 Say there's an agent out there watching and they're not a top producer What are some of the top things that you've noticed that are in common amongst the top producers that you see? That you can share that a new agent a struggling agent that wants to be a top producer can learn from so that they can too Become a top producer. I got a secret. Okay. Good. Good. I love it. I like it. There's a secret agents may not know this Here's a secret that they should know Agents I got my good buddy mr. Andy Daster the president of North American life friends and Andy, how are you doing today, buddy? I'm doing great Cody. Good to see you man. You too, man. Thank you so much for your time for being on here I would love I'd love for you to take a second and share your story with those that are watching because Andy He's been around the industry for for a couple days Knows a lot and is focused on helping a lot of agents and definitely has a story And a song to sing so once you share that with us right now I'll be brief about me. I've been doing this now for 30 years. It's all I've ever done right out of college I got into the insurance business and have focused almost entirely on health insurance and individual life insurance throughout that time I worked 20 years working for an insurance company or several insurance companies and then last You know eight or ten years or so have been Running an independent FMO to help other agents and you know, you're really right The idea was I want to try to share with everybody what I've learned over 30 years I have realized a lot of your audience may not have been doing this for 30 So if there is any way I can accelerate their learning curve and Shortcut from the three years. They've been doing this from the 30 years that I've been doing it Then I've accomplished what I was hoping to accomplish today Exactly, which is awesome, buddy, and you've been you've been doing this as long as I've been alive So we've got something in common there From experience standpoint though, I mean if we were to we were to rewind back 30 years ago I think you said you were 20 or you were in college. You were right around there Walk me through that like how did you start? What were you selling? What did it look like? What were some of the struggles you you identified and noticed and what are some some some things we can focus on that? Can help that agent that maybe is in the position that you were 30 years ago? You know, it's funny because 30 years ago. I was working at UnitedHealthcare is used to be called golden rule you're Remember that okay, so it was called golden rule and Now it's UnitedHealth one and I was literally just selling health insurance exclusively for UnitedHealthcare back in those days get this Long-term major medical. Yeah, there was major medical But you could buy from an insurance company that you didn't have to keep renewing. It just kept going There was no Obamacare. It was it was short-term medical. In fact, if you look at the short-term medical That's out there today. It's exactly the same product as what we were selling 30 years ago same thing So that was around Long-term major medical and then I also did things like Medicare supplement a little bit of life insurance a little bit Renewities I had a real nice mix of things since that time when United is really sort of taking it over You know United tried to do Obamacare and I didn't turn out so good Yeah, but but they still are doing a lot of the same stuff today that they did 30 years ago when I was Knocking on doors selling health insurance back at that time. I Love it and and when you when you started and you were selling health insurance What was your way of getting in front of people? How did you do that? How'd you prospect? Well, it's interesting back in those days. It was almost all working with Non-insurance, sorry non health insurance agents PNC agents life agents CPAs even all kinds of different professionals that didn't really want to get their hands dirty The interesting thing is if an agent were to ask me what I should do today I'd actually tell them the same thing go network with PNC agents go network with life agents go network with large group agents Go network with CPAs attorneys providers That's a great great Source of prospects that will just call you you don't have to keep Asking badgering people build a network and I'll tell you it will serve you well for a long time If you build that network the problem with it though is so many agents want instant gratification They want to you know get a prospect right now and networking doesn't really do that It doesn't give you that immediate gratification But over the long term it will absolutely serve you well and it will be the best possible lead source People will just call you and thing. I really like that. I won't keep talking about the thing I really like about it is when the prospects call you number one love that But number two, they know who you are and they know what you do Somebody else has told them. Oh by the way, you need to call this guy He can help you with whatever this insurance problem is that you have so they already have the expectation That you're problem-solving because somebody else told them that you were Yes, that's way to develop prospects doesn't really cost a lot It's just a lot of elbow grease and unfortunately it takes some time. It doesn't just doesn't happen fast That's awesome. How how was how much money did you make your first year? Do you remember? Oh my gosh? This is not gonna be relevant because of the time Difference of 30 in