I'm pretty sheltered. I stay in my hole, I do business, I grow our thing. But it's very— it's a— I like your angle.

Yeah, so a lot of the same stuff, definitely, right? IUL for you, you sell some IUL. You sell mostly life insurance, right?

Mostly life. Yeah, we do probably— we're probably pushing— I think we did like $2.5 million in IUL business last month.

Okay.

And probably $12 million in life total. No, outside of it, so $15 million total.

Okay. So, so we're more annuity and AUM focused.

We sell very little. When I heard your annuity number, I was like, whoa.

Yeah.

I mean, we do, we do a small, I think we did $40 million last year. Yep. What was yours?

We did about $2.3 billion last year of annuities.

Oh, Lord.

Tracking every month this year, we've beat, we've beat last year. So we're tracking, we're going to have a big— we'll see.

Close.

We may sniff it. Yeah, we may see.

Ilyen and annuity with 600 people write annuity roughly?

Pretty much. Yeah.

So we'll have— for perspective, we had 6,000 agents write a policy last year. We have about 1,800 a month. You know how that is. They fall off, whatever, turnover, which you don't have quite as much of because your model, which I want to hear about. 6,000 for $40 million.

Yeah.

You have 600 write 2.5 billion. Yeah, I'm trying to learn from you, dude.

Well, um, life insurance, it's like a different— in some ways it's a different customer, but in other ways it is the same, right? Like there's some crossover. Yeah, but then there's a lot of guys that maybe don't have the patience to write life insurance, 100%, right? And whereas annuities are— there's no underwriting, there's no more higher-end client.

Yeah, I think you target for sure.

I think so.

Manage money, CPAs, things like that.

We're not— we turn down term business. Yeah, you know, so like if they're doing term business, that's just not what we do. We're not staffed for that. Um, because our life team's small. Our life team, we've got 4 or 5 people on our life team. And then on the life side this year, I think we'll do maybe $7 million of target. So it's a profitable business for us, but we're not killing it like you guys are. And then on the AUM front, we write, this year we'll probably do $800 million of new assets under management on the, just on the IP, it's called Impact Wealth on the IPW platform.

New business.

That's new business. Yeah. Yeah. And so that's a great business.

Oh, totally.

Total, um, roughly 3, 3.7, 3.6, 3.7 billion between AUM and annuities. Yeah. And then we give life times 10 credit, right? So, because it's close to being equivalent on an annuity, life insurance. So if you do a million of life insurance, that's almost like doing $10 million of annuities.

Yes, we do 10% credit on the annuity side for the same— we do the inverse. Yeah, for the same reason.

Yeah. So the model is just to, um, to go find financial advisors. Our focus is media, so we want those advisors that are, that are doing radio, that are doing television. Um, we try to bring them in and show them that we can make their lives a little bit easier. And that we'll do it for them. And so, you know, we co-host radio shows all across the country. We produce now, I think, 40 or 50 television shows across the country, a ton of TV commercials across the country. And we're, we're trying— actually, we had this conversation this morning, which you'll appreciate. So had the sales team in and just talking about Like, how do you answer this question? What do you do?

Got it.

What do you do?

Yeah.

So if you're talking to an agent, right, you're trying to recruit them. Well, they want to know one thing, like, what do you do and how can you help me? Right? And so, but the thing that I was thinking about this morning, it's like, not only obviously do we as salespeople need to know that, that, that question, like, how do we answer that? But like, if we have a sales team, like our answer needs to be the same.

Correct.

Right? Like, what do we do? It all needs to be the same. But so does our director of first impressions. She needs to have the same exact answer as my top sales guy. Right? And so that I'm positive that we don't have right now, um, because we did a little exercise this morning with the sales team.

Right?

And it's like, okay, what do we do? What do we do? What do we do? And even though they were getting to hear each other, the answers were still a little different.

What kind of answers did you get versus what you want?

Well, the answers are, you know, we help advisors grow their businesses in a nutshell, in their own words. That's what they all kind of say. Some of them say we're an IMO, you know, Insurance Marketing Organization. Some say FMO, Field Marketing Organization. The lingo over the years is starting to also change a little bit on— because they call— what do you— they call you guys BGA? Oh, they— IMO. Okay.

There are others that have that BGA, MGA thing. I'll be honest, I don't know what any of that means. But yeah, it is changing. I'm like, MGA, BGA, what? Yeah, that's not our lingo. We're straight IMO. And then we have like VPs and senior— we have all kinds of titles as well that we just Honestly made up internally.

Well, and that's where it gets a little confusing, right? Because we're all selling insurance.

Correct.

But like the, just the lingo depending on, it's almost like the, the, I grew up kind of in the, um, is it okay to say the carrier name? Yeah, I don't mind at all. So I, I grew up in the Allianz world. So my first company got acquired by Allianz. And so for 10 years, Allianz lingo is pretty much the lingo that I use. But one, as soon as you get outside of the Allianz lingo, then other insurance companies had different, you know, instead of Allianz called us FMOs.

Yeah.

But then Aviva at the time, which is now Athene, called us IMOs. And then some carriers called us NMOs, National Marketing Organizations. Right. And then if you're on the life side, it's like, oh, you're a BGA. Well, wait, we're, we're not, I guess we're BGA and an IMO and an FMO and an NMO.

You're all of it.

Yeah, we're everything.

We sell insurance.

And we got VPs and senior VPs and directors and this and that. So it's just trying to make it simple for that end client, man. Just tell them what you do.

So what do you want the message to be for your team?

I want the message to be, we help financial advisors become local celebrities in order to make the biggest impact in their communities to help the most people that they can help retire successfully.

It's a lot more clear.

That's what, that's what we do, right? Because we bring them in, we rebrand them, we build them a new website, give them all new business cards, marketing materials, make them look like a billion-dollar company. Put them on radio, start to make that, that brand happen in the community, filter it, or layer in some seminars, right? Then sprinkle in some television. And then the next thing you know, you're walking into Publix and you're in small town USA, right? And they're like, hey, are you John Wetmore? I saw you on television. I listen to your radio show. Right? And so then you're starting to build a brand that competes against the big brands, Edward Jones and the big dogs in the, in the industry.

It's given them a lot of credibility.

And exactly, third-party credibility, that's, that's the magic word. What can you do to build your third-party credibility?

Reminds me of, uh, I was just talking, I just did a Zoom podcast a minute ago and I was talking about that dude, uh, you ever see that Million Dollar Listing?

Yes.

It's, I mean, look how big they've got. Yep. Now that they've just made a TV show of what they do, follow around some real estate guys who sell some, who sell some real estate.

Yeah.

And they built their credibility up through the roof. This guy's— I, I like that. I follow that dude, Ryan Serhant.

Yep.

