Creating Business Breakthroughs, Entrepreneurship, and the Power of Broke with Daymond John and Jay Abraham - I Love Marketing Bonus Episode

I'm dean jackson, he's joe polish and this is the I love marketing podcast.

In this episode you'll discover what every entrepreneur should know about success, the three ways entrepreneurs limit themselves, what you can do to create breakthroughs in your business, and much more. With Joe Polish, Daymond John and Jay Abraham Daymond John is an entrepreneur, investor and TV personality best known as the founder, president and CEO of fubu. He also appears as an investor on the ABC reality television series Shark Tank. Jay Abraham is Founder and CEO of Abraham Group. Jay has spent his entire career solving problems and and fixing businesses. He has significantly increased the bottom lines of over 10,000 clients in more than 400 industries and over 7,200 sub industries worldwide. If you would like access to the full presentation, the show notes and the special resources for this episode, please visit ilovemarketing.com power that's ilovemarketing.com power hello, this.

Is Joe Polish and welcome to a special episode of I Love Marketing. What I've decided to do here is share with all of our I Love Marketing listener an interview that I did with Daymond John, who you know from Shark Tank, and Jay Abraham, who's one of the most brilliant marketing minds on the planet. And this particular interview was done just for our Genius Network members and Genius Network is the highest level discussion group in the world for marketers and industry transformers. People invest $25,000 a year to be in the Genius Network group and come to three two day meetings a year and one of those meetings includes a two day Genius Network annual event which is the highest level marketing event in the world for the level of people that attend running very successful companies, many, many New York Times best selling authors, lots of just business icons. And we're doing a special half day session at this upcoming Genius Network annual event this year in Arizona, which is where we've been doing it for the last couple years. And so this particular interview was done just for the people that were attending this. However, the advice that is shared, the discussions that we had I consider so valuable and so useful that although this interview is just done for people that are coming to Genius Network, I wanted to use it as a podcast episode because no matter where you're at in business and what we discuss on this episode, I think you'll find really valuable. So listen to it. I think you'll take a lot of notes if you're not doing it while you're driving or running up mountains or you know, whatever you do when you listen to our podcast and I hope you Find it useful and please share your comments and have a wonderful day. Now here's me introducing and then interviewing Jay Abraham and Daymond John.

Hello, this is Joe Polish and today I'm going to be doing a fascinating interview with two respected and celebrated champions of entrepreneurship. I have both Daymond John and Jay Abraham here with me to discuss what they'll be sharing at our upcoming Genius Network annual event and what they both plan to achieve with you as a Genius network member. On October 5th, we're going to have a bonus session after our two day annual event with both Damon and Jay. This is really a sneak preview of two different experiences you're going to be part of at the Genius Network annual event and it's going to be awesome because first, Damon is an industry pioneer. He's evolved from one of the most successful fashion icons in the country, having grown Fubu into a $6 billion brand. And he's become one of the most sought after businessmen in the country, appearing as an invest on one of the most watched TV shows, Shark Tank. Damon is just super sharp, super smart and I'm really excited to have you Damon on this call with Jay. And Jay is basically the most preeminent strategist and marketing mind alive. Just to give you a sense of how amazing Jay is, he's increased the bottom lines of over 10,000 clients in more than 400 industries and over 7,200 sub industries worldwide. He's dealt with virtually every type of business and has 15,000 plus individual business success stories from around the world. Many of the world's top entrepreneurial icon seek out Jay's advice to help them grow their organizations. Both Jay and Damon are amazing and the discussion you're about to hear is going to open up your mind to some really unique perspectives on business building, entrepreneurship and growth. So before I start asking both of you some questions, I just wanted to say welcome Jay and Damon. Great to have you here. It's always fun to do interviews and talk with you and it's really informative.

So thank you. Ditto Joe.

Thank you. Awesome.

Well, so I'm going to launch right into it. This is going to be for people that are coming to our sold out Genius Network event. This is the highest level event of its kind for people that are in the field of marketing and what we refer to as industry Transformers. The room will be filled with people running multimillion dollar businesses, some of the very best in the world in their categories. And for both of you, you're both industry Transformers. You are the best in the world for both of what you guys do. So I'll start with you first. Damon, you've been a shark on Shark Tank, which is one of the highest rated TV shows, for many years. How many years now have you been on Shark Tank?

Actually, y.

Seven years. We're going on our eighth year right now.

That's awesome. That's awesome. So what lessons have you observed that every business and Genius Network could. Could benefit from?

You know, I think one of the most important things that I've learned, you know, because of the current change in the status of social media and online conversion, is that, you know, we're going into an area where a lot of people can really, you know, watch their downside. And because of the data that's out there, they don't necessarily have to be exposed to as much inventory as they used to in the past, you know. So what I'm learning is that people are going out there and they're converting and they're finding out who their audience is. And once they know who their audience is, then they know how much they can leverage that audience by selling them whatever the goods are, whether it's apparel, whether it's a service or something of that. And they don't necessarily have to keep inventory. You look at some of the largest companies in the world now, they don't have inventory. Facebook, Airbnb, Uber, iTunes, whatever the case may be. And I'm noticing that as the everyday entrepreneur is trying to find ways to not have that exposure, because two of the biggest exposures you're going to have in your business are going to be marketing and also then inventory.

Well, interesting. You know, let me mention this also, right at the very beginning, I've done several interviews with Jay with Damon in the past. Many of the people that are coming to Genius Network have promoted Damon's book, the Power of Broke. But yeah, I mean, I think the whole world is actually changing terms of even how retail is going to show up in terms of buildings, in real estate and how people are buying. So, Jay, what are your thoughts on that same question?

I deal with a broad spectrum of people who are not selling information. Most of the time, they're selling all kinds of products, services all around the world. And just to go where David's going, I look at their online presence. It's fascinating. Direct response, marketing, selling, psychological techniques have been around for hundreds of years. And they're immutable. And these people, they'll have a website you hit and it's just got a name. It has no headline. Denominating any of the advantages, they almost unknowingly make their website inferior. And a lot of the people, it's not a negative of these people, but a lot of the people that purport to be the experts on all this digital marketing don't have a clue how to make a website multiply three things. Its ability to attract and maintain a quality prospective buyer. Its ability to preemptively establish that company, that their product, their service, whatever it is in a way that is incomparable. Establish a buying criteria. Their ability, you know, to move them all the way to whatever direct response is required, whether it's a purchase, whether it's a phone call, whatever. And I find it fascinating. Now, in my normal work, there's three almost universal recurring observations we make. One, everybody does the same thing the same way everyone else does it in their industry, which is very rarely the best way. It's just what they followed. It's like following the herd. And even that they're not really trying to optimize. And I'll give you a little. I don't want to be too deep. Number two, almost nobody is strategic. They're all tactical. They really don't understand how to make sure that everything they do enhances and advances a big outcome that is very, very well defined. And then number three, there's about 50 different impact points in the revenue side of any business. Now, that sounds daunting, but it goes to not just the main activities, but within every activity, whether it's securing an appointment, setting the prelude of the appointment, going to the appointment, trying to convert the appointment, whether it's the signage at a trade show, whether it's what you say in the first three minutes, how you follow up, if you're a big sponsor, what you do with the attendee list. And almost nobody recognizes the leverage and the strategic ability to harness all that. And I can go on and on, but I find that fascinating. That's probably enough for now.

