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The 61-Year-Old Outselling Everyone on $2 Leads (Ep. 266)
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One agent takes about 40 inbound calls and writes $30,000. Another agent gets similar calls from the same source and writes nothing. That gap is what we unpack with Gary Michels, one of the top producers in the Las Vegas office, and the conversation gets brutally practical about what actually moves the needle in inbound life insurance sales.
We talk about what an inbound lead really is, how the economics work, and why you cannot judge success by one weird call where someone thinks it’s “free.” Gary explains how he approaches inbound leads as a law-of-averages game, why taking most calls matters for volume, and how focusing on the script beats trying to outsmart the process. We also dig into one-call close habits, why callbacks can quietly destroy your week, and simple ways to qualify early so you don’t waste time when someone can’t receive texts or doesn’t have a way to pay.
This episode goes beyond tactics into the habits that keep producers consistent: daily preparation, staying in a Zoom room or office environment where you hear winning conversations all day, and getting comfortable asking for help. Gary shares how his background in door-to-door sales shaped his work ethic, why “input equals output” is a real performance lever, and how purpose and accountability keep you showing up even when you feel off.
*****DISCLAIMER******
Results mentioned in this content are not typical and are not a guarantee of future performance. Individual results will vary based on a number of factors, including but not limited to experience, market conditions, product availability, and individual effort. Any examples, case studies, testimonials, or income figures shown are for illustrative purposes only and may not be representative of the experience of other individuals. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Insurance and annuity product guarantees are subject to the claims-paying ability and financial strength of the issuing company. FFL USA does not provide tax, legal, or accounting advice. Consult your own tax, legal, and accounting advisors before engaging in any transaction.
Why Inbounds Become Streaky
SPEAKER_02All right. What's up, everybody? Thank you for joining us. Today we have Gary Michaels with us. Who, if you don't know Gary, he is one of the top producers. He runs circles around everybody in the Las Vegas office. He just did twenty sales did you do on inbounds? About 30,000. And how many did you take? Maybe took 40 calls. 40 calls, you wrote 30,000. So we're going to talk about inbounds because the some other people in here got the same calls and wrote nothing from the same vendor. What do you have to say about that when that happens?
SPEAKER_00Well, it's yes, you have to keep dialing for sure because or keep taking the calls, I mean, because it goes in streaks. I I my first two weeks I got$30,000 and then I had 20 no's in a row, but then I got two more sales again. So it's just a game of numbers. That's that's the main thing, and stick with it.
Door To Door Work Ethic
SPEAKER_02Now, how long have you been in sales? Since college. Okay. And give us a little bit about your background. How'd you end up in life insurance sales?
SPEAKER_00So um when I was in college, I sold books door-to-door with a company called Southwestern. There um about 3,000 college students do that every summer. And I was blessed to back in the 80s make 105,000 in three summers. And I stayed with the parent company, still with them today, 42 years later, doing five startups. Southwestern group, right?
SPEAKER_02And they're in insurance with Family First Life. That's right. So they looked at the insurance industry, they said, why don't we just build an agency with Family First Life? Yeah. And tell us a little bit about what they do. Because I bought like$700 worth of books from a kid that knocked on my door and was pitching Southwestern Group. And it was, I thought he said it went to charity or something like that. I don't remember. Or no, that's not what he said. He said, if I don't want the books, they'll give them to charity.
SPEAKER_00That's right. That's right. So the whole idea is these are reference books to this day still that help kids in their homework and tests to get ready for college, pretty much. And they start all the way in elementary school, all the way to high school. And what they teach the college kids how to do is have a great work ethic. So um when we work in the summertime, we're working 80 hours a week. There's actually a an award called the Gold Seal Gold Award, which is working 80 hours a week, six days a week, early morning all the way till late night. Um knock in time is what's called 7.59 in the morning, and you work till nine o'clock at night, and then six days a week. So so like it's it's crazy how in this business, Saturday's money day, and we have some people that take Saturday off. It blows my mind. It's just something that that I'm used to doing. And and I remember learning from you, Andrew, when when I first met you, you said you would dial on Sundays to get ahead for Monday, right? And and that's like what I'm always thinking is like if we know so many people in this business fail and and the 10% or more succeed, I want to do everything I can to do what the 10% are doing to be successful and let's get ahead.
SPEAKER_02So now, can you talk about how you learn sales door to door and then how much that's helped you as you've transitioned to life insurance? And is this easier?
Work Hard Then Play Hard
SPEAKER_00Is life insurance easier than some books? I think so in a way, because we're not out knocking on doors, you know, 13 and a half hours a day. We can do it in the comfort of our home or in an office. Um, but I do think it's a little bit harder mentally because of the financial investment involved in it. And if you have a if you have a bad day or a bad week, it it gets into your head. And um, and so it's so important, I think, to be constantly every day pouring positive things into your head, putting the right people around you. Because if if if you're not if input, I always say if input isn't right, exput, export isn't gonna be right, you know.
SPEAKER_02So yeah, and for people watching, Gary's the definition of being a student of success. He does a call every single day. What tell us about your call you do every single day that anybody can get on that's completely free.