I like that guy, New York guy. And, uh, it's neat watching. I don't know, that show's probably— he's probably been on it a decade at least, however long it's been. And it's nuts watching what that source can do. I'm sure y'all kill it. And it's like the elevator pitch. What you said is a lot more intriguing.

Well, there's still— if you're targeting a 50-year-old-plus demographic, they still do listen to radio.

Yeah, 100%.

They still do listen to talk radio. So AM radio has— it's probably taken a little hit over the years, but there's still a lot of ears. And then of course, TV.

Yeah.

TV's, you know, yeah, there's all these streaming services and all that. And people are watching Netflix and Hulu and whatever else, but they're still watching local news.

Yeah.

People still are.

Are you changing anything with the world change? Like, I don't, but I'm not the norm necessarily, but I don't watch news or radio just because I'm oblivious to most things.

Yeah.

But I'm sure like 30-year-old, you know what I mean? Like as that's changing to the Netflix generation and Are you changing or targeting in any different way? Like kind of a lower client with money?

The only, I would say we're adding on, like we've, as you've seen our facility, we've doubled down on media. We've spent millions of dollars.

I was gonna ask if you'll share.

Yeah, I mean, we've spent, we spent about $8 million on technology, right? Just cameras and studios and you know, all this equipment that you've got in here, stuff isn't cheap, right? You want, you want the best stuff because in 6 months it's all gonna be old anyway, right? So you got to get the best stuff that you can today. Um, and so we spent about $8 million on the studios. Um, we need— we had a small TV studio that was just at max capacity at our old building. And so then we had a choice to make, you know, do we want to stay where we are, which would have saved us a lot of money, but it didn't allow us to scale. And we've talked about this. If you're not growing, you're dying.

100%.

Right? Why be in it? Yeah. If you don't want to grow.

What up, insiders? John Wetmore here. Quick break interruption in the podcast to let you know that if you have interest in leveling up your insurance game, getting to a new level, multi-six figures, building an agency, things like that, I've had a ton of people ask me about coaching. I don't have anything right now, but we are starting a waiting list based on the interest. I'm going to put some stuff together. You can go to theinsuranceinsiders.com/start to get on the waiting list and see if we'll, um, join— have you join the team. Appreciate it.

Now I understand if you're little— if you're 60, 70 years old and you're you're complacent, you know, you're selling your insurance, you're making $100,000, $200,000, $300,000 a year. You want to play golf 3 days a week. Got it. But like, if, if you're in this business and you want to get after it, which is what, what we want to do, what you want to do, then you have to be able to scale your business. And for us, our home field advantage is our office. And for those, you have a lot of agents, I think, that watch the, the podcast, right? And it's like, you're not gonna ever spend— you can't— it's hard to outspend the value that you get from creating an unbelievable home field advantage for yourself. So I've never seen an agent who's really dumped money into their, their office where these clients are walking in the front door I've never seen them where they come back and say, man, I spent too much money on my office.

It's true.

You know, it's just, it's hard to, to like, that's your home field advantage. So you want it to be as nice as you can possibly make it. And, um, and that's what we try to do. It's just like, just go for it.

Sick. I wish we should, we should, uh, I almost want to bring him up with the Cameron like put it on here somewhere.

Yeah, we might.

Maybe we'll come up with something. It's unbelievable. That spot where you host events. Yeah, it's ridiculous too.

Yep.

Yeah, it's a— it's a nice spot.

So it's funny, we had, um, one of the things that we wanted to do when we started the company, the name's Impact, and we wanted to not only, of course, impact our teammates' lives and of course our family's lives, but we wanted to impact the community. And when you're starting something, you know, you're just trying to make payroll, right? You're not really worried about impacting the community, but it was something that we talked about. And then eventually we got to the point where, hey, you know, let's start thinking about things we can do in the community to add value. And so one of the things that I really wanted to do was to, during summer, all these kids that go to, you know, these public schools that are all around us here, a lot— there's like 100,000 kids in our area here that in the summertime, if they're not at school, they don't eat during the day.

Damn.

The way that they eat is when they're at school. They get their lunch that's provided, paid for by the government, right?

I was on that lunch as a kid.

No, that's true. Your story's unbelievable. So like 100,000 kids, man, right here, like within 10 miles of where we sit. There's 10 miles of us, 10 miles.

Stop it here.

100,000 kids.

Dude, this is not a bad area.

I know, I know.

I didn't know that number.

And so, so I challenged my— the lady that runs our human resources. I was like, how do we provide value to the community and go into these schools? Let's go pick a school. And figure out how we can provide the kids at that school lunch during the summer that need it. All right, so that was kind of the task. Well, there's something to be said for like putting stuff out in the universe. Okay.

I agree 100%.

And so fast forward to like 2 weeks ago, our kids go to Mount Perrin. We had a give back, a family serve day. So we were at this Lockheed Elementary School doing a family serve day. Well, guess who happens to be at the school is the lady that runs the nutrition department for all of Marietta City Schools.

Stop. Naturally.

And so we have a conversation. I tell her exactly what we're wanting to do and how we're wanting to help. So yesterday she was at my office in that room that you're talking about and had her up on stage, had her show all the statistics. To my team and, um, you know, they've got the food, they just don't have the distribution. How do we get the food to the kids in these apartments during summertime? Uh, right.

I got it.

And so I'm like, well, I've got 120-something teammates.

Yeah.

And, and so like, I know we can help. Now we can't solve hunger for the state of Georgia, but can I do it for one or two elementary schools. Absolutely, we can do it. But just when she came in, we had the music rocking, we had the disco ball, we had the lights. Good energy for a Monday morning. And she's like, I feel like I'm at a Friday afternoon meeting, not like a Monday morning meeting. And so just another little tidbit, man, for people watching. What can you do on Monday mornings to shake the cobwebs off from the weekend and get the week rocking, you know? And so that's something I learned at my old company and we've kind of kept that tradition going. But that big room you're talking about, that's the point of it.

A lot of intentionality.

Oh, for sure.

So did y'all make a plan on how you're going to deliver stuff?

Yeah.

How's it going to work?

Don't worry, I'm going to be asking for your help.

No, I'm going to volunteer the help.

Yeah.

We're definitely coming.

Yeah. So, so what they'll do is the YMCA has been a pretty big partner to Marietta City Schools during the summers.

I grew up going to that thing, that and the Boys Club.

You grew up at the Y?

I went to the YMCA and Boys Club. And the Boys Club. Lynn Mass YMCA, Boys Club, all the time. I have a million memories at both.

And so, man, that model's still there, right? For lower income kids. And some parents, I don't know how much it costs to go to the Y or the Boys Club. But, you know, like our kids can, we can put them in summer camps, right? Well, if you're living in an apartment and you're getting free lunches, that's not even an option. Summer camp is not right.

I ran around the neighborhood.

Exactly.

That's what they like doing, bad things.