No, no, yeah, you're right. You're right. I mean, and just even exploring that and thinking that opens up your brain to unexploited opportunities and things that just probably are being absolutely neglect. And I've always loved the term sales prevention department because many companies have a really superb sales prevention department. We figured out how do we set things up so we just do not have people to continue to do business with us. Jay and Damon, you speak to huge groups of business owners and entrepreneurs. From whatever you can think of at the top of your mind, what are the most frequently asked and also the most unique questions you both get asked and what would be your answers? You can pick one or two, whatever you can think of, but you get hit with everything. And so I'd love to hear what are the most frequently asked things that people are asking of you and the most unique ones and what are your answers to those questions?

Yeah, I think that the number one question I get asked by corporations is how to have their employees think like entrepreneurs and think outside the box and how to create innovation. Yet even when they want to create innovation, they don't make any change internally to create innovation. They don't have, you know, the legal is not speaking to sales, the sales are not speaking to production and production not speaking to, you know, to retail or anything of that nature. And that's the biggest challenge they have, is how to, how to have people in their organization feel incentivized to then think like an entrepreneur, but yet they don't want me to speak to them and get them too excited so they quit their job. So I think that, you know, that's the biggest challenge and that's, that's the biggest question I'm always asked by anybody in corporate America. And, you know, startups and small businesses, it's always going to be access to capital. When do they, you know, when do they take in capital? You know, because when you take in, the earlier you take in capital, the more it costs. And is the capital purely from, you know, a monetary standpoint or how do you have a strategic partner also put in capital? And where are these people and how do you get to these people and how do you speak to them? Basically, how do you get on Shark Tank and pitch a shark? At the end of the day right.

Now, that's probably like your number one thing. Every weird way that someone would approach you is hoping that you're going to land them on tv. Can I ask you about this? Because I've always thought of this. I mean, I'm a person who never went out and raised money. I never went out and looked for investors and I've always sold stuff in order to have money. Now certainly a lot of people need revenue depending on the type of business that they're having. If it's very technology and programming intensive and whatever, money, an infusion of it in the beginning is always helpful. What I've also seen is a lot of people to use something. I think I heard Jay say years ago, when people are just given a ton of money, they can be very promiscuous with it, especially if they didn't have. It's not their own money. Do you typically try to talk people out of getting investors in certain sort of context? Because most of the whole Shark Tank world is like, let's go in and get money and also align ourselves with these smart people that are going to hopefully bring us not only marketing and exposure, but connections. I mean, what are your takes on when is getting money just a dumb, dangerous thing? Because your book the Power of Broke goes so deeply into that. Being broke creates creativity because you got to figure out what to do.

So what are your thoughts on that? Yeah, I've never raised capital as well. I mean, you know, I ended up having a distribution deal with Samsung, you know, after about eight years of operating FUBU. And you know, I opened and closed it three times from 89 to 92. And by the time I knew that I needed some capital, I really didn't need capital because I would have burned through the capital anyway. I needed back office, I needed manufacturing and letters of credit opened up and people who understood quality control and quota, you know, bringing things out of other countries. So I needed way a whole different other aspect in capital. But we're the day and age where, you know, venture, venture funds are out there, crowdfunding is out there, and people feel that they need capital. I personally am against taking in outside investors. I'd rather, you know, obviously own, you know, a larger amount of a smaller company than having to deal with investors. So I say you don't take in capital unless you absolutely ascertain that the scalability is not guaranteed. But as I said in the earlier part, that you know who your customers are, you know that you have a subscription service and you know that 10,000 people are paying $100 a month for your, for your product. And you know that you can take that 10,000 to 100,000 if you had this infusion of capital which would, which would either set up your systems or your software or your ability to deliver or take to another level. But the capital will have to take you, you know, three and four and five times X to me. And it would have to be a small amount of capital you take in comparison to your ownership because there's no need to go from, you know, 10 million to 20 million. But you just gave up 50% of your company, so you're really just doing the 10 million at the end of the day when it comes back to your pocket. So I always say that capital is only if you really want to take it to another level. And you have made every Single mistake you can at a small stage. So you know what not to do. And if, you know you're going to go 5 and 10 and 20 and 30 times X of the capital. But more importantly, you know, can you get a strategic partner and is that capital also the. Can you go back to the bank on that capital? Is that capital in phases? Do you. Can you. Can you take a quarter of it now and then. And then slowly ratchet up to. To elaborate on that. A lot of the deals that I've done on Shark Tank, after, you know, the fifth, sixth year, I started to understand that, you know, all the money I put out in the first two, three years, I never got any of it back. You know, it still had. You still had to feed the monster. And a lot of those, A lot of Shark Tank people had to go out and raise other capital, come back to me for capital. So what I realized is that if I'm going to give somebody, you know, $300,000, I'm going to give it to them and tranches of 50s if we hit every goal over the course of two years.

Right.

And what that. Right, that, yeah. What that does is that gives them a little bit of a, you know, puts it tethers them a little bit to say, wait a minute, don't, you know, this is not the lottery, you know, go. And as you said, you know, Jay talks about being promiscuous, Be very, very frugal what you do and make sure it's the right decision. Because if you blow this, you're not going to get, you know, tranche number two.

Right.

Or trunch number three or four or five, and it makes them maximize it. Then it also, from my standpoint as an investor, lets me get to see how, how this person performs over a course of time. Because, you know, the dating process of, oh my God, I have a shark as a partner that runs out after the first month, after, you know, after they realize I'm not going to come there and, you know, and save the day. Right. So it starts to really get to see how the person performs over a good amount of time. And you get more and more comfortable in both parties. You get more and more comfortable. But I say don't take in money if you don't have to. The only couple of times that I've maybe taken in money, and not because I need it, because some friends of mine wanted to come in on a partnership, I couldn't sleep at night and I sent them all back their money in six months.

Yeah, you know, you know, that that's actually very insightful. I mean, one of my favorite quotes that I think I heard, you know, Gary Halbert say years ago was the most expensive information in the world is bad information. And there's a lot of people that are, you know, dispensing really bad information. And if you get some free information online as an example, but it's bad, it could be the most expensive free information that you've ever given. And what I want to say is that to remind everyone listening now, we're going to do our two day Genius Network annual event. It's going to be awesome. I'll be doing an interview with Damon John and also Brett Wilson, who is a dragon on Dragon's Den. I don't think anyone's ever interviewed a dragon and a shark at the same time that I'm aware of. I don't know. But that's going to be really awesome. And then on the 5th, we're going to do a half day event with Jay and Damon. And as you are listening to this, coming to the Genius Network annual event, if you're going to be one of the people that will be in that room and our event sold out currently, so it's fantastic. Think about here, you got Damon, who is now going on the 8th year of Shark Tank. He has seen thousands of businesses, proposals, deals, asking for money, built a $6 billion company himself, numerous other businesses, investor in so many things. What you said the first three years, we weren't even making any money. And that's something that most people would.

Be like, oh my God, I wish.

I could go on Shark Tank. But what they don't realize is when you were, because we've talked about this on previous interviews, like in the very beginning, this is the first time they did that they didn't know how to filter some of these businesses.

Great.

And the level of wisdom you have, the right question posed to you in the right way could save someone 10 years of their life or could put them on the right path. And then going of course to Jay Abraham, who's one of the most brilliant marketing minds on the planet that has. I know for a fact that his strategies have generated first clients at least a minimum of $9 billion in revenue. So you're going to be able to spend an afternoon in a real intimate setting with both of them. And so come to this prepared in advance. Read Damon's book. If you haven't read up the stuff I've sent you on J. Abraham or listen to the interviews, do that and come to this because we're not only going to, we're going to record this also. So we'll create a video for you so you'll be able to have it captured and it's going to be awesome. But I want everyone to show up knowing just how much you can come and get out of listening to them. So, yeah, thank you for that, Damon. Jay, you want to answer that question? Most frequently asked question that you would get and what would be your answer?