about $15,000. Okay. Okay, you know what and when let's just say it's that's probably I don't know maybe 45 now or something like that, but but I think that's reason asked there's a there's a lot of agents that Maybe get off to a slow start They make money. They do okay. They do well, right? Whatever that was time period wise. However Getting over the hump into where Fast forward in your career. You've been a lot of places. You've done a lot of things You have a ton of experience you're helping agents all over the country now and you really have found What you enjoy doing and you know now you make probably a heck of a lot money more money than when you started I sure do and so if I was 30 years ago and I look back and say what Gave me the foundation to be still in this business 30 years later Which by the way most of the people I knew back at that time. They're not in the business anymore exactly but I stuck through it and Certainly doing north of $15,000 today. Yeah, I'm pleased to tell you barely right 15 back Then it's probably 30 35, you know today. Yeah, not great and good news is I live with my mother So I was able to save so on cost which by the way is not that uncommon for new agents today They're not some other source of income or somebody else paying the bills in order to help make that transition You know Cody, I hear you talking all the time about how you got a persevere You got to get over that hump and it takes time I wish I could say yeah, I know this thing that will make it go from two years down to two months and now All of a sudden everybody's got it, but yeah, it just doesn't work that way. Certainly not in this business, but the two things I think that I really benefited from and I try to really utilize that same thinking even today is I realize that agents need a lot of training and I really feel like at the end of the day the thing that probably makes me different from any other FMO out there is that I am a producer Who knows how to produce and has done it for a long time and spends all day every day thinking about how to Help other agents learn what I've learned huge. This is just one example, but it's not the only one It's every single day training training training and if if you're not associated with my organization I highly recommend you find one that is as committed to training as I am doesn't have to be but Trying to figure this out on your own And that's just too tough to do now You you provide so many great resources to help agents get training You got to have people that you can count on that can provide and share What they've learned Without that you don't have a lot the second thing and I know Cody you and I also See eye-to-eye on this is you got to have a way to generate prospects the And I heard you say this on On one of your previous videos the number one reason agents don't make it is they don't see enough people I'm sorry if I just stole your quote, but it's absolutely true. You totally You could be the most Ill-informed agent out there. Yes, but if you have a large number of prospects, you're still gonna make it Unfortunately, the opposite is also true. You could be the smartest Best trained most sophisticated advisor on the planet and you will fail if you don't see enough people That's right. Just is no substitute for it and you know one of the things Cody you and I talked about is You know, how do you get to those really really big income levels? I wish I could tell you it was some fancy Plan on how to get to those hundred two hundred three hundred five hundred thousand, you know what it is Yes seeing enough people in fact your big income earners will tell you that they can't keep up Now for someone who's only two years in the business. They're probably thinking man I can't even imagine a scenario where I can't keep up with all the prospects exactly But believe it or not that happens and that happens a lot to your superstar producers That's their key. They know how to efficiently talk to as many people as they possibly can and They will tell you I can't keep up the phone rings too much. I'm working nights I'm working weekends because not because I'm pushing harder than the next guy the phone won't stop ringing That's awesome. I yeah, there's a lot of agents that you're right They can't even fathom that being possible, but how amazing is it that as long as you don't quit along the way? Yeah, life is gonna get really good Like that that's what we know about the industry. That's how amazing this industry is So how do you get those prospects? Okay? Let's not talk about the five hundred thousand dollar producer For somebody who's only been in the business a few years. They probably look at that and say I can't even fathom that. Yeah, so let's talk about the producer that's got a couple years in the business Mm-hmm. I would argue that what they need to do is they're gonna need to Sorry, they're gonna need to Find a way to partner with somebody that can help them with that So if I was starting brand new I tell you what I did I would either find An organization that is dedicated to helping newer agents find prospects Training them helping them either get prospects or paying for prospects. You know work at a call center work at a Insurance company like I did find a place that will give you the training that you're gonna need and Will help you find not only prospects But prospects that you like working. That's another I think challenge that some agents have They'll say yeah, I've got leads, but man I don't want to call them. I don't want to hate you know I hate being