That's what's still happening. They're still running around the neighborhood. And so what we've got to do is we've got to go pick up the food.

Okay.

And they have a facility that's from here. It's 15-minute drive from here.

Heck yeah.

They have a facility, you pick it up, they pack it in coolers, and then we just have to get it from that facility to these 4 apartment complexes that we've signed up for.

Yep.

And give it up just for like an hour. Like, it's not—

I mean, 100% thing.

All we got to do is just be there. And she's like, you just, just wait and see, man. The kids will start they'll start coming out.

Heck yeah.

And they'll come.

When's it starting?

Uh, I think it's June 5th through like the middle of July.

I definitely want to do it. And I have some idea we can get some people— we know too many people around here. Yeah, that can definitely afford the time to help.

Absolutely.

You know, Steph would love to be involved.

It's just distribution. It's really amazing because I was thinking, okay, we're gonna buy all the food, we'll prepare it, You know, I was kind of envisioning going all in conveyor belt, right? At Impact, like, stamp people. Here's the bread, here's the meat, here's the chips here, you know, pack it in and just have cars pulling through and handing it out. But she's like, no, we've got unlimited amounts of food. We just don't have a way to get it to the kids during the summer.

Dude, I will— Steph knows a ton of the moms and she does little mom groups at church. So her dad, speaking of like conveyor belt and hand it— her dad, he passed away like a year ago. But he, he worked at— he volunteered at a place in Paulding County. And that's what they did. They'd leave a certain day and they'd come in and people could come in on certain days and they just, they'd hand out the meals. And Steph used to volunteer. We've been up there a couple times. And, you know, since he's not— again, we're not in Paulding anymore and he's not alive anymore. And so she's definitely— us as a family looking like, what can we do to help?

So yeah, and our staff can help, but we can And it's important, I think, for— and I'm going to encourage my teammates, like, have your kids be a part of it.

Yes.

You know, like, if your kid is, is privileged enough to be able to go to summer camp and have 3 meals a day, yeah, you know, what's crazy, dude, is I took Maddox the other day, um, so he's 12, and he has gotten into it.

He went from the stage which— yours is a freshman.

Yeah, right.

So do you remember the stage where they didn't want to shower or brush their teeth ever? And then one day they wake up and he's now using like— not only is he brushing his teeth, he's using mouthwash, deodorant. And he asked the other day if I could take him to the store and buy him cologne.

Yeah.

So I'm like, all right. It's like 8 PM, like on a— I don't know if it was Friday or Saturday night this past weekend. And, uh, so I take him up to just the mall, dude. Town Center. And that place is a dump now.

Yeah. You know, sad.

Yeah. So we get out and he's like nervous because he's— we live in our little bubble, dude. And he goes from my house to Mount Perron to the country club. That's all in his baseball team. I mean, he doesn't— and he's not experienced. My other kids knew broke. Maddox doesn't know that world. And we take him up to the thing and he's like, what? Is this the one where there's violence? Like, and I had to like explain, like, dude, you ain't seen violence, kid. You know what I mean? Like, he doesn't understand, but he's such a sweet kid at heart. And him and his buddies, they can definitely afford some time to get out of the club this summer. And we were talking with Steph. All we have to do is drop them off in the summer and they play at the pool and eat and do whatever they want. Like, they're spoiled as shit.

Yep. But what a life.

I try to explain to him, he's never been where I grew up. I've never taken him. But I kind of—

where was that again?

Lynn Mass, right outside of Boston. Projects, big high-rise, like a 12— there were two 12-story buildings right next to each other. And, um, so 12 stories each, and there's probably 30 or 40 apartments on each floor. So we're 400-plus people living in this completely welfare government-assisted housing. I remember as a kid, we used to walk up My mom didn't have a car till I was like— I remember she got her first job and car when I was like 10. Like, I remember her getting her first job, I remember her graduating from college, and I remember her coming home with a car. Before that, we walked or we took— put quarters in the bus and public transportation. We used to walk up to this— walk up the street and stand in line at a place like you're talking about doing, like the facility, your facility, and we'd stand in line for these cardboard boxes of cheese and they'd give you a slicer and you buy a brick of cheese and have to cut it up. That's how you get cheese for, you know, mac and cheese, grilled cheese, whatever. And this giant tub of peanut butter, we just— they give it out, I guess. It's all I knew, but I didn't know any better. So eventually her goal was to get us out, which she did.

They give you bread too? Was it—

it's like you could have food stamps. Some things were at the grocery store. I don't know why. I've never really asked her. I don't know why we went this one spot for certain things. But I remember most clearly the cheese and the peanut butter for some reason. But then I remember the booklets of food, like before the cards. Now they have like cards, you just basically debit card. We have the booklets look like Monopoly money. You tear it out and you know, the $1 bill is brown and the $5 purple. And I remember growing up paying for stuff with those things. You know what I mean? It's just different. And so I tried to explain to Maddox like, It's this weird balance of loving him being able to live the life, but not taking it for granted. Yeah, I mean, it's— and I don't know how to do it perfectly.

I don't know if anybody does.

But we're trying, man. And so some of that stuff, I mean, we like to involve him in things like that to like see reality. And, you know, at some point our kids are going to be adults.

Yeah.

They're going to have to go get it. What I love about the industry is you can— certainly we can help. But without this industry, me and you ain't sitting here.

Yeah.

You know what I mean? That was, that was a part of my path, which obviously, and I don't know a ton of your upbringing, to be honest. Um, but it's been a dope industry to provide not only a lifestyle but value to other people. And man, I definitely help others get out.

My, my dad was a butcher. I grew up right here in Marietta. My dad was a butcher for 50 years.

Dang.

And my mom was a crosswalk guard at whatever school I was at.

Okay. Always followed you? Is that what you mean? Oh yeah.

That's awesome. Middle, high school. And yeah, the one day that I skipped school in my senior year of high school, I didn't think about the fact that my mom would ever drive the parking lot of the high school where she was a crosswalk guard looking for my car. And sure enough, The one day that I skipped school, she knew. She, she knew, but she thought someone had stolen my car.

Oh no.

So she freaked out. It's not like we had cell phones, right?

Yeah.

So she ran into the school and like, someone's stolen Stephen's car. So it got all the way to the principal. And then so they're trying to call me out of class. And of course I'm not there. I'm at Town Center Mall.

It was a lot different back then.

I'm at Town Center Mall. And, um, so next day, you know, obviously they figure out, oh, he's not here, so he's gone. My mom never in a million years would have thought her baby angel son would even ever consider skipping school. But, uh, next day, the— not the head principal of the school, but like one of the counselors, one of the tough ones, Mr. Merson, he calls me in his office and I'm like, man, I'm gonna I'm getting something, right? In-school suspension, or I'm getting something. And he's like, how'd it go with your parents last night? And I was like, yeah, not good. And, uh, he said, I figured that's punishment enough, so you're good to go. And I was like, thank you, Mr. Merson.

