Ed Dressel  0:10 
Hey, welcome everybody. It's good to have you here today. We are excited to have Blake Barnes here. Kind of a unique interview for me. I don't typically do a lead generation system, but I've been working with Blake for a number of years, and constantly get good reviews, and just wanted to interact with him. I know he's working hard, has a good team behind him. Blake, welcome. Good to have you,

Blake Barns  0:28 
Ed. I appreciate it. Thanks for having me.

Ed Dressel  0:30 
My pleasure. And tell us a little bit about yourself, where you're located, where your company is.

Blake Barns  0:36 
Sure, yeah. I was born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio. This is where I work out of. I lived in Vegas for a number of years in my 20s, and that's actually where our company is headquartered, is in Henderson, Nevada. There are a few of us that work here in Cincinnati, and then the majority of the team is based out of Henderson as well.

Ed Dressel  0:57 
So, how did you get started? You've been doing this for how many years, and kind of a unique niche. So, go ahead.

Blake Barns  1:03 
It's got--well, it's kind of a unique story as well, and probably one you're not going to hear out of a lot of people in this business. So, give you the kind of the rundown. Prior to Covid, I was actually a professional poker player, and this was after years of being in the real estate and mortgage business at the time, COVID hit. Right before that, a really good friend of mine--we've known each other a very long time, since college--he asked me if I was interested in a sales and recruiting role with the company he was working at, and they just happened to be in the lead generation space and specializing in the 403(b) market, so I ended up taking that job. I learned a lot, actually enjoyed it. Different, different space for me, and yeah, it was like I said, different, but pretty fun, you know? Learning new stuff and a new business is always interesting, right? So, yeah, after doing that for a number of years, we ended up realizing that at the end of the day we could probably do this a lot better than the company we're working for, and overall experience for advisors and clients alike, we could improve, and that's really where LG Four began, was, you know, kind of right there.

Ed Dressel  2:15 
So, in during COVID, you started a new company?

Blake Barns  2:20 
Yeah. So the co-owners, James Davis and Casey Long, started it, and that was part of that process. But yeah, we've been doing this for a number of years, and that's when it started. I could have the dates wrong. I believe we're going into our fifth year, so 2022--something like that. Sounds about right.

Ed Dressel  2:41 
And you focus on federal employees. Tell me a little bit about that.

Blake Barns  2:45 
So, yeah, that's kind of my--and total transparency--I'm a licensed advisor myself. I really don't have the time to run these appointments much anymore. And the quick story behind the federal employees side of it was well before getting into this business. My brother worked for the Commerce Department right out of college. He was there for 20 years. When he went private, he had no idea how any of his pension stuff worked, how any of his TSP stuff worked, and right then and there I was curious about that market and became interested in it. So that's kind of the start for me. And at some point at our own company we started dabbling in the federal space, got out of the 403(b) market, or not got out of it, but you know, added the federal side of things. And I was a recruiter at the time, so I worked with all the new advisors, and what I started to notice was a lot of the most successful advisors were running the federal appointments, and I became friendly with them, and kind of picked their brain on some stuff. And their rationale was like, look, the federal market is one space, it's one pension. Once you learn all the ins and outs of that, the sky's the limit. There's really nothing these people can ask you that you're not going to have some answers for, as opposed to the 403(b) space, where you can have several different pension systems out of one state, and you know that's where your software comes into hand, where we've been referring people to you, and the TRAK Software for years. It really makes a big difference, where you can just plug and play and have something that does all the calculations for you. But yeah, on the flip side of the coin, for the fed space, it's one system. You learn the ins and outs of that you're going to have a very good chance to help these people, put them in a better spot than they ever could really have known for retirement, just based on your guidance and your expertise in that space.

Ed Dressel  4:54 
So, when you're generating a lead or going after a lead, what makes a quality lead for a customer, for you?

