 Hey everybody, it's Dave Duford here at daviduford.com where I help agents like you become top producers and today I'm doing a special interview with Cody Askins at SecureAgentMentor.com. Say hello, Cody. Thank you, brother. How are you guys? I'm doing good. Thank you so much for popping on the call today. So the purpose of today's interview is to talk more about Cody's new conference, which is going to be in Nashville in late October. And before we get into some of the details about this great conference that's designed specifically for insurance agents looking to up their game, let's go ahead and ask Cody a little bit about himself just to formally introduce yourself to my audience so they can get to know more. Thank you, buddy. Appreciate you doing this very much, man. We're really excited about the conference. I've been in the business since I was 19. I started actually as an intern at 18. My father's been in the business almost 30 years. He started like three months before I was born. He started in April. I was born in July. I don't know if I ever said that on video, dude, that's kind of funny. And so then I got started at 19. I was in college playing basketball, full-time student athlete, really fell in love with the business. Didn't know what a lead was. So there was a lot of cold calling, call nights, bringing over college kids, cold door knocking. I was fortunate enough to make 117 grand in my first eight months and just truly fell in love. I mean, we are in the best industry, the best vehicle in the world. I mean, it's amazing. Most people don't realize that there's more millionaires in the financial services and insurance industry than any other industry in the world. And so I love it. That was early stages of career. I was fortunate enough to go to the World Series a few times, earn a few nice trips with the captive carriers with back then, Mutual Loma Hall, who I started with. And then over the last four or five years, fell in the field, fell over the phone, built a security mentor. Since I looked this morning, my first security mentor video was December 28 of 2015. And man, was it awful. It sucked. And now we've just continued to, you know, involve the mission and focus is to bring value just like you do and help our audience. You know, the insurance industry where unfortunately about 92% of insurance agents fell. So here we are. Yeah, so that kind of brings me to the whole concept of what the 8% nation means. So you mentioned 8% a lot. Tell us more about what the implication of that is and more about how what that really means. Absolutely. That's definitely been a really popular question. Statistically, you know, most stats aren't always down to the decimal correct, you know, down to the number, but about 92% of insurance agents fell in this business within their first few years, which is a sad number. When I got started in the business, there was four of us all getting trained, trained at one time. And they said, hey, the chances are three of you won't be here, at least three of you won't be here. And here in a few years, I'm like, dang, this is not a good start, man. That's like, that's kind of worried, you know, that's like, I'm trying to make this thing work. And actually, two of the four are still there. The other was my best friend, brother-in-law, and he's still in the business too. So there you go. But it's just, it's all about bringing awareness to the fact that too many insurance agents fell. It goes back to, like you talk about a lot, seeing people on a consistent basis, getting in with friend people. That's, you know, people don't fell because of a lack of experience, a lack of knowledge, you know, they fell because they don't ask the people to buy, just plain numbers, just like 92% of agents fell in. So we've created the 8% Nation Insurance Wealth Conference to bring awareness to that fact, to bring a modern spin around helping insurance agents, developing insurance agents, bringing everybody together in Nashville at a big NFL stadium and Nissan stadium to hang out and really give back to this industry that's given us so much. So why now are you putting this conference together? I mean, the intent is completely understandable and good because the unfortunate reality of this business is that the vast majority fail. Why now? Why this conference? That's probably the one question I would ask for anything else is, dude, why in the world are you doing this? And at the end of the day, I'm someone that I believe in goal setting. I write down my goals every morning, every night. I'm sold on my mission, my goals. And Memorial Day this year, I was in the pool, but actually day before, hanging out with my family, talking to my dad, you know, laying around. And we were talking about conferences and events. And I'm like, you know what, I've always wanted to throw a conference. I've always wanted to throw an event. And I thought, why wait? What better time? I was 27 at the time. I'm like, you know what, I preach, think big and take action. So what kind of hypocrite would I be if I think big, but then I don't take action and really put it into force. And so yeah, we're doing something that's bigger than me, bigger than our team. And it's gotten a lot of awareness and getting bigger and bigger every day. So the people know it's less of the Cody show. It really is. That's what I've