 What if you noticed over the last 13 years that maybe there's a maybe there's a struggling PNC office out there. Maybe there's a new PNC agent out there that's like, dude, what do I need to do to be Dan Kidajima in 13 years? What would you say? It just started, you know, first year 100 policies of a month, you know, and then now just a couple months ago we hit our highest, which is 600 policies. Boom. Yeah, as much as I'm proud of what we've done, I feel like I don't want to even want to hear that I'm doing a great job. Like I don't please don't say that because I feel like I feel like although I'm proud, I feel like I'm definitely not satisfied. Successful people are doing big stuff, man. They're never satisfied. They know they can always do more and they're committed to the game, you know, it's a process, you know, for you, you're just you're enjoying the journey, you're enjoying the ride. Man, that's awesome. Hey, I'm excited to interview Mr. Dan Kidajima, owner of a farmer's insurance agency in Orange County, California. Dude, you're doing some mega big stuff. Have you always been that way or have you just gotten better over time? Hey, thanks so much for having me, Cody. It's a real honor to be here, you know, because talking about big stuff, I mean, I'm humbled to just be talking to you and we talked about it earlier that I should be the one asking you the questions, but we'll get that on my YouTube channel, hopefully. You did agree on it. But no, yeah, it's been really something that just gradually over time, you know, took place. It wasn't anything that just one year after another just had a huge jump. It's just been very steadily, but, you know, I think the business that we're in does take some time and with some patience. But if you're consistent and you're putting the right activity each and every day, you know, over 13 years, you know, something starts to happen. So, yeah, I would say over the last several years, we've hit some things that has started really working for us, but it has been a steady increase when it comes to production. That's awesome. Dude, 13 years, they always say long obedience in the same direction, you know, and you're a literally a spitting image of that. You know, I mean, you're successful, super successful. One of the larger PNC agencies that I know in the country doing some big stuff, right? It took 13 years. You got amazing staff. I love watching some of the videos, the behind the scenes and some of the sales meetings and stuff. I enjoy that kind of stuff. What have you noticed over the last 13 years that maybe there's a struggling PNC office out there? Maybe there's a new PNC agent out there that's like, dude, what do I need to do to be Dan Kitajima in 13 years? What would you say? Wow. I think first thing first is we'll be the marketing, you know, how are you marketing? Because when I first started doing insurance, you know, we want to market to not only to today's world, but also we want to market thinking about what's going to work in five years too. So I think the marketing strategies, if it's a little outdated, what has worked before was great, but you know, what's going to work now and what's going to work in five years? I want to always think a little bit ahead, a step ahead. So some of the things I was doing earlier on, I was thinking, hey, try to see some trends of what's going to work and try to, when you see the trends, you could see some trends that may not work. Like for example, I'm not sure if people like being called these days. You know, people do like to be on their phones and be entertained. So I would say, hey, like, how are we marketing? I think that's the number one thing I will be thinking about as agency owners. I almost feel like that's our job is like, we're almost like a marketing company now. And how to just be marketing and be present and be transparent. And I think those are some of the things that I feel is going to convert these days. So I will say, yeah, I will start off with marketing probably. I love it, man. Dude, in today's world, you are cutting edge, right? You're branding, you're marketing, you've got a staff, you realize it takes a team, you're probably spending, you know, obviously tens of thousands of dollars a month, you know, if not 100 grand a month, and you get the, you get the, you know, you get the modern day business world without giving away all your secrets, because they got to go to your website and actually pay for some time with you is, and they should, by the way, if they're in your space. What's some type of marketing technique that isn't crazy revolutionary, but it's something that's working well for you that you're okay sharing? Yeah, well, Facebook, you know, and Instagram, really, I would just, that's really the answer, really. And I don't, I feel like making videos, you know, being transparent, getting them to know you, you know, I think that's a big part of the business, you know, you have to be known. And I think, I think just, just by doing a little bit of research on you, and I'm going to do a lot more on you, I mean, I don't think there's anyone else that is doing it at your level, you know, so that's why, you know, I'm just so honored to be talking to you with you is, I feel like we're on the same page when it comes to just, hey, let's just put ourselves out there. You know, we have nothing to hide, we're just insurance agents, we're not, you know, we're just here to help people, you know, we're professional and friendly and just, you know, nothing to hide and just put ourselves out there. It did, as an introvert, was a little bit harder for me to get across that, you know, point of being comfortable enough. But I think it's necessary these days to just film ourselves, take picture, make content, and just really put ourselves out there so people could know us and then do business with us. Yeah, yeah, Rich Cavanus and Dallas had me had me reach out to you and start following you and I instantly went to Instagram, like you're talking about Facebook, Instagram marketing, I instantly went to Instagram, followed you, you're always showing some