SPEAKER_00We were doing it every week, we were doing it six days a week. Now we're doing it four days a week. Okay. Okay. We do it Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, 8 a.m. in the morning Pacific. And yes, it would be awesome if you guys want to join. Um, 8 a.m. Pacific and um 11 Eastern, we call it a morning impact call. And we have different speakers all over the country that are succeeding in this business, both in sales and leadership. Um, and then on Saturday, I do a leadership call. I just feel it's important because so much of this business is building a team. But if you are building a team and you don't know how to lead, all right, um, it's a it's a forum where people can come Saturday mornings and and learn how to lead. So uh we've had a lot of success on it. Had tons of Hall of Fame producers, Hall of Fame agencies been on, Sean's been on, you've been on, and and uh we have a great speaker.
SPEAKER_02But dude, thank you for doing that because you don't have to do it. You do it because you love teaching people success. I do, and you love helping people, right? And people, they're not on your team, you're helping everybody all the time. You're also in Zoom every day. And it's funny because Brett texted me uh the other day and he said, I think it was you. He said, out of all the people in the company, at 5 p.m., there was only two people in left in the Zoom, and it was you and him.
SPEAKER_00Me and him, and often we're we're the first ones on in the morning and the last ones to leave. But but Andrew, it's like I still play hard. Like that's what people don't get, is like you can be the hardest worker, but still you can have when you're not working, you can also play hard. I think people get the I I always believe in the either and it shouldn't be either or it should be either and you can work hard and play hard and have a good personal life with your daughter and and your girlfriend and your family and and doing fun things.
SPEAKER_02The biggest thing for me, so when I first started, I felt like a I created my own prison. Okay, because I was always working. And then there's a guy named Barry Clarkson, he actually runs Equist, another another company, not FFL, right? Dude, great leader, and he would get on the call, he would get on the call when I worked with him back in the day, early in my career, and he would say every week, he would say two things that I'll never forget. One of them was you can't beat the numbers, and the numbers can't beat you. And I never really understood what he meant early on, but what he was saying is if you don't put the activity in, you can't cheat the numbers, you're not gonna get the numbers long term. And on the flip side, if you do put the activity in, the numbers can't cheat you. Like so, if you're if you consistently put this activity in, the numbers will work out. The numbers can't beat you.
SPEAKER_00And from the numbers, you learn your mistakes. Yeah. That's that's been my thing is like I've grown my sales every year, and and now I'm trying to look at what would it take to do a million this year because people are walking off on this across the stage to 1.5, and I'm thinking, man, Hall of Fame, that's like it's crazy.
Starting Broke With Old Leads
SPEAKER_02Yeah, you know, but the other thing Barry Clarkson always said is he said, if you spend 50% of your time, uh 50% of your focus when you're working, then you're gonna spend 50% of your focus when you're having fun and enjoying your family. Because while you're with your family, you're gonna be thinking about work. And while you're at work, since you only gave 50% to your family, you're gonna be thinking about your family. And so you're never free. You create your own prison and you cannot get out of it. So the only way to be free if you're self-employed is to go hard, work hard, so you can play hard. And I, dude, that was I was 18, dude. That was like almost 19 years ago. And you still live it today, and I still remember it to this day. So crazy. All right. Um, we could talk all day long, but one thing I do want to talk about is it I got a few questions for you. If you're brand new, what's your advice to somebody to start? And also, how much did you write off of silver and bronze old leads when you started?
SPEAKER_00That's good, that's good. So started five years ago here in Vegas, and I was driving all over town, and I was in person, of course, and it was the$4 leads, and often they were on sale for three bucks. And first year$260, but it wasn't a full year, second year$440, third year$430. And I wasn't working the full year. I got married that year. So, and those were all off$4 leads, and um yeah, and four dollar leads, all final expense, too. Yeah, because we didn't really have IULs at that point, really. I remember you doing like why were you doing only old leads? Because I don't remember there being more expensive leads, honestly. Or you just didn't know about them. I didn't know about them. So that and and that's what that's what I was told to run and just run a lot of them. And uh, yeah.
SPEAKER_02That's awesome. All right. What are some what are give us some tips for someone who's caught because I want this to be let's face it, dude. People don't get in this industry because they're making a bunch of money. They usually get in the industry because they have no money, and that's okay. But if you don't have any money and you're scared to buy leads, give them a plan and also go through a phone script of calling an older lead.