told my team from the very beginning. I don't want to think about me. It's about me. People aren't going to tend, you know, most people in the business have no clue who I am and they don't care, which is cool. But at the end of the day, I want to bring value to the industry. I want to bring awareness. I want to bring people like you onto the panel to give back and to educate so that our industry can start to elevate. And so I did it because I knew that I was going to do it eventually anyway. So I took time out of the equation and what better time than now. So you've emphasized on some of your promotional videos that this is not just a conference. This is an insurance wealth conference. Can you kind of expand on the overall meaning of that and the theme behind the event? Absolutely. I've got a few mentors in my life as I feel like everyone should. One of them, his name is Mr. Charlie Cina. He'll be at the event. Really, really good dude. And we were talking one night and he said, hey, what's the, because it didn't start, it started out as just an insurance conference, you know, back in June. And he said, hey, what does everyone want? And everyone initially gets in this business to create wealth. They just do. They want to generate revenue. They want to make money that they see other. They see someone like you being successful. They learn from you. They feel like you that they can also make the kind of money you make. And so rather than just making another insurance conference, I want to make it a insurance wealth conference where the entire focus is we're going to break the four days down into different parts. And so the whole focus goes back to creating wealth. And you say, well, dude, it ain't all about money. Well, sometimes wealth is more than just money, you know, it's the freedom it gives us. It's the ability it gives us to spend time with our family. I know you spend a lot of time with your family, all your kids, man. And that's what this industry and this career allows us to do. It allows us to give back, allows us to donate, allows us to be a part of charity. It allows us to be more than just us being self-absorbed in us and only thinking about the end result and money. And so wealth in all facets of life as an insurance agent. Yeah, I think reaching for the higher purpose of this is great because it kind of draws the whole the whole draw to this business. That's like you said, from the outset separates it from so many others, you know, just the freedom and prosperity that you can achieve through this this medium is fantastic. So, so if that's not enough, continue to expand on why my audience agents like those who are in the field selling whatever it is they're selling, what reasons, what kind of benefits will they get out of attending the wealth conference? Absolutely. So this conference is focused on four different areas. It's focused on becoming a marketing master. Friday morning, the 26th, that's what we're going to spend time on. That's what the speakers are going to educate on. Then Friday p.m. is where we talk about living an ideal life. We've got Tim story. I believe that due to the best motivational speaker personally that I've ever seen. I got to see him at growth con in Vegas, Grant Cardone's event when I tap front row. And I'm telling you what Tim story is unbelievable. He motivated me like nobody before. But then after him, we could hear from an NFL Hall of Famer, recent NFL Hall of Famer, Mr. Ray Lewis and the Baltimore Ravens. That dude, his story is incredible how he fought through pain. His 52 card story. If you guys haven't heard his 50 52 card story. I implore you to go back and watch that. You're probably on YouTube now. Research that once we're done. Then it's watching this. But after that, you got to watch the 52 card story. I'm telling you what it's amazing. And then we get into Saturday. Saturday morning, we get into a million dollar self summit. Guys that have built million dollars and 10 million dollar businesses. And even businesses are on their way to hundreds of millions. And then that Saturday morning on the 27th and then Saturday p.m. After lunch, we get into blow up your business. Coach Michael Burt is a really good, good, becoming a good friend of mine. I met him at growth con. He spoke at growth con. He lives in Tennessee. He believes everybody needs a coach in life. And that dude is a coach and he's going to coach. He's going to coach you. And then even after that, Grant Cardone. Grant Cardone is becoming the most sought after international sales trainer on the planet. And it's because I do know how to get attention. He knows how to help people. And we've also got two different panels. We got a lot of industry guys going to be filling up the speaking spots in the panel. Especially this for David Duford, who's going to be up there hanging out, bringing some knowledge back. Man, I'm excited. That's the cool thing. I think the best part of this, the speakers will be unbelievable. I think we're agents will soak up the most is when they get you and several other top industry influencers on one stage, answering live Q&A in front of an audience of thousands of agents at Nissan Stadium. That's what I'm probably most looking forward to. So at the end of the day, you're going to learn, you're going to, the reason to tend events, you're going to learn valuable