BHC Hector Lemarque

Hector Lamarck, a Circle of Champions member and million-dollar earner at Primerica, shares his success story on a conference call. He emphasizes the importance of finding and developing motivated individuals to achieve financial success in the business. Hector believes that focusing on teaching and equipping others to be successful is key to retention and growth in the company. He attributes his own success to his background in sales and his ability to identify potential in people. All right. Well, good morning, Hector. Good morning, Larry. Good morning. Glad to have you on the call this morning, Hector. Thank you. Glad to be here. We're going to count down and jump right into the call, and we're going to have Josh jump in at some point during the call with some questions as well. Go ahead and get started. Okay. All right. Here we go. Good morning, Monday morning conference call crew. Welcome to the Big Hitter Call. This is Adam Weidel. It is Monday. On today's call, we are spotlighting Circle of Champions member and million-dollar earner Hector Lamarck. Hector has been with Primerica since 1984 and has 16,000 licensed agents and $15 million earners. Let's get the call started. Larry, I'll turn it over to you. Good morning, everybody. And, Hector, what a fun thing it is to start off the week hearing from you. I really want to let you know how much we appreciate you getting on, and you always make a major impact. And thank you for all you've done down through the years at Primerica. If we had a hall of statues, and we should outside of Primerica, you know, heroes that have made the company what it is today, Hector would be right in that group. And, Hector, by the way, I'm saying that, but I don't think we're ever going to get our statues. Oh, darn. How am I going to live with that? Yeah. So I just keep talking about the statues that we should get, you know. You never know. Keep it up. You might get it done. Yeah. And so the thing is that, you know, Hector, what a tremendous career you've had. And there's so many things to explore. And Adam and I were talking about, you know, what you represent and what you've gone through. But, you know, it was a great day in the history of the company when the light bulb went on in your mind, you know, and had come from an exposure that, you know, words that you heard and examples that you saw. And I don't know if it happened right away, but you got the picture in your mind, you know, with me and Bob Turley, you know, the company was in sales. There was no such thing as an override. You know, that came like four or five years later. You know, Art called me one day and said, hey, do you think, first of all, he gave us a 15% override on first generations. Then he called me one day after I had about 50 second generations. He said, you think it would be a good thing to have 5% on the second generation? I said, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I think that would be really good, you know. But anyway, you know, so the vision wasn't out there. In fact, Bob Turley and I used to have arguments. We used to laugh at meetings where they would talk about recruiting because you didn't make any money on recruiting. But once they put the overrides in and all of that in, the picture became very, very clear. And the picture became, you know, but for us it was a gradual unveiling, you know, the reality of where the future was and where the real payoff was for you spending your 24 hours in a day. And so I'm curious about how that happened with you. Was it all at once? Was it gradual? How did that come on? Because, Hector, I think the greatest thing we could do right now in the company, you got 93% and we always have had 93% of the RVPs who never really produce an RVP, and they pretty much get stuck in sales. If you talk to any of them one-on-one, they really would love to get in the building game, but there's a breakthrough, you know. There's a speed bump that keeps them from, you know, getting over that thing. And until they get the vision, until they get that want to fired up, they're not going to believe the reality that they can do it because they're not going to take it serious. But you had, you know, you had that light bulb go on, and I'm curious about how that happened for you because, man, the greatest thing we could do is we turn on one person who goes out and recruits 10,000 people, you know, recruits, trains, develop, license, promote 10,000 people in the next three years, and the company, you know, that one person could be anywhere in the company, and that's going to have a major impact and ripple throughout the whole company, you know. And so talk about, you know, how you went through that happened for you. If you don't mind, then we'll, you know, you can talk about whatever you want to talk about, you know. Sure. That's a good question. Well, you know, for me, before I got in Primerica, I was a professional salesperson. I had been studying Hopkins for years, and the selling part of Primerica was really easy for me. I never struggled with that and making money. I never struggled with making money as a result of that. But what I saw is that if you want to make big money, you've got to develop other people. You've got to find, recruit, develop other people. There's no other way to do that unless you want to be doing all the work for the rest of your career, which I didn't want to do, you know. My thing was finding the right people. I never tried to motivate people. I think trying to motivate people is a waste of time and energy. I never did that. I looked for motivated people, and when I found them, I recruited them, and then I taught them. And I'm big on teaching. I'm big on getting people equipped and prepared to be successful. And you can't be successful unless you make money, and you can't make money unless you close transactions. Pretty much as simple as that. I don't understand that most people don't get that. But I was always looking for motivated people, and when I found them, I worked my tail off to get them involved in the business, and then I worked my tail off to teach them how to get results in the field. That's what I focused on because I noticed that if you want retention, you have to get people making money, period. If your people aren't making money, it's not a matter of when they're going to leave, if they're going to leave, I'm sorry. It's when they're going to leave. They're going to leave. Everyone that doesn't make money leaves, and everyone that makes money stays for the most part. So that was always my total focus is finding the right people. And you've got to go through a lot of numbers to find the right people. There's no question about that, and I see a lot of people recruiting a lot of people. But what you've got to get great at doing is identifying who has the potential to actually make it here because not everybody does. You'd like to think when my first two or three or four years of this, I wanted everybody to be successful. I wanted everybody to make it. But, you know, the truth is most people aren't going to do the work to be successful. It's not because it's not possible. It's not because you're not helping them. It's because for whatever reason, they're just not that motivated. And