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In today’s competitive mortgage and real estate landscape, success isn’t about working harder — it’s about mastering the right skills with purpose and consistency. In this episode of Lykken on Lending, David Lykken is joined by Todd Duncan, the founder of Sales Mastery, to discuss the proven principles behind transforming your sales career. From the importance of practice and preparation, to aligning your life force with your professional calling, Todd shares insights that have shaped thousands of top producers over the last 30 years. Whether you’re stuck and looking for momentum, or ready to push beyond boundaries, this conversation offers the tools and mindset shifts you need to thrive.
[David] Listeners, we’re in for a real treat today. We’ve got Todd Duncan joining us of Sales Mastery. And it’s so good to have you here. You don’t need much of an introduction, but let’s start by those that may not know who you are. Todd, let’s start off with you and a little bit about yourself and your background.
[Todd] I had no clue, like most of us, David, that outta college I would get into the mortgage business. But once I was in, I learned very quickly I wasn’t good at it yet and three months in, I ran into a guy that was super successful and he had the heart to mentor me. And within the first year, that mentoring allowed me to be in the top of our branch number one or two every single month. And then the next year I was number one in the company and the year after that, I was in the top 1% nationally of all mortgage originators. And I give it up to a couple things. One. Mastery. This word mastery, all about skill. This gentleman just told me, he said, if you spend an hour a day every day, mastering your trade, mastering your skill, practice, dress, rehearsing, before you go live, within three years, you will be one of the top masters of your trade. If you do that for your whole career, then you are going to be one of the best. And so when I did loans, I pursued mastery. I wanted to get really good at the few skills that mattered most. And then 12 years in, we had helped almost 6,000 families finance real estate. And I had a different calling that God put on my heart. And that calling was to shepherd a company that could help anybody in mortgage and real estate become their best version of themselves. And so we launched Sales Mastery in 1992. We’ve done 30 years of Sales Mastery. And the beauty is when you look at people in the audience, David, that have had change, that have experienced the transformational power of what happens at a Sales Mastery event, you end up with new business partners like Don Goettling. And Don’s been in the audience, sat in the chair taking all the notes, and his story’s profound too. But, together we have teamed up now and so we’ve brought two of the biggest, best events in mortgage together. And October 14th through the 17th we’re gonna be in Dallas. We’ll have 40 people on stage over three and a half days helping people learn, grow, and get better. So that’s the journey that I’ve been on.
[David] That’s an exciting journey. And you would doing it for 31 years? That’s It’s quite a testimony on consistency and just persistent staying out there. So, let’s talk a little bit about what sales ma mastery really means Todd, you, a lot of people have this concept, and you’ve already introduced how important training is or mastering your craft. So talk about this.
[Todd] When you really think about what we do, we exchange life force. When we have a job.
[David] When you say life force, what do you mean by life? Explain.
[Todd] It’s who we are, man. It’s our heart. It’s our god-given soul. It’s the ability to wake up and realize that 65 times a minute, this heart that I’ve been gifting with beats, and it’s supposed to do that for 70 or 80 or 90 years, maybe a hundred with some of the new medical breakthroughs. And that is our life force, right? We have this, and when we align it with a skill or a character trait that is a God-given character trait, right? or strength, if you will and we bring those things together. Then if we’re trading this life eight hours a day, nine hours a day, 10 hours a day for business and for revenue, it would make all the sense in the world that the better you get at that trade. And the more you’re able to make for the hour that you put in, that, that would be a beautiful life model for us to have lower stress, to have more balance, to have more connection with the people that matter most. And most people let the business run them instead of running the business and so we have this million dollar question, and I’ll speak specifically to, let’s just say a loan officer. It could easily be a realtor, it could be a CPA, it could be any of these people. Are you a loan officer in business? or are you in business as a loan officer? It’s a very interesting question because the first part of it is I have a job. And I go to work and I get paid. The second part is I’ve chosen to be a business professional and I’ve chosen loan origination to create the income for my business. So therefore, then I need to run a business like a business, which means I need to think like a CEO, which means I need to have a board of advisors, mentors, if you will, early on as I talked about one of mine. And when you get better at business. Business gets better for you, and that unlocks the gateway to more freedom, to more joy, to more happiness, to longevity, to health. But if you’re not good at the trade, your ROI on the hour end and the revenue out is very low. In fact, the US Department of Labor Statistics says that the average hourly rate for a licensed loan officer in America is $34 an hour. The masters of the trade are at a thousand dollars an hour. So you just have to decide how great you want to be, and then you have to go after it.
