 You earned $400,000 on one case, by the way. I want to throw that out there because that is freaking legendary, Bruce. Thank you. I can't say it, and I don't know two people that can ever say something like that. That is nuts. How did you earn 400 grand on one single case? I don't want to give all the secrets away, then nobody will come into the breakout session, right? It was a high-level estate planning case. I was doing retirement planning seminars, and this couple came, and they had a $5 million stock portfolio. All right, my buddy Bruce is in the hot seat today, Mr. Bruce Weinstein. How are you, sir? Great. Great. Thank you. You've been in and around the business for 30 years. Almost 35. Almost 35, almost equal to my age. So you know far more than I do. So take it easy on me today, okay? Because I know you could talk over my head in a hurry, right? Because one of the things I've learned about you is, you're extremely impressive. You know products crazy well, and your experience comes from a lot of facets, right? And a lot of experience in different products, and financing, and insurance, and all this stuff. Have you always been like this product guru all along? Yeah, I think I started in the brokerage industry in 1986, 1986. And I was doing consulting, planning conversations back then, versus just trying to sell. Everybody was given a pitch, a Merrill Lynch pitch, and you had to just try and make that sell. And I was always trying to probe and uncover if it was a mom answering the phone, a woman answering the phone during the day, kind of figured it was a mom staying home, you would shift to college planning. You know, if you're calling the senior communities, we always were talking municipal bonds back then. But I always tried to consult, and it was way ahead of its time. And then in the 90s, the financial planning approach came about. And so I was probably about 12 years ahead of the curve in regards to just being consultative, which is the topic of my breakout session, if I could throw that in. Are you selling, or are you solving? Yeah, and the way that came about is, I'm excited for your breakout session. A personation, by the way, it's gonna be unbelievable. You guys have to go to this breakout, trust me. Because you've earned $400,000 on one case, by the way. I want to throw that out there because that is freaking legendary, Bruce. Thank you. I can't say it. And I don't know two people that can ever say something like that. That is nuts. I also just heard you talk about planning. So I'm wondering, okay, should we call it planning versus pitching? Because if you're not planning, you're pitching, right? Or a transaction versus transformation. Or consulting for versing just cranking out policies. So there's my little comparisons there, as I'm thinking. I'm talking to you. Yeah. How did you earn $400,000 on one single case? I don't want to give all the secrets away, then nobody will come to the breakout session, right? That's true. But it was a high-level estate planning case. I was doing retirement planning seminars, and this couple came, and they had a $5 million stock portfolio that had a cost basis of $8,000. Okay. So explain cost basis for us to know what that means. Thank you. Basically, the stock was, to them, was an $8,000 acquisition price, and the street value was $5 million. So liquidating, transferring the stock, closing the stock out would trigger a capital gain, a taxable event, of literally $5 million. And at that particular year, capital gains tax was 28%. So nobody before us ever initiated the conversation to sell the stock because they're going to give up $1.4 million in capital gain tax. Yeah. So the portfolio manager was just keeping the stock and collecting a dividend. Without giving away too much of the details, this stock became Wacovia stock, which had a 5% dividend. So the client was living on that dividend. And as you know, with the financial crisis, Wacovia stock plummeted. 98% eliminated the dividend. And if they had not met me and done this work that I had done pre-financial crisis, their $5 million would have been worth about $100,000. Ooh. So it is a lot of wins of what transpired and why you diversify and why the strategy we did, which used an annuity, used an islet trust. So it was a big life insurance case. It was a big annuity case. And having the toolbox to know and understand the techniques in a state planning, not many people are familiar with what's called a charitable remainder trust, which is what we used. And it was a lot of bells and whistles. And I would say less than one-tenth of 1% of financial advisors out there even know the terminology, let alone the strategy. So it was a big win. Only 50% of the people on this call. And it's not on this side. So selling versus solving. I love that. You talked about a toolbox. How important is it for a rep to have a toolbox of like an arsenal, you know? Well, I came to Nate's event, right, SWAT and you, Pete, Brad Hannon, you know, everybody was kind of on a topic, right? You know, health, life, Medicare, specific tools in the toolbox. And why I knocked on the door to see about speaking at your event was to bring a bigger array of tools, right? There's more to the problem solving. The backstory I'll give you is a buddy of mine lost his job and was going to get into, he tells me, long-term care sales. And he knows nothing about insurance. He certainly knows nothing about long-term care. So let me ask you something. I said, if you're in a hardware store and you're only selling screwdrivers and the guy comes in and wants to buy a hammer, are you going to tell him just to use the hammer, use the screwdriver as a hammer, or are you going to be able to find him a hammer? So if you're only selling long-term care and they need final expense, they need an estate plan, they need health insurance, they need Medicare, you're letting that