fresh kicks, I'm a shoe fan, you know, I'm an ex basketball college basketball guy, so I'm always watching your stories, I'm like, that's awesome, I love that. Congrats to your Lakers, I'm assuming you're, you know, maybe a Lakers fan out there in Orange County, but no, I'm actually a Clipper fan. I root for the underdog, but you're around Dallas, right Cody? Actually, in Springfield, Missouri, I'm in Dallas so much. Oh, really? Okay. In the conference? That's your conference was, yeah. Yes, everybody literally thinks I live there. And I told my wife of the day, if I go to Dallas one more time, I want to buy a second home in Dallas. I've been there like three or four times in the last month and a half, it's crazy. So as far as, as far as the last 13 years, what kind of growth have you had? What kind of, how many policies have you sold? What kind of numbers are you doing now? I'd love for those to really, I'd love for your numbers to speak for themselves from a credibility standpoint. Yeah, sure. Yeah, well, as a farmers insurance agent, there's a lot of different ways to get started in this great opportunity that farmers agents have. But I started off in a system where we just started off day one, your agency owner, and you just write a book, write a policy that's yours. So there's nothing like really given to you or you're not buying any policies for anything. So just organically growing every month. But yeah, again, it's just nothing where, you know, one day we just bought a big, big, big, big business. It just started, you know, first year 100 policies a month, you know, and then now, just a couple of months ago, we hit our highest, which is 600 policies. Boom. Yeah, they call it units. I'm not sure, you know, different ways to calculate it. But it's just a three car household and it counts as three units. So 600 units, 601. So we have 10,000 policies in force. And yeah, close to 10,000, 9,900. So I don't want to, you know, exaggerate. Honest man, close enough. Yeah. So yeah, but honestly, Cody, I feel like I'm just getting started. You know, I feel like sometimes, you know, we've got the Personal Alliance Agency Year Award from Farmers Insurance, which is a huge accomplishment for our agency. I'm so proud of my team. But people will say, hey, we're doing great things. And I guess the numbers are great. But I just feel like the potential is just, is just, we're just really just getting beginning to just start to see it, seeing the potential, like what I feel like we should be doing. Because I mean, I'm not sure what's your experience, but I'm sure independent agents, you know, there's some monster agencies out there. I just feel like I never want to be thinking that I'm doing a great job. Because frankly, like, there's just so much potential in this business that it's almost like disrespectful to the business or to the company for not taking advantage of it. You know, so as much as I'm proud of what we've done, I feel like I don't even want to hear it that I'm doing a great job. Like I don't, please don't say that. I feel like, I feel like, although I'm proud, I feel like I'm definitely not satisfied. Successful people that are doing big stuff, man, they're never satisfied. They know they can always do more. And they're committed to the game, you know, it's a process, you know, for you, you're just, you're enjoying the journey, you're enjoying the ride. Man, that's awesome. Absolutely. Yeah, if you were to describe yourself for those that don't know you in a single word, that's tough. What would you say? Oh, man, just only give me one word, huh? One word. It depends on the day, but I think right now it may be consistent. You know, I just feel like, like you just touched on a code. It's like, I just love the journey so much that I don't feel like, hey, once I get to a destination, I'm going to take a break. I'm not always like looking forward to a break, even though there aren't necessarily, I do take maybe a vacation a year, but I just enjoy working so much that I don't feel it is work. So it's easy for me to stay consistent. And I think that is from when I see other agency owners, I think that could be one of the different makers because I'm always thinking of the next thing. I'm always working. I'm always trying to motivate my staff. I'm just always doing something. And I feel like this may be a blessing that I've had, you know, that I just want life to be busy. And that helps me stay consistent. That's awesome. Dude, what a great word to choose when 92% of interest agents are filling in their first three years and you're coming out and you're picking your word consistent. That's what a lot of agents struggle with, man. They're not consistent on a daily basis. I always say step number one is to show up, right? And you show up every single day. I notice that about you. I see it about you. I respect that about you. And I love it, man. I love that. If you had to look back over the last 13 years and you had to think of one aha moment that really maybe shifted things for you, right? Got your attention, made you change something and it really started to propel you on the path to success. If you had to look back, it was probably several, I'm sure, right? Because for me, I've had a revelation many times in our business about how to change something up. If you had to pick one thing that could benefit somebody that's watching that was really more of an aha moment for you, what would it be? Wow. Man, these questions are great, Cody. Thanks. You got to step on my game when I interview you. I might just ask the same questions, honestly, because these are great ones. And I love the passion you have for trying to bring value to your audience. Thank you. These moments are so important in our careers. And there's so much to talk about, but with the time that we have to focus on what has really pivoted our agency, man, I just have so many that I could think of right now. Man, I think one of them was when I was new, I think part of being ambitious, the problem could be that you get overly ambitious and you start getting a little frustrated that things aren't