[David] Such, and I think everyone says, is it important to base it on numbers like that? I think it does, when I think you talk about life force, your purpose is really, It is really what you’re getting into, the money you make is the scoreboard, is how I’ve always looked at it. It’s not the should not be the why, the reason you’re doing it. It is the scoreboard of how effective you are at the game of business. I love your the terminology you used in all this. It’s always so fun to talk to you because you used, you’ve been so intentional about creating language around things like sales mastery and I’m really fascinated about the pathway to mastery.
[Todd] Yeah the pathway starts with recognizing that I have found my purpose, that I have found my calling, and when I have my purpose and I have my calling, then the pathway becomes clear, more will be revealed. If I’m not clear on that, then it gets a little fuzzy and when you have a fuzzy vision of where you want to go you tend to get sidetracked and go left when you should go straight or go right when you should turn around and so the pathway starts with purpose and starts with your callings. It leads to what is the skill, the one skill. It’s like you don’t see a lot of doctors that are heart surgeons and brain surgeons and hand surgeons and foot surgeons, and you don’t see that. You see the idea of a specialist. Outside of a general practitioner, you see these specialists that have gotten really good at one thing. They’re passionate about that thing. They’re very good at it. When I was 13, my father took me to the medical center that he went to when he was preparing to become a doctor, and we went into the cadaver room, David, and it stunk like high heaven. You know that whole formaldehyde from biology in high school, right? Everybody remembers that. And my dad asked me a question as I looked at the corpses laying on the tables, and his question was, do you know why doctors practice on dead people? And I thought I had an answer, but didn’t come out right. And he says, the reason is so that when we have a patient that is alive, we don’t kill them. And it was like all of a sudden I thought this idea that if a mortgage originator. Practiced for one week, a new conversation anchor with a borrower. Their conversion of that borrower to a loan could double or triple if they spent that time, if every day they spent one hour role playing, appointment setting, just doing that for a month every single day, 20 hours of preparing on how to set appointments, and having that role play that would increase the amount of new potential referral partners they could have conversations with. If we practice. More than we play, which is the recipe, which is that when we actually play back to my dad’s point we look like we’ve practiced. But if we’re not getting ready, then we miss the opportunity. So that’s the pathway of skill mastery is to overtrain. You look at any military special forces, they are all overtrained, right? They’re overtrained for almost every situation that would develop, and they’re game ready for anything that pops up. When we think about sales, the question is, are you game ready for the objections? Are you game ready for a different kind of questioning? Are you game ready to use boldness and bravery and courage to try to move relationships to a new level? We have a company that we’re working with right now, and it’s really going slowly, it should be going much more rapidly than it’s going and I lovingly sent a text to the guy last night. That’s a decision maker. I said we’ve done everything we can on our side to pour into you and to pour into your company. And we realize that it just doesn’t feel like it’s getting to the point that we had agreed to a couple months ago. I’m feeling stuck. How are you feeling? And it was like, okay, that’s boldness.
[David] Great way to frame it up because it’s, you’re putting it out as a question rather than making a declarative statement, you’re putting it out as a question. You’re trying to get gauge where he’s at.
[Todd] And think about this. Think about how many loan officers. Don’t have the courage or bravery to decide who they want to do business with. And they don’t have the courage to disengage from people that are taking their life force down and calling them 20 times a week and all that kind of stuff when you wake up, having achieved a level of greatness in sales, which is nothing more than connection, collaboration, and consistency. Then you have the world at your fingertips. You can choose who you want to do business with. You can say no to people you don’t want to do business with. Life’s too short to do business with people that you don’t like. You don’t need more people. You need less people who are better and then you need deeper collaboration and connection because then you’re gonna get more business. And that more business allows you to use referral engines and refer business back to your partners. That’s what Mastery’s all about. So yeah. Why has Mastery gone 31 years? because it’s all about the intentional pursuit of being the best you can be and when you do that in business, David you have many options when you’re not doing business, including freedom and travel and things of social value that you want to participate in.