so I think for me what turned my business around, it took me about three years. In my third year, I think I made $35,000 or something like that, or $86,000. And in my fourth year, I started making some big money. I made $400,000. Then I made $855,000. But it all came because I made a total focus on finding motivated people, and then I worked my tail off to teach them how to be successful across the kitchen table so they could make money and stay in the business, and then they could also develop the skill to be able to develop other people. And when I made that focus, my business really took off then, and it's been going great ever since. But I think the key is always in developing the people you have. That's all I ever focused on is finding the right people, not trying to make the right people. I think a lot of people in Brown America are trying to make people successful, and you can't do that. These are people that are going to put forth the effort and the work, or they're not. So I just got really astute at finding the motivated, working very hard at developing them, and then the business took off, and that's how I did it. That's always been my focus, even to this day. That's my focus is finding the right people and spending a lot of time coaching, training, developing those people. Well, you know, there's a phrase out there, eyes that see. And really, we all, to a large degree, are governed by what we see. When we look at the world, we look at people, how we evaluate things in our own mind, because that's us deciding where we're going to go, what we're going to value, who we're going to spend time with. And a lot of people don't develop those eyes that see. And so somehow early on, you developed eyes that saw people for what they could be. And so how did you get that? Did that come from your earlier sales career? Yeah. Was it something, a primarica for you? How did that get in your mind? Well, yeah, it did, because I was in the retail jewelry business, so I used to hire salespeople all the time and then train them, and then some would work out, some wouldn't work out, and you could start to see who the motivated ones were and who weren't motivated. And then I'd have to get rid of the unmotivated, and then I'd work really hard with the motivated to teach them how to close, how to get results cropping in our business across the counter. But, yeah, so I figured out that, you know, you've got to go through the numbers. No question about that. The numbers are the numbers. You still have to do that. But I found when you found the right people and you developed them, things really took off. And even in my other business, I produced, I don't know, three or four other managers out of my stores because I trained them so well. And then so when I got into Primarica, everything to me was about training, developing people, getting people's skill level up high. Because the higher people's skill level is, the greater the probability they're going to stay in the business. Because, again, if people don't make money, it's not a matter of if they're going to leave, it's when they're going to leave. So my thing was always to try to retain as many people as possible. But you can't retain people if they don't make money. They won't stay, you know. So I was very big on teaching people how to close, how to get results, how to close sales, how to close recruits, but how to close. If you follow me at all, then that's, you know, I was a big Hopkins student. So I listened to Tom Hopkins, how to master the art of selling anything, in my car two hours a day for three straight years, then listened to the radio, and I learned how to sell. I learned how to sell because selling everything, even recruiting is selling. Getting people to meeting is selling. You know, closing transactions is selling. Getting, you know, everything, everything about our business is selling. More people don't talk about that. It's always baffled me. I don't quite understand that. But I knew that if I get people selling, they're going to make money. They're going to stay. My business is going to grow. As a result, you know, we have 16,000 agents. We do about $5 million a month in premium, and I don't know, $20 million, $30 million in securities a month. But that's all through selling. That's not through any other method. You can't make money in Prime America without selling. I mean, you just can't. Even the recruit is useless to us unless they produce, right, unless they sell something. Right. So there's no point in having a recruit that doesn't do anything or doesn't sell anything because you don't make any money. I've never made a penny on a recruit. I've made a lot of money on recruits that were competent and could sell and could get results. But I've never made any money from a recruit in my career. Maybe you have, but I haven't. Yeah, well, the thing is that when they're trained, that helps build their confidence. And I think one of the reasons people fail, you know, one reason they don't dive in with the activity and they, you know, eventually leave has a lot to do with their lack of confidence. But the more they're trained, the more knowledgeable they are. When you learn things, you just talk about it. You know what I'm saying? Because it's fascinating. You learn things that fascinate you. And then you find yourself just bringing it up in conversations and everything. And, you know, Hector, in the early days, I used to go over at Sandy Springs. And Bob Turley had an office out at Sandy Springs. They started a new gym. And, you know, I always played full-court basketball, you know, three days a week. And when it started, it was just me. And then another guy would come in. And then soon it turned into where we had, like, 30 or 40 people coming in there. And, you know, I never even – I can't even remember a game plan to try and sell the guys there. But when I stopped that and I moved on to another location, I looked back and I said, I wound up selling every single person that was, you know, a client in our market that came out there. I don't even know how it happened. But when you – the more you know, the more you spontaneously talk about this stuff and you build a confidence. And so you don't talk about stuff you don't know about or you feel insecure about. Okay, I think the thing is, this is the thing I'm always focused on, competence leads to confidence. The more confident we are, the more confident we are. The more confident we are, the greater the probability of us staying involved. So if people aren't competent, they're never going to have the level of confidence needed to build something. Everything is about confidence. I mean, if you're building a – I don't know, you were in sports, right? I mean, I played basketball and tennis in college, and I was good at both of those things. And I worked like crazy on my competence. And the more competent I became, the more confident I became. And the same thing is in sales. The more competent you become, the more confident you become. If you want people – and people don't go for big things. They don't go for RVP unless they have a lot of confidence. But they can never have a lot of confidence without a high level of competence. So for me, I was always focusing because competence comes