Sure, but I'm going to answer it in a little bit of a unexpected way. All I do anymore, I don't do key, I do keynotes, but they're very unique. I don't do any basic Jay Abraham anymore. I just do Q and A, problem solving, strategy, restructuring, marketing, makeovers, things like that. And what I found is most people, most entrepreneurs can't even articulate what their real question is. It's very abstract, it's very tangential. So what I do or what I do when I do things with other people like Tony Robbins is we first of all have to get them clarity on what the hell the right question to ask is. And we have to really help them understand the why, because a lot of them are asking very tangential questions. Secondly, when we get clarity, usually the question is how do I grow my business with my limited resources, capital, infrastructure? And the real problem that they need to ask is how many better ways can I reach my market? How many better ways can I convey my proposition? How many better ways can I discriminate and find the quality people I want and not waste time on the ones that either I don't want or don't want me? How many ways can I distinguish and differentiate my business from everyone else? Now this is not arrogant, it's just clinical. When I started, 99% of the people I worked with had no capital. So I had to become exceptionally proficient at using, abusing, using ethically other people's assets, distribution, brand, sales forces, affinity groups. So there are so many. One, when you do as many industries, not just companies, as I do, you have a pretty fascinating perspective because you see so many higher performing, better performing, safer, more profitable, more strategic, higher yielding strategies, sales approaches, revenue models, ancillary ways to either enhance or make profitable a marginal deal. You see so many elements that are not linear that you can reach the market and people really, that's what they want, but they don't even know how to ask good questions in my opinion. And I work mostly with entrepreneurs. I don't do many startups. I have a Couple. But mostly the range that I will do is an entrepreneur maybe a million. But usually it's going to be five or ten to a couple hundred million. And it's very interesting because they don't know how to leverage up, by the way. And Damon should affirm this. I think he will. Biggest overlooked advantage people have is not looking at what I'll call the critical mass and velocity and motion. By that I mean there's all this stuff going on right now, but they don't look at how many ways they can make everything perform better for zero extra time, effort, expense, number one. Number two, the most underutilized resource asset most entrepreneurs have is their talent. They get about 20% of the capacity and they get bad because they can't hire good talent. But the key is if you can't hire it, you build it, you grow it, you develop it. I can go on and on and on, but. But that's my answer.

Okay. And what I will say is that prior to the event, because the way that I look at Genius Network, Genius Network is just a really high level discussion group where we help build a better entrepreneur. And then everyone that's in the group comes together for the annual event and people that are not currently members of the event. This year it's $10,000 a person, which it has been for going on seven years now for the annual event. And I think next year I'm going to raise the price to $25,000 just for this two day event. And now this one. We're attaching to this special half day bonus day with both of you in order to impart guidance and direction and wisdom and strategy and perspective on how to not only think about building and growing a better business, but. But being a more effective entrepreneur and building a type of life that you would want to live. And with all of that, there's going to be like, well, you know, what I ask and how I go into it is going to determine the type of response you get asking better questions. And so I am sending to everybody a list of questions that Jay came up with. To think about your business, to think about your clients, to think about how you think. And if you go through those questions before this event, you're going to come into this really prepared to get the most out of it. I've always loved the line, is the juice worth the squeeze? I was with this organizational lady at my office several years ago, Barbara Hemphill, and her name was Tracy Campbell. And they were helping me go through just. I'm one of the biggest swipe files on the planet. That's for people that don't know what a swipe file is. It's something from the old school days of direct mail and direct marketing. You would hold on to sales letters and promotions and campaigns. And I've got just some of the greatest marketing promotions and courses on the planet in a physical form. And we were looking at like, what the hell do I do with all of this stuff? And I was staring at stuff they did. Tracy said to me, because she could see I was confused, should I, should I save it? Should I file it? Should I throw it away? And she asked me the question, is the juice worth the squeeze? And I was like, that is a damn good question when it comes to saying yes or saying no to a person or an opportunity. And I use that a lot. When I get overwhelmed, I ask myself, is the juice worth the squeeze? Well, the way to get the most out of an event, the way to squeeze the most juice out of this genius network event and the day that we're going to spend together with Jay and Damon is to literally prepare yourself in advance. And if you do, if you come in with the right level of thinking, you're going to get a hell of a lot of juice out of it. Because I can guarantee you there is some enormous wisdom, as you can tell just by listening to the conversation we've had so far. So I just wanted to. Not to be redundant, just to make that point. And questions are what they're going to open up the doors to, what you want answers to. So that's my little rant there. Damon, when you're not buying into businesses on Shark Tank, what kind of businesses do you own, invest in and look for and why?

You know, I think that's a perfect question after, after, you know, that statement, is the juice worth the squeeze? You know, and even as of probably about 2 o', clock, 2am last night, you know, I was dealing with some fairly big celebrities. So. So let me, let me just backtrack and say that my business is comprised of a couple of things. You have my Shark Tank investments, which may take up, and they can take up anywhere up to 30 or 40% of my time. It only takes us approximately, you know, three weeks to film the entire show. But after that, it takes up a massive amount of time to go through due diligence and do everything and close the deals and deal with entrepreneurs and work.

Right.

Then you have my fashion and my textile businesses, where we have about eight, eight, eight companies. And that probably takes up another, you know, 20, 30% of my time. And then you have consulting, you know, consulting, speaking and developing a new product. I'm developing, developing a product called Blueprint and co. It's very similar to the co shared spaces out there in the market where you know, people no longer necessarily need these huge offices. They go and they sit around like minded entrepreneurs and you know, you're a startup but you know, you're a wife and you have a company, you're creating some kind of lotions or cosmetics but you know, your husband doesn't necessarily want you to be in the house picking up half, half, half the home with a bunch of boxes and, and people coming over. So you know, you go and create this space and you go rent the space and this, we do it so that those are my businesses. But one of my businesses for many, many years because of a symbiotic relationship has been representing and, or dealing with artists, whether it's athletes, artists, you know, music artists and things of that nature. And the reason why I initially done this is because whether it's Boo Boo or by any of my other brands that I owned, I used to want to go to a video set or a movie and I would ask them to wear my product and exchange. Instead of giving them a hundred thousand, two hundred thousand dollars, I would advise them on how to monetize their brand. As the music industry and television started to kind of implode, I then started to represent a lot of them. So if you look at the Kardashians, I represented them, product integration and their brand for about the first three years I've worked everybody from Pitbull to Lennox Lewis to LL Cool J to anybody and everybody underneath the planet. Last night, about 2:00 in the morning, some huge stars that I have that I was representing and some licensing, they decided not to go with the direction that I thought was best because they just decided, you know, they come with a lot of egos. And I looked at my, I looked at my current business model and I realized that even though I have, you know, I represent a lot of them.

That it has changed these days.