person walk out the door. So for me as a financial advisor, capacity over the years, my toolbox was constantly being added on to. This child remainder trust, I went to a workshop in Indianapolis in the 1990s to learn about and study and get certified on this estate planning technique. So for me, it was always a matter of being as well rounded and conversational with anybody in any circumstance. I won a $5 million case from a Merrill Lynch competitor. As I sat down with the prospect who came to my, I did retirement planning seminars for many years. And as the person was pulling stuff out, I was telling him what he had. He's like, how do you know about that? How do you know about that? And I said, I said to him jokingly, I said, I'm not here to crack walnuts, man. I know my stuff. Like, let's get serious. Like, do you want to work at the professional? Because, but he was like dumbfounded, like why or how I knew about all this stuff. And I'm like, I'm a professional. So I want to add to that. I want to add to that real quick because I love that you just said that. Like that is so key for you guys taking notes. I hope you're taking notes with listening and watching this as, as, as, after we put this out is a pro versus an amateur. You know, like a lot of people in our business are amateurs. That's why they fell. They never become part of the 8%. They never become Bruce freaking Weinstein because they're amateurs instead of being a consummate professional and knowing their stuff and knowing their game. Uh, how important is it to seek out being a true professional and going at this thing like it's a real career versus just a side job? Well, I think for a new person, if you're going to start somewhere, you can't know everything immediately. That's right. Right. So you definitely need to become an expertise in one particular area first and foremost. Yeah. Again, side story. My son was interning with interning with me one summer and I had him sit in on client interviews post seminar coming in now to, to undercover their situations, their pain. And to the better part of a three hour conversation, he looked at me as like, I can never get into the business. I said, why? He goes, you talked for three hours. He says, you had so much wealth of knowledge and information that the conversation just kept going and going and going and probably to overkill. Obviously, on my part, I'm a talker, but to the point of the client and the situation, there was a lot to uncover and a lot to share with them. And so it was intimidating to him as somebody considering getting in the business, because how am I going to learn all that? And I said to him, it took me 30 years. It took me 25 years to know all that. I didn't know that 1986 when I started at Merrill Lynch, it took decades. So yes, I think anybody who wants to get into the business with what's out there today, whether it's health, Medicare, final expense, life products, is just dive into something, start to get to critical mass, make a living, see that you're having success, and then work on personal growth and expansion to say, now I'm going to do this. Now I'm going to get into, if I'm in health, I got to get to Medicare. I don't want to lose those clients to Cody because they're going to go to the gurus for Medicare. I want to be able to transition that client. So what do I need to do to put myself in that position and educate myself? So for us, it was just a constant evolution for our practices, just be, we kind of say the line, all things insurance. So it doesn't matter. We don't say no to anything. We have strategic partners. PNC. PNC, we're not writing PNC, we're licensing PNC, but part of my, with Dave and Joe Campert and others in the PNC space is to be strategic partners because as I'm networking and having clients and they might be in Austin or Dallas or Kansas City and they say, can you help me with blank because I'm the resource, I'm the quarterback, right? I'm the navigator of the ship. I don't say no. I say, I've got a strategic partner. Let me bring them into the conversation. And I work, and I worked it out with Joe or Dave or somebody to facilitate, be involved and still be the lead dog on the relationship because the clients came to me for that trust factor. That's smart. And what do you sell the most of? These days, probably I would say life is, life in annuities is the bigger ticket in that regard, health and Medicare or smaller ticket stuff. It takes stacking and volume. But as I have evaluated, thanks to you guys, you and Nate, working with Coach Burt and diving in deeper into my own brain but looking at my 80, 20 and where my business is coming from and identifying those relationships, it's natural market. You can buy leads all you want. It's natural market. That's what's getting the better deals. I wrote over $8,000 of premium last week with one of my fraternity brothers who came knocking. What does Coach Burt say? Become a person of interest. Interest, have them come to you. I'm doing the stuff that you and Landon and others are out there doing and promoting. I'm trying to follow the people who are having success on this side. I'm doing the types of things and trying to execute. Nothing works perfect. But my inbound opportunities are coming from people saying, I don't need health insurance, but can you help me with this? That's a nice deal, $8,000 premium. That doesn't suck. That doesn't hurt. Are you going to share the secrets of how anyone can do this at the conference? 