told this or that I got you got the wrong lead You got to be looking forward to talking to people and if you're miserable because you got the wrong lead source You got to go find somebody that can provide you a lead source that you like It's never gonna work if you fear the phone, right? I mean, it's what agents do they look at that phone They're looking at me and I don't want to pick it up These people yeah, you gotta have a lead source in the light. Yes, you do man. You're absolutely right. That's something you got to do for you It seems like you were just someone that embodied because when I think about when I think about Andy I'm like, okay. He he he didn't quit. He persevered. He got better over time He made more money over time and and you deep down Want to help people like the first time we spoke on the phone when I was trapped I think I believe I think I was driving to Rolla, Missouri to see my In-laws and it was like last summer maybe and I'm like man this dude Gets it this dude cares about people this dude likes and does everything he can to help people and knows a ton about the industry and I remember getting off the phone. I'm like That's just a good dude, you know like you get off the phone and you're like and you think this is someone I want to start to really get to know is that someone is that something that? Because of the way you were raised or you just always been that way like how is Andy become The good dude that Andy is today. Where's that? Where's that come from? I don't know that I have a great answer, but you definitely have You definitely got me right. I when I was Producing when I am producing is the same thing what I work with agents. I never think about money Ever never think is this gonna make me money is this gonna make me more money. I never do that. I Am always thinking about how to help people Yeah, whether it's a consumer that I'm trying to help they got a problem and I'm trying to solve it and Certainly every day the same thing with agents. I'm only thinking every day. How can I help more agents? How can I help them accomplish their objectives and I love the success stories? In fact, one of the things that we're gonna do at 8% We're so excited about this summer is I'm going to be sharing with your With your audience success stories And I'm not just gonna talk about them I'm going to bring them and I'm gonna let them talk about how How they got the kinds of things that they needed in order to be successful and that doesn't mean just getting started Maybe it was just hey I wanted to get to the next level and I just couldn't figure out how to get over the hop That's a lot of what we do sometimes it was just you know, I just wanted to be comfortable I didn't want to work to the point where I was struggling. I just wanted to have good things happen to my family That was I love You're gonna see those at 8% and we're proud of the fact that people View the things that we do as making their lives better if I can help more agents make their lives better Then that's what keeps me going and you're exactly right when we were talking about that I think that's the kind of thing I was telling you about and I still think that every day and yeah, you know what money will come You know, it'll be there and if you know, you're an agent and and you're thinking how do I make more money? How do I make more money? You're asking the wrong question The question how do I help more people? That's what people who make money do they help people they help people with their problems and You'll find that it is Constantly feeding itself as soon as people know you as the guy that helps people Everybody wants to have to talk to you whether you're an agent or you're an FMO. It's the same thing people know It's just like you know, you were saying it. I really do believe it. I don't never think about money I only think about how I can help people money will be there That's right, I love that man I love that when I because when I first started on YouTube I remember not really doing anything Monetarily to monetize it all for the first 13 months, you know, it's like it you're right You do enough good in the world and the money will come Yeah, you know, if you would have just done you to do for the purposes of making a buck Well, you wouldn't have made it 13 days much less 13 months. It's okay. Well, this isn't put money in my pot Yeah, now your intent was to try to communicate Your intent was try to help your intent I can tell it when I'm watching your videos as I mentioned I've been watching a bunch of them I really enjoyed them and Got a great message and Unfortunately, you're kind of out there on an island. There's not a lot of Cody's out there. So if I I'm an agent I would go on to you Cody's YouTube channel and watch every single video you have to come to watch and and If you've got five minutes go watch a Cody video, I mean you will benefit and I Don't get paid to say that Cody. I just want to help you because I know you're helping agents. Thank you Thank you. You bring up you kind of one of the things I wanted to pivot to based on what you just said is Finding a mentor in this business finding someone that you can rely on that you can learn from that you can lean on is So much more important than people think and I know it's something that you talk about and believe as well Yeah, you know it not only do I talk about and believe it, but we do that every day our organization is made up of producers and It is not only Me and I still sell I still talk to consumers every day keeps me sharp but Everybody