You know, unlike maybe 10 years ago where I can go out and get license and, or a license to put out somebody's brand who is a celebrity these days, the current celebrities are, Instead of having one person with, you know, 20 million followers, you can have, you know, whatever, whatever that breaks down to is, you know, 20 people with 1 million followers that are just average everyday people that convert the numbers much, much better. And the Day of the superstars are really going away. So I looked at my business and I said, you know what? It's this, it's the same 80, 20 that we're all going through, but these 20, this 20% of dealing with these licenses and these stars, whether it's, you know, to represent my Shark Tank brand or my. All my clothing brands, that really is changing now. So now how do I take that 20% and move it over to be a loss leader in a new area, feel where that 20% will eventually grow to replace the 80? I had done that around 2004 when I realized that apparel was starting to slow down. 2008, people stopped buying apparel because they needed to. They need to pay their rent. The last thing they were doing was buying a new pair of jeans or a coat. And I. And I started to license out my FUBU business and everything else. And my 80% of business I started license out. I started to do all the books and go on to the media tours and started to create content because of this new thing called Facebook coming around and Twitter and social media. And now that 20% that I called the loss leader now started to move over to 80% because that's not how you see me on Shark Tank. So the basic, what I'm trying to say is that every single year, every single day, I start to change my model to save time and move my 8020 and keep investing in the 20. So the 20 replay places 80. And hopefully I gave you somewhat of the answer you needed as going around that whole story.

No, no, that's great. And I mean, you make a really interesting point that the world of the superstar is, you know, there's never going to be. At least I don't believe anything ever like an Elvis or any. I mean, and that's going back, you know, many, many years. But as we get more and more, it's just. It's just not that world anymore. And certainly you did mention something about ego.

And I would, I believe ego is.

I have a friend, Ryan Holiday, who wrote a book, Ego is the Enemy. I think it's being one of the biggest underminers of success. And I think all three of us could probably even speak to our own egos when it has served us, when it's in check and where it's actually allowed us to make a ton of shitty decisions. And when it comes to the world of famous people. And you certainly have dealt with a lot more in the celebrity and entertainment world than me, but one of my passion projects is artists for Addicts because. Because many artists are riddled with addiction. And so it's one of the platforms that I'm building right now where we're selling art to help fund education, change the global conversation about how people view addicts instead of as being moral degenerates, but as people that are in pain, that are using drugs, alcohol, behaviors, coping mechanisms. And I have come across.

A lot.

Of famous people, and I have a few of them that are friends of mine. And not only in the business world, but in Recovery Centers, in 12 step groups, high profile groups that they go and just share everything. And I have seen how fame could be enormously destructive to people, and at the same time, the world admires it. And they admire people that they don't really always know what the hell. Well, they hardly ever know what is going on behind the curtain. And I run across a lot of people that would rather be well known than well paid. Just because you have a ton of Instagram followers or Facebook followers or Snapchat or whatever does not always translate into you having a business. You could have a giant following and no revenue. And again, many people would rather be they would be well known than well paid. Jay, with his knowledge of conversion and his knowledge of deep relationship building and value creation. And there's a lot to be said about it. So my question to both of you is, I have always learned early on, like when I was young in business, don't believe your own pr, good or bad. When I say believe it, I mean you should pay attention to it, but don't get caught up into it. If someone thinks you're the greatest thing in the world, don't convince yourself you're the greatest thing in the world. That's what I mean by it. What words of advice would you have for people of keeping your ego in check and what matters most, what is really important? Because I've seen so many people become arrogant, become assholes, become promiscuous with their spending and with all other areas of life and just not really thinking through. And I think both of you probably have a lot of insight and probably some good advice for people on that subject.

So I got started at 18. Many people know that, and I'm older now. I've had three midlife crises and they've all been predicated by the same thing. And I'm gonna tell you a funny element about it and a sad element about it and a profoundly revelatory element about it. So, you know, every time I was very, very successful, I kept waiting for the heavens to open the sky to, you know, to, you know, send majestic, blinding light, the angels to. And for euphoria to happen in my life. And nothing happened. Except. Except I realized I had a larger set of disappointments, of frustration. I went to bunches of therapists, and most of them frustrated the crap out of me because it'd be 55 minutes, you'd be getting into something really cool, and they go, yeah, see you next week. It was like a cliffhanger. So I decided I was tired of having these. So the last time I retained somebody for a whole week, I said goodbye for a week. And if I don't come, I'm going to send somebody who's effed up. And it was hilarious because I would just send all my screwy friends. But this one person gave me a context that changed my life. And now I'm going to give you observations about other people and a context that can help you keep your ego in check. So what this person told me was quite profound. He said, most people are obsessed with the end product. They want to be the most popular. They want to have the biggest, fastest growing company.

They.

They want to have the hottest wife or the hottest wife and the hottest 18 girlfriends. They want the biggest car collection. They want, you know, the media. And when they're unlucky enough to get it for that reason, it's anticlimactic. And he said, the process is really all there is. This conversation is wonderful that you and I and Damon and I'm learning from listening. Damon and you is wonderful. But if we were having a conversation with the damn janitor or I don't mean the damn janitor, or it would be just as relevant. Now, that's one point. The second point is I've been blessed because I've not only worked with some profound people, but I've been impacted, mentored, taken to task, because I was much more egotistical when I was younger. And one gave me a context of reference that has changed my life. He said, your job in life is to first and foremost examine, understand, appreciate, respect, acknowledge, and grasp what it's like to be in the life, in the mind of the other side, whatever the other side is. And you have to realize that in mass dissemination. We learned this in direct response. We learned this in magazine advertising, and I think Damon would agree it's the same thing in any kind of a social or digital media. You can have a million, 10 million people, but you're communicating to one human being at a time. And when you keep that in check and you realize that our life is denominated by three things. The problems we solve for others, the opportunities we make possible. And opportunities have a very broad font. They can be entertainment, enjoyment, liberation, commiseration, empathy. But I look at it with more humility and humanity. But I must acknowledge that I was an arrogant, pompous, very, very self consumed person earlier in my life. And I think that the most wonderful thing that happens to somebody is a reversal that doesn't absolutely destroy you but gives you a reality check so you realize how irrelevant we really are. And I'm just, I mean, I don't know if my answer is helpful or not.

No, I think it's very helpful and I think it also is relatable. It's harder to hear when people are in the, you know, when ego is running the show. I mean, I'm a guy that goes back and forth to, you know, I'll read, you know, Eckhart Tolle stuff to, you know, let's do strategy and building businesses and stuff. And I hang around egomaniacs all day long. And I also simultaneously meditate daily and do float pods and do addiction recovery work. And I've done more therapy and looking at myself than most people that I know. And I constantly think about the Socrates quote of the unexamined life is not worth living. But I also believe that the unlived life is not worth examining. So part of it is how do you live a great life and how do you do it in lots of ways and how do you not let your ego become your enemy? I mean, some people pursue, you know, let's not have it, you know, don't. No ego, no ego. And it's like, you know, that's actually if you're going to go out and say things that are contrarian, if you're going to build a successful business, if you're certainly going to write books and go out to the world and put yourself on tv. I mean, there are ways to harness. It's important to have a healthy ego. And you know, most of the time it's not healthy. So it's always great. You know, I don't know the answers. I just like hearing other people's perspectives.