Dude, skipping— the first time I skipped school, second grade. Oh my gosh. Swear. I show up to school. I've walked to school since I was in kindergarten. Like, I just— my mom was wherever she was, you know what I mean? I just— I've always walked to school and it wasn't crazy far, but I just— I walked to school and I go Washington Elementary School, second grade. I go up and my buddy Joely's there. We hung out in the neighborhood and he's like, want to leave? Like, that sounds like the best idea ever. So we bounce. And they, they, we were, it's again, second grade. Teacher see, you know what I mean? I just left. Dude, they called my mom and she chased my ass around. So she found out and then we were just messing around in the building and she came looking for me, finds us and I tried to run to hide. And do she chase me up and down the stairs and do she beat my ass. I grew up with a paddle.

Oh yeah.

My mom was a paddle mom. Yeah, she whooped my ass. It was— I, I was rough on her.

She deserved it.

I definitely deserved it. That wasn't the only thing. That wasn't the first or the last time. It was the first time. It was not the last time. I was a lot. I was a lot for her. So, but she got us out.

Well, hey, and you found this industry.

She was a trooper, man.

Yeah, you found this industry.

How'd you get in it? So obviously, like, what you do, people are like, sounds good. I, if I had the money for a $50,000, I'd do it too.

Yeah.

You obviously didn't always have it.

No.

What was the start like?

How'd you get it? Starting out, I was, so I just graduated from KSU, Kennesaw State University. And I had a buddy that he and I played high school basketball together. And he kept asking me, he's like, you need to come interview at this little company. You need to come interview at this little company. Well, I had taken a job at a company called InHealth because I knew I was going to sell something. but I didn't know what.

Did you? Got it.

Um, cause like, I don't have any other skills, right? I don't know. I couldn't wire, uh, these lights or I could, you know, I'm not a plumber. Like I, I'm not an attorney. Like I don't know how to do anything else.

So you just knew sales right off the rip?

Yeah. I knew I was going to do sales.

Really?

I just, I knew that for sure. That's cool. But like, what was I going to sell? Well, like let's sell some pharmaceuticals. Cause like, sounds like those guys make good money. Yeah. Right. So, so I started down that path and took a job with this company called InHealth. I was there for 1 year. And in that meantime, my buddy Preston, he just kept calling me, you need to come interview, you need to come interview. And so Kendra and I got married and this was 2001, August 4th, 2001. And we, we didn't have enough money for a full week of honeymoon. So I took like, you know, we took 3 or 4 days, went to, drove to Clearwater, Florida, came back on a Friday and I went and interviewed because I had the day off. Right. And, um, I met a guy named Steve Craig and Steve said, my goal is for you to make more money than you ever thought possible. And of all the interviews that I ever did, and I graduated in '99. From college and no one ever, and I, so I interviewed probably 10, 15 places. Like it was a great time to graduate. No one ever said anything to me like that. My goal is for you to make more money than you ever thought possible. And I believed him. And so I took the job and started off as a recruiter, really as a recruiter, as a receptionist. I was employee number 6.

No way.

Yeah. So like, it's just, you know, actually it was an office building just very similar to actually almost identical to this one. And we were in the basement, this part of like a State Farm advisor's office.

No kidding.

And so I was receptionist. I was mailroom guy. And when I wasn't doing that, I was recruiting, trying to find new agents.

Was it a State Farm you worked for?

No.

Just in their basement. No way.

Steve had leased the— God. In the basement of the State Farm building.

No kidding.

Just exactly like this building. And so, you know, recruiting an advisor is more, it's more like a transaction, right? Like it's fast, especially back then. Things have changed over the years, but like back then it was like you're selling somebody on a 20-minute phone call and trying to get licensing paperwork back via fax machine, right? Or mailing it out. Yeah. And, um, that there was no email. Like, we didn't have email. Maybe there was, but we didn't have it.

It was so new.

It was just fax machines. And so it was just, it was a transactional sell, which I was okay with. I wasn't, I don't feel like I was the greatest. I was good enough to get promoted to the sales team, which was more of a relationship sell, right? So this is now the advisor is, is recruited. They've They've given you a contract and now your job is to try to get them to sell something from that carrier.

Got it.

Right? And that's what we just call the sales guy. Got it.

Makes sense.

And that was my sweet spot because I don't want to like put the screws to somebody in 20 minutes, try to get a contract back. I'd much rather like get to know you, figure out how I can add value. And so then I got that opportunity and quickly became the number one sales guy for the company. We were growing like crazy. We went from, from like $70, $80 million in sales to a billion two in like three years. What? It was fast. So 9/11 happened, right? So I start, I got married August 4th. I started the week after 9/11 in this business. And that changed our industry forever. That changed the fixed index industry forever.

I don't know how, obviously I didn't start until 2012.

I think what happened is you had all these guys on variable annuities out in the world. No one really even knew what a fixed index annuity was. And when those towers came down and the stock market crashed, all those VA guys got killed. Their clients are calling, they're paying these big fees and the market's going down. And it was a time where all of those guys were freaking out. Because when the market's good, a variable annuity is fine, right? When it's not so good, then that becomes a different sell. And so then this fixed index annuity thing sounded too good to be true. Like, you're going to give me some of the upside, but none of the downside, right? Yeah. And so it was a rocket ship. And I was lucky enough to be the number one sales guy. And then Steve and Nick, the two guys that own the company, they sold it to Allianz in 2005. And, um, and then they made the mistake of putting the number one sales guy in charge of running the team, you know, um, because that mistake happens a lot. Yeah, right. You think, oh, just because they're a great salesperson, they'll be a great manager.

Yeah.

And, um, and so I had never managed anything, right? So I just had to learn. And I'm sure I was a terrible manager in some ways, and I'm sure I was good in other ways. Eventually I became the co-president of that company. And, um, and then I was, I guess I'd been co-president maybe 3, 3 years, 4 years, was making more money than I ever thought possible for sure. And, um, was as unhappy as I'd ever been. Why? Well, cause money doesn't buy happiness, right? Like it really doesn't. It buys options.

It definitely does do that.

But it does not. Make you happy.

Yeah.

And so here's this company. I mean, really what happened is you have a large insurance company that comes in and buys you, and you're this little small entrepreneurial company that started right here in the basement of an office just like this. Now you're owned by the biggest insurance company in the world. Right. And it's like, just, there's lots of layers, legal, human resources, things that when you're a little small company were not necessarily top of mind.

True.

Right?

I'm in it.

Yes. And so it's hard to have a taste of true entrepreneurial. And the stuff we did back then, it can never be recreated because the world has changed. You know, like we were a frat house slash locker room. You had a bunch of 25-year-old, you know, 23 to 27-year-old guys running a sales organization, right? I mean, so it was just very different stuff that you could do in public.

