Magic Johnson: This Simple Branding Strategy Made Magic Johnson Millions!

You will always be able to make money if your brand is strong. A lot of you will block your own success because you're fearful of what's going to happen. I'm a big believer in if you don't dream it, you can't become it. I promised myself and my parents when I got some money, I would know what to do with it and I would take care of it. Mm-mm. Nah, when you line up trying to take something from me, especially that championship, I hate you. Larry, you— no, you're just what a basketball player should be.

He's an American retired NBA player who played point guard for the LA Lakers. He won a championship and an NBA Finals Most Valuable Player award in his rookie season. He was rated as the greatest NBA point guard of all time by ESPN in 2007. He's Magic Johnson, and here's my take on his top 10 rules for success. Number 4 is my personal favorite. And make sure to stick around all the way to the end for some special bonus footage.

What do I worry about? I worry about brand control. My brand is huge now, right? And one thing I fight with every day, I want to make sure I don't dilute the brand. I don't do anything, make any major mistakes, because any mistake will hurt your brand. And so those are the things that keep me up at night, just making sure my brand remains strong. And so that's a good message for all these young men and women watching your show is make sure that your brand is everything and you will always be able to make money if your brand is strong. Even if you go bankrupt, if your brand is strong, you'll be able to still make some money. Donald Trump proved that he, he bounced right back. Look where he is today, you know. He went through that phase, came right back because he kept the brand strong, and that's important. When I did my research in starting a business, the most important thing you have to do, and a lot of you in here someday want to be like Larry and like Mr. Brant, is that you have to first stop being fearful. A lot of you will block your own success because you're fearful of what's going to happen. Because the comfort zone is here. Make a great living, you know, my bills are paid, you know, everything is great. Oh, I'm scared to change. So you block your own growth. So you have to now say to yourself, hey, once you get the tools, Once you've done your homework, then you can start making a move to say, okay, hey, I can be a businesswoman, a businessman, and start my own thing. But you gotta believe in yourself first.

[MUSIC] [APPLAUSE] [FOREIGN LANGUAGE] He throws the ball from where? He throws it from 10 feet inbounds. And it went in.

I'm a big believer in if you don't dream it, you can't become it. I mean, look, look where you're sitting. Uh, you, you've done a wonderful job and you remained a, a good man to, with all the success that you've had and your family has had. And just like myself, you had to dream that you could be something in life and do something in life. And so I was a big dreamer, you know? And so my job was to clean these 7 floors between Friday and Sunday. So every time I would go to the 7th floor was the CEO's office. So I would bust in like I was the CEO. I'm dreaming like I'm the CEO now. And then I would kick my feet up on his desk recline the seat back, and I pretended like I had an assistant out front, and I would hit the intercom button. Tony, could you bring me today's paper, some coffee, and donuts? And so I pretend she would come into the office, and, you know, and one time I'm sitting there dreaming, and he walks in on me, and he said, what are you doing? I said, well, I'm dreaming like I'm the CEO I've been blessed, and here I am. I am the CEO of my own company, and what a blessing. And so, but I think back to those moments, and those moments helped me to get to where I am today. When I was starting out, I've always wanted to be an NBA basketball player but also a businessman. And so this went way back, so even before I even, you know, was drafted. So I promised myself and my parents when I got some money, I would know what to do with it and I would take care of it. But you had a lemonade stand somewhere? Yeah, yeah. Oh, back in the day I was hustling, man. Because, you know, I didn't get money to go to the movie. My parents didn't have that. So you bought your own movie theater?

Yes.

Paper route, lemonade stand. I used to shovel snow. So I was hoping it was gonna be a snowstorm so I can go out and shovel people's driveways and so on. So I've always hustled my whole life and I always knew what money was all about.

[MUSIC] For no, another fine rebound by Green. That gives him 5 in the game. The Magic, a 360 turn for the dribble. Magic down the middle, gets underneath to Worthy, slams up!