[David] Yeah. And it’s, when you have that freedom it’s wonderful. But then you also are enjoying the journey that you’re involved, that’s helping you create the financial wealth so that you can do those things. But a lot of people get stuck and so using mastery for the long-term goal and success. Is really what you’re talking about here. Get a couple specifics on how you use mastery to get unstuck if you could.
[Todd] Yeah. So let’s first of all just agree that so without mentioning I have a car. It goes in once a year and it goes in for a complete tune-up and everything on the car is checked and everything’s addressed, but it’s once a year. Sales mastery is once a year, and it’s the same thing, right? I have this engine, right? I have this body, I have this life force. It could be a V12, V8, it could be a little four cylinder and you need to come to mastery a couple times, whatever, right? And the methodology is if I learn, grow, and get better over a three and a half day event. And then that event produces an opportunity every single day to connect and to learn and to grow better, and you come back the next year theoretically, you’re going to be better that next year than you were this year. Getting unstuck is a daily decision and there’s an interesting, there’s an interesting kind of psychology to getting unstuck, and it comes originally, my original source on this is Dr. Jerome Butler from Harvard. It’s been quoted many times in different ways, but what he originally said is, you are more likely to act your way into feeling than you are to feel your way into action to act. And so how do you get unstuck? You take one step, tomorrow…
[David] An intentional action is what you’re saying. You’re talking about an intentional action to…
[Todd] Yeah and intentional because you’ve practiced, you feel a little bit more confident and you know that if I keep doing what I’m doing, I’m gonna stay stuck. And so in faith, you take that step. The Bible says faith is the assurance of things so forth and the conviction of things not seen. I need to trust myself that if I take that step, I haven’t seen the results yet, but when I take that step, I’m gonna have the faith that step gets me to a different belief level, less limiting and more inspiring and uplifting and empowering. And at the end of the week, I’ve done that five times and maybe that’s led to 10 times and then maybe as I went from Monday to Friday. Friday I did it 10 times. And Monday I did it only one time because it was the first step. And getting unstuck is about momentum and getting unstuck is about the faith that the step you’re gonna take works. So why ministry? Mastery is a trade. Sales is the trade. You don’t have somebody that makes furniture that makes one piece a month. You have somebody that makes furniture and they do something every day to make furniture. You don’t have an automotive plant that only makes cars on Friday. They make cars every single minute of the day. And so the question becomes, what is your pathway is your assembly line to confidence. And to consistency, and the only way you get to confidence and consistency is you have competence, which is what we’re talking about. Sales mastery is competence, high competence, to the point where you’re unconsciously competent. Because you’ve practiced so much and you have the habits ingrained that it’s just natural for you. And so when you get to that level, and I don’t know from the time you might say, my life is horrible my partner Donn Goettling, was ready to quit the business. He was running out of time and just trading time for dollars. He finally said, you know what, I’m gonna reverse this. I am not going to accept this. I’m gonna stay in the business and he started saying no to about 80% of what he was doing every day, because A, it wasn’t in his skillset. B, it wasn’t highly profitable, and C, he didn’t have fun doing it.
[David] He hit some really powerful things. Those three things right there. It’s so true. It’s so true. And I think what Sales Mastery can help people with is. It is helping them take the right step. A lot of people, Todd, seem to be afraid of what step to take, and they see all these various steps in front of them and they don’t know which one to take. And so when you go to an event like Sales Mastery, you’re really getting the right ideas and reinforced of what steps to take. Talk a little bit about what’s going to happen in Dallas this October with Sales Mastery.