nuggets. And you're going to be able to network and connect with people that'll impact your business. And then you'll be able to implement those nuggets that will drive revenue. I went to growth con in Vegas and I've been able to four to five X my income since then by attending an event. And so I'm sold on events and the power of networking. Right. Yeah, I know it's super exciting because, you know, agents have this opportunity to, to see some well known sales trainers in the business, but then also see people who are doing it specifically in the industry. I'm super excited. Some of the panelists, I know they're going to be there. Matt Mangea, he wrote about a half million in business and final expense. I think in 2014. Great guy, great trainer as well. Jeff Roots going to be there. He's the owner of digital BGA. He's going to be on the panel. And if you don't know about him, he's really at the cutting edge of helping agents develop their own websites. We generate organically training. That's just absolutely pivotal if you want to develop your business in that capacity. And then they're there for your edification questions. So, you know, I'm super excited to be speaking with them and conversing with them as well. And of course, you guys can bum rush us as well and flag us down and ask us questions. That's what I plan to do is peruse the aisles and meet people out there and shake hands and I'm looking forward to it as well. How did you end up getting Grant Cardone? I mean, that's, that's kind of a cool question here. I mean, especially Ray Lewis, too, and an NFL stadium. I mean, you're going big, as for sure. How did you do it? Yeah, it's really the Grant Cardone piece. I've followed Grant for probably five years, as long as most have followed him back when he first started getting attention. And I was fortunate enough to not only follow him, but I was in Miami back in January with my wife. She's a big Duke fan. I take her to the Duke game every Duke basketball game every year. So we're at Duke in Miami game in Miami. We stopped by Grant Cardone's office just north of Miami and we were there for over an hour. They were the nicest people, you know, because you see stuff on video, you know, he's very well known. He's got like six million followers, you know, and so you don't think they're going to give you the time of day. Well, his staff was incredible. His video guy talked to me. They let me in the studio to shoot some video content testimonials for them. We were waving at Grant. Grant came out. We got to talking and negotiating for tickets to his event. Just that Michael Bondette, his salesperson there is just an incredible guy. I was just, I was amazed. I was really, really shocked. And so then I went to growth con at front row, got backstage, got to talk to him and Elena quite a bit. I talked to a lot of the speakers. Then afterwards, my wife and I did a one on one coaching mentorship strategy session with him for about 30 minutes on Zoom or Skype or whatever it was. And it was, it was, it was amazing for him to spend some time with us to invest in our lives. I just know that he is great at getting attention, bringing value, driving revenue at the end of the day. That's everything that an insurance agent does. We want to get in front of people. We want to provide value. So having Grant Cardone, I'm really excited about the MPs. He's incredible. Ray Lewis, I just love his story. To get to the NFL Hall of Fame, people have no clue how much effort that takes. It's incredible. When I do things, I'm like, okay, how can we get attention around what we're doing? Well, have an NFL stadium in Nashville and that's a good start. So that was my way of getting Grant Cardone, getting Ray Lewis, plugging in the stadium. Once we walked through the stadium and got a tour and they were telling us how we could have the event here and stuff. I walked out and I'm like, holy crap, my mind is blown. I was so jacked up and excited. I'm running around the parking lot like, man, we are doing it here. So the stadium didn't know that yet, but I knew. So it was cool. So, you know, I spoke of a few panelists that are going to be there to answer questions. Can you kind of expand on who else is going to be there as well? People probably have heard of before on YouTube and Facebook and the insurance space. Absolutely, yeah. Obviously, you mentioned, we mentioned yourself, we mentioned Jeff Root, Modern Life Insurance Selling Podcast. Probably one of the most listened to insurance podcasts, at least for me. Maybe I don't know about all of them, but I know I've listened to that one. I listened to Winning Interviewed You, man, for that podcast on a plane. When I get on a plane, I turn on that podcast. I told Jeff that last week. Matt Mengia, doing over half a million in personal production with his own pen, final expense in the field, face to face, by himself. That's unbelievable, unbelievable. He's going to be up there. Sam Wolfe, a Marilife HBS, really incredible story, Mortars Protection guy. Ryan Saragakis, a community leader with Facebook Group 4000 agents. Tips, tricks, and closing. Really good guy. Eric Fierro and Justin Brock in the Medicare space. They want to help agents sell more Medicare, drive more renewals, create that financial freedom. And then Ryan Madison with the Adress Academy and Sean Fogelsen with the Finance