before confidence. I focused on getting people highly, highly competent. And that's all I ever focused on in building my business, is having people super competent. And then as a result, those people got confident. They go work. They prospect. They recruit. They train. They develop people. So, I mean, to me, it's been always been a – it's a simple process. It just takes a lot of work to do that, to commit to getting people competent. It takes a tremendous amount of energy and time and repetition. And most people just aren't up to the task. Well, the thing is that – let's circle back to finding motivated people. When you get people in, of course, we're going to give people a chance. You know, you never know how someone's going to be on the athletic field until you give them a jersey and get them out there and, you know, get them running around. Beat them around like Art used to say. Yeah. And so – but the thing – people are listening to this. You need to realize it's not that hard to see if they're motivated. Do they come early? Do they have a smile on their face? Do they ever ask a question? You know, I remember, Hector, in riding around with somebody in my car from, you know, when we were up in North Carolina going to lunch or going out to the farm or someplace, and I said, you know, what's amazing to me about this time we're spending together is not that you haven't had more success, it's just that you've got me all alone in the car with you and you haven't asked one question. They're not real motivated. Well, watch their behavior. If you just watch people's behavior, it tells you everything. It's not like trying to build a rocket ship or something. It's very simple. Their behavior tells you everything about them. Their behavior. Not their word, their behavior. I watch people's behavior. Your words, you know, whisper to me, but your behavior screams at me. So I'm always watching people's behavior because it tells you everything you need to know. Yeah, because, you know, one-on-one they're going to all say, oh, I cut off my arm to be successful. They and I work around the clock, and then they go home and turn on the TV, you know. Yeah, exactly. Or don't show up to the next training meeting or whatever, you know. But, Hector, the thing is you want to get in the people business, and, you know, you've got to develop these kind of eyes where you notice stuff and recognize reality and stop lying to yourself. You know, the mark of unproductive RVPs to me and that I've found through the years is how they are about the group of knuckleheads they've got together. They've got three or four. No offense, because I'm just talking generally now so nobody can be offended. But you get around them, they say, you know, let me show you my guys, or who you have in Atlanta, you know, came down to the convention, or who do you have at a school, or you go to their office and have a meeting and they bring in. And it looks like, not many, you know, you've got three or four chuckleheads who look like they came out of a Star Wars cantina. You know, they have, you know, you know what I'm saying? It's just like, what are you? And then, you know, and then before you got there they told you, oh, these are the greatest people in the world and everything. And it's just like, you know, you're just living in a fantasy land. And, you know, there was a time where even Mike, you know, Art Williams said to Mike Tuttle, and he said, how many studs you got, Mike? And he said, well, I got this, I got that, and he said, no, Mike, how many studs do you have? And I think at the time he had Randy Godfrey and he had Josh Huffman, and that was it. He said, Mike, you've got to go get some studs. And so how did you go about your, you know, because you've got to have, you know, even you've got to have a lot of people trying out to sort through. You've got to get ten people so you can get the best one out of ten. And even if you get motivated people, you want to get the most motivated one. It's not like somebody who's got one degree of motivation. You know, you want somebody who's a charger. And what was in your mind? What gave you the breath to go in there and recruit Rick Susie, who is your boss in the jewelry business? As I've understood, and I don't know if that's true, that's what I've heard. Well, he was never my boss. I didn't work for him. I left when he became the manager and stuff. I was gone already. I left. Oh, okay. But we were very good friends. Okay. Well, I mean, one thing is I did the work to become great at the business personally. So I had a lot of self-confidence that, you know, that people should follow me. You know, I think a lot of what happens why people never become really successful is they don't do the work to become great at what they do. I was great at doing the business. And so I knew if anybody got in the business and they got under me and they listened to me and they followed my example and my instructions, that they would be successful. So I was very, very straightforward about letting people know that I would tell my favorite, if you get in the business with my ability, what I know how to do, and as good as I am at this right now, and you let me teach you how to do this, you're going to be amazing at things. So I would tell people that because I was really good. Across the kitchen table, my closing ratio was 80-plus percent. It was very unusual for me because of my closing ability. If I got in front of a qualified client, I'd close at least 80 percent of them, sometimes more. So I was good at doing that. And so I was also very direct to people about the fact that if they got involved with me, not just in Primerica, but in business with Hector Lamar, that they were going to become successful. So you don't have that level of self-confidence unless you do the work to become great at what you do. And I don't think most people focus on that because when you're great at what you do, people want to be around you, people want to follow you, people pay attention, and you get results. So I think it's important that also that your ability to get people to like you and trust you is everything if you want to build something great. If people don't like you or they don't trust you, you have nowhere to go. And I don't think people pay enough attention to their people skills as well. That's a huge part of it. Getting people to like you and trust you, to me, is the easiest way to build something big, assuming you know what you're doing and you're really good at what you do. And I think the other thing is stay in the right market. I see people spending so much time with people in the wrong market, and that's just dumb. It doesn't make any sense. So for me, it's married children, homeowners, living in this area for a while, have good credibility within their war market. So the more you can stay in the right market, because if you're selling Mercedes Benz, you don't go to the guy that's behind the counter at 7-Eleven and try to get him to buy a Mercedes because they're not qualified. They're not in the right market. And I think a lot of what happens to people, they think if we just recruit, recruit, recruit, it doesn't matter who we recruit, but let's just recruit. Well, for me, that didn't work. For me, it was finding