[Todd] Yeah, the 14th through the 17th, Sales Mastery will be hosted at the Hyatt Regency in downtown Dallas, Texas. The theme for the event, David is Beyond Boundaries. And the reason we chose Beyond Boundaries is about 87% of salespeople surveyed have limiting beliefs about what’s possible. And what we want to do is we want to take the theme of Beyond Boundaries, and we want to move you physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually and strategically to do that, we have nine keynote speakers from around the world that are the best of their game in helping achieve breakthrough, helping align your DNA and your purpose with executing at a higher level. We have panel discussions around the power of AI in today’s business and market. We’ve got a lot of surprises. One of which is a gentleman that wrote a book that at the Super Bowl took off. He was a former baseball player. And there’s pictures of AJ Brown reading that book on the sidelines. And that gentleman’s gonna be at Mastery on how this idea of inner excellence really works, right? And that’s a beauty. It’s and I think the last thing I would say is everything you need to know about how to do business well, how to do social well, how to do marketing well, how to do relationship well, how to do vacation and time off well. How to achieve balance, more balance. It’s never permanent, status. It’s always, is gotta be vigilant about the whole balancing act and at the same time then lots of community. Imagine thousands of people that are there to create community together and to help each other win. And I’m very big on, I feel my legacy is at least partially tied to the beauty of this event having run so long. It’s the longest running private event in the history of the mortgage industry. And so that’s a real gift. So my promise to everybody is, if you understand the question I asked David, you understand the power of investing in yourself. And here’s the promise I’m gonna make. If you sit in that room. Yeah. And at the end of the first night, you don’t feel you’ve gotten your entire money’s worth. You can ask for a refund. If you don’t feel by the end of the second day that it’s been worth your time and money, you can have a refund, this is guaranteed. Wow. If you if you listen and you take notes and what, we have a digital workbook this year. That’s very cool. Using some AI technology to help you implement, you’ll never, ever be the same. Somebody asked me the other day, what’s it like to be a motivational speaker? And I said, I don’t know. And he goes, why? And I go, because I’m a transformational speaker. I’m not a motivational speaker. And I know that word transformation, David, is very important to you. It’s even in your email signature in business.
[David] Those are my business. I said, even my business.
[Todd] Yeah. So come join us. There’s a discount code in the show notes, and you can hang out and we will spend three and a half days learning, growing and getting better. Make some beautiful memories, celebrate life, celebrate business.
[David] And one of the powers that this, something like this has, Todd, is you’re getting around like-minded people who have the same pursuit, have the same challenges. And when you get in a community that is going for it, one of my clients will be there. I’ll have the privilege of being there this year. I’m looking forward to that time. I get to have a stage. It’s very great show of you. But I think it is really about being around people that are wanting to grow and learn and that creates an atmosphere that can be so transformative, very excited about. One that, go ahead.
[Todd] Here’s what I wanna say. It does not matter where you are right this moment. What matters is that you see that you could have a better future. It doesn’t mean that your current reality is horrible. And I’ll put my hand up. There’s things that I could do to improve the quality of my life, and all of us can do that. But let me give you an example of what David just brought up. What would it be like to sit in an audience and realize that one of the persons sharing with you came to mastery in 2013 as a $7 million a year producer, and the next year she funded 34 million. What would it be like to have that same person sharing with you how she went from 34 million? To 221 million and had a life, had a wealth.
[David] And see, that’s the key. It’s having a life at the end. Yeah.
[Todd] Yeah. And took more time off than she ever thought possible. And so we’re there to transform the way you think. The scriptures use the word metanoia, which is the transforming of the mind. And we want to give you a uniquely new vision and confidence in what does it look like to think at a new level and then to start to feel when you look in the mirror that you’re worth it, that you are a miracle. There’s nobody on earth like you. You are a one of a kind person and you deserve, your family deserves. Your clients deserve the best you possible. So if it’s all in hotel ticket, airfare, one loan commission, and it might not even be that much. Do you believe enough in yourself and are…
[David] We wanna make that investment. Absolutely.
[Todd] That you wanna be your best and if that’s the answer, then buy your ticket right now and come and don’t even think about it.
[David] Yeah, there’s a code there. Folks in the show notes. Go grab it up. We’ll try to put it up on the screen while we’re talking here. We’re recording this and we’ll have that done Todd. So good. I appreciate this. It’s also powered by Momentum Builder. That’s something I want to just touch on briefly. What is Momentum Builder?