Blake Barns  5:03 
Yeah, and this is something we've spent a lot of time over the years, really, really honing in on. And just off the bat, we actually create appointments, preset appointments, so that right there is a big difference between your traditional lead, right? So beyond that quality appointment, in my opinion, is someone who has real intent, real needs, real pain points, real concerns, not just a name and a phone number. I was in the mortgage business for years, and our boss will come in, slap a stack of papers on there with just names and numbers, and say dial for dollars. You can only get told so many times to stop calling people before it gets a little disheartening. That's why the preset appointments, the book by the prospect themselves, we follow up with all the correspondence to make sure these are as high intent. The show rates are the highest in the industry, and at the end of the day they're actively thinking about retirement, their benefits, financial planning, and more importantly, they're open to having a conversation, they're willing to learn, they need the education, they need the guidance, timing matters, accuracy matters, most importantly, trust matters, and that's probably the main, the main focus. It's something that I've learned over the years is that trust is a big factor, and with all of our marketing, with all of our forms, we'd like to be upfront and transparent as possible to let these people know, hey, this is exactly what you're signing up for. It's not just as easy as clicking a button, and you have an appointment. We really have them jump through some hoops. We want them to, like I said, have some skin in the game, and they're genuinely seeking information, guidance, help, and that's when the conversations become a lot more productive for everybody involved.

Ed Dressel  6:59 
You referred earlier that you said from your prior company you could do a better job generating leads. Tell me, where do you think you differentiate yourself?

Blake Barns 7:10 
Yeah, I can get into some specifics without getting too specific, I guess. So, me and a few other people I worked with, we were on the sales and recruiting side. We got to see the day to day operations, dealing with advisors. We were the one fielding all the calls with all the issues and all the problems. We saw that firsthand. And we didn't see much being done about it. So we're just kind of keen to, hey, these are some fixes that can really improve the system and optimize it and just make it better overall, and that was just more on like some basic stuff. And then to add on top of that, our CTO is an absolute genius, quite honestly, he's got some accolades. He's very, very good at what he does. He built our whole platform from scratch, and it's super user-friendly, like I said, completely optimized. Took out all of the issues as soon as they come up. Anything that comes up is fixed in real time, which for us was a big difference from the last company, and something to this day I thoroughly enjoy, because you'll take a real problem that's something that comes up and it's fixed immediately, which is always, always a good thing, especially in this business.

Ed Dressel  8:32 
So, are you still doing 403(b) leads as well?

Blake Barns  8:34  
Of course, yeah, that's the majority of our business. My main focus is the federal space. This is a role I took on within the last three or four months. I'm actually in charge of all of our digital marketing, our ads, our campaigns. Since I have the experience dealing with the federal market, I have my training in that space. It makes a big difference when you're reaching out to these people to know what their pain points are, to know the right language to use. They can tell, right? I mean they can tell the difference if you know what you're talking about, or else you're just trying to get them to sign up for an appointment. And that's something I take a lot of pride in, is knowing the federal pension system itself, and being able to directly kind of reach out to these people and offer them some guidance, offer them some help, and we've seen it in the numbers, our share rates have improved, our volume has improved, and I think intent is up, and that's going to be a lot based on what we're doing as far as the marketing, and we've seen some, some positive results,

Ed Dressel  9:42 
So yeah, getting skin in the game, qualifying to lead that way. Who's really interested? What would you tell advisors that may or may not be in using leads? You're an advisor yourself, you see that you're on the lead generation system. What would you communicate to them about why would they want to try a lead lead gen source for their business.

Blake Barns  10:01  
Pretty simple answer to this one. I mean, at the end of the day, you need to get in front of people, right? Unless you have an endless string of referrals, you need to generate new business. That's what we're here for. We are very, very good at getting people interested in talking to you, and the end of the day, it is a numbers game, but I've seen it for years. The opportunities are there. I get to hear all the success stories. I mean, we have husband and wife teams, partners that have built whole agencies solely from our appointments. It's fun to watch. It's great to hear the success stories, but to those people who've never worked leads or preset appointments, you need to get in front of people, and one thing I always stress is you're not just buying that appointment, you're buying the opportunity to speak with that person, and then get referrals from that person, really squeeze all the juice out of every single one of these appointments, and I always compare it to the mortgage business, where it's a pipeline. You're going to have your first appointments, you have your follow-ups, and hopefully you're gonna have a very nice mix of referrals mixed in there. And at the end of the day, that's a process. And once you start closing deals and that engine starts cooking, the sky's the limit, and people can do very, very well. So, to answer your questions, get in front of people, get yourself some opportunities to close some deals, generate some referral business. At the end of the day, the more people you get in front of, the better chances you have to sell some products.

Ed Dressel  11:37 
What would you tell somebody that said, 'I'll try it out. How many leads, and how many appointments do they need to make to go this is for me, or this doesn't work for me?