Dial Early To Build Confidence
SPEAKER_00So I'm learning more and more every day how important it is to get them dialing early. And so when we hire a new person, or not hire, but bring on a new person, want them to get through the class as quickly as possible. And we want them to be studying in the evenings and dialing during the day for their leader. Um we've seen a major change of success when they're dialing early and we're paying them it's just a little bit of money. Eight bucks an appointment,$100, that becomes a deal. And Andrew, I've had a few people that it was a pretty good sized deal that they're setting appointments for me, and I paid them$300 because it was a it was a bigger deal. But I tell them that that money that you're making during that dial time will be your first lead spend. And so if we make two grand, you're gonna go all in two grand. Okay. So that I don't get the lead objection really because now because they're earning money dialing. And the ones that are dialing are have more confidence. So I want someone dialing early on to get that confidence because I'm finding if they come into an office, they come into our office here, they come on Zoom and they can hear it, and they're dialing, those are the ones that are writing policies. The the ones that are not connected to a Zoom room or the office and aren't dialing are just falling off. And I've just, it's taken many years, many, many mistakes of learning that. But if people are around it and dialing, that's where the success comes. So, anybody new watching this, you got to start dialing and figure out a way to either get a loan, dial the$1 leads to 50 hours a week, 60 hours a week to make a sale. We had Reggie here in the office. It's been kind of in that tough spot. And he just dialed, he was the first one here with me, working late, and then he got made$2,200, then he bought, he bought$800 in better leads, and then he wrote three policies off that. So he put the grind in first to get himself to be in a position to buy better leads. So that that's that's my recommendation for someone new coming in. If you're not dialing, you're not making money, you're not growing, eventually you'll quit. That's I really believe that. As far as what was the second question about scripts or something like that? Yeah, go through a phone script of calling an old lead. An old lead. It's not much different than a regular lead. Okay. Hey, my name is Gary. I'm the local field underwriter here in Clark County. And I just wanted to give you a call real quick. Um, we were doing an audit, and sometime back you had filled out a form requesting information on the state regulated life insurance. I'm the one that's been assigned your case. I have you listed at 123 Main Street, and your birthday is 4265. Do you want to grab a pen real quick and I share with you what we found? Okay, so the pivot is the audit. And I think also my sales last year and this year so much better because I'm just pivoted to one call closes. That's it's just I'm seeing across the board people that are setting appointments. It's just so frustrating. It's mentally beaten you up by calling someone back and then they don't pick up the phone. And, you know, maybe 50% of those appointments that you set won't even pick up the phone. And then it just, ugh. So knowing how to do one call close and asking for the business right away, asking to get on a call right away, if they tell you go grab a notepad real quick and they don't grab a notepad and they say, Oh, I can do it later on, then I'll of course take an appointment. But but every time trying to get on a phone right away is huge.
SPEAKER_01Mm-hmm.
One Call Close Phone Script
SPEAKER_02That's huge. Okay. Now, what if somebody says I filled it out, I already got it taken care of? Because what I've learned from um what I've learned from listening to the inbound calls because they're recorded is agents are not very new agents are not very good. Because they're letting things go. And there was, I remember this point in time when I was new. I was very uh shy, and I wasn't pushy at all. Okay. And I would go to people's houses and people would be watching TV because we had to go to people's houses not that long ago. Uh, they'd be watching TV, they wouldn't be listening to me. One of my questions when I got around top producers was how do you get people's attention? And then my favorite answer was Sean Mike when he was like, You take their remote, turn their TV off, and you tell them, This is so important, I'm not gonna do your family a disservice unless you watch TV, which I did start doing, and it did start working, which was kind of crazy. But I was shy, and then I there was this one point in time where I realized I was people were telling me, I like you, I'm gonna buy from you, but I'm not gonna buy from you right now. And they go, I'll call you back. And out of thousands of appointments, guess how many people called me back? Zero, zero, never one, never one time did somebody call me back. So I'm like, okay, um, I'm not helping these people. Okay. So there was this one appointment where I was like, I'm not letting them off. I'm going to get uncomfortable and push them, even though they're it might be a little bit uncomfortable, but I'm gonna push them to get it done. And I sat there through the uncomfortable situation and I just kept going, look, like if something happens, I'm not taking no for an answer. Like you, you said you need it, and it was very uncomfortable and awkward, but they ended up getting insurance and they ended up getting protected. So, how do you learn to go through that uncomfortable when people tell you no situation and keep pushing to get the yes?
Preparation Beats Fear
SPEAKER_00Well, I I live by this quote: the pain of discipline is easier than the pain of regret. And I know for a fact, Andrew, that there's two main emotions that people experience one is fear and one is confidence. And the only difference between fear and confidence is level of preparation. And I think in our industry, the people that are failing, they're just not prepared because they're not listening to the podcast in the car. They're not coming into an office, they're not on Zoom, they're not taking the time in the non-peak hours or even during the peak hours to listen and sit next to people that are doing it. Right. Okay. But I just in the office here, I see people that come every day and they get better and better and better because you have six, eight, 10, 15 people around you all doing it and it's subconsciously going into your head, right? Okay. And people try to figure it out. Um, I was talking to Gustin, who's gonna be on the call tomorrow. And he said the first time around when he came here, he didn't listen. Okay. And he said the second time around, I called Grady and said, I'm willing to do everything you tell me to do. And this time he's crushing it. He's gonna talk about it on the morning call tomorrow. Um, and that's where I think people really can grow here is by putting your guard down a little bit and saying, for the first 90 days, I'm gonna do everything that you tell me to do because you've been there and you've done it. And too many people try to figure it out on their own. And so preparation. Like I say, for every eight hours you're working, there should be a half hour of preparation. And so that means if you're you're, you know, are you spending three and a half hours a week honing your honing your own?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but people are becoming success zombies and they're not actually doing anything except listening to tapes and listening to other people. So there's a fine line between studying and actually doing it.