Couldn't put on the internet now, huh? No.

Um, so that, that turned eventually into like, you know, missing the stuff that was no longer possible. And it wasn't anybody's fault. It was just time. And so I knew that the guy that had started the company, I knew that he had set some money aside. He had told me years ago that, you know, he was going to do something again one day. He had no idea what. And, uh, and so I just called him one day out of the blue and said, you know, let's meet. So we met at Marlow's Tavern right there on Chastain, and, and, um, I said, told him that I just really wasn't happy anymore. I've kind of reached the pinnacle. I couldn't go any higher. I was the president of the company, you know, so like, and I wasn't gonna move, so like, what's next for me? And I was young, I was, uh, That was 13 years ago. I'm 47. So however old I was, 34, 34.

So what year was that?

Young boy.

That's when I got started. You said '11?

That was 2011. Yeah.

So I got started right after that.

2012, I got started. And so he said, so I said, well, you know, I need to borrow some money. I'd like for you to be a part of it. And, and so we borrowed $1.2 million. And he said, under two conditions, you hire my son, you hire my daughter.

No way.

And so I said, absolutely. And so his son became our IT guy. His daughter was like receptionist and operations, scrubbing applications, that sort of thing. And then a couple other guys ended up joining. And so we had a small team of 5. That, uh, that just started. And it was crazy because you go from making great money, right, to like making nothing. Zero.

Yeah.

And I had a 1-year-old, a 2-year-old, and a 4-year-old. Like, looking back on it, I'm like, what was I thinking? Yeah, you know. But like, in the moment, I, it wasn't— I never even questioned. I just knew.

Felt right.

Like, you know how to do this business, right? I know how to do this business. So I just never— that all those fears just never creeped in, thank God. Yeah. Because it may have kept me from going for it.

100%. That stops most people from doing it.

But thankfully, I just never even thought about it. But when I tell people now, I had a 1-year-old, a 2-year-old, and a 4-year-old and like started over. That sounds like, like, you know, what were you thinking? You know, but there comes a point where in all of our lives it's like you come to a crossroads and you have a choice to make. Do you want to be complacent or you want to go for it? And thank God, you know, my biggest cheerleader was my wife.

I was going to ask.

Yeah, she— because she could have very much have been like, let's brakes on it. Yeah, right. Like, man, that's too too risky. Yeah, we've got these kids, like, what if it doesn't work? Never once did she say that to me. Never once did she say, what if it doesn't work? You know, it was just— she's— it was the opposite. It's like, whatever you want to do, I'm with you.

Yeah. And that's so sick.

There we go.

Yeah, Steph was the same way, dude. I've, I've had a lot of people over the years struggle because spouse, one or the other just kills them with the negative negativity. And what if it failed? What if all the negative stuff, you know, and same Steph didn't question this once. And I same quit a job. I wasn't making crazy money. I wasn't present, but I was— we were paying the bills barely. And quitting was like, you have— you go from $40,000 to nothing.

That's right.

That's a nutty, insane— she was like, go for it, do it, knock yourself out.

Yeah, it's all relative, right?

Yeah.

If you're making $40,000 a year and that's, that's that's the lifestyle you're living, then going to $20,000 a year is tough. Yeah, like 50% pay cut, right? So whether you're making that, $500,000, a million, like it doesn't matter. Pay cut's pay cut. And we all live up to our lifestyle, right?

Yes, we do. Yeah, it's wild, dude. Yeah, such a neat journey.

How's the—

so the one question that's— and this is selfish question because I need to get better at it. You said this, putting the sales guy in charge of running shit. Yeah, that's how I feel. I'm like, I sell stuff. I— how'd you, how'd you adapt? How'd you— because I've been— your team is sick, dude.

Thank you.

Um, and which I love, you know, the other part, totally off, completely off topic of my question, the 29029. Yeah, some of your guys. So I'm going in August to Whistler.

Awesome.

Yeah, I assume— what's it— what's your guy's name, the one I met that has done it multiple times?

Thomas.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I assume he's going this year.

Thomas is doing trail. He's doing 290.29 trail. So that you run 3 marathons in 3 days at Lake Tahoe.

I don't know about that one.

I know it's a whole different beast. Do the mountain first. Yeah. And then work your way to trail. Trail will be tough. It's all hard.

Yeah.

It's all hard. But there's a lot of lessons. There's a ton of lessons that you'll learn up on that mountain.

I can't wait to do it. It was neat getting— when I first started thinking about it, your team was there. Funny enough, I— someone, uh, Kohler's who got me in. Yeah, because it was sold. It sold out in 3 seconds. It sold out before it was to the public because when you do it, it's available to previous entrants first. So I couldn't even get in when I wanted to. And dude, I told him, this is obviously Cat did it.

Yep.

And I'm like, he asked about it one day and I'm like, yeah, I couldn't get in, sold out. He goes, hold on. Dude made a phone call, next day I had the— I was in.

Yep.

And I think it's someone in your circle. I don't know who he called.

Yeah, he called me and I called Thomas.

Did he call you direct? I didn't know that. Yeah, well, I appreciate it, bro, because I'm going because of that phone call.

Yeah, no, man, it's been a great part. Those are great guys, really real one-run company. Um, and the guy that— one of the founders of that, got named Jesse Itzler.

Love him.

And, um, and so what— tonight, another good takeaway for anybody listening he calls it a masogi. Yes. And a masogi. And so you've got your masogi for the year, which is you want something that's so hard, one thing on the calendar that's so hard that it kind of either dictates the rest of the year or it gives you something really that as you look back on your life and it's hard to remember like what you did yesterday, but you will never forget you will never forget your masogis, those big hard things that are super challenging but doable, you know, whatever those things are. And yours is going to be 29029, and it's a beast.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. I did two this year, so I did a marathon earlier in the year. I've never done— I did a 5K once. Yeah, and I did a marathon. I was like, holy smokes. But I like Itso's stuff, and his— I got to speak on stage right after him maybe like 2 years ago. Yeah, I don't— for like 2 seconds.

He's, he's a good dude. He's awesome.

Um, what I was going to ask is the management stuff. What advice do you have for sales guy trying to— how'd you get to manage that, dude? I have— we have 4 people in here, and some days I just— I someday I'm like, I think I speak to them like they're sales guys. I start, you know, man, I struggle with it. Um, so I'm trying to learn that side of it. Because I've only managed the 1099 guys. I don't have a big internal team. It's all, let me find a guy like you who wants to manage some 1099. And I taught a guy like you to manage a bunch of 1099s. So I cut and copy and pasted that model. Yep. I didn't do like, let me grow my internal team just because I was so bad at it. I'm like, I gotta go at this a different way. Sure. But I am trying to learn it. So any advice you can give, you know what I mean? Like, what have you learned over the years, man?