8% nation? What is this 8% nation you speak of? Exactly. What is this 8% thing? Talk to me about what you're going to share there because I love breakout sessions because it gives people like you that have a ton of experience, knowledge, super impressive people that make a killing, the chance to actually teach others how they can do the same thing. You can't see my desk, but I have all my little blue note cards thanks to Nate and the conference at SWAT. I've been jotting and writing and, again, taking that information and coach Bird and putting down my... I'm an outline guy. I'm not a script person. My seminar, I would speak for two hours off of an 8 or 10 item and I would just converse on my journey of this financial planning conversation and lead them through the steps and the process of what I did. I'm not big on repeating myself and being scripted. It's very conversational and it's always tailored. To your point of the breakout session as I rack my brain on and try and find the talking points, I'm a person about so what? When I talk in interview with clients or prospects or when I was a training manager teaching other advisors back in the day, I said, don't talk for the sake of talking. You're going to talk to Cody what's the so what? You're talking to an audience, what's the so what? Don't have diarrhea in the mouth and don't just keep blabbing, but have a so what? What's the point? I'm trying for a breakout session in your event 8% Nation everybody. Is that an 8? 8% Nation Are you selling or are you solving was the headline that I came up with in the sense of what's separating you from your competition? I want to talk about overcoming adversity, the head trash, I got a lot of little note cards with a lot of different topics on there being an octopus. Yeah. All those types of subtopics that I'll bring into my so what and hopefully it resonates with those in the audience that can gleam a couple of those takeaways. You know what? One of the things that's attracted me the most that you've talked about already is the retirement planning seminars. I'm a big event guy. My dad is doing seminars, his team is doing seminars every week how impactful were those retirement planning seminars back in the day? I was literally the first I'm from central New Jersey Rutgers Princeton area 50 years and I got paroled I went to Florida and I made the pilgrimage down south but around 1997 I started these seminars and it was a dinner seminar a local steakhouse, a local restaurant I kind of had a strategy and I had a discipline that I executed as a wedding style invitation and it was my topic was your right to financial dignity and I talk about the journey life's journey and getting to the finish line called retirement and having enough assets and resources that retirement is optional and affordable and again a lot of colleagues that I started with in the business and they were not doing this, they were still stock brokers and I was a financial planner I was a financial advisor I did the insurance side, I did the investment side my colleagues from Merrill Lynch were strictly doing investments they didn't know from the insurance side of things and planning not yet anyway and so takes money to make money but I was investing and again this is 20 months ago right so between 25 and 50 bucks ahead and it was a couples only event I tried to keep the singles out and I had my language first time attendees only and I kept the database act for windows if you remember what act was and so if Cody if Cody and Mrs. Adkins what's her name? Lauren if Cody and Lauren are signing up from my seminar like in my database and I say Cody listen I see you attended last November I appreciate that you signed up but it's for first time attendees it says so on the invitation couples only, first time attendees I said however I'd love to take you out to dinner we'll talk privately we'll follow up, you obviously didn't take me up on the consultation last time but you wanted to come to the dinner again it's the same exact presentation why don't we get together my treat I'll take you and Lauren out dinner again so that was my way around the platelickers to keep the repeat offenders from coming repeat offenders so let's see 1997 to about 2010 right so what is that like 13 plus years ask me how many people took me up on that second free dinner that says none they're platelickers that's insane but you need a system right if you're paying 25-50 bucks ahead 100 bucks a couple marketing 10,000 piece mailers $5,000 at the restaurant you put the events you need ROI and so for me it was just whittling down and letting people self-select of coming in the door and coming to see me and again my numbers I was getting about a 75% conversion of a lead at the end of the dinner because the story and the conversation resonated and the ask was just to keep the conversation going there's nothing to sell only problems to solve so what can we do to solve those issues if I have five hotbed topics long-term care, retirement, investment rate of returns pension maximization if you have a pension whatever those topics were something I spoke about had to hit at least on one level maybe two maybe five but nobody walked out of there saying you're lying you're here for a steak Ruth Chris makes good steaks have a good night cost of acquisition is that where you did the seminars? at the end it was Ruth Chris in Princeton wow 50 bucks ahead baller it's Princeton I didn't start there I finished there later on there were some local restaurants I used initially in the 90s the point of it is you have to invest money to make money everybody has their process I started as a cold caller in the day literally as a phone book I know you and your dad others have talked about the generation of the 80s where you were cold calling out of a phone book with a ruler Mr. Smith write down the list making that pitch boiler room doesn't lie movie wall street doesn't lie this is what we did and eventually I don't want to do that anymore I don't want to make cold calls I was a person of interest before the term in the sense of I'm going to do these dinner seminars I'm going to go to a higher level here's this hidden lesson one of the many times in different sessions I may have gone to over the years you've