SPEAKER_00Right. Well, it's both. Again, it should be either and as opposed to either or. It needs to be putting yourself around people and doing it. Because I got people on my team, and I'm sure you've had over there's 10 years to get ready. No, that's that's crazy.
FFL.tv Zoom Room Training
SPEAKER_02Okay, so speaking of that, you you're on Zoom every day doing this live. People can watch you and learn from you every single day. How do they get in there? How do they do it?
SPEAKER_00Well, our Zoom room is FFL.tv. And then, and we're what Brett and I have been doing is we've been staying in the main room during the day. And if someone needs extra help, we go into a breakout room. And then we have so many things, we have so many extra things, guys. We have a Spanish breakout room in there. We have um an orientation every Wednesday at noon. If you're new in the business and you just want to get kind of a quick overview of the business and what's available, every Wednesday at 12 noon, we do an orientation. Um, Riley, who's who's really she's a school teacher that's gone full time this last half of the year and she's crushing it right now, both in recruiting and in sales. She does a new agent training from a teacher's mentality every Wednesday night at five o'clock, where a new agent come in there and ask questions and feel like they're not alone. So definitely coming into our Zoom room and our community is.
SPEAKER_02And you'll help anybody. Anyone, and you just go to FFL.tv. That's the website. That's right. FFL.tv. Reach out to us for the password. We're not going to put it out the password because we got Zoom bombed. And that's right.
SPEAKER_00I remember that.
SPEAKER_02The password was public, and next thing you know, describe what happened in our Zoom.
SPEAKER_00We were in the middle of a podcast, and some guy came on and started talking porn, and it was like crazy, and we couldn't even shut it off. That's how that's how they took over.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And it was very disturbing. Things I don't ever want to see again were playing on our Zoom. And we couldn't turn it off. That's how much power they had. That was crazy. Yeah. Yeah. That was nuts. Okay. Um, so I think something I often see happen is a new agent gets in there, but they don't talk, they don't do anything, they don't connect with anybody, and they kind of just go away. They're not truly getting help. What's a good way to actually get in there and build connections? Do you just ask for help?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think, and I'm seeing more of this that new people are coming in and they're actually introducing themselves. Okay, because we don't know necessarily because our group is such a mixture of a lot of different people. And you have to be proactive and introduce yourself and say, hey guys, I'm new at this. I'm gonna be in here now. I'm Gary, I'm you know, and introduce yourself. And then I also think leaders need to, if they don't recognize somebody ask. Yes. So take responsibility and leave it on them. Right. And not be afraid to tell somebody to turn on their darn camera and unmute because that's that's a tough one. I I remember when I first started out, although I can get in front of, you know, 50,000 people and speak, but I was nervous on my first, you know, Zoom room of like coming unmuted and having a bunch of people that know about this business. And then that really quickly changed because I realized I need feedback. How am I ever going to know what I'm doing wrong unless I can do it out loud and someone could let me know what I'm doing wrong? And and so it kind of goes back to that pain of discipline is either easier than the pain of regret again. It's because the the discipline of maybe being embarrassed, but but everybody in there had their first style too and their first unmute, and they probably all had those same feelings. So I encourage anybody that's listening to this to don't be afraid to go in there. It's a gift, it's a gift that we've been given to get the coaching from people that are doing this and doing well at it.
Ask For Help And Be Annoying
SPEAKER_02Yeah. There's uh I'm gonna say this. I'm gonna actually get the correct name. Okay. So I've said this many times, but I'm gonna say it again. Atlas, my son, has a children's book called The Boy, The Mole, The Fox, and the Horse. And it's a kid, a little boy talking, and Atlas loves animals, so he loves this book. And he's talking to these animals uh about life. Okay. And the horse, the boy asked the horse, What is the hardest thing you've ever done? And the horse's answer was ask for help. And when I read that, I'm like, bro, I have struggled with going, look, I don't know what I'm doing. I need help. And I've let pride and ego get in the way of that, right? Many times. And I know other people do the same thing, but especially in this industry, you have to put your hand up and you have to ask for help. Actually, I'm gonna go a step further. You have to be annoying asking for help. And I'm gonna share this with you. There, one of the one of my top producers, when he was new, called me so much I was having nightmares that my phone was ringing and he was calling me. Okay. Now, after a month, he didn't need me anymore. And all of a sudden, you have this uh profitable agent building a team within your company. So I always tell people, I want you to bug me so much that I'm gonna make that joke about you. And I've noticed that the people that do really well, they're not scared to call and ask and ask. And you got to remember this people are making money if you make sales. You're not calling them for it's not free advice they're giving you. They're making money if you do well. Now, if you just don't do anything and bug people with no activity, don't do that. But what's your opinion on that?