Um, So one of the benefits of having Steve, who had done it before, he had built the previous company, which is called Game Plan. He had built Game Plan and sold it for a lot. And so whenever you have someone that's kind of been there and done that, like, you don't need to recreate the wheel, just do what they tell you to do. And so I'm channeling Steve here. And what Steve said, and we had one point, you know, we had some cash, right? So like if you're starting with nothing, then like this is probably not the best advice. But if you have a little bit of money, a little seed money and you're starting something, it's what are the things that you can hire that are not your skillset, right? So for us, the very first person that we hired was a CFO.

Got it.

And so I think most people would never ever do that. They would just kind of figure it out with Excel, you know, payroll small when you first start. But we hired a CFO right out of the gates. So then that way I didn't have to think about it and Steve didn't have to think about it because neither one of us are good with, you know, with that. Yeah. Yeah. And then the next, You know, we had an IT guy, right? Like, could we have figured out how to restart computers when things aren't working? Of course. But having people that are, that like, you know, that's their expertise in those different roles. Like we did that early on and, you know, operations. You want a bunch of sales guys scrubbing annuity or life applications? Right. Well, a lot of companies have their sales guys doing that.

Yeah, I did it. And so, yeah, it's not good typically.

It's not. And that's because, you know, your sales guy, let's say they're making $200 an hour, $300 an hour, or maybe your best guys are making $500 an hour, $1,000 an hour. Well, if you've got someone that's making $500 an hour, doing $20 an hour work, then you got a problem. Yeah. Right?

You're very inefficient.

Yeah. And so that's a great filter is like, you know, how much do you make? How much does your sales guys make per hour? And anything, any job that they're doing, that's, if they're making $100 an hour and it's a $50 an hour job, well, that's probably doesn't make sense. Right. You need to go find the, the $50 an hour person who probably is better at that job than the sales guy that's trying to do both. That's probably not good at it in the first place. Um, but, but you're making them do it and I made them, I mean, same thing. But that was just one thing that I've learned through the years is like, as soon as you can afford to hire, like, and if you don't like managing people, you, as soon as you can hire someone to manage people and do what you don't want to do, you need to do it. So it's because you're probably not that great at it anyways because it's not your passion. Your passion—

mine is not—

is— I know. I mean, I— yeah, I think I know. Well, what is your passion, man?

I love, um, I love helping. You know what it really drives deep is the kids. Yeah, it all comes down to the kids. So like, I love helping people get to a point financially where they can impact their kids in a different way like I've been able to. Yeah, you know, and I just, I love that piece of it. Even if it's staff, like Amanda has twins. I mean, I love that she can do cool stuff with her twins because I put in the work and then she— I was able to hire her for that, but then she put in the work here to help grow our company. I mean, so it's like helping even, even though she's not in a sales role. Yeah, I still like that piece of it. But for me, it's like, how can I give back to people who want to achieve big things for their family and just tell— be wide open about the mistakes I made and kind of help guide them through the darkness of the sales side or leadership side or building a team? It's like, I like helping people build to a new level so they can provide a crazy financial security for their kids. It's all about the family from it, you know what I mean? Like, I just love that piece. Yeah, dude, because I'm— dude, I would love everyone to get to live like our kids live. Yeah, that'd be dope. Yeah, you know, so it's fine. What I, what I struggle with is people who don't have the self-motivation, which is easy in a 1099 world.

Yep.

Yeah, I mean, I just move on, find new ones.

Um, they don't cost you anything.

Yeah, yeah. And now I'm learning to find like, all right, how can I find guys that employees that, you know what I mean, that want to do big things and then incentivize them as we grow the company to— but again, I don't like the, hey, did you do this today?

The micromanaging. But early on, it's part of it, just a requirement. Yeah, I don't know that there's any shortcuts. That's—

yeah, it makes the same answer as I tell the sales guys.

Yeah, that's a hard one. But I do know as soon as you can make the change, everyone benefits.

Yeah, 100%. Yeah, you're not 100%.

Yeah, you know, so they feel like you're going to benefit because you don't have to do it anymore.

Yeah.

And then they're probably going to enjoy it because you probably aren't that great at it.

Yeah, that I agree 100%. I'm not that great at it. Yeah, it's wild. Last thing my team told me, y'all, y'all had— did you have some kind of cool— do you golf?

Um, I, I Yes, but I'm not good and I don't golf together that often because I'm not good either. Yeah, I'm— I— the first time that I ever golfed was in St. Andrews, Scotland.

No way.

On the old course. And I swung the golf club because my agent— I was there on a trip, a game plan trip, 2005. And the guy's like, how'd you play this, this week? And I said, I haven't even swung the golf club. And he about had a conniption fit. He's like, you're in St. Andrews, the home of golf, and you haven't even— he's like, you're swinging this golf club. And, uh, and so I came back from that trip and took golf lessons because I'm like— because Kendra was like, if you're going to be in this industry, I think you need to learn how to play golf.

Yeah.

And so I took some golf lessons, and I've just never— if I can shoot a 95, I'm happy. Let's put it that way.

Dude, you and me are the same. Yeah, we should definitely play then, dude. I was a member at the club I've been there since like, I think, 2017. Dude, I've played more times in April than I did the first 7 years. Wow.

Are you at MCC? Yeah, right here. Yeah.

So Maddox started playing with his buddies at school in August. Okay, football season. Some of the kids left football to do golf. He's like, golf? His buddies invited him out and he fell in love with it. And I'm like— and I would play with like some of the guys in the business that— man, they hit the ball 350 yards and they get mad if it's more than 3 feet from the hole. And I'm like, well, that's the best shot ever. And they're pissed. I'm like, why are they slamming their club? I don't know, it went straight-ish. Yeah, you know. And, uh, so I started playing because— playing with him. So we go out and play 9. I haven't got down the 18 thing yet. That's a long day.

It's a long day.

But I go out and play 9 with Maddox all the time now.

And it's— well, when it's with your son, right, that's a whole nother thing.

Yeah.

Because when it's on a Saturday and you're with your friends, it's like you've been working all week. Yeah, it's hard to give up that family time. But man, when your kid's into it, that's awesome.

It's been fun.

That's awesome.

They told me— did you host a golf tournament? That's where I was getting— did y'all host something?

So what probably what they were seeing is we do these on-tour events and we, we typically have a celebrity that somehow, some way we're a part of their— just depends on what— in this case it was Bill Murray. Got it. And he had his Caddyshack golf tournament.

No way.

And so we got to bring down, I think maybe 20 of our teammates and our customers.

Dope.

And we set up something just like this and we do radio interviews. So we'll put Bill Murray, of course, on our radio network for all the shows that we produce. And it gives some financial advisors, back to that third-party credibility thing, like, why is Bill Murray? Like if Bill Murray were sitting here right now instead of me, people would be like, John, why the hell is Bill Murray doing interview with you. It's true. And so it's—

it changed things.