all of our sales managers sales directors everybody involved in our organization our top producers and Believe it or not. They want to share with others and let me explain one of the ways that they do it. I Believe we may be the only FMO in the country that has their agent force be a community We have a community Hundreds maybe thousands of agents that are all with our organization Nobody knows about this because nobody else can see this, but we have a closed group on Facebook and It is an incredibly powerful group Hundreds thousands of our agents are on there and they're all helping each other every day And the beauty of it is I'm a member of so many other Facebook groups And I see some poor agent ask a question and They'll get 20 responses and unfortunately 17 of them are wrong And I'm just looking at that You know series of comments. I'm like, oh my gosh. This is wrong. This is wrong. Oh my gosh, please don't do that Please don't do that. Yeah, but on our group. It is moderated by experts only our top producers Are the ones who comment our top producers are the ones who are telling you this is how this works Or here's a phone number for the head of claims or here's how this benefit works or here's how underwriting works I just don't know of any other organization where top producers are that freely willing to share their best practices whether it's sales products carriers Partners vendors that they share everything and nobody has any qualms like am I helping my competitor? Talk that way. They never think that way. They just want to be a part of the community And you might say, you know, how did I get them to do that? And the answer is I did I've never asked him to do it I've never Intended that they would do it. We've just built an organization of like-minded people that want to help others It's I guess maybe it's kind of rubbed off on everybody that you know, we're we're all better off helping each other There's no benefit to hoarding all the good information and And not sharing it with those that are really craving it I think it's something really different unique that you just won't find in a lot of other places So true man. Is that is that also something that happens? I know you guys do some events as well Yep Is that something that really happens a lot of events as well because I'm a big believer in the power of getting people together to learn So you're exactly right Cody We were actually gonna have you be our keynote speaker at our last event last summer But as you know, it didn't go so good because it's pandemic So we didn't have ours and I don't think we're gonna have ours this year either But there's no question that if you ask First of all all of our top producers Coming for this event all on their own dime Wow, even though you think they've already got to figure it out They're only making hundreds of thousands of dollars you why would they come? What are they again and every one of them says the same thing because I'm learning from others I still want to learn that's of course. What top producers do right? They're constantly learning. Yeah, you should never think of Learning as having some sort of it of an ending. There's no such thing You stop learning your dad or retired or whatever, right? So they they crave the learning they love the interaction they like being a part of that community of other producers They're like minded. Yep. The event is the same thing unfortunately, the pandemic has sort of handcuffed us a little bit, but Make no mistake What you're alluding to is is no different whether it's virtual or whether it's Whether it's live That's huge. Let's say there's an agent out there watching and they're Not a top producer What are some of the top things that you've noticed that are in common amongst the top producers that you see? That you can share that a new agent a struggling agent that wants to be a top producer can learn from so that they can too become a top producer I got a secret. Okay. Good. Good. I love it. I like it. There's a secret and You agents may not know this But here's a secret that they should know When they register For a training webinar They get on my radar The more that they register in 10 training webinars The higher they get on my radar The more that I'm wanting to do for them the more that I'm wanting to help them the more that they are somebody that we want to develop because the thing that top producers Have in common is the desire to learn We had a given example. We had a series of webinars this last summer and They were largely repeats that I mean largely meaning similar sort of concepts and just sort of reiterating them and looking at them from some different perspectives and I'm looking at the list of people who register and guess what our top producers went to every one of them Talking to me, we're still trying to learn and they'll tell you I went and I listened again And I learned something additional and I learned again and I learned more But the newer people that I see attending webinars over and over again Those of the guys and gals that I'm keeping an eye out for because that tells me they're wanting to learn And if they want to learn I want to invest in them Most agents probably think when they sign up for a webinar That nobody really notices Okay, I'm just signing up for a webinar. I'm one of you know, whatever hundreds of agents that are signing up for this webinar Yeah, but trust me. I'm watching I want to see who wants to learn because I can work with that agent That's right. I can't work with is an agent who says just hand it to