Blake Barns  11:45 
That's a great question. And people who are brand new to either lead generation or preset appointments are going to think, yeah, if I can hop on and run three or four appointments, close one, and then off some money to buy some more appointments. That's not the way to look at this. You're either going to be big picture or really don't mess with it, because the end of the day, you have to understand that this is a numbers game. It's not a get rich quick scheme. If you're not in it for the long haul, it's probably not worth the effort to just run a few appointments, and then if you don't have success, give up, because that next appointment could have been a million dollar rollover that could pay for your next appointments for the next year. I always still advisors, look, you're searching for diamonds in the rough. Take every advantage of every opportunity out there, but the opportunities are there. Are they going to be in the first three or four or five appointments you run? Maybe. I mean, we have somebody that came on within the last two weeks and basically has closed every appointment that they met with. Is that typical? No. Is the opposite typical? No. It's going to be finding that happy medium where you get better at running these types of appointments, you get the opportunities, and you capitalize on those opportunities. So, to those newer to this lead generation preset appointments, give yourself enough of a budget and really, really get the foundation. Do your studying, don't just hop in like these people know when you don't know your stuff, and quite honestly, in this space they're not going to know a whole lot, and if you don't know more than they do, then that appointment is pretty much over from the beginning. That's that's kind of my two cents.

Ed Dressel  13:39 
So, my next question was, what are you going to advise an advisor? One is, get educated about the industry you're working, the pension plan, whether it be federal or the specific states, pension plans, at least no more than your client's prospective lead going to know. Any other recommendations to the advisors for working leads or the servicing?

Blake Barns  14:00  
I would say really give yourself some time to be successful, like I kind of hinted at earlier. What I've seen over the years is people don't really dedicate themselves to, I won't say this business, but if you're going to go in, go all in, you know what I mean, like give yourself a real opportunity to be successful, and it takes exactly, we said, studying these markets, being diligent, being a hard worker, and really putting in the effort. And as cliche as that is, I've seen it time after time where advisors come on, they know what they're doing, they have a solid team or a solid group behind them, they hit the ground running, they put in the work, and they see the success. On the flip side of that coin, we'll have people that come in, run two or three appointments, and they're on to the next service, or back to what they were doing. I would say, give yourself an opportunity to succeed. And that's just going to take some time and some effort. The end of the day, that's really what it comes down to.

Ed Dressel  15:05 
So, you're serving the federal market and lots of different pension plans. What role does TRAK play in helping your advisors be successful?

Blake Barns  15:15  
Yeah, so we've been referring people to you for years and years now on the 403(b) side. I don't know any other software out there, quite honestly. I think you may have cornered the market, but for us, and this is my, my spiel to new advisors, it's, it's very much a time saver. It has every single pension system across the country built into it, and I normally tell them it's a plug and play, right? You get all the data you need from them, takes all the guesswork out of the pension calculations, and it can give you a very, very detailed report that's going to highlight some major concerns for the actual prospect, and that's what gets the ball rolling on the sales opportunities, and for the price, and for what value is there. Like I said, more than anything, it's a giant time saver, and it just makes everything much easier. You do not have to go and learn all these pension calculations yourself. You can run any state in the country, and just from this one software, and it's something, like I said, we've been recommending for many years, and there's good reasons for it. Same goes for the Fed side as well. There's the same merits. Take all the guesswork out if you don't want to do the calculations manually. This has it all built in to take care of that for you.

Ed Dressel  16:33 
Do you see a difference in success from people that use TRAK, or do you see people not using TRAK, and the difference between the two type of advisors?

Blake Barns  16:42 
I would say probably yes. I don't really get to speak much to the advisors as I used to, just because my role is always working with newer people, setting expectations, getting them on board, and then kind of handing them off to our admins. But I know that I've heard stories of, and I think we covered one recently, where people hit the ground running, and the TRAK software makes a big difference, because, like I said, especially if you're newer to this space, you have to put in the time and the effort to learn all these pension calculations, or you can just use a software, plug it in, and will give you everything you need. And one of the things I like to really highlight for people is the instant credibility you get when you show them that report is invaluable, right? It goes a long way in showing them, hey, I know what I'm talking about, and here's some opportunities for us to really, really help you maximize your retirement.

Ed Dressel  17:43 
Blake, it's been a pleasure to talk to you today. Thanks for spending a little bit of time with us. I wish you a lot of success in today's business and helping people look at retirement, move there successfully. Thanks for taking the time today.

Blake Barns  17:55 
Yeah, Ed, my pleasure. And, like always, it's always nice to talk to you. It's been a pleasure working with you for all these years, and yeah, can't recommend TRAK highly enough, and thanks for all the referrals, and vice versa. It's always a pleasure.