happening as well. Especially in the PNC world, it just takes some time to build it up. And I could sense that with my ambition as high as it was, I was getting frustrated myself. I wasn't as nice to my employees. I wasn't as nice to maybe even my clients almost. So one of the aha moments was like, hey, I have time. So having a sense of gratitude, more sense of gratitude and patience, really. When once I had that patience kick in, I was like, hey, I'm doing a good job, give myself a little bit of credit, don't beat myself up, everything's gonna happen, just a matter of time. That's when I became a lot better as a leader, especially to my employees, even being patient with them too. So for me, it was patience. Another aha moment I just thought about right now is when I found a lead source that really worked and I was spending money on it. For some reason, I just thought I shouldn't spend more than an X amount of dollars on it. I just didn't think like, but it was a aha moment was like, well, why not? I want to scale my business, I need more leads, just blow up the marketing budget. So that was an aha moment where I don't know why. It was like an imaginary cap I had on myself where like, oh, I shouldn't spend this much anymore than this on marketing. That was an aha moment was like, well, let's just blow this place up and just spend more money because once you have more leads, a lot of the problems are solved. Yes, yes. Now you're speaking my language, man. I love that. Dude, that's strong. Those are great, great feedback for the audience. I have time, overly ambitious. I struggle with that too. You mentioned with a team and staff and stuff. Along the way, I, being overly ambitious as well and being a lot of like, we seem to be on a similar, how old are you? I just turned 40 this year. 40? Okay, dude, you don't even look 40. I just turned 30 this year. So we're a similar age, you know, in a way. And we feel like, I feel like we have a, we've had similar paths because I've been in this industry about a decade and I've been overly ambitious, hard on my staff, didn't treat people the way I should along the way. And I feel like you start to grow and mature and you sort of come into more of a business owner because in this business, I feel like, I want to see if you agree. I really feel like you're, initially you're a great salesperson, right? Then you want to be a great sales manager, then you want to morph into being a great CEO and business owner. And I feel like, you know, it was a great salesperson. I made 120 grand when I was 20, you know, great sales manager, learned over time how to be one and now trying to be a CEO and business owner and you seem like, you seem like you've moved in to more of that role as well. Yeah. Yeah. The roles will always change, you know, but I call it, you know, being patiently in a rush, like, I'm always in a rush, like doing something, but in the, in the big picture, I'm being patient. When in the small picture, I'm just in a rush, like, I gotta get stuff done, I gotta get stuff done, but I'm still looking at it, you know, taking a step back and looking at it from a macro view. But yes, you've been owning 30, man. The sky's the limit. I mean, you're just getting started. Dude, I mean, that's, that's, you know, I'm really looking forward to just, you know, just connecting with you and just keeping in touch and seeing what great things you're going to accomplish. Because man, to be where you are at 30, I mean, at 30, I just, I was three years in and I was just mad every single day that I wasn't, you know, having a million dollar book of business. The mindset was so different. But I think I hope that that could help some people work. Hey, if you're working hard every day, even though there's, it's going to be not easy and it shouldn't be, it does pay off. For sure. It always does, man. You know, I mean, those that survive and make it and really, they end up thriving, you know, they really do. You said being patiently in a rush, maybe think of the country song. I'm in a hurry to get things done. Yeah, I don't know. It's, it's, lyric's always kind of on my mind. I don't even listen to music, but lyric is kind of on my mind, which is kind of funny. If you had to do it all over again, not that you would, because you know what, you've learned so much along the way, right? But if you had to do it all over again, you had to start over from scratch, someone to drop you off in the state of Maine, I don't know, need to build a new team and a new office and everything else. Nobody knew who you were. What's the first thing you would do? I would just, you know, have a marketing plan, you know, I would make content, I would promote it, and I would just, I would do that first and then, you know, look for staff to help grow our agency. But I think I will say, I say marketing before staff or even location, maybe, is because you just, you just need, you just need someone to talk to, you know, and that's, that's the first thing, the first step for anything. And I say, looking back at things, I will say, some of the mistakes I made sometimes being consistent also means that you're not willing to change as much. So I think, although people have said that, hey, you've adapted to the new world, I look back and sometimes wish I would have adapted a little bit sooner or spend more money on marketing sooner. So those are some of the things like, from what I've learned, I wish I would have, you know, went from internet leads to social media a little bit faster or, you know, just spend more money on marketing when I knew it was working. Some of those things are things I look back on. And if I was starting all over, those are the things I would do a little bit sooner or be a little bit more aggressive. Yes. Yes. 100%. Me too. Me too. Me too. As far as staff, what's, what's, what's something you, what's something you look for when you're hiring staff? There was a lot of people that have agencies, they struggle to find good people. You've clearly found, I mean, how many staff members do you have? I have 12. Yeah, exactly. I was thinking, yeah, I was