Joe, can I interrupt with a very profound insight that I think that I have learned that I think is really interesting. And I'm not trying to be rude and disrespectful. I'm trying to make a point of profound insight that I forgot to make. And I think it's very appropriate. What I found in all the different and as I said, I only do question answers, problem solving. I don't do any general theoretical shtick. What you find is different people have totally different definitions to same word, the same scenario. For example, ego. You could ask somebody, are you egotistical? And their definition would be fascinating. Well, particularly if you ask a sociopath. But I think it's very important. One of the things I try to do when I'm working with anyone is say, okay, stop, stop. You're using phrases. And I need to know what. Because everybody's got a different life, different experiences, and literally different mental and verbal definitions in their mind. That's driving whatever that machine is of words and no. 2. I mean, it was funny. We used to do seminars where I would purposely come in late. Well, I was never very punctual, but I would come in later than normal and I'd say, oh, gee, I'm so apologetic. I was in the corridor and I saw the most stunning woman I have ever seen in my life. And I would just stop and do something else. Then I'd come back and I'd go around the room random and said, okay, what vision came to your mind when I said that? And it would be hilarious because certain guys who were conservative would talk about, you know, just abstract. Certain guys who were a little more lascivious would talk about very embarrassing elements of anatomy and physiology. Certain people liked a European curvature. Dark haired, certain, like tall lit or whatever the word is. Blonde women were very much more conservative. But you have to realize that no two people are even having the same definition. It's a very interesting distinction, and I apologize for interrupting, but it is a very important distinction.

My whole point about bringing it up is, you know, based on some of the things that Damon was saying, you know, I have seen when people are hungry. Well, here's. I would say it this way. I did this interview with Dan Kennedy a couple years ago on I Love Marketing, my marketing podcast. And one of the things that we talked about is when you first start out, you get paid for what you do. Like, you have to go out and do something useful. You have to have a product or a service, a skill that people want. You have to not only be able to persuade, to demonstrate, to deliver it, you get paid for what you do. And if you do a really good job of what you do or for some luck or whatever, you're on the right tide. You become who you become famous. And then when you become famous, you get paid for who you are. Like, for instance, I think I've interviewed Richard Brett Branson probably more than anyone. I mean, I've got hours and hours of footage at Necker island from, you know, six week long trips there that I've done in the, in the past and that sort of stuff. And Richard Branson doesn't need to say anything all that intelligent. He just needs to show up and be Richard Branson. Because he gets paid for being Richard Branson. He gets paid for who he is. And so a lot of people spend time wedding and then if they do a good job, they get to spend time for hooing. Like, you know, both you and David are, who's, you know, you're out there, you know, you, you know, people want.

To know who you are because you.

Have, you have a track record.

What I have seen with a lot.

Of people that, you know, in the way that I understand ego, that don't keep their ego in check is they think they're so freaking cool. They think they're such badasses and they, they don't work as hard, they lose the hunger and worse, they start becoming mean. They're just not really, they're not very nice. Now maybe, you know, like, I have a company, Piranha Marketing, and I remember a conversation I had with Glenn Morshauer and let me tell you guys this because I thought it's really quite fascinating. And we had about a four hour lunch. And Glenn is an actor who's been on every episode of 24. He's been on more military roles than any actor alive currently, as far as I know. And most people don't really. They hear the name, they're like, who is that? But then when they see him, they're like, oh, I saw him in Transformers. I saw him on, you know, these movies. And we're having this conversation. It was years ago and it was right during the time where Kiefer Sutherland was on the COVID of National Enquirer, I think People magazine, where he was drunk in front of the Viper Room in LA and he had been outed. And I was talking with Glenn and I was like, you know, talking about celebrities. And he said, you know, he goes, a single piranha will not do much damage, but a swarm of them will take down a great creature. And he goes, kiefer is one of these people where his fame is globally inescapable. There is no place he can go in the world and not be recognized. And that puts an enormous amount of on people. And he said this great statement. He goes, if you get into the entertainment business, actor, you know, musician, any sort of thing. He said, if you get into this business without knowing who you are, it will misinform you. And I was like, wow, that is, that is an interesting way to look at it. And what happens is if people don't surround themselves with mentors, if they don't surround themselves with people that are not ass kissers, there is a potential that they're going to, you know, they're going to start believing everything that is written about them. Everyone would always say, before social media, the media is bullshit. The media is. And then you have social media. So what does that mean? Like social media is true. I mean, Facebook could very much be called fake book. I mean, people present what it is. They want things to be said in a certain way. And look, I have no issues with any of that. I think it's great. Instill conversations, share knowledge. I mean, there's so much that is beautiful about our ability to communicate more effectively. This is really more about an internal question of at the end of the day, we're all talking about building businesses, growing business, reaching our aspirations. It says, how do you do it to where you don't lose yourself? How do you do it where you actually stay relevant? You know, and so that's really what I'm really asking you guys about. And it's just fascinating to hear your answers.

Well, let me, let me, you know, I think that, you know, a good thing about coming to the Genius network is that, and in regards to this is that I think that I can relate to a lot of the individuals there because they're business owners and operators. Now I have been a business owner and operator for, for many years. I've had many businesses that have failed, you know, and then, then I've had, you know, the FUBU and a couple that have succeeded. And even during that time of having FUBU and a couple of succeeded, I've had another 20 that have failed within, you know, in between that time. And you know, I heard a great saying the other day with somebody said, you know, everybody, we all compare our blooper reel to everybody's sizzle reel, right? You know, because everybody, how many things go wrong with me and look how everybody else is doing so great. And that's, that's really much your analogy of Facebook. But I've always been the person like everybody else who's going to be there those two days. I've been that person who's been in back of the camera. I've had to deal with talent, I've had to deal with managers in whatever level Whether it's talent being your, your CMO or whether it's talent being, you know, somebody you need to hire to come and do a speaking engagement or somebody you need to take a picture of and, and, or advertising and put it out there. And I've always disliked dealing with talent unless the talent was a business person. But now I happen to be talent and a business person. And it is a really weird world because if you do not know who you are, you'll get lost. But if you really look at it, if we only talk about whether it's an athlete or whether it's an actor or somebody else like that. Well, maybe not athletes because they perform on a certain level, level, everything. Everybody who sings, they have the same three and a half minute song. It's really the machine that's behind them that puts them out. Because we all know, we all know somebody who sings great in the church, but they can't get arrested in the studio, right? You know, everybody who's on a reality show or an actor, it's the same hour and a half that you're on the movie. It's all about the, you know, as we all operators of the Genius network know, it's about the back office. It's about the advertising, marketing, production, distribution, financing, you know, whatever it may have been. So when you look at an actor or an actress, they purely, their ego is purely set upon if somebody else loves me, you know, because then I get to sing another song, then I get to do another movie. Unlike us, who we have to quantify no matter what, at the end of the day or the end of the month, we have to look at. Did we do more sales or did we decrease costs? There is no other way to go around operating a business. You sell more or you decrease cost.

And that's it, right?