[Todd] My partners Donn Goetling and Gino Fronte have been students at Sales Mastery for almost two decades. And about three years ago they asked me, so I did sales Mastery Mumber 30, and I decided just to take a year off. I was gonna come back and do 31, and I decided to take a year off the market, soft and got a little weird. And then the year after that, it was even more soft and weird, but they came up to me and they said this is 2023. And they said, what are you gonna do with your Sales Mastery Legacy? And I said right now it’s 30 years in the can. I don’t have to do anything. I have nothing to prove, but I still have everything to offer. And it was all about that. And they said, what would it look like if we bought your brand and what would happen if we merged our brand? So they had gotten into the event business because they saw the joy of doing that. And it’s the example of a collaboration where I decided, okay, let me help you guys for three years with the Sales Mastery brand. You buy the brand and then let’s use Momentum Builders as the engine that powers it. And everybody wants more momentum, right? Let’s build momentum in our life and our finances and our health and yes, and all of that. So David, it worked out just splendidly. It was like no hard lifting. It was an easy discussion. And so here we are now and we believe that our events combined will produce one of the largest events in the mortgage space every year, and we’re grateful that we get to do it. We trust both brands, and it’s cool to put them together, like Sales Mastery, powered by Momentum Builder, who doesn’t want a master sales and who doesn’t want more momentum? Exactly.
[David] Right. It’s gonna be an exciting event. You’ll wanna be out there and you’re gonna be on stage yourself. We’re gonna see you there.
[Todd] I’m doing what I’ve done every year. I’m leading a lot of the panels. I do the opening night speech, which is just that whole fun opening night has. Oh, it’s been one of the joys of my life to, to come out on stage and look at everybody there thirsty and hungry and wanting to learn and then we jump right into it the next morning at eight o’clock and we go all day long on the second day till five, and the third day till five, and then on Friday we go till noon so everybody can get back home that evening, a lot of people choose to stay over the weekend and just experience Dallas and take some notes and look at their journals and put that plan together so that when they land back. At their office.
[David] Yhey get back home. Yeah.
[Todd] They at least have thought through what they’re gonna do, and so they don’t default to the old behavior. So that’s great. Yeah. It’s gonna be great. And I love you, brother. I so appreciate what you’re doing for the,
[David] I’m so grateful for you too.
[Todd] The hearts you’ve transformed. It’s good to be your partnering.
[David]It’s wonderful to get those notes from people and here what you do. And that’s what, if you’re a listener and saying, what am I doing to transform lives? Come to this event. You too could be a life transformer. Todd has been doing this for 37 years. I’ve been doing this for 51 years. It’s wonderful. It’s wonderful. Beyond words. Todd, thank you.
[Todd] I just wanna say to everybody, just so you know, this relationship between David and myself. I can definitively say that I may not have ended up where I ended up if it had not been for a conversation that I had with David 35 years ago. And a brother to still be kicking and still be changing life together. It’s try hot in my life.
[David] Yeah. No quitting here. That’s, thank you Todd. I love you brother. It’s so good. And the thing I wanted to celebrate is your faith. We both share that in common. And a lot of people say it weirds me out sometimes. You know what? Quit being weirded out. Step into it. Open up your heart and mind to see what happens. I love that fact that you base everything you do on that faith that you have, we both share. And it’s wonderful, Todd. It makes such a difference.
[Todd] Yeah. Thank you. And there, there is a bigger force in at work in our lives.
[David] whether we wanna recognize it or not.
[Todd] Yes, sir. That’s right. That’s right.
[David] Have a great day, Todd. Good to have you. See you at Sales Mastery. Blessings, brother.
[Todd] Thank you bud. See you. Bye everybody.
Important Links
Todd Duncan is a renowned sales entrepreneur and leadership expert, with over 20 published books, including the New York Times bestsellers Time Traps: Proven Strategies for Swamped Salespeople and High Trust Selling: Make More Money in Less Time with Less Stress.
In 1992 he Founded The Duncan Group with the commitment to transforming the way people work and live. With a focus on personal and professional productivity, he helps people make more money in less time with less stress.
He has mentored over 5 million professionals globally across real estate, mortgage, banking, and financial services industries, notably through his High Trust Selling System™ and his energetic and engaging keynote speeches!
In 2024, Duncan co-founded FUEL Inc., the world’s fastest growing digital video library for personal development. SUCCESS Magazine calls is “the most profound breakthrough in education in decades.” Founder of Selling Power Media, Gerhard Geschwandtner says, “FUEL is the Netflix of Personal Development and the Peloton of Performance Acceleration.”
Duncan’s goal every day is to help people win! His Annual Sales Mastery Event is in its 31st year having served millions of professionals around the Globe.
Todd has been featured in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Sydney Morning Herald, The Los Angeles Times, The Daily Telegraph, Forbes, Fortune, The Seattle Times, Entrepreneur Magazine, SUCCESS Magazine, FOX and CNN amongst other media publication