Yeah, it, it does. And so we've done, um, a lot of celebrity things just because our radio network has such a big reach. We reach like 15 million people every week.

Dang, dude.

And so it's, you know, now it's like if you want to— if you're Tucker Carlson and you have a book to sell, well, we're on like almost all the major AM talk radio. If Sean Hannity's on a station, we're probably on that station.

Got it. Makes sense, right?

And so, um, if you have a message that you'd like to get out there, then come on to our network. All we ask is for like 1 hour of your time. And, um, in the case of Bill Murray, you know, we, we brought him a check to his charity, his foundation, and, uh, in return he gives us a bunch of radio interviews and It's a, it's a lot of fun.

Yeah, that's so dope. Yeah, I love the, I love the angle, dude. It's cool stuff. Enjoy getting to know you.

Yeah, same.

Obviously we gotta do— we gotta set up dinner again soon. Um, but anything you want to end with? Any messages you want to pass? Any info you want to give out? You want people to follow stuff? Whatever you want, man.

If you're, uh, I guess if you're, you know, doing radio or television and you, you're looking for some help, then That's what we do. That's our niche. We'd love to try to help you. We focus again on the annuity side of the business. So you can keep writing all that life insurance with John. But no, man, just keep, you know, what we're doing when I say we, if you're an insurance agent and you're out there selling life insurance to people or you're selling annuities or a lot of these guys now they're doing it all. They're AUM, they're annuities, they're life insurance. They're helping these people retire with dignity. And it's like, we take a lot of slack in our space, but I don't know, like what could be more honorable than helping people retire? A, helping them retire, but helping them retire in a way that they can be proud of. And, you know, are there bad apples? Of course there's bad apples in every industry. But for the most part, I think people are trying to do the right thing and they're trying to help people in their community do that. And, you know, it's important. It's a job that you should be proud of. And I think us as the distribution, you know, we should be proud too, because for every family that has someone that passes away and your advisor hands them that check, hands that, that widow the check that allows them to keep their lifestyle going. Like, man, what could be better than, than that? You know, like, that's something to be proud of. And, and so just, uh, I know it's a grind. Business is hard everywhere. If there's money to be made, competition's good everywhere. So just really focus on what makes you different. And don't be afraid of that because there's a lot of people just like you out in the world that are looking for someone just like you and they don't want just the cookie cutter type of thing. You know, they're looking for, for someone that can be a little different in the space. And, and, um, so I just encourage everybody to like what makes them different, really think about that. And then, and then go spend some marketing dollars. Takes money to make money. Believe in the system and, uh, and just keep grinding.

I love it, dude. All simple things. Yeah, man, at its core, it's going out and doing it.

Simple but not easy. Yeah, yeah.

You know what's funny too? I always think about— and we'll kind of end with this— but like, man, there's so much opportunity out there. And what's nuts is, especially now that I've gotten to know a bunch of people at the school, like, there's a ton of people killing it in insurance. At my parents. Oh yeah, like, I know there's 6 of us that run like big-ass companies. Yeah, in each other's backyard.

Yep.

And never cross over each other.

Yeah, yeah, you know what I mean?

Like, never run into— this is never— we're never worried about like if he gets the business, I— you know, it's wild to me.

Yeah.

And there's a lot of other companies, obviously, you know, the Metro Atlanta is nuts.

Oh, for sure.

But in Kennesaw, Georgia, you know what I mean? He's a little Marietta, whatever. We're on the line. For those wondering. You know, it's wild how much opportunity there is and how many good people there are kind of helping out in that space.

Yeah.

Grow others and build big teams and give others opportunity and help clients.

And yeah, so, and like we started with, there's not a, there's not a right or a wrong way.

Yeah.

You know, like, because each of us, it'd be fun to maybe get all of us in a room one day and, um, and just share ideas. And there's probably some stuff that one of those guys would be like, that would never work. And for me, it's probably something I would say that almost always works. It just depends timing and it's the people that you have on your team and I don't know, it's just—

We should do it.

It'd be fun.

Would you do it?

That'd be fun. Oh, 100%.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I know a few of them that I'm pretty close with that would Definitely. I'll ask. I'll put it together if you want to do something.

I love doing stuff like that, right? Because you just can learn so much from each other.

You know the Bottoms?

I do know the Bottoms. We're not— my wife knows them better, but they're at the school.

And then Kyle Rice and them. He's a big guy at Aflac.

Yep. Trying to think.

There's another big one at the school. Something in my mind right now.

Well, he's that Your Integrity Oh, for sure.

Hunter. Yeah, Hunter's— yeah, I mean, I talked to him most days. Yeah, you know, so yeah, he's there too. He lives 3 houses down from me.

Yeah, so, so there's 5 right there. There's 5 people, you know. Yeah, but all— but very— but different niches.

Yeah, we're all very different. Yes, we don't actually do anything the same. Yeah, of those 5, they're all very, very different. Yeah, it'd be fun. Set something up.

Let's do it.

I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna text them all today.

Let's do it. I'll host it.

Hell yeah. Where you want to do it?

We'll do it in my office.

Heck yeah.

Yeah, bring them in.

Okay, I'm down. I'll reach out today. I love it. I enjoyed having you, dude.

Same, man.

I can't wait.

Congrats on, on your success. I'm always watching. I love, I love, uh, everything that you say because, you know, you, you've got that natural, um sales mind. Yeah, you know, like you, you— there's just things that I've shared so many things. I just send it. I love that on Instagram because I can just hit the little button and forward it right to the lady that runs my sales team. And it's like, man, this is a great— it's a great thing to think about.

I was wondering who was doing it besides Steph and my mom, so I appreciate it. Yeah, okay. Yeah, I love it, dude. I appreciate it. And, uh, you know, trying to do my best to I want to be a big piece of the industry as a whole.

Yeah.

I mean, just while we're here, why not help a bunch of people?

Yep.

On this path. I'm like, if this dipshit could figure it out, I'm sure a lot of y'all could.

Yeah. So whether this is done or not, I actually have a question. I'm curious. So who do you, do you listen to anybody like an Andy Elliott or, you know, from a sales perspective? Is there anybody that you are like that dude.

So Andy is one of them. I know him.

Okay. Yeah.

So I've met him. I've actually, funny enough, they, him and Bradley are in the insurance space on a real financial and it's under our umbrella. Okay. So they did, they're just, they distribute under.

Gotcha. World.

Um, so I've got to meet them a couple times. I've spent some time with Andy. He's cool as shit, dude. His culture at his office is unbelievable. Yep. So I know a lot of his, some of his guys too, his sales guys are dope. He's got these Macklin twins, this dude Danny Klein. And there's another guy that I'm blanking on his name right now, but I love his style. Andy Frisella, 75 Hard guy, I love. Jesse Itzler, I definitely follow.