the right people and going through the numbers to find the right people. And that's what allowed me to build the business I have today. And then teaching them how to be a professional salesperson. I know nobody talks about that at Prime America. It drives me crazy that nobody talks about that because everybody that's really, really good at Prime America, I guarantee you whether they like to say it or not, they're professional salespeople, or else they wouldn't get big, everybody. So I think people should spend more time on that. I don't understand why people don't pay attention to teach people how to close. Closing is how you make money in Prime America. You can't close them on joining or you can't close them on buying. You can't make any money because it's all about closing. Everything about being successful is your ability to get people to say, yes, I want to buy, or yes, I want to get involved. It just seems so obvious. Yeah, but see, I mean, I think people feel like the reason they're getting beat in the company is some kind of mysterious thing. It's kind of obvious stuff, you know. It's totally obvious, right? You know, what a great thing it would be. You know, I've had this attitude that if the light switch would go on with our RVPs, pretty much every office would go to ten times capacity of where they are right now. They wouldn't have to worry about, you know, getting more facilities and this, that, and the other. Like, bam, ten-time increase in your income, your fun. You know, the thing about what these are deal killers to your fun of the business because the more you get good at this stuff, the more effective you get, the more fun you're going to have and the more enjoyment you're going to have in the fun. But when you allow sloppiness in your qualifying of your prospects, you're going to go out there and have defeat after defeat, you know, one after another. You're going to have to take the risk, and you're going to see it as rejection. It's not so much rejection as they're just not in our market. You know what I'm saying? They did you a favor by not buying it because they were going to drop it anyway, and it was going to be a bad mark on your persistency, you know. But, you know, the great salespeople in the company historically have always been great at using their time and as related to sales pre-qualified before they would take the time to go in and make a presentation on a sale or a training sale. It's like, well, where are we going? Tell me about this person, you know. Are they married? Do they have children? Do they own a home? I mean, if they're not in the market, what's the point? You haven't even seen them. It doesn't make any sense. Well, you know, it's the same thing of not having eyes to see, Hector. It's like, oh, that's a recruit. No, it's not a recruit. You know, he's a prisoner. Of course he's interested. Yeah, he's calling you online from the prisons. You know, that's not a recruit. Yeah, but he's going to get out, you know. Oh, shut up. And the thing is, like, they take anybody they can get, and they're so – because they want to have – they want to have a recruit, 10 recruits. And, you know, if 10 recruits get in the market, you know, Andy Young used to beat that. He said, you're going to start skyrocketing when you go over 10 in-the-market recruits, not just 10 recruits. Absolutely. Married children, homeowner, got a good job. You know, it's not that complicated. This is not rocket science from here. And then it comes in. You get people that, you know, you're tempted to call them names, but it's really they're great people. They're just not right for our business. Yeah. And they might try. They might be motivated. They might not know they have no prayers, but they might be motivated to make an effort, and they're looking at you with those cow eyes. But, you know, if you've got a brain, you're going to look at it and say, there's just no hope for this person. You know, they're not in the market. They can't talk to people in the market. You know, their appearance is, you know, unacceptable. You're not attractive. You know, the thing is, you've got to be – we're in the attraction business. The thing is, one point I wanted to bring out that emphasized what you said a minute ago is, like, people you couldn't get when you're making, you know, you've got your income up to $50,000 a year at Primerica, you've got a much better chance of getting them when you go over $100,000 or $150,000. You know, why? Because you're magnetic. You know, recruiting is a – you know, it's an attraction business. Now, we know financial services, most magnetic industry out there, the strongest. You know, always financial services always does good. And then Primerica, incredibly magnetic, incredibly – but we all know a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. But then you take a great industry and a great company and a great messaging concept and you go out there and you do a weak presentation or you're a weak messenger, you know, the whole thing unravels because you're just not there. You know, you just weaken the whole process. Because they know that you are the gateway for them into all of this, and they're like, no. But if you're making more money – you know, Hector, when I went to North Carolina, one of my guys went out and got John Lennon and brought him to my office in November of 1979. November of 1979. And John was going to come in and he had an office and they sold tax-sheltered annuities and he had 17 full-timers and yada, yada. John was going to come in. We took him down to a fast start school in Atlanta. And he talked to Art and, you know, he was going to come in. But, you know, like people do when they put you off, they send you signals. If you've got eyes to see, he would always say he's coming, then he'd miss the appointment. If they miss the appointment, folks, they're just not ready. They're just not into you. There's something – there's a reason. Regardless of the excuse, you know, it's just like that book out there, you know, like, girls, if a guy does not call you, he's just not going to call you back after the date. He's just not that into you or reverse, you know. And so you could, you know, the people like the wailing wall outside of opportunity meetings of all the people strolling up and down waiting for the so-and-so to drive up to the op meeting and they never come, you know. You know, you should have gotten them if you really wanted them to show up. But, you know, the thing is out there that people will tell you by their behavior, like you said. It's very obvious if you open your eyes. Down through the years, the guys who have been – had the greatest sales ratios have been great at pre-qualified. How would you pre-qualify? Before you went out with somebody, took your time, what would you – how would you sort through and make sure this is where I want to go? Well, I just want to say one other thing. People won't follow you if they don't see value in being connected to you. Your skill level is critical to attracting the right people. Most people don't see that. I attracted a lot of great people because I was really good. I mean, not to be braggadocious, but I was really good at the business across. And so, you know, that to me is one of the