me. Mm-hmm I don't want to do anything. I don't want to make an investment in my business in terms of in terms of learning I just want somebody to hand it to me on a silver platter Can't do anything with that person but somebody who's attending webinars and trying to learn I can help them get from wherever They are at to the next level and then to the next level after that. Yeah, that's such a massive secret to success as well if you think about it because The what I've noticed as well is the top people They show up Consistently They show up when they don't want to they show up anyway, they don't make excuses, right? They just show up and Even as simple like like a free webinar the barrier to entry is so low and Still people will register and not even attend Yep, and then we wonder why so many insurance agents fell you just learned from one of the from one of the top Dudes in this industry that all you got to do is show up and your chance of success increase Sounds so overly simplistic, but that's how I know who actually believes that who actually is showing up I just got a look at the webinar registration list and I say hey This is the third time I see agent participate in this. I don't see production. We got to work with this agent We got to help them. They're wanting to learn. They want to get it figured out. That's huge Yep, I I know exactly what we're gonna title this video now based on what you just said. That's huge That's good, man. That's so good. That was that was the That it also there's gonna be a lot of agents that watch this that don't make it the 25 minutes that we've been on and This was the best part I see so many people that that say they're gonna do something and they don't do it They say they're gonna jump on the free webinar and they don't like we have a 30 about a 30 4% attendance rate on our free webinars And we'll have a thousand agents register 340 show up that is the problem with our industry. It's not it's not that Difficult to get over the hump and succeed. All you have to do is show up and you know The 76% whatever 66% that didn't show up really missed out Yeah, I want to know who the 34% that did show up. That's right Those are the guys that can be worked with guys in the house Those are the people that want to learn and those the people you and I can help That's right. I'll help you if you don't show up. That's amazing. That's amazing What what tell me a little bit about North American life plans you guys what you do what you do for agents and and Couple more questions before we wrap up. Sure. Well, so first of all, I want to say we may be one of the last true Independent insurance marketing organizations out there, you know, there's so many companies that are getting bought up and rolled up in this Whole consolidation. We are not for sale. We are an independent organization I was named president of the company on January 1st I got you know 20 years ahead of me and then we have a whole succession plan as to how that's going to happen And I think that's important because you want to make sure that you're working with an organization that you could be with for the Long-term, especially if you've only been in a couple of years. You want to know what the future is The second thing is is while we are big and we are growing fast at the same time I still kind of think of us as a boutique You know, we do health insurance and we do financial products like life insurance and annuities and Medicare and small group But I don't ever want to lose the fact that we're a boutique because that's what keeps us Tight in a community and as soon as we kind of get too big I always worry that we look lost that personal touch and the genuine desire to try to help agents The third thing and we haven't really mentioned it and I know they're gonna kill me for not mentioning it is We are leading the interest at the industry on making the transformation to virtual marketing Hmm. If agents are still trying to market the old-fashioned way Try to knock on doors or trying to you know do seminars all of those are great and maybe they may come back But you have got to figure out how to do digital marketing and virtual marketing And we are leading the industry and helping agents figure out how that is You've got to be able to sell over the phone and roll electronically and virtual market last but not least two other things Second last thing is if you're currently in an organization where you feel like you've sort of hit the ceiling for whatever reason All of our top producers came from someplace where they felt like they hit a ceiling Found that pathway to independence and making that really big money That's one of the things we specialize in last but not least because we have sort of that commonality This organization really is a community of agents community of producers that all want to help each other Not something you're really gonna find in a lot of places There's a lot of great people in this business that I love dearly But if you're looking for hundreds of mentors that actually know what they're talking about and we're willing to take the time to help you Talk to you work with you on social media That's that's who we are Mmm. That's amazing What's some of the top takeaways if someone's wanting to transition to being a hundred percent virtual nowadays and they've been doing it The old-fashioned way so certainly you've got to learn how to do digital marketing I mean there's just no way around it and you know Digital marketing has so many different Ways to go about it, but One of the things that is really