See, the most important thing in business is you have to know your customer, and then you have to speak to that customer, and then don't try to be everything to everybody. See, we do one thing, urban America, that's all I do. And that's very, very important. And so we have the number one TGI Fridays in the West restaurant right in Los Angeles. Only Fridays that serve Cristal, Dom Perignon, XO, 'cause that's what my what? Customer wants. Gotta know your customer. My mother, I tell you, first of all, She rubbed off on us so much because here's a woman that worked all day, then she had to come and care for all the kids. And there were 10 of you. And there's 10 of us. So when you think about 6 girls, man.

I get the picture.

Yes, and so I got this from my mother though, John, and this was the key. I got her smile and giving back to the world. That's what I took from my mother. And that's why I try to help everybody, and that's why I have this smile that I have, because of her. But this lesson that she tried to instill in you very early about listening, yeah, I have to assume that's come back to help you a lot in life. No question about it, it really has, because especially when you, when you're in sports, and so you have to listen to your coaches and you have to listen to your teammates, and because they're gonna really affect the outcome of the game. And so I was always one of those players who listened because of my— what my mother told me. And, and then at the end of the day also too, I listened to other CEOs and other business people as well because I don't know it all and don't pretend that I do.

Now here's Magic down the middle. Magic! Oh, no look pass to Worth it! Make it to Rambis who scores! Foul!

I thank my high school coach, Mr. Fox, for teaching me that making your players better would win championships. I remember when you— my senior year and I was averaging over 40 points and you said, "Irvin, we will never win with you averaging over 40 points. You gotta average around 20, 25 and make all the other players better." And you're the first one who started me off learning that, and I thank you for that. Do you think there's anybody in the NBA now that could have played in your era? I think— and been an All-Star? Oh, yeah. Yeah. I think that Kobe and LeBron, for sure. What about Garnett? You know, Garnett, with his toughness, would have been able to play. I just can't see LeBron driving down the lane on the old Bad Boys team, Pistons, all this stuff. Oh, no. Old Knicks team. He would have been on the floor, no question about it. No question about it. I mean, we would have made all those dudes a little tougher. Now, Kobe already got that. Tough mind attitude. So he would have fit right in. But, uh, even Kobe would have— if he had came down that middle, you're gonna get slammed on the floor, no question. And then the guy stand over you and look down at you like, what you want to do? And you just had to— those days, those are the days I missed, you know. But you, you had to understand that you have to have tough skin because the Pistons made Scottie Pippen a better player. And you know, Michael Jordan, they classic battles. And I love Dr. J against Larry Bird, Philly against Boston. Back then, Bernard King, you know, he might have been the only player on the Knicks, but he gave everybody hell, boy. And so you think about all those rivalries that we had back in the day. Now dudes are friends with each other, so they don't really go at each other. I don't like that though. I like the Charles Oakley, Anthony Davis, Charles Barkley. They're like, please follow me on Twitter. We hate— we hated you, you know. And so when we came to the arena, you knew we hated you, you— we knew you hated us, and we gonna go at it. Just like you talking about Isaiah, we went at it twice in the finals. So Isaiah drove the lane, I put him on his butt. Boom! Sorry, homie. Yeah, he came up swinging. You, you guys remember that? He came up swinging at me, so I hit him, he hit me, and Lambeer— so we started fighting. And we end up winning that series. So the next year they beat us. But like we told each other, he said, man, hey, I hate you for these next 7 games. So I said, hey, handle your business because you come down that lane, I'm gonna put you on your butt. And the same he did to me. But now today, these dudes, man, they just friends hanging out, speaking, talking to each other on the court. Yeah, I wish I would Talk to somebody, man, my opponent. And I hated the Celtics too. We all did, man. DJ, DJ lived in LA, so we told DJ before the finals, every time we played the Celtics, hey brother, you the enemy. And so don't talk to me, can't talk to me, nothing. I mean, he was cool, but that's my boy. But mm-mm, nah, when you line up trying to take something from me, especially that championship, I hate you.

I want you to see Magic's reaction. He likes it. Yeah, he likes it. The fans love it. That magic went off. Point to everybody. Yeah! Yeah!