most important things that you could do is work on your skill level, your knowledge level, your skill level. You've got to personally develop yourself if you want to attract the right kind of people. What was the question you just said? I'm sorry. I just wanted to make sure. Well, I was going to tell you. I just remembered I didn't finish the John Lennon story. John Lennon, he led me along for months, you know, January, February. Finally, I said, the heck with John Lennon, screw him, you know. But in the meantime, we got on our march to recruit 1,800 people in 1980. And we went, you know, 7, 13, 18, 56. So by the month that we did 147 recruits, which was July, the following July, I made up a thing. When John never called me back, I said, I will never call him. I'm never, you know, if he wants to talk to me, he'll call me. And I forgot about it. But once my income started doubling every month starting in April, Hector, it went from like 3,000, 6,000, 11,000. And so the month that it got up to 22,000, and I went to RVP, and we exploded from 56 to 147 recruits. You know, amazingly, Hector, I got a phone call from John Lennon. He said, I've been watching you. Because he's seen the value in being connected to you because you're a winner, right? That's the deal. Right. So people have to see. Yeah. And so it was the worst possible time, but that's what you're going to get people. You know, it's like everything in life. You're going to get it when you don't need it. You've got to make your own success. And then things that you don't need will come in. You know, it's like all the stars and athletes and everything, they don't pay for their meals at restaurants and this, that, and the other. You know, the restaurant owner is glad to have them in there, you know, for the publicity. And so that's the way it is in life. You know, it's like you want to get lucky, get big. Yeah. Get great at what you do. You know, money follows greatness. If you get great at what you do, I don't care what industry you're in, if you're great, you're going to make money. And most people don't pay enough attention to being great at what they do, so they never max out the kind of income they could make. You know, money follows greatness. That's a saying I came up with. I've never heard anybody else say that, but money absolutely follows greatness. So if you want to make big money, then you've got to be great at what you do, period. And most people aren't. And there's people making pretty good money here that really aren't great at the business. But if you want to make big money, you've got to be great, period. That's non-negotiable. Absolutely. Josh, you want to jump in here with a question for Hector? Yes, I do. Good morning, Mr. Hector. Man, awesome. What a privilege to be on here and get to ask you a few questions. The first question I have for you, Mr. Hector, is do you feel that the Primerica of today is different than the Primerica from when you built it? No, not one bit. Okay. No, no. I mean, because people are people are people are people. You know, we've got, you know, there's a lot of stuff happening with, you know, online and all that. And in the end, your ability to attract the right people, your ability to train those people, your ability to be attractive to those people, I mean, you know, that's not ever going to change. You've got to ask yourself, with your current level of confidence, are you an attraction magnet? I mean, are you? I mean, are you that good that people want to be around you? I mean, that's always the key to winning big in business is people want to be connected to people that are really great at what they do. And most people never pay attention enough or do the work to become great at what they do. And if you look at any, like, the great companies in America, like Apple, for example, they're great at what they do, right? They're awesome at what they do. So the key is you need to become super competent, and then you're going to become an attraction magnet if you do that. So, you know, like, for me, I knew, I got to the point from a confidence standpoint that I knew if I could recruit, if anybody would get involved with me and they would actually follow me, follow my advice and do what I'm asking them to do, that they're going to be successful. And everybody that did, did. So, you know, are you, you know, your confidence level is everything. Right. It's the most important, in my opinion, okay? So, I mean, I'm just telling you my experience. I've made almost $100 million here in Prime America. And I'm just telling you what I know from my personal experience. You've got to be great. You've got to become great. That should be everybody's focus, becoming really great at your business so that people can see the value in being connected to you. That's what I did. That's what I've always taught. And, Mr. Hector, phenomenal. This is a, it's kind of a different question. But if you were getting started, like if you signed your IVA today, is there, do you feel like there's a business out there that you would model your business after? A business? Like a business in Prime America or a business period? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, like do you feel like there's a Prime America business that you would look at and you would say, man, you know what, that's the model I want to follow? Oh, I think right now it's got to be Willie in Florida. I mean, anybody that's not paying attention to what he's doing is an idiot. I mean, he's killing it. See, I did a thing for Willie just a week ago or so with some of the top leaders. And I told Willie, I said, you know, the biggest mistake I made is I got out of the field too soon. And I listened to somebody that encouraged me to do that. It was a huge mistake. I said if I had to do it over, I would do what Willie's doing. I would have built a 200,000-plus base, and I would have not stopped until I had 100 first-generation RVPs. That's the kind of business. And I could have done that. I'm good enough that I could have done that if I would have actually made the commitment to do that. That's what Willie's doing. Anybody that's not paying attention to what Willie's doing just doesn't have a clue, in my opinion. He's killing it. I mean, I think he's going to be at $6 million of income by the convention next year. Big base, big base, big base, big base, big base, big base. I mean, that would be my focus. That's all I would. Because everything else, all the money, as soon as it goes to second and third and fourth generation, your income drops like a rock. The reason he's making so much money is because he's doing so much production in his base shop and at first, and then at second and third. But he's doing all that production. Anybody that has a focus outside of their base shop and first generation, to me, doesn't understand our compensation. That should be your total focus if you're trying to build and max out your income. Any other focus, you don't get it. You're not paying attention. Right, right. Mr. Hector, and if you don't mind me asking, when you got out of the field, and when you say you got out of the field too early, how many first-generation RBPs did you have? About like 30, 33 or something. I had like 30-something. Wow. Well, Mr. Hector, thank