thinking you had 12. They seem really impressive. What do you look for? And how do you find great staff? Yeah, I just look for good attitude and good activity. I think them having confidence is important too. Yes. And then having someone who has a long-term view too. As agency owners, we always play the long game, but sometimes staffs, that's a little bit harder to expect that from them. But some people do have more of a long-term outlook in their careers. Yes. I feel like that's important. And also I try to look for people I like to just generally want to help, you know, and I'd like working with because a lot of times, you know, I'm not sure how other agents do it, but for me, it's, I haven't had that great of luck of finding people who are already licensed where to go. My strategy has always been, hey, you know, you don't know anything about insurance, just have to be a good person, a hard-working person, again, attitude and activity. As long as you have that, I feel like, hey, I'm going to be patient with you. We're going to, I'm going to teach you from day one what everything is, and just build with that person long-term because even though they may not be licensed, they'll start off with. So in the beginning, I feel like I'm really helping them, you know, paying them and I'm training them. I feel like my training is pretty valuable. So I feel like if you don't generally like that person, you're not really going to go through the journey of paying them and training them at the same time. So I do feel like someone that you like as a person you want to help is a good fit. And I look for those types of attributes rather than skill or pedigree or resume because I'm really in it for the long run. And I feel like if you help somebody from day one, there's a little bit of sense of loyalty that you may be lucky enough to get if you really help them with everything they know about insurance really came from that person. For sure. Let's talk about activity for a second. We got a couple more minutes real quick. I got two more questions. As far as activity, what's some of the activity metrics or some of the activity things that work well in your office that someone can learn from? You know, Cody, I don't really look at, although, you know, I'm agent so people think I'm a real numbers guy. You know, I'm kind of more of a just just a field guy, you know, I'm in the, I'm in the middle of the cubicles. This is my private office, but I'm in, I have a desk, you know, I have a cubicle out there was in the middle of everybody. That's awesome. So, you know, and newer agents are sitting next to me. So, I'm just literally this way that way. I could train this person. I could train this person and questions all over the place. So, I just gauge activity level by how busy we are. And sometimes another thing that I'd like to do is like, hey, if we're not busy, then it's sometimes I'd like to take accountability and figure out what am I not doing right? I might not get enough leads. Am I not giving them duties, you know? So, I just, I just know what busy is and I like being busy. So, I like to be out there and just help people stay busy because being busy, I feel is a blessing. Yeah. Yeah. My dad always says, you can work half a day. You got 24 hours. You choose which 12 hour period you were. Alona and your dad was an insurance, huh? Yeah. He's been in it for 30 years, this past April. And he's more on the life and Medicare side. But yeah, he's been doing it forever, man. And actually that leads me to my last question, which is it's kind of funny you said that I credit a lot of my success to my parents, you know, and raising me the right way, making me show up when I don't want to show up, right? Teaching me how to have good manners, teaching me how to be on time to something and not be late, you know? Who do you credit for your success? Same thing, you know, my parents. Well, my dad was an entrepreneur and I actually, you know, helped him out with his business too, the digital marketing side. But yeah, same thing, Cody. I mean, it's just like what you just said about, you know, how your parents helped you is the exact same thing, how I feel about my parents. But we're really blessed and I feel like sometimes when I come across staff members or people that may not have had that luck, then I feel like it's maybe my obligation to like trying to provide that, you know, learning lessons. And hopefully I could, you know, influence them in a positive way, the way my parents have influenced me. Exactly. I love it. For those that are like, dude, Dan Kirajima is a beast and I love him. How can they find you? Yeah, just my name, Dan Kirajima, Facebook, Instagram, Facebook's big with insurance agents, but I personally like Instagram and then YouTube channel, where I have, you know, interviews with top elite agents, I call it. So you'll be the next, well, maybe not the next guest, but a future guest, all right. Where, you know, I just love talking to other agents are doing great things and really learn from each other. So those are some of the places. And yeah, always DM me or Facebook messaging me is something that I like to engage with because man, there's just so much to learn. And that's what I'm a big believer in that I have a lot more to learn and we got a lot more to get done. Boom, dude, you did an unbelievable job. Thank you so much for being on today. No, thank you, Cody. Too bad he had to go, but we're going to keep in touch, man. I really want to do some more things with you and then get to know each other too. Dude, for sure. Hey, for those watching again, you're like, man, this has been good. I want you to be in the hot seat and be the next Dan Kirajima doing big things. Thanks for watching. Have a great shoot. Hey, if you enjoyed this, I got another one you're going to love. It's right there. Click on it. See you next. Hey, so I want to transition now into working leads. I want to give you some specific training on how to work leads. And then I'm going to finish with some mindset pieces. Okay. I'm going to finish with some mindset pieces in a second. Okay. So, so, so