My father worked 2 jobs his whole life. One was at a GM plant? Yes, GM plant for 30 years, and then he had a trash hauling service. So he had his own truck, and we would go door to door, pick up people's trash. And it was one situation where it was probably 7 below zero. And very cold Saturday morning, and my job was to pick up all the loose trash. And so we— it was so cold that I got everything that I could just grab, throw it on the truck, and I ran to the truck because it was just cold to jump in. By the time I got in and the door shut, my father opened it back up, grabbed me, and dragged me through the snow back to the barrels to say, Son, you did a halfway job. And if you do this job in a halfway manner, you're gonna be a halfway basketball player. You put in half the time. You only put in half the time as a student. And he said, you're supposed to do this job right. So I want you to go get that shovel and I want you to chop the ice until you can get all the trash that's trapped in the ice and put it on the truck. And that's, that's what happened. And so he taught me how to be a perfectionist and do everything. So those are—

you got to get it, you got to put it up. If you don't get a shot away, they'll talk about it the rest of your life. Magic fires for 3, got it! At the buzzer, Magic hit a 3-pointer! The Lakers win!

I got up here. You do not go into this Hall of Fame and win this honor by yourself. Larry, you know, you're just what a basketball player should be. You The biggest reason that I'm here is because of you making me go to that gym every summer, not only staying for 4 hours, but I figured I'd better stay for 6 because I knew you were there about 5 or 6 yourself. It was tremendous playing against you, and I'm just happy And I thank God that I got to know you not as just Larry Bird the basketball player, but Larry Bird the man. And I appreciate you coming out here doing this.

James Worthy off Magic Johnson in the low post, being guarded by Dennis Johnson.

Byron Scott is in the ball game now.

5 seconds to go. Magic with a hook shot. Scores with 2.

Thank you guys so much for watching. I made this video because Zaino asked me to. So if there's a famous entrepreneur you want me to profile next, leave it in the comments below and I'll see what I can do. I'd also love to know which of Magic Johnson's top 10 rules had the biggest impact on you and why. What change you're gonna make in your business as a result of watching this video. Leave it in the comments and I will join in the discussion. Thank you so much for watching. Continue to believe and I'll see you soon.

It's not enough for us just to deliver anymore. We gotta over-deliver. If you want to keep all the billions of customers you have and hundreds and hundreds of million customers you have, you have to over-deliver to them. You know, like the G-Phone, it over-delivered. So you gotta over- deliver. And so we've been able to do that with our fund. They turned me down a couple times, CalSTRS, CalPERS, and they wanted me to really come back and understand that if they gave me this money and, and the reason they're giving it to me— first they turned me down for the reasons of I didn't have the track record that they thought I should have. And then they said, if this business strategy is so great, why isn't somebody else doing it already? And I couldn't answer that. So they said, what we gonna do, we gonna give you $50 million. And we gonna, 'cause I was there for $150 million, but they said, we'll give you 50. I said, I'm African American, I'll take that. $5 I would have took. But, and if you deliver upon your promise, you can come back and access the other $100. So I bought a shopping center for $22 million. It was only about 40 to 50% occupied at that time. We brought it up to 100% occupied. We sold that same shopping center for $48 million.

$100 million.

So did I overdeliver? Yes. That's a lot of money they got and a lot of return on their investment. So I was able to go from there. It took— to access the $100 million, but also raise my first real estate fund, which took us almost 3 years to raise $300 million. We returned our partners 30% on their money. They were very happy. So how long you think took me to raise $600 million after we returned them 30% on their money? Mm, almost less than a year. We raised $600 million. We just returned them about 18 to 20% on their money. Very happy. And then before the market crashed, knock on wood, we just raised $1 billion in cash, and we're ready to go out and invest. It still blows you away, you know, that somebody would want to have your jersey on with your name, want to go in your business and frequent that business and want to take their family to your business. It's been a humbling experience. And sometime when I— early on, and I still do it now, I just go park the car and watch people go in and out. And know that you have affected the community in such a positive way. And then sometimes I cry. I guess God put me on this earth to do some special things for other people. It's not about me, it's about the community and making it better. And I'm glad I've done that.