and Business Coach Group becoming more prominent on YouTube as well. Somebody just added to the actual speaker lineup on stage given a keynote is insurance soup. We don't know that. We just added them the last couple of weeks. Michael McCormick and Taylor Dobby. Super, super well-known. Over 21,000 people are part of our group. I've been following them for years, just very well-known in our industry. We've got some other industry guys, Branding Clay, VP of Health Sales, Senior Marketing Specialist out of Columbia. My father, Brian Askins, who's been in the business for a long time. He's got as much knowledge about this business as anyone you'll ever meet. It's unbelievable. Ryan Palomini is going to teach people from stage how to write over $5 million a year in annuity. Vince Pampinato, the tele-filled guy with North Star. Just a lot of really cool names. Just a really good group of dudes. I'm getting to know. I'm starting to really enjoy the networking, the collaboration. I used to not believe that mentorship was that important. Finding mentors, learning from others. I think that was an ego thing. It was a pride thing. It was getting in my way. I started letting other people help me. I started to learn from others. I started collaborating with other people like yourself. My life's totally changed. So would you say this event is more geared towards the brand new agent, the experienced agent, or really both? Definitely both, but if I had to choose one, it's that agent out there that is struggling. Or maybe it's the agent that feels like they've got more potential than where they're at. They feel like they can do more. They feel like they can write more insurance. They feel like they can build a bigger team. They feel like they can make more money. I feel like all these things, I think it comes back to we all can do better. We all need help. We can all learn. You get two books up there behind you. One I was fortunate to be in. The other one, the official guide to selling products for insurance. I mean, really good books. I'm a huge believer in self-improvement, books, audio books, learning from others. So I know that anytime I'm sold on the fact that I am nowhere near my potential. I'm sold at David Dufort is nowhere near his potential. I'm sold that our audience is going to be at this event, has more left in the tank. And so let's put emphasis on helping all of us learn the mindset. I'm a big believer in the mental part of the game, the mission. Everybody's got to have a why. You talk about this a lot, the why. And then the specific moves that they can implement, the strategies and the nuggets, you know, to produce millions of dollars in this business. It's extremely capable. I feel like it's for everyone, but I feel like it's for anyone kind of a funny answer. But I feel like it's for anyone that feels like they got more left in the tank, that they can still do more and they've got more potential. They can get more. So as we wrap this up, Cody, tell us exactly if my audience is interested. I said, I want to attend. Where do they need to go? What do they need to do? Yeah, so what I'd love for them to do is go to 8%nation.com. Again, 8%nation.com. They can learn more about the event. They can see the speakers, literally as we're shooting this, because obviously we're shooting it before we release it. We're 29 days, 14 hours, 35 minutes and 24 seconds from showtime at Nissan Stadium in Nashville. We've got some amazing options on tickets. I'm not, you know, I'm somebody that I'm not going to make money from the event. I'll be fortunate if I don't lose money, frankly. But at the end of the day, it's more about the value, the mission, giving back. I don't care if I ever make a dime on the event. At the end of the day, I want to help people. I want to be like you and care and really, really care. So they can go to, they can do, they can do this. They can go to 8%nation.com. They can use the coupon code DOFORD B-U-F-O-R-D. And if they want to use it, that'll give them 50% off of any of the ticket levels. So whatever the current price, you got it, buddy. Thank you. Yeah, and I'll put the link below as well as the, how could you forget the coupon code? But I'll put that below. And it just follows the link there. And bye. So very good. Anything else you want to leave us with, Cody, for a wrap it up? Dude, man, I'm excited to hang out with you. I'm excited to hang out with everybody that's going to be there. We're expecting about 1,000 agents and we're, I'm just excited for the, like you mentioned, the conversations backstage, the conversations in the audience, the conversations at the VIP party on Friday night, the conversations at the VIP lounge, the conversations in the hotel, the conversations in the elevator, like those things are, they're freaking priceless. So I'm just, I'm just excited to get there, hang out, get to hang out with dudes like David Duford. I'm telling you, you guys have an awesome dude here and I'm excited to have you a part of this thing. So thank you for not only being a part of this, thank you for, for, for interviewing me about this and for being a part of this and, and it's really, really appreciate it, buddy. Thank you. No, you're welcome, Cody. Thanks for joining us and we'll see you then, okay? That's awesome. Thank you, buddy. Alright, man. Appreciate you guys. See you there.