There's going to be a profit or a loss. And I think that we have a little bit more of reasons why we could put our ego in check. My ego happens to be as much in check as I can make it because when I started getting to a certain level and I started to have multiple companies, I reached out to Jay Abraham. This is, I think this before Shark Tank, I, I reached out to Jay Abraham because I knew that my. I know that life is a series of mentors, and I knew that my current mentors were okay, but there was nobody out there who I think could take me to the next level of where I was going. As I said, when I moved my 80 to 20 and 20 to 80, I knew that I was going into a world and I was trying to share my marketing ideas and initially I was going to be put in a box with, well, you just make baggy jeans for the people who like rap music, right? So. And I knew that I had the DNA and the fundamentals of business. But now how was I going to take this on a global level and how was I going to create this blueprint to get it out to everybody else to show that no, I understand, you know, every aspect about business and marketing. So, so I need to go to somebody who's already done it before. So I reached out to Jay and we create an amazing friendship and he's been an amazing mentor. But that put my ego in check because if you're talking to people who've been there and done that, they have no problem telling you when you are out of place. But I still, on the, on the flip side, I still have tried to surround myself with people know me 20, 30 years and I often do that when I go and I look at other companies and other people and I see that, that have a heavy turnover of staff. None of these people have known this person maybe, you know, more than five years be set besides the one secretary or the right hand man who don't know for 20, 30 years because that's the only person that will take their shit. So you really, it's really about all the people that you surround yourself with. And the end of the day, as you said, you have to analyze the business. And a lot of these people at the Genius Network have to just look at how their businesses have gone and how they are, you know, going forward and, and you know, what's their turnover and then do they have good mentors in their lives and what are their true goals? A lot of people have egos unfortunately because of different reasons. Their father may have locked them in the closet for 20, 30 years and said, you know, you're never going to be anybody unless you can sing and dance and make everybody laugh when you come into the room or unless you wear a shortcut blouse or something like that. So sometimes it's not really, you know, just the business aspect, it's something way, way deeper. So, you know, hopefully that gives you some insight from, from the business aspect all the way to the show business aspect.

And it's very nice and flattering. Thank you Damon for that. But I've been around Damon in a multitude of scenarios and he is very well recognized and he has humility, he has humanity, he has respect and he has engagement of people and he treats people with enormous dignity, even if they are inappropriate when they bother him in an environment, dinner or something else. And I think that one of the things that's very important is you have to try to appreciate and fall in love with the people who are either your market or who are respectful of you, even if they're not exactly respectful of you, you for the reasons that you would hope, because they just don't know any better. But he's really wonderful, very humble. And I'm not saying that to pander or to mutually allot him, but he's enormously impressive and gracious and he extends himself. And I've been with a lot of, I mean, I don't name drop, but I've been with a lot of people who are very, very much the opposite. And just so you know, I think he respects. And this is one of the things when you have achieved a level of prominence, really, if you think about it, there's a corresponding responsibility if you really want to exercise your privilege to enrich people's lives. And you could do it in a moment just by acknowledgement, shaking a hand with the right way, eye contact. But most people don't really recognize that. I don't mean to interrupt, but it's important for me to make that observation. He's very gracious, he's very humble, and his ego is truly in check.

Well, you know, that's interesting you say that because that's not been my experience. I've hung out with Damon a couple of times and he's just really arrogant and he won't sign autographs.

Joe, let me ask you something. You know, as. As we talk about this and forget even about all of us from a personal standpoint, you know, every, every single member who's going to come there, you know, and we're going to meet the conference, they all have, they all have the same problem on various different levels. You know, every one of them are business owners. So every one of them has to hear every single reason why their employees life is tough. And every. And they all. And they all have the same problem. Everybody think they walk on water. All the people they pay or people that them from outside do they realize that the ego also communicates within their communication to their customers. I've seen that in business owners where they have an ego that their product is the best. And at the end of the day, it's all about what's in the best interest of your customer, what can we do for them. And I've seen that in communication, you Know, I've seen people say, well, we have the best product and you need to come to us because of this instead of, this is how it's enhancing your life, Your life, your life. So, you know, for somebody to have some takeaways from our ego conversation when they look at their communication, how does their communication go out to the market and how do they take their ego out of the communication and enhance the ego of the person buying.

That is great insight because I mean, it, it culturally affects everything with, with, you know, how you come off and how you represent yourself and how you think about things. And simply, I mean, I think some of the greatest business owners, and when I, you know, the way that I would, you know, look at successful business owners, certainly, certainly financially, in order to have a capitalistic endeavor, it's got to be profitable. Solving problems for a profit is kind of what we do. Beyond that, it's reputation, it's value creation. It's doing what you say you're going to do, delivering upon it, not actually giving a shit about what you do. And you guys have seen this for many years. The beauty of, of this is we've been at this game for a long time. I mean, I have had my marketing company since 1994. I've had my own business since 1990. I've been doing it for a while. And I see hot shots that'll come along and they'll make a boatload of money and they'll get really well known, and two or three years later, they're gone. They lost it all. And I'm more impressed with longevity and I'm more impressed with people that, you.

Know, they don't really let it go to their head.

And like you said also, though, Damon, I mean, if you look at any human being's life, when I am thinking from my higher self, and I always don't, you know, I mean, there's many times where I'm just not there. Every human being, I believe, is doing the best they can with where they're at. And you know, their level of consciousness is based on their upbringing, their traumas, their exposure. When you have a lot of people that are egos, either, you know, the hardest shells hide the tender meet. I mean, there's all that sort of stuff. So part of it is having an outside perspective. Sounding boards are so important, especially if you grow the ladder. Having people that are really great sounding boards and surrounding yourself with someone like that and not being too cool for school. And that's what's so great about Genius Network. I Mean, I have great presenters, I have great people, I have great knowledge. And at the end of the day, I want people to come to Genius Network and meet other amazing people and have great conversations and I want them to help grow their aspirations, but I also want to help them reduce suffering in their life. It's hard to sell that though. It's hard to say, you know what, come to Genius Network because we're going to reduce some suffering. It just doesn't sound as sexy as add another million dollars in revenue to your business or have better clients. But I'll tell you, that's what I want. And that's the number one thing people hear. They like it. When I talk about, when I talk about addiction. Every meeting people come up to me. Some people probably don't want to hear anything about me talking about, quote, unquote addiction. People come up to me and say, thank you for that. I mean, it literally makes me feel safe. It allows me to understand I'm not the only one that's going through this or living this double life. And I want help. And that makes me more happy than someone giving me some testimony about how they've made millions of dollars. And I have a lot of that, as do both of you. So let me say this because I could talk about this sort of stuff all day long, but I want to make sure we set the stage for everyone coming to this. And I want to mention your book, which we sent out to everybody and many people have received it in the past when we sent out a copy to.

And I definitely appreciate the support. I mean, they've been extremely supportive. Thank you.

Absolutely. Yeah. Your latest book is the Power of Broke and it showcases 15 self made entrepreneurs and Jay Abraham is actually one of those 15 entrepreneurs. So if you could real quickly, for people who haven't read it, what's the book about, why did you write it and what are a few of the powerful strategies that are in it? And then I'll ask you, Jay, about, you know, anything you want to say about your section in the book is about. So yeah. Why did you write it? What are some of the strategies and what's, what's, what's the purpose of the book?