you so much. Yeah. You know, Alex and Sandra Santana are huge fans of yours, and they poured into us the same, and we're huge fans of yours as well, and we're just super grateful. Thank you. Thank you so much for taking the time to be here. You're very welcome. Thank you. All right. Congratulations on all your success. Thank you. Hey, Hector, this is Adam. Talk a little bit about, you kind of have answered it indirectly, but what's the biggest mistake you see people make with recruits once they get them signed up? Well, the biggest mistake is they don't get a list. If you recruit somebody and you don't have a top 25 or 50 list, then you're an idiot. Okay? That's everything. If you're recruiting somebody, you have to get a list because a recruit is useless without that list. So when I would recruit somebody, I'd get the list. I don't care if I have the IDA. I want the list because I could make a lot of stuff happen with that list, assuming they have a decent or market and stuff. So to me, that's the biggest mistake I see people making. The list. Because even if I've had so many people, I got the list with everybody, that they quit before they got started. You know, those people do that sometimes. They get in, they're excited, but then they don't show up to a meeting. But I have their 25-name list, and I'm really good at setting appointments in that market. I'll set up, you know, I'll probably recruit, you know, four or five people in that market. I'll probably close 10-plus transactions, even if they did quit. So the list is everything. If you're not getting the top 20, I would not take an IDA without the list. I want the list because the IDA is useless without their warm market list, unless you just want to have to be cold, you know, cold calling people all the time. I never did that. I always got a list, and then I got into their market. And then what I would do also, sometimes what I did is I got their list, but they don't show up to meetings. Maybe I set up four or five appointments in their market. I'd call them up and say, hey, John, I just set up five appointments in your market. Are you sure you're not going to get involved? You want to come with me and make some money, and let me teach you how to do the business? And then maybe you can get those people back. But without the list, you have nothing. A recruit without a list is useless, 100% useless. Yeah, you might get some recognition and primary and stuff like that, but it doesn't help you make any money, and it doesn't help you grow a business. Get the list. And also another thing I'd like to touch on, and you can talk about the importance of that you see, is within the base shop and growing the base shop, talk about the importance of competition within the base shop, driving up the numbers and driving the recruiting. Yeah, absolutely. You've got to have competition. I mean, everything, you know, what I used to do, you know, and by the way, if a person isn't competitive, the chances of them staying in private America is about zero, okay? Most people are, the ones that really end up killing it are always very ultra competitive. Everybody that's big right now, I guarantee you, is super competitive. So I would make sure that I would talk, this is what I used to do. I would call people up. I'd say, hey, Rick, this is Hector. How are you doing? How's your month going? He'd say, oh, it's going awesome. I'm at, you know, three sales and two recruits. I'd say, oh, great. I was just talking to Gary McCrummon. He's at ten recruits and ten sales so far this month. All right, you're doing a great job. Talk to you later. Bye. And I would pit people against you. I wouldn't, like, blatantly do it, but I would do it just like that so that he knows there's other people killing it. And you create competition. That's how I used to create competition. I get people letting the other competitive people know what the other people they're killing are doing so that they feel competitive. And then you do recognition. It's always about the recognition. You recognize those people. You also recognize them in front of other people. So if somebody's doing really great, right, so if McCrummon's doing really great and we're in a group after a meeting or something, we're talking to someone, hey, did you guys know that, you know, Gary's at ten sales and ten recruits so far this month? It looks like he's going to do 50 grand this month. So then I would let people know what other people are doing to create competition. And the people that are not competitive, folks, if you're not competitive, you're not going to stay in Primary. Or if you are, you're not going to do anything significant. I'm not that vocal about it, but I am a really competitive person. I've always, I played every sport in high school. I played college basketball and college tennis. And I've always been super competitive. I'm not so vocal about it, but, man, I wanted to kill everybody. You know, I wasn't, and what you're doing is looking for people like that. Everybody that you look right now and see is doing big numbers or has done big numbers, you know, Mike Sharp or now Willie, whatever, these people are mega competitive. And if you are going to get big, you've got to get competitive. You've got to be competitive. With coming up this next year for the convention again, what are you most excited about the company's doing and it's got people gearing up for this upcoming next summer? What are you most excited about this coming year with your business and where Primerica is headed? Well, you know, you probably know I'm not that connected right now to stuff, so I don't know. I don't know. I mean, my thing has just always been the same thing. What everybody else does or whatever the company is doing, it doesn't really matter to me. What matters to me is what I'm doing. What am I doing to grow my business? What am I doing to help my team be better? What am I doing to make, you know, my business more attractive to people? That's always what I've always focused on. I'm not really too worried about what the company is doing, to be honest with you. If you're not doing the right things, it doesn't really matter what the company is doing. The company is going to do great things. We already know that. They're focused on trying to get everybody to do more. What I would do if I were you, I would work like crazy at getting every motivated person to that convention because there's something about a big event that moves people. And if you were smart, you would start selling that right now and getting people, you know, ready to do that. Letting people, like a lot of people, it's expensive to get to the convention for most people. So they should just start. I would get them to start a savings program to get this so that they could pay for whatever is necessary, hotel rooms or travel, whatever. I would get people thinking about that right now and selling that, selling the convention, how great it's going to be and how important it is that they're there and not only that they're there but they get their motivated people there because there's something about big events that really, really moves people. And if you don't get them there, you can't come home and say, oh, it was the greatest event ever. People