heard it is identify your a client what's your a client and replicate your a client that's it for me in central new jersey where we had corporate America wazoo world wide headquarters Pfizer, Merck AT&T, Lucent, Exxon, Mobile it was corporate America so the millionaire next door literally resonated in every neighborhood and you worked at a company in central New Jersey most parts of New Jersey but central New Jersey where I was from you could be there 30 years and be the clients of mine the local maintenance man retired with a million dollar 401k and he was nothing more than a maintenance man he wasn't executive VP he wasn't you know Johnny got rocks with a hundred million stock option package that normally happens to me I normally happens to me what I've noticed though that happens to a lot of big time thinkers that are moving fast and accomplishing a lot we just get going we just have a lot in our brain we have a lot of tabs open I'll take that excuse but it's also going to be 58 there you go what I was go ahead selling versus solving and what do you think was the one single thing if you had to pick one thing that was the biggest separator which allowed you to do $400,000 on one single case you had to pick one single thing what would you pick as far as skill set goes or just anything wow that's a great question let's say it's skill set I would I think it goes back it goes back to a desire to want to help people again I got a lot of different cards here I got my some day aisle which I'll talk about when I when I started the business my dad was not necessarily a business person in the sales capacity but he was in leadership and management but he said two things to me he said I hope someday you pay a million dollars in taxes and I said why on earth would I want to pay a million dollars in taxes I paid two million dollars that's what the other is you can cut a person's hair many times you can only scalp them once so you want them coming back so over my career the industry consolidated where not to be disparaging to the name of Merrill Lynch but they wanted a higher ilk client if you didn't have a million dollars they didn't necessarily want you as a client and as the financial advisor they wouldn't compensate you if you worked on a client worth less than a certain value so it discouraged you from working with again 80-20 we were talking about 80-20 before so 80% of your client base coming from my sweet spot was a 58-62 year old getting ready to hit retirement and me helping them get to the home stretch that's where I brought the most value to a client not that I don't want a 30 year old Cody Askins who's on his way up and has some needs would you take me? I consider it can I go on the plane? rule number one if your 30 year old client owns a plane the answer automatically is yes that's what I'm talking about how about that my son's 30 he don't own a plane there's a good exception to every rule absolutely don't judge a book by the cover and to go back to this $5 million guy for that $400,000 case if you saw this guy walk in to the restaurant overalls I mean he didn't have a straw in his mouth but this guy was as I'm not trying to be disparaging but you would not have labeled $5 million you would have been like be quiet and enjoy your dinner you're clearly not just for success but blow your mind when he pulled out and said I'd like to talk to you you can't millionaire next door a lot of people do that I used to do it as a life insurance agent I would pull up to a trailer and be like oh my gosh here we go and I would walk out with three policies for like $700 a month in total premium and I'm like well I didn't expect that one so you just never freaking know you don't know to come back I don't know if it's the exact point I was making before but my most loyal clients my most referring to me back clients with the people that started on the lower end of the investment spectrum that I never had my nose turned up to that I never said hey you don't have enough for me if you don't have X I can't help you I took any client any time and I still to this day you want to do $10 a month for term insurance I'll sign you up you want to be on the HSA not the HSA on the marketplace for ACA and it's only a $50 referral fee I'll sign you up I will help anybody any time no matter their economic disparities sorry discrepancies that always served me in the sense of and my deliverable of what you asked earlier what separates me where did you get and how did you get is to help versus hamster just look I was going to save some of it but my folks my mother died when I was 22 my mother lived on some day I'll I was raised by a single mother that died when I was 22 from cancer so my mother never got to some day I'll and so when you talk about your explanation of services and why you do what you do and I had to do this deep soul searching was I was out to help everybody realize nothing is guaranteed you could be dead at 45 why are you waiting what do you need to be put in place to have your financial comfort to retire or do whatever you want to do where work is optional right and I think that foundation came from having lost a mother that never got that opportunity right and so at 23 starting as a young stock broker and becoming this financial insurance advisor was just always somebody needs help not everybody knows how to get it themselves and we're here to help and that's that's the epicenter of Weinstein wealth insurance solutions that's the epicenter of what my wife is going to do with our business and will help anybody but you got to give us the opportunity right that's right I like Weinstein wealth that's cool that's got a catchy fun name and you started stock work when you were 23 23 1986 yeah yeah that's incredible well at last question okay thank what what does what is this the other part of the wristband which is at Cody ask us calm is this