Age Does Not Limit Production
SPEAKER_00That's the first note when I go back to my office. I'm gonna write down because I need to be better, I think, at that, of letting them know because I do speak with them all when they first start and I, you know, launch them, but I don't tell them, I don't go deep enough. Bug me, bug me, bug me. I I think I can go deeper in that. I think you're 100% right. And bug others in a good way. Like I've called so many leaders in this company that aren't even my upline asking for support, but I still feel uncomfortable, you know, sometimes because like when I have guests come on the morning call, they're I'm asking something of them, and there's a little bit of nervousness, but but I know that it's good for everybody, and you just do it. And then when you're done, they're happy to do it. That's the crazy thing is we get nervous sometimes about things we shouldn't even be nervous of. Fear is so crazy, it stands for false evidence appearing real, right? And we're nervous about things we shouldn't even be nervous about often. It's crazy.
SPEAKER_02All right. Does age matter? I'm 61. I don't think so. Bro, you're and you're killing everybody in here. What do you have for the month?
SPEAKER_00I know for the year of I've I've um written$250,000. You ran$250,000. What are you gonna hit at the end of the year? I'm shooting for a million, but you know, I'm just gonna give it my best.
SPEAKER_02So you're gonna do a million dollars personally with no recruits, an issue paid premium, which means you're probably gonna make a million dollars by selling insurance yourself.
SPEAKER_00And I'm spending a lot of time recruiting too. So, you know, that's it's easy, it's both.
SPEAKER_02But you're killing everyone in here. You got these young kids coming in, they talk this big game, and you just smash them in numbers.
SPEAKER_00Why? I think I'm working harder than anybody else in here, which I learned from you and Sean and just who I am.
SPEAKER_02Oh, you're working harder because if I come here on Saturday, there's one person here. You if I come here on Sunday, I don't come on Sundays, but I've seen you here on Sunday before.
SPEAKER_00I think. Maybe one time. But I Sundays I'm pretty pretty religious about um Sundays church. A day of rest. Yeah. And maybe an hour prepare for the next week, but but you're recharging on Sundays.
What Inbound Leads Really Are
SPEAKER_02What church do you go to? The Crossing. Is that a Catholic church? Christian. Oh, nice. Where's it at? On Windmill. Awesome. How long have you been going there? Since I've been here five years. Awesome. Yeah. Cool, man. Um let's get into inbounds. This thing, we need to talk about this. So in describe every to everybody what an inbound is. Oh, first I want to go back to your your million dollars. So, you how much do you spend on uh on leads a week?
SPEAKER_00Probably two grand. Okay, so you're because I'm but I'm three different lead vendors right now, and I'm constantly like I'm willing to try a new lead vendor. If it's not working, I'll try something new. I know people say stay with something, but the beauty of being in an office and being around other people is you hear what's working.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but the thing is that's different with you is you're always trying multiple things. What a lot of people do is they try one thing, stop, try another thing, stop, try another thing, stop. You have four or five things going on at one time, so you can rotate things out. Yep. Yeah, like there's a big difference between what you're doing and what we're telling people not to do, which is start something two weeks later, stop something. Start something, two weeks later, stop something.
SPEAKER_00So I'm in a Facebook campaign. Um, I'm doing the inbound leads and I'm doing ethos leads.
SPEAKER_02That's it. Custom Facebook campaign, inbound leads, ethos leads. I want to talk about inbounds. Tell everybody what that is, how it works, and that way they can wrap their mind around it. Because I believe that takes us to a billion dollars.
Follow The Script Word For Word
SPEAKER_00And I made a mistake and fixed it, and the second time around, it's better. So um, you had somebody come in the office and talk about inbound leads about a year ago, and I tried them and I thought I knew better than the guy that was teaching. And he said, follow the script and do it this way, and I didn't, and I quit after 12 calls. Honestly. Then I saw inbounds coming back at convention, and I'm thinking, man, if we can get that going and teach it to our new agents, so at least they're having conversations because repetition's gonna give them that practice they need. Um, I want to lead by example and and do inbounds and figure it out. And so second time around, um, the gentleman that shared this opportunity said, Hey, you're gonna go through all the training, five trainings, and you're gonna actually learn word for word the scripts. And actually, it's been good because a lot of the scripting is word tracks I use in all my presentations now, which is crazy. And I believe so much in scripts, but it's just sometimes good that we all get stuck in our ways, and sometimes just a good checkout from the neck up to kind of kind of re-reengage. It's huge. So um I actually, as part of the training, had to give the presentation to their trainer, and um and I just follow the script. And um, and sure enough, like I said, the first two weeks it was$30,000. Um, and you know, when they say this, you say this and the whole thing and the order of it. So I it's it's crazy because after five years of doing this, I still got my script in front of me and I're reading it word for word. And and if I'm off just a little bit, I notice a difference in in how the person reacts.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's funny though, because a lot of people think inbounds is easy because they sell everything, but a lot of people get their butt kicked. And then you got people like you, which you had to actually learn the script and everything. And then you got Eric Schmidt, who he just sells. I mean, he's just an animal. Um, but there's a lot of people having a lot of success. But I want to talk about, and if you if you message us, we'll give you the three companies we have seen to be successful with inbounds. There's three of them, they all do things a little differently. You can pick how you want to do it. I think it all ends up being pretty similar at the end of the day. Um, it's just some have longer buffers of how long you can be on the phone before you take before you have to pay for the lead. But dude, when I heard that somebody can call you and you get to talk to them, and if you hang up, you don't have to pay for the lead. I was like, this can't be real.