simple is Facebook Everybody's on it now. It's so simple and easy You just have to learn some basic steps to do some simple Facebook marketing and you can do it for super cheap Sometimes even not spend anything at all just use some elbow grease So you got to be able to do that the second thing I would say though I think sometimes agents think of virtual marketing as Only being social media or search engine optimization and things like that But that's still too narrow to me to me networking Mmm. It is a virtual marketing method. I can call PNC agents I can ask a friend I can talk to people and I don't have to physically be in front of home or go buy a Launcher true those things you can network that's still virtual marketing and as we talked about at the onset of this program I don't know that that will provide you instant gratifications in terms of leads But over the long term it will provide you the best Prospects that convert the highest rate spend the time to build your network build that referral basis It takes time, but networking is a way to virtually market without having to do Facebook or search engine optimization that takes even longer because it takes some time to get it figured out But we are leading the industry in helping agents figure that out. We have One of the things I was telling somebody our December of this past year We were up 70 percent over to the December of the prior year and if an organization of our size to be growing at that clip That's just that's ridiculous So, you know somebody was asking me did they pandemic affect you? Well, you know, obviously not very much 70 percent's pretty healthy number But I would argue that part of the reason that we have done so well is and I talked to other guys who tell me They really struggled through the pandemic is because we were in front of it We were showing agents how to do things over the phone how to enroll people electronically how to do digital marketing We've been in front of this for a while. None of this took us by surprise It probably accelerated a few things like it probably did for a lot of others Good example is this, you know, I've never done YouTube interview with Cody asking So, you know first time for anything or anything, but but our agents didn't get surprised. They didn't get Handstrapped or you know, they didn't get handcuffed from the pandemic They were prepared and they were ready to go and didn't really affect them Actually, if anything it might have helped them because 70% is a ridiculous Amount of growth year-over-year for a company of our size. I think they probably Capitalized on other agents sitting back going on. I don't know what to do The agents that I've heard even didn't say they didn't know what to do. They said I'm gonna wait Hmm those guys who said they were gonna wait wait until it all goes back to where it was before our agents took their customers Yeah, exactly. That's so sad too because that was such a such a moment in a positive way It was such a moment for opportunity to advance to expand, right? Yeah, exactly what we did we looked at as an opportunity We were locked and loaded and we took advantage of the opportunity. I love it. What's some final tips for an agent that's Needs to take it to that next level and really expand in 2021 I'll just re-emphasize what I said earlier get all the training that you can from every source that you find credible and reliable Spend the time you will turn into a top producer by learning. However, I'm gonna be the smartest guy out there You've got to have your prospect bucket full That's right find a way to do that partner up work with a carrier work with a IMO work with a call center Do whatever you got to do to be overwhelmed with leads and prospects those two things. It's really pretty simple do it I'll do it if you're willing to do it. I'm willing to help you. I'll find all of it But it's huge how to take those steps. That's huge man show up so difficult, right? be willing be willing to learn and Feel the bucket with tons of people to see that's incredible If if if if someone's loved this they're like man, I like this Andy dude How do they get in touch with you? How do they learn more and how do they? Reach out to you You can find me almost everywhere. You can call me 888-362-1214 my direct extension by the way is one zero zero three Wow should be an email at a Daster life plans lc.com But for your audience, you know what just connect with me on Facebook connect with me on LinkedIn or Instagram You'll find me there Andy Daster by the way Sometimes you'll see my professional designations after or so might see Andy Daster cl ucfp But it's there's only one as far as I know There's only one Andy Daster in the entire insurance industry. So it can be that hard to find me. That's right You want to run faster contact Andy Daster? You like that I Love it, man. Well, thank you so much for your time today. Appreciate you being on an unbelievable job You're you are doing and you are leading from the front and you are focused on helping people and it truly means a lot that you Spent some time with me today. So thank you Appreciate it buddy thing and also thank you guys for watching want to run faster contact Andy Daster. See you next time Hey, if you enjoyed this I got another one. You're gonna love it's right there. Click on it See you next who's here because you want to change the game for you in 2021 and you want life to get really good in 2021 you want your income to go up in 2021 You would have a lot of people in 2021 and you want to look back and say dude 2021