mean to you except responsibility that's one of my cards actually is it really well it it says here can you read that point inward point inward not outward that's good same same concept yeah yeah is you you know here's the other one are you playing a win or you're playing not to lose right how many people out there I don't want to do blank or I'm afraid to take this or if I spend that money I won't be able to whatever you can't play it goes to the seminars right as you had to invest the money maybe you put it on a credit card maybe you expend money you don't have but the results I mean I can't say I made 10 times my money back then but if I spent $10,000 on a seminar back then I got $100,000 worth of business back no doubt about it and eventually the business moved into a fee based away from a tuition type of relationship so now just think about the health insurance and the Medicare that has renewal income a fee based advisor I don't need a new sale I just need to maintain my critical mass and let it grow and manage attrition and keep stacking so any business doesn't matter what you are in in a sales role capacity any business needs three to five years to get to critical mass you're not going to be a flash in a pan I started at Merrill with no connections no relationships no daddy with money no daddy with friends at the golf course and I cold called and I've been a grinder since I'm five years old right but I started with guys that were connected and they came out of the gates and they were top top right out of the gate and six months later I'm doing laps around them because they were done they used tools they had but I was grinding I was cold calling and I was getting business and the my training class at Merrill Lynch was a hundred and seventy five people September 1986 by the by the end that's one month that's how many people Merrill were bringing in the doors about a hundred and fifty to a hundred and eighty advisors nationwide a month over two thousand by the end of the next year there was ten percent left ten percent so it's it's not a joke it's they hired and trained and they're looking for the cream to rise to the crop and I had ninety advisors in my office we had about thirty rookies and again this is eighty seven eighty eight the market crashed I was number one in new accounts I was number one in business we were not talking major major money back then but for a young person grinding from zero I just worked this off and worked hard and so the the drive the determination the perseverance to your point again coming back to some of this is to not just not give up but keep expanding keep evolving and move yourself forward adding more and more and more and you have to have the capacity obviously but if the clients are in need of it you better know about it and then you'll be valuable to them and then I think one of the biggest keys to my success is that my clients come back to me knowing they need an accountant they need an attorney they need a guy to sell them a plane they know I know people I tied that in you like that thank you it's good it's good okay actual last question do you believe anybody can be Bruce Weinstein no just you I'm a unicorn no I mean I'm half tongue and cheek but I've seen a lot of people come and go into business and I'm seeing them today I'm still seeing them come and go and you're dealing with a lot of them and kudos for you for what you're doing look you guys got my attention six months ago and I dove all in with you how did we get it six months ago that's what I want to know how did I find it Facebook probably a combination of Justin and the gurus and Bradley and hustlers I was seeing all the cross-pollination of all you guys it led me with the campers to come to SWAT and to go from being out of the room to in the room to now at 8% being part of the room there we go involving that and be part of the room out of the room to in the room to hit the head of the room I'd love to be a keynote at some point oh dude you're on your way that's a that's a concept right there most people are out of the room the winners notice they want to be in the room then they get in the room and then the real winners they're in it how do I get up on stage I was VIP right I got in for VIP at 8% not 8% sorry SWAT and there's Pete and there's Brad and I've been talking with Brad a little bit because I'm in his the HST side for our health insurance he and I had some slight communication so I might be there to make sure you say hi but I went up to Pete and I shook his hand I went up to Marlon and I shook his hand I went up to introduce myself to everybody and I wanted to just be known but I want to know who's up there and I even joke with Pete the second time I ran into him like you know I've been licensed longer than you're alive and Pete and I have been we've had a one-on-one we've had some private conversations but you know I'm a sponge I mean I met Zig Ziglar back in the day I've been listening to Brian Tracy and Nightingale Conan and I've been a student of the game and I say the game of sales and marketing noble selling and all that stuff books on tape, cassette in the car everywhere you went I didn't listen to music I didn't listen to Howard Stern he was always cassette tapes on some sales motivation and sharpen the tool sharpen the tools in the toolbox and be better am I perfect? no do I talk too much? probably you're as close as it gets he can close he's a closer but I don't need to close selling or solving selling or solving see this pen? sell me this pen Bruce one impressive dude man thank you I'm telling you guys get to know this cat, look him up and get to 8% and watch his breakout see you there hey if you enjoyed this I got another one you're going to love it's right there click on it a ton of inbound leads from social media, from facebook organically like referrals friggin galore you are the king