SPEAKER_00But but one thing I've learned though is if you're trying to think how I can save money by getting off the call, you should think how I can get better at the script and take all the calls. Unless it's crazy where you can't hear them or there's a language barrier or something, obviously you're gonna give up those calls. But I found that I'm just gonna take all my calls. Okay. And and I also learned a little bit about how if you're not taking every call or not taking most of them, your priority is getting new calls isn't gonna be the same. So so I've just taken them and and I looked at it like I was paying$25 per per inbound. And what if I have 10 bad ones in a row or even 20 bad ones and I spend 500 bucks, but then I close three in a row and I make 2400 bucks. That's still a five to one ROI, but I had 20 chances, and then that's on me. I think often when I'm outbound dialing and I'm pretty good at outbound dialing, it's there's a lot I can't control.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00If they don't pick up the phone, I can't control anything then, but at least I have a conversation, you know? And so I think that's the mentality of a person that wants to do inbound leads. You have to know that they're not all going to be the best calls, but you're gonna get a chance, you're gonna get a chance to swing every time. And then it's on you, which makes you study better and and and and practice it and know your objections and know how to build rapport and how to qualify. And those are all things that we need to know in this business. And like I said, so often since I've gotten that new script, in my little one-liners and things in my regular presentation, I'm using from that script. Crazy. Yeah.
Free Callers And Lead Cost Reality
SPEAKER_02Now, a lot of people, for some reason, when they call in, uh basically, this is the way an inbound works. Somebody runs an ad, the person clicks it, and it goes straight to an agent. Okay. But sometimes people think it's free. Have you run have you run into that? A lot. You have. Okay. Now, if you hang up, do you pay for the lead? Yeah, well, and the one I'm doing is 10 seconds, so pretty much. Okay. So the one you're doing, you have 10 seconds, but the lead's how much? 25 bucks. 25 bucks. Or basically you can pay 50 and you have 90 seconds to hang up.
SPEAKER_00Right. But but what a Andrew, I had that before, okay. And you don't really have you haven't built enough rapport yet. You haven't known their why. You haven't gotten into what kind of insurance they would need. You haven't gotten into their health, you haven't built enough trust yet to have an opportunity to properly close them.
Zoom Out And Trust Averages
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I agree. And I've heard a lot of people that think it's free end up buying. But a new agent, dude, they could get one of those and they think the world's ending because the person thought it was free. How do you get agents to understand this is a numbers game and don't be so judgmental about one individual lead? And the way I was taught is if I had if I paid 20 bucks for a lead in 2008, I was pissed, dude, if they said I didn't fill it out. And I had their signature on a piece of paper that they filled it out. And I'd be like, bro, that's three hours of me at the grocery store that I just spent on this lead. Like eight bucks an hour. I basically after taxes, I basically spent three hours to get this dude to tell me he didn't fill it out. And I get pissed. I'd crumble it up, throw it in the trash, kick my desk, and then I would call the next person, and I they would hear in my tone that I'm frustrated and they wouldn't want to do business with me. So now I burned another lead because this other lead was didn't go good. Now finally, my friend was like, dude, you have to zoom out. Like this works on a weekly or or a monthly or a yearly basis if you consistently do it, but it does not work on an individual basis. How do we get people to understand that and be comfortable with that?
SPEAKER_00I was just talking to Ben in the office today about it. Um that it's just like anything else, it's a lot of averages, right? And I had a really good success at the beginning, and then I had a run, like I said, of 20 in a row that were not the right customer. They just they weren't right. It went for free. I couldn't do anything, and you know, but then I go law of averages is gonna flip. And and so I had 30,000. It's not like anybody's out to get me. It's like they're not sending me bad leads on purpose. What can I do to get better? I think that's where the mentality is of each person, is what can you control? Right. And if you control, I'm just gonna take more leads and get better at it. And then if it's if you're getting that free, that's the most objections we get. It's free and they can't afford it. And then the other one we often get is they they're older people that can't get a text. So we have to get really good at the beginning of the call of talking about who's else is around you or signature processes is this, so that they can receive a text. Because that that that will mentally uh frustrating.
SPEAKER_02Oh, you get down to the wire and they don't. That's like, yeah. But dude, imagine five years ago when we were going to people's houses and you drive to their house, you spend an hour with them, and then they're like, Oh, I don't have a bank account. Yeah. Like I use this uh social security card that that a carrier didn't take at that time. Which you do that once, and then you're gonna be in a point where you asked that at the beginning, and you dude, that's right. So so I went on 10,000 appointments, okay? And a lot of them were very scary, which I believe a lot of people, especially women, didn't want to do this industry because it really wasn't safe. Okay. And I had this goal because I went to Compton, Inglewood, everywhere, all over scariest areas to sell life insurance. And I would be scared a lot because I'm like, dude, I'm walking down the street, I have to park down the street because there's nowhere to park. Uh, this is a scary neighborhood. Who knows what could happen? Um, so but I never backed out of an appointment, which was probably not very smart, and I video recorded how sketchy all these areas were because people wouldn't believe me. But my last appointment ever, okay, ever, was in Las Vegas, and I show up and the they're at a motel, like a sketchy, sketchy motel, okay. So I call them before I go in because I'm like, I don't want to die today. Like I've made it this far. And I go, before I before I come in, do you have a bank account? No. Do you have any form of payment to make this payment to the insurance carrier if you get approved? No. And I was like, okay, I'm not gonna call me when you have those things. And I didn't go to the appointment. That was the last one I backed out on. I didn't go in, and uh, that was it. Other than me making some sales on Zoom and like over the phone. But that was the last in-person appointment I ever went to. But what you're saying, dude, is yeah, you can get ahead of those things and you can just get it out of the way up front. Do you have a way to pay for the insurance?