don't even understand what we're talking about. A convention is something you have to experience, right? So I would really start talking right now about that to people. I don't know how many months we've got. Is it in June this year, coming up, whatever it is? I think June or July, yeah. June or July, okay, so that's five or six months, and then we've got three months left in this almost two-and-a-half months. So you've got some time, but you've got to start selling it now to people because it's expensive for people to get there, and they need to start preparing for that right now. So I would be talking to people about saving money and having an account so that they can afford to get to that event. It's going to be great. They always are great. They're always exciting. And there's nothing that sells the bigness of Prime America like a convention. I mean, you can't duplicate that in your meetings, in your office, and you definitely can't duplicate that in your fast start schools. They're not anything like what the convention is. It sells the bigness to people that this is really something special. So I would start selling that right now if I were you guys. And, Hector, you said that a lot of people know and a lot of people don't about all your lifestyle and things like that, and you said you're not so as connected right at the moment, but you put the time in, you built a giant business, you're reaping the rewards of that now and will be forever. Talk about what your lifestyle is now because of Prime America. Tell us the dream a little bit. Tell us the things you're able to do. Well, one thing I've done is I love traveling. So I've been to 70 countries, and I've done this. They have this thing called travel in a private jet tours that go all over the world. I've been on four of those over the last 10 years or so. So I've been to 70 countries. It's incredible travel. I mean, it's very high end. You're traveling in a big commercial jet with only 50 seats in it and 50 people, and it's pretty incredible. I've seen stuff that blows people's minds. I have three homes. I have a home in Las Vegas. That's my residence. I have a home in Newport Beach that's right on an ocean view, and I have a beautiful home I just built in Cabo San Lucas that has a golf and ocean view. So my life is pretty much like I'm on vacation every day. And, you know, I don't go to events anymore. I haven't been to Prime America in 10 years probably. And so I built a business so that I could be free, so I could travel and spend time with my family and help my family and all that stuff. And I think that, you know, my life is ridiculous. It's almost embarrassing to talk about. You notice that if you follow me on Twitter or whatever, I don't really sell the dream much, you know, because I don't want anybody knowing what I'm doing. But I have a dream life. I really do. It's pretty spectacular. I can't imagine it being much better than it is. And I think that everybody has the potential to do what I did. I'm not special. I'm not an extraordinary person. I was very shy growing up. I was an introvert. I still am an introvert. But my thing was, you know, I wanted to build an amazing life for my family and for myself, and I wanted to be free. I think freedom is the most awesome thing you could possibly imagine. I mean, I have some beautiful homes and all that stuff, right? I have nice cars, et cetera, travel. But the best part of what I've done is I've developed a life of complete freedom where I do what I want, when I want, where I want, with whom I want, in the style I want every day of my life. And without Primerica, I could never have done that. And I think that you have the potential to do exactly what I did, everybody on the call. You may not do it, but there's nothing that can stop you from becoming great at the business except yourself and unwillingly to do the work and to create this amazing life for you and your family. Everybody on this call is capable of doing that, and it just depends what your focus is. So, like I said, you know, you need to focus on being great at what you do, and the rest will come. Money will come. The recognition will come. All that will come if you become great at what you do. This is an amazing company that can help you create an amazing life for you and your family. And the main way to do that is by developing other people, you know, helping other people become successful within your business. That's the key. That's what I did. That's what anybody who's big right now has done. And, you know, it's never been a better time right now, because I don't know if you guys noticed, Matt, but this current administration that we have around is messing up this country so bad that the people are looking for opportunity right now. They're looking. And that opportunity is in your hands. You have it. You have a way to help to change people's lives. So, you know, work hard at changing your own so you can help other people change theirs. That's all I've ever done. It's doable 100%. I don't care who you are. I don't care if you're male or female or where you come from or what your ethnic background is or your level of education. None of that matters here at Prime America. None of that. The only thing that matters is what you're willing to do. And I hope you make that decision, because there's an incredible life waiting for you out there. And, Hector, how long ago did you join the business? I actually joined in 1983, and I didn't do anything. I wrote my first sale in January of 84, so 1984. So it's almost, you know, it'll be 40 years next year I've been at Prime America. Went by in a flash, by the way. Went by in a flash, and like I said, the only thing I would do over again is I would have kept my base going for a lot longer and I would have produced 100% of the 30-something that I did. But it turned out okay for me, but it could have been a lot better. Well, yeah, it's just, like you said, you're living the dream life. You've got the money coming in, the residuals, the passive residual income that will keep coming in year after year. There just really is no other company in the world that offers anything like this and we're all blessed. And you should look at that as the people you talk to. You're giving people an opportunity to be a part of a company that offers something long-term that no other company does. Yeah, life-changing. So when you're out there recruiting, it should be unapologetic. It really is, you know, a once-in-a-lifetime type opportunity for the right people. Absolutely. Go ahead. Well, go ahead, Hector. I'll come in after. I was just saying that, you know, everybody here has a chance to build something extraordinary. The only thing that's stopping you from creating this magical life is yourself. It's important that you really get that and that you make the decision that you do the work to become great at what you do so that other people want to be involved in business with you. That's the thing that I did. I think if you have that focus, you're going to do something great with your life here. Well, Hector, as you make money, as your lifestyle goes up, you wind up meeting people from other walks of life at the same level. And I don't know about you, but I've been confronted more and more