So. Absolutely so. And I'll definitely let you know because Jay's portion of the book is something I love to share with people, but because he here I can talk about the rest of it. So the reason I wrote the Power Broke is because, you know, after, you know, seven years on Shark Tank, I get, you know, the same, you know, Common questions. And I meet two type of entrepreneurs, and I meet two type of millennials. I meet the entrepreneur that says, you know what, If I get a deal with the Sharks, all my problems are going to go away because they have all the answers to every single thing in the world, and then all this money is going to help me scale. And I always say, if I had all the answers to every single thing in the world, then FUBU would be called Ralph Lauren or be called Nike. But it's not. It's fubu. Right? And, you know, then I have the other type of entrepreneurs that come up and say, you know, the sharks are a stepping stone in my life. And whether I get a deal or I do not get a deal, it doesn't matter that I'm going to still proceed. And I'm going to be. I'm going to go out and find strategic partners, and I'm going to go and leverage my assets, and I'm going to use what I know how to do best. And those people don't use anything. And those people don't have any resources. They don't take in capital too soon. And I love hearing the story about a kid that I met in a, in a, in a hotel where I came downstairs and, you know, I was talking to him, he wanted me to help him become a rapper. And I said, I can't really do that. I make T shirts for a living. And I go outside to the valet and I go get my car, and his car comes around. His car is more expensive than mine, mind. So I look at the kid and I say, you know, you look like you're really doing well as a rapper. He says, no, I'm a, I'm a fine painter. I paint them. But I have a hundred thousand people that follow me on Instagram, and every single Monday, I paint a white shirt on Instagram. I, you know, I time lapse it and I tell people, you can only get this shirt for the next 24 hours is $50. You buy one, you buy 50, you buy 100. It doesn't matter how many you buy, but you're only going to see it for the next 24 hours. It's only available for the next 24 hours. Hours. Everybody that likes the shirt, they prepay for the shirt. He takes their money over to the screen printer on Tuesday, and then he copies the amount of screens that are needed and he sells them. He mailed them out on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, he does it all over again every single Monday. Now, I asked the kid how much did he do in businesses here? And he, he did about $1.2 million out of his living room. Now, this is not new to many people who are going to be there, and this is by far not new to you or Jay because there's nothing that we're going to create new in this world. Again, it's just a, a delivery. Because what is he doing? He's converting half of 1% of his customers every single week. It's nothing that you guys haven't been doing for the last 20, 30, 40, 50 years. But what he's doing is in a new sense because he doesn't have inventory. And think about it. When I would sell a shirt to Macy's, I make the shirt for 10. I sell it to the Macy's for 20, they sell it for 40. If they don't sell enough, they then reduce the cost of it. I have to guarantee the margin and give them the rest of the money. And then I have to take the shirts back and sell to Burlington. And you find it in a bucket with a bunch of sneakers for $3 in Burlington Coat Factory. This kid is making it at 10. He's selling it directly at full margin to his customer at 40. He knows his customer size because they've been buying it for quite some time. So he gets a low percentage of returns. He upsells his customer. He knows who's buying it or why they didn't buy it. When a person bought my shirt in Macy's, did they buy it for their sister? They buy for their husband? Was it for themselves? Why did they not buy. Did the kid ever take it out of the back, out of the, out of the, out of the, out of the closet and put it on the rack? Did he put it next to some matching colored sneakers? So what I realized is this kid out of his home had zero. He used his talent on Instagram and Twitter and whatever the, whatever the outlet is to do that with zero. And I saw, I interviewed people such as him all the way up to Kevin Plank, who has Under Armour, who, who, you know, didn't have enough money to cross a toll to pay for. To pay to go over a toll. When he was starting Under Armour, so he got a ticket and now he's doing, you know, $5 billion in revenue annually. And I, and I showed a lot of examples, even social media kids and even famed dj. Now Steve Aoki is the guy. Steve Ioki's dad created Benihana. So the, so having money was actually against him because when he moved over to New York. And he was this Japanese kid who is. And who, for those who do not know, Steve Aoki, he has a something, a movie. I called out, I'll sleep when I die. He's the most touring, is DJ. He does 300 dates a year everywhere from India to Taipei, all the way to New York and la. When he went to New York to perform, they said, get out of here. You know, when he was downtown, they said, get out of here, you little rich kid. You can't. You can, you can't perform down here. So money work against him. When he went to his father to, you know, to tell him he's gonna play music, his father said, I'm a World War II veteran. I work very hard. If you're not picking up a brick or building something, okay, you're not worth anything. Get out of here. So he was not accepted and money worked against him. But he ended up, you know, creating this culture around him and utilizing the power of broke by going onto those streets and creating these little events and parties where he had no money because his father wouldn't give him money and the cool kids wouldn't accept him. So to sum it up, the power broke is how you tap into any and all resources that you, that you have available from you. And I try to put myself in the book as well, because I didn't have any resources when I was growing up. I. I'm dyslexic. I got left back. My parents got divorced, I never went to college. I didn't know anybody with any money. You know, I don't have a famous last name. Well, I do have a famous last name, but if I call Elton John and tell him I'm his son, you know, he probably wouldn't believe me for various different reasons.

So I think it's because I'm black, right? But.

It'S kind of.

Yeah, it's hard to say.

But. And that's the theory of how it broke. And I, and I interviewed Jay and 14 other really amazing people from all walks of life because somebody said, well, it works if you over here, or it doesn't work in this industry. I wanted to keep hammering it home. And generational wealth, as we all know, disappears two generations afterwards. And, you know, we've all seen it. A lot of winners and athletes, they say over 65% of them are bankrupt three years either after winning the lottery or after getting of the league. So that means that the tool of money sometimes they have not learned to master. And. And that's why I came up with the Power Broke. Yeah, yeah.

And I will say, before Jay says something, is that even the title, the Power of Broke? If you just want to, you know, people say, well, yeah, it's a good title. And, you know, want to obviously sell books and all that. And it's like, yeah, of course. I mean, anyone that writes a book, what you want to obviously put it in the hands of people, especially if it's, you know, useful and can change their lives with this book can't.

It's.

The fact is there is a. It's a mindset. I mean, like what you actually teach in the book is that, you know, even if someone is super successful and runs a multimillion dollar company, there is so much value in this book, if nothing more than just a reminder of what probably helped you, you know, get there in the first place. But seeing all of these different individuals and how they did it and their strategies is definitely something anyone at any stage in business, business could benefit from.

I mean, you even look at what I said earlier where, how I said I give money in tranches. When I first gave money and 200, 400, 500, I wasn't activating the Power Broke. And ever since I started to, you know, give money in tranches, my portfolio have doubled in regards to profits because I either cut my losses at an early stage or had a way to, you know, really cut the downside, or I infused the capital for the right reasons and made the entrepreneur work harder. So it just really, really was. I was giving away. I'm giving away or I'm not giving, but I'm investing the same amount of money. But it's the mind frame of how I'm putting the money in that creates the discipline, and the discipline creates the revenue, and the revenue creates the profit.

Yeah.

Love it.

Love it.

Awesome. Thank you. Jay, you want to talk about your section of the book?

I will do I want to know, but I will. But before I got to make a little intervention and make a point that's quite profound. What I love about Damon's book and he interviewed me and I really wasn't prepared that he would actually include it in the book. So I was very flattered, but that's not what I want to talk about. First, what's wonderful about this book and why I am such a strong advocate is it's not just stories. There are masterful and pretty deep, penetrating, illustrative, and highly dimensionalized case studies. But Damon did something quite wonderful at the end of a chapter or of a tranche because they're different aggregations. He clearly and specifically explains what the lesson is there. It's not like you have to figure out what are they really saying. He goes into the very, very specific benefit of saying, here's what you should have gotten from that strategy. Then at the end he goes through and reviews all the strategies and helps someone reading it figure out which one or ones are most appropriate, what to do first and second. And that's what makes the book so powerful. Now, as far as I'm. I was humbled, I was flattered, I think. And it's still going to say it like three minutes. I think what Damon might find interesting about me is that I've had to learn in my life three things. One, how to make everything everybody does, everyone who does it, the markets they do it to, the resources they use perform many times better for no extra cost, time people. And that's probably a pretty, pretty unique skill set. Secondly, in the earlier stages of my life, I had two different parallel universes. One, nobody gave me a salary job. I had to basically sort of, I hate the word eat what you kill, but you only eat if you earn and you figure out what works and what doesn't and what works infinitely better and you become very inculcated into what I'll call call optimization. Then most of the people I helped didn't have resources and I had to be outrageously resourceful. And like ICI, we got them $25 million worth of marketing for nothing. And I've done a multitude of things and I think lastly is that I have seen many, many, many, many, many higher performing options, opportunities, approaches. And most people don't know that. And somewhere in that seemingly convoluted ball of string, I think Damon saw something that he liked and I was flattered that he focused on it. So that's probably it.