Qualify Payment And Text Ability
SPEAKER_00Yeah, those are the two things. Because even if I don't make the sale, time is money. Right? So if early on in the presentation you could find out their banking situation, you know, do they have a bank, do they have a routing number, account number, right? You know, you know, on the bottom of your check, um, those numbers there, do you have a way to get that? Do you use Direct Express? And by the way, the way that they, it's not, you know, since COVID, they make it a lot easier for people to get insurance. There's no blood, no urine, no doctor checks, nobody's gonna come out to your house. But we do have an authorization way, and they've made it so simple that twice during our our call today, you're gonna get a couple texts from the insurance carrier so they know we're communicating. And are you able to receive texts? Okay. And and if they can't even do that at the beginning, I will schedule another call or I'll say, is there anybody like I did one where a lady was in a senior care home, and I go, could you walk with your phone up to the front desk because it's senior in a senior care home, and can they help you? She goes, Sure. Okay. And I do a lot also, um is a lot of people have iPhones and I have FaceTime. And when I get any sort of resistance, I've been doing a lot of this lately, I'll click the camera, and I'd say probably 33% of the time they'll come on there and they see me and I can see them, and it's total trust and credibility. And I've closed many deals because of that.
SPEAKER_02That's good. Yeah, that's solid. Yeah, I just had a flashback of uh this is how good this business is now. One of my appointments was at Randy's Donuts in Englewood. Do you know what that is? Uh I know where Inglewood is, but I've never heard of Randy's Donuts now. Okay, it's really it's in a bunch of movies. It's just this little donut shop, and I have my computer, and uh I go in to meet this dude to sell him a policy, and I tell him where my next appointment is, and he goes, Dude, you can't go there. And I'm like, why? And he pulls his his butt cheek out, like his pants down a little bit, and he goes, Dude, I got shot in the butt over there. And he's like, Don't roll your windows down, do not uh do not stop at any stop signs, and do not go to that appointment, which I'm pretty sure I did actually go to that appointment because I was like, dude, it's like 9 a.m. Like, I'll be fine. But how good is it now that you can go on Zoom, build rapport? The like this industry is amazing now, and you can help all these people, and anybody can do it. And someone else, someone said this to me, and I've been thinking about this for years. Think about the opportunity now in life insurance selling selling over the phone with people with disabilities.
Why Remote Selling Changes Everything
SPEAKER_00Think about that. And it's even crazier that a person that's in a bad financial situation could dial for their leader and could literally get a payday loan for$300 or$400 if the will was strong enough, right? Put hours and hours of practice in, sell a policy that sells in his effective date right away, and get paid two days later in a period of a few weeks, change their whole life situation. It's crazy. It's crazy.
SPEAKER_02It's dude, I love like the reason I love this business is because I believe it is the place where underdogs can win. And I've always thought that I was the underdog growing up, and this gave me an opportunity to do things that I never thought I would be able to do. But dude, there's so many stories we haven't even seen yet of people that are gonna come from bad scenarios and have success, which I just love seeing those. Like those are my favorite movies.
SPEAKER_00Well, it's Sean says that people that have had a rough life or they've got like a chip on their soul. We want them all, right? Right. Like I always say that that we all have imaginary backpacks on our back, okay, and in our backpacks is a bunch of bricks, okay? And the bricks that are weighing us down in our life, bad people around us, not being prepared, not confident, etc. Right? Tough childhood. And our job to live a really happy, good life is to remove each of those bricks that we're using as excuses for not being successful. And what how does that feel each time you've you've kind of conquered that brick and gotten it, and then your backpack feels a little bit less burdened. And the people that are crushing it here, I guarantee you they had bricks, and some of them still have bricks, but a lot less bricks, right? And they've learned how to overcome those bricks. So that's just something I always think about. Cause I But the I think the important thing, dude, is everybody has bricks.
SPEAKER_02It's just like what type? Like, obviously, you you you have not you've gone through Through stuff in your life, right? You know. Yeah. And you still how do you do that? You still show up every day. What do you do if you're sad, down, don't feel like it, depressed? What do you do?