Yep.

Mylette, former insurance guy. I love his stuff. I don't follow a ton of people, but right off the rip, those four for sure I see every day on my feed. Yeah. Mylette's podcast I listen to. Frisella has a podcast. I listen to. So I just like the— you know what I like is like, it's one of the funny things people ask, like why I keep working. I don't understand. I'm like, why do people ask me this regularly? I'm like, what? You know what I mean? I'm like, I don't feel like I've accomplished that. And I get— I'm not blind to like where we're at. But what I love about guys like that is they're— they don't— it's not about the money. That they all have it. Yeah, like an obnoxious amount of fu money. Yeah, those guys, all of them. And they just keep— it's like they love the hustle and the build and the grind and the development and the stretching themselves and hitting new levels. And, you know, it's like, you know, as you hit new levels, you realize, oh dang, it just keeps going up. Yeah, you know what I mean? And so I like their mentality. Kind of keeps me— I don't know if humble's the right word, but I'm like Dude, relative to these guys, I've done nothing in the world, you know. So it challenged me a lot too.

Sure.

I resonate with the guys a lot, and you know, I take a lot away from— because I'm by default, I can be a little negative internally, like I'm wired.

Yep.

So they, they keep me like positive and outlook and future, you know. I mean, I have to work on that a lot.

That's— man, that's— so I joined Jesse Itzler's mentorship program 2 years ago. And that's one of the things that I think about, like, why, like, what do I love about, about Jesse? And I would encourage, you know, anybody to have a mentor, have somebody that has been there and done that. You know, don't be listening to people that have never done anything that are just, are all talk. Go find people that have actually built businesses and listen to what they say and just do what they say. Um, but I find, I find with Jesse that it's like you sometimes as a business owner, like we have to be recharged, right? Like our teammates are looking at us to, to bring that energy and to bring that positivity and to bring that like, hey, you can do it. Like we can do this, you know, like, so if we're not bringing it, than who is in the organization. And so those guys, and for me it's Jesse, it's like, you know, he kind of recharges the batteries for me. He just, it's that shot of energy that does fade. And you'll see on 29029, when you're done, you're going to come home and the hardest part is going to be, how do I bottle this and not let it go and not forget how I feel right now? Because like a month later, it's gone. And so you got to figure out the things that you're doing in your life because not everybody can take 3 days and fly to Whistler or wherever you're going. And go do that or spend the money. 'Cause it's like, it's not cheap, right?

It's not.

And so, but there's other things that we can do where we can get those wins that continues the momentum.

Yeah.

And that's different, right? Maybe for you it's, I mean, I think you work out a bunch, right? And so like, that's the consistency of that. That's just building momentum in your life. And that's awesome. But maybe— and I'm just going to use this as an example— maybe you're not building that momentum with your kids, or maybe you're not building that momentum with your team. Maybe you're not building that momentum with your wife, with your parents, whatever it is. Right. And so it's just finding all those little areas where we can continue to build momentum, because the truth is we can't bottle up anything. We have to just keep recreating. That's so sick, the energy, right? And so you're gonna, when you come off of the mountain, remember this conversation because you're gonna be like, man, I wish I could bottle this up. And, and I— maybe there's a way. Maybe you'll figure out a way to do it.

I haven't, man. I don't know. I'm— I will keep it in mind though. I love Itzler's— how do you like the mastermind? His delivery is different than the other guys I mentioned.

Oh yeah, he's like a— oh yeah, softer delivery, smooth, very different.

Yeah, he ain't slowing down though.

No, no, Jesse.

So he has similarities in a lot of ways. Yeah, but how do you— I saw his master— I mean, you know Patrick Bedavid?

No, I don't know Patrick.

Uh, he just sold, um, and he ran PHP. Okay, big insurance company on my side of the world, um, for like $300 million.

Wow.

Yeah. And he runs Valuetainment also. I think they have how many subscribers, Reese? 5, 8 million subscribers on YouTube. I mean, it's insane. He's a beast in the industry. So I just joined his mastermind.

Yeah.

Because he's in the industry. But how do you like— I was reading about it the other day. It's like 2 levels or whatever.

Yeah. I love it, man. It's like, because what I love about it and what I love about Jesse is he gets me outside of my comfort zone.

Really?

And so you need people like that in your life. And even if it's not someone that you can meet, right? Like, maybe all you can do is watch a YouTube video from Andy Elliott. Maybe you're never going to meet Andy like you got the opportunity to do, but like, they can still push you and motivate you for free.

100%.

You just watch the YouTube clip. Maybe you have to watch a commercial, but like, That's free. Um, and with, with Jesse, it, for me, it was, I wanted to surround myself with people outside of my industry that are successful. Okay. So that was the number one thing that I was looking for in a mentorship group is like, how do I surround myself with people that just come from completely different backgrounds and do not do what I do? Because there's a lot we can learn from each other also. Right. Um, and then with Jesse's, it was, you get access to all his coaches, which I thought was really cool. And so you get like so many hours, just call it 100 hours that you can use with his personal coaches. So a lot of Jesse's program, you don't even talk to Jesse. You're, you're talking to the people that help make Jesse, Jesse.

No way.

Yeah.

And so his business coach, the people that coach him, the people that coach him, people he hired to coach you.

That's right.

So sick. I didn't know that.

Yeah.

It's really virtual deal.

A lot of it's virtual, but we meet some in-person. We're flying in July to Aspen. We did a deal here at his house. I don't know.

So sick.

A few months ago. And so we get together a couple of times a year and then We, um, we meet virtually, um, once a month.

Dope. Yeah, we'll talk to you more about it.

Yeah, it's cool, it's cool.

I need more of that in my life.

Yeah, it's just people that, you know, like one of them is a nutritionist and God knows I need that. I need to talk to her every day. Um, so sick. But her name's Mona and it's Mona Sharma and she is— will John Smith, the actor, his nutritionist. She lives in Hollywood. So it's someone I would never have access to. Right. But now she's my nutritionist. You can book it. Yeah. So I just have to book it. I just talked to her the other day and it's like, I probably would not be talking to a nutritionist if I wasn't in the program. But when you're in the program, you've already spent the money, you have the hours, you know, it kind of forces you to— there's a little skin in the game.

Yeah, right.

It's not free nor cheap. And so you want to maximize the program, and so therefore got to get outside of your comfort zone. Got to be talking to a nutritionist. I know what she's going to say.

Some of it's accountability.

Yeah, I know what she's going to say. But I need to hear it for sure. And, you know, so forth and so on with all the, all the coaches. It's cool. So yeah, man, absolutely.

Let's do it again soon and appreciate your time. Absolutely. Later.