with what an incredible opportunity Primerica is, being in financial services, being able to build up the residual massive income for massive people, compared to if we had spent our time like you. Let's just say you were an incredible tennis player. I'm thinking about that because over at Mar-a-Lago, they just sent the brochure for the upcoming new season, and they had some pictures from last year of them. And they had Jimmy Connors, you know, the legendary Grand Slam winner. He was out there doing a clinic. Now, I don't know if he needed the money, but he was out there with Trump, and he was doing a clinic with the club members who could barely stand up in their walkers and everything. But you have this guy. I don't know what Jimmy Connors, what the crap he was doing out there, putting on a clinic. Hopefully he was doing it because of the love of the game, but I kind of doubt it. He wasn't doing an exhibition at the U.S. Open in front of some crowds at the Alexander Ash Center Center Court. You know, he's out in this little, you know, this is a nice club, but good gracious, you know, Jimmy Connors. And so the thing is, you know, when you're on these tours, you know, and I've been on things like that, you know, where you meet people, and it becomes face-to-face with the reality of how insane this opportunity is. Don't you believe? I totally agree with you 100%. Yeah, it's amazing. You know, I actually have friends that I play with that were professional baseball players that did very, very well, were all-stars and all that, and they're retired now, and they did well. But, you know, most of the people that are, like, professional athletes don't really end up in that great a financial situation, and their careers are very short. You know, by the time they're in their mid-30s, they're basically on their way out. And in Primerica, I'm 66 years old now, and my business is still cranking. I'm still making big money, and I foresee that to happen for years. And looking at Primerica, there's a lot of people who are really great, and they passed, and their kids are now running their businesses, and they're still doing great. I mean, this is something that you can share with your family for generations. I mean, this is a generational type of business, I think. It's unusual, folks. And by the way, I know a lot of guys that are very, very successful financially, but they don't have the kind of level of freedom that I have. They have to be in an office. They've got to be doing stuff. And, you know, I don't have to do that anymore, really, and my income is still significant, and I've saved a lot of money. And, you know, I make as much outside of Primerica as I do in Primerica now, and I'm doing great, and I don't have to be anywhere. You know, I can either be in Vegas, or I can be in Newport Beach, or I could be in Cabo, or whatever I want to do, I can do that. And that's an unusual thing that you can create in your life, if you decide to build a great Primerica business. Now, if I were you guys, I would focus like crazy on building a big bay shop, producing strong first-generation RVPs, and not lose that focus until you're completely done. In other words, when I'm incompletely done, you have huge income with Primerica, and you have a lot of, you know, millions and millions, maybe 20, 30, 40 million saved. That's putting off income as well. That's the opportunity you have right now in your possession, if you choose to accept that and do the work. And the thing is, running a big bay shop, like Willie's not persecuting himself. You know what I'm saying? No. Willie has a great life. He does. He is. You're right. You know, you can't underestimate, folks, the joy, the fun, the excitement you get out of just running a big bay shop, because you have so many new success stories happening all the time. Of course, you have the, you know, the frustration to deal with. You've got, you know, you have so many success stories, got so much excitement. It's an exhilarating way to live. And with technology and with the company now, you can set it up where a lot of things we had to do by manually happen automatically now. And so the fun of this thing, you know, just like you talk about athletes, the other penalty they have is their bodies get brutalized. Oh, they're beat up. Absolutely. Yeah. And so, you know, they've got to pay the piper for all those pieces. Absolutely. And so it's just a joy to be in this thing. And so, folks, don't hold me. You know, most people don't have the ability. Let's face it. Most people just don't have the ability to do it big. They don't have the vision, the mindset. But if you're one that does, go for it, you know. Go for it. Find out, you know, what you've got a chance to be and how great you can be. Don't you be the one that stands between you and this kind of life, you know. So, anyway, Hector, thanks so much for being on. You're very welcome. Yeah. All right. Cheer it up, guys. Yeah. By the way, Hector, in terms of us being able to do the business right on out, like you and I are really putting out right now. Yeah. This is work right here. Yeah. Yeah. We're just killing ourselves right now. Yeah, absolutely. So difficult. Although I had to get up at 5 this morning to do this call. I mean, better. Except for that, and I appreciate it. It's a tremendous pleasure. Sure. I hope I helped somebody. Yeah. That was behind me saying that I appreciate you getting on. I didn't expect to say so early in the morning. But, Adam, I'll let you wrap it up, and we get Hector's final word and all. All right. Josh, give us your final word. We'll let Hector give us his final word, and that'll be it. Absolutely. Well, just, you know, based off of Hector's entire call, we're going to continue to just strive at being great at what we do, polish up our sales skills, develop our people skills, communication skills, and just attract the right already motivated people and work with them, train them, and build a huge base shop with strong RVPs. So we're very grateful. We're very excited. And, man, what a way to start the week. Thank you so much. Josh, that is great. That's a great little message you made there at the end. I think the thing is, look, you only have one life on this earth, folks, and it goes by fast. You know, when I started by America, I was 26 years old, just about turned 27. I'm 66 now, so it's been basically about 40 years. That went by in a blur. And one thing I'm grateful for is I did the work early on to build a big base, build a big hierarchy, and set my family up. And you have that ability to do that here. Don't throw it away. Don't waste it. Look at yourself and say, okay, what do I need to do? What skill sets, what knowledge do I need to acquire so that I can create what some of the greats in primary have done? All of you are capable of doing it. I don't care if you feel insecure or you don't see yourself as that. You can do that. It's not going to happen overnight, but it can happen. I just want to encourage you to just go do what you need to do to grow your skill sets, to grow your knowledge, to grow your skills so that you can help other people become successful. I promise you you will not regret it at all. It's been awesome. I hope I helped a little bit today. And go be awesome.