Bricks In The Backpack Mindset
SPEAKER_00It's not an option. It's non-negotiable. I think part of it is is deep, deep, deep core, because I've done a lot of emotional intelligence leadership development work over the years, is wanting to prove um to myself and to my father, okay, my worth. And although he loves me tremendously, there's still an inner drive. And he's still alive. My dad's still alive. My dad's 86, and my dad worked till he was 85. And my dad is young at heart, and my dad still travels. And like I feel how blessed I am to be 61 and feel like I'm 50. And and and I have so many conversations with people on the phone that work keeps you young. It just has a purpose in life. And you know, people that retire and don't do anything, they slowly die. And I really believe that being in the industry we're in. Um, and then the other thing is is my daughter. You know, my daughter lost her mother five years ago, and every odd was against her for being successful for many, many reasons. And um, and I've been blessed to be her rock. I know that. And um, she got five scholarships to colleges and is going to Arizona State, and it's kind of in in the fall, and it's like a victory that that I've been able to be the leader and and uh motivation and inspiration for her to be able to do that. So when you get out of your own head, okay, and and do it for other people, like I haven't built as as quickly as I've liked, but I'm definitely my team's the best it's ever been right now. And it's because I g I I will give my left shoulder and my right knee to someone on the team before I'll make a sale myself. And and that's that's what keeps me growing, I think, is and eventually I think God's God's gonna see that.
SPEAKER_02And you can't beat the numbers, right? And the numbers can't beat you, right?
SPEAKER_00And eventually is it like that could be God, but you can't beat the numbers and the numbers can't beat you. Right. And and and it's always it always comes around, right? Like if you do the right thing enough times, it it always comes around, and I believe that. It just works out, it does.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I've uh all right. So, what advice do you have? Someone going through something, they're in their head, they're going through something, they want to break out of it. Where do you start?
Purpose Through Family And Service
SPEAKER_00Input equals output. So it has to start with what you're putting in your head. Okay, for some of you it's spirituality, it's the Bible, okay? For some of you, it's motivational um videos and podcasts, yeah, or both. Okay. It's it's putting yourself around the right people. That that's a huge part. I also think it's being willing to get out of your own way and make a commitment to somebody other than yourself. I think as soon as a person's willing to be accountable to somebody other than themselves, game game on. Game on. When people figure it out that people say to themselves all the time that they can do it on their own, like we were talking about before, never as much. I know that whether you're a Republican or a Democrat, the average president has had 16, average president has had 16 strong advisors that are the people that they go to. And they're the most powerful person in the world typically, and they still have 16 people. Dude, and we're just like roughing it by ourselves. Right. The most powerful people in the world have 16 advisors that they go to, yeah. Right. On the average, and and we don't like we don't put it out there like, please hold me accountable, dude. Give me advice. What am I doing wrong? Like, like, if if if that was the I wish everybody on the team would get that because that's so huge.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. It's legit. Yeah. All right. Um, any last tips for an agent, someone in business that you want to give out?
SPEAKER_00Part-time doesn't work here, really. I'd like to argue that. You would? Well, I think you can work part-time with a full-time mentality, but part-time, I'm just gonna try it out.
SPEAKER_02Because I've I've had people work a job and they're starving to win. And they work, you know, four hours after work every day, and they make three, four times more than they made at their job, and they transition out.
SPEAKER_00But they don't have but I'm saying I agree with you, but the full-time mentality, they're on the trainings, they're they're learning the business, they're investing in leads. They're what I mean by part-time doesn't work is I'm just gonna try it out and they don't show up.
SPEAKER_02So well, part I always say you have full-time, part-time, spare time, and any time. And you have to be full-time or part-time, which means you're clocking 25-30 hours a week part-time. Spare time and any time definitely does not work. I like that. That's good. Yeah, yeah, that's and like, dude, this isn't a hobby. You will get hurt, you will waste your money, you will buy leads and lose your money. You shouldn't do it if you don't take it seriously.
SPEAKER_00Yep. So, so that is one is is putting the hours in and work ethic. And and two is continually learning. Like, you got to know how to answer those objections. I think if you don't know how to answer objections, I'd rather a person spend an entire day and sit, lock yourself in a room and know those objections word for word, and then get back dialing again.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Than than not know them really that good.
SPEAKER_02100%. All right, dude. Well, thank you for everything. You're a huge asset. You don't you don't try to take advantage of people, you don't try to take money from people, you try to help people regardless if they're on your team or they're not. You love training and helping people with leadership. Um, we appreciate you. You help everybody here. You're every single day serving. If you're watching this, you should hop in and these are very excellent thought-out trainings. These are not like you just rolled out of bed and you're looking for something to say, you're you're planning everything intentionally, four times a week, doing trainings, um, interviewing top people, and you guys should check it out and get around. Gary, Gary, thank you. Uh, if you're watching this, we were looking at our numbers as far as how many people watch this podcast. And last month on YouTube alone, there was 3,000 hours watched, which I feel like that's a lot. 3,000 hours. But uh Apple Music and Spotify have some crazy numbers too. Um, so a lot of people are hearing from it. We've interviewed thousands of top producers and learned about their morning routines and their production and their schedules and all kinds of things. But if you are watching this and you enjoyed it, if you can share it or at least leave a comment or like it to help us reach more people, we would appreciate it. Thank you guys for joining us. Gary, thank you for coming in. Thank you.