No, that's great. Let me mention something. What's at least on my mind, based on what both of you have said, what I love about Damon's book is it also reminds me of the driver that helped me when I was a deadboat carpet cleaner living off credit cards. You know, I mean, when people ask me, so what's your story? I'm like, well, you know, how did you get into marketing?

It's like it was accidental.

I never thought I would teach people this. I never thought I'd write, you know, my new book. We're actually going to be handing out the first copy of my new marketing book at this annual event. And you know, the funny thing is that I never thought I would do what I do for a living today. Genius Network, Piranha Marketing, my marketing podcast, all the stuff, it's all.

It's all accidental.

And it all came out of the Power of Broke. I mean, that sort of mindset, because when I was living off credit cards.

I didn't want to go work for.

Anyone, but damn it, I didn't know what it is. I studied marketing because I needed to eat, I needed to survive. And one of the things that I have always admired about myself and I look for in other people is resourcefulness. Like you mentioned, Jay, which the book the Power of Broken is many examples of resourcefulness and simply no entitlement. I never had an entitlement attitude where someone just should give me something just because I want it. I mean, anything that came to me, I had to go out and create value first in order to do that. And my dear friend Dan Sullivan has really helped reinforce that, that sort of mindset. And given the choice of eating or starving, most people won't starve unless they don't have any capabilities. So it's one thing with the Power Broke teaching people, in showing people examples about others do it, but in instilling strategy. So it's not just, oh, you know, when you're. When you're in this state, it's going to evoke things in you that probably will not come out. I mean, just like you're saying, Damon, if you just give someone $500,000 up front, you know, it's like the value of any service you provide diminishes rapidly once it's provided. And so having people have to. It is critical. And you went through a stage of learning that, and you financed it with your own money, not money that you were blessed with. It was. I mean, in order for you to be a shark, you had to freaking go through so much shit in order to actually learn how to make a business work and go through the ropes and all of that stuff. And that in and of itself is totally admirable. And people that are out there trying to bumble their way through life and figure out, how do I do this when they can pick up a book that has your life experience in it that will only cost them like a tiny amount of money and a few hours could literally save them not only decades of their life. It can make the difference between succeeding or not. And that's why I take this sort of stuff so seriously. This is much different than reading a coloring book. I mean, there's different things that different books will do for You. So I guess you don't really read coloring books. That was like a stupid analogy.

Yes.

I'm sorry. I hate to be. Well, I probably don't hate to be.

But no, you don't act polite.

Say whatever you want to say. So there's a point I have to make and I've read, endorsed, written a lot of books. So what I think is very important. I did one time, I did a 10 minute talk for you. Very difficult for me because I can't do 10 minutes. But the topic was on thinking differently because you can't achieve the greatness you want, certainly for yourself, but for others, which is the only way you're going to get it for yourself without approaching it differently than everybody else. And I think what is very profound about this book, irrespective of whether you are broke, irrespective of whether you're rolling in prosperity, is it gives you 15 distinctive ways about yourself, your business, business, your market, things you can do and add that can add exponential impact. I think that book is universal and I want to make that point because I've been a very staunch advocate of that book and I would be even if I wasn't included in it. But it's certainly flattering to me. But I think that book gives creative seeds of realization to anybody, whether they are an entrepreneur, whether they are a manager, whether they are a young adult getting started. I just think it's got so much very, very straightforward, dimensionally evident and very clearly expressed instruction on thinking differently. And I'm anything I want to be known for in my life, it's teaching people to think differently. So that's all I want to say. Perfect. Love it.

So here's what I'd like to do. I'll just ask you guys a couple more questions in order to set the stage for all of the Genius Network members that are going to be coming to this, to this half day event that we'll be doing on October 5th. And for people that cannot make it for Genius Network members, I will get you a recording of this session that we're going to do because I know it's going to be awesome. So the people that are attending, I want to make sure that they are come into this prepared so that again is a juice worth a squeeze for all of us. And I really want to say this based on everything we just talked about with Damon's book. There are many people in Genius Network write books and certainly most people that I know that especially are coming to meet, learn, build, grow their businesses, probably have More books than they could ever consume. And you know, it's. And I did this great interview with one of our Genius Network members. Mike Aguilera is very hard to pronounce his last name. And he said, you know, yeah, great guy.

And exactly. He donated.

He contributed $15,000 to Joe volunteer.com and me and you. Jay did a day of consulting with him, which was so nice on your part to do that. And I so appreciate that. That and what he said is like, if you have so much information, so many books, you just simply need to ask yourself the question, what needs solved right now? It's just a great process of, you know, when you're consuming everything and you just like, should I read this book? Should I go to this seminar? Should I talk to this person? Ask yourself what needs solved right now? And go in and read and learn what needs solved right now. So I want people to come into this event with Jay and Damon thinking, what do I need solved? Because I can guarantee they can help direct you in that way. This book, the Power of Broke. If you're someone that has a big following in a large list. Genius Network members have helped make other members books New York Times bestsellers. We did it with Arianna Huffington. We did it with Peter Diamandis. Very instrumental with Tony Robbins. I mean, guys like Robin Sharma, who's one of our Genius Network members and has sold millions of books. And he is fantastic. I mean, there's a lot of people in the group that have the ability to share this message. So if you're someone where you think what you've already heard from Damon and what you'll hear at the event that you'd like to mail his book to a lot of your clients, I would love that. And by the way, this is not an affiliate pitch. Damon's not paying me. It's none of that. We just want to share this information with people and vice versa. So if anyone would like to do that, talk to. Talk to Jay and Damon at the event. All right, so having said that, since we're going to do a half day session, a bonus session on October 5th at the the event with both of you, Jay and Damon, let me ask you both or start with you, Jay, and these could be short answers. What will you be sharing or what is the best way for members to prepare to get the most out of it? I gave my perspective. I'd like to hear you.

What I would prefer them to do is get clarity on what the real issues are, that we have a belief that everybody is stuck in their business and they don't even know it and you can be successfully stuck. That document, I think is worth reading, whether they answer it or not. I think the key, I mean, I'm most valuable when you pose to me me a clarified question that doesn't require me to do excavation, to try to get context. If you can pose to me a very specific question that is high impact, it's a waste. And this is not arrogant, it's a waste to ask me a little tactical question. It's very valuable to ask me a big strategy or marketing or revenue or model question if you can pose it very clearly so I don't have to spend 10 minutes trying to figure out what the heck you're saying and what the implication is. So I try to get people because I'm not as gentle as other people. I want to know what's the business, what's the problem, how you're doing it, who you're doing to, how it's performing, what you're trying to do. And I want you to be clear enough because if you don't know the questions you're trying to solve, you can't solve them. So bring me great questions at a high enough level of impact that we could make profound difference. And I will be thrilled to do everything in my power to clearly address them, not just abstractly, but complete with enormous context of what to do, why to do, and give you a reference scenario of how someone else did it. So it'll be very clear to you and it'll be believable. That's about as clear as I can be.

That's not only great advice for this day session, but just for the event in general and honestly in all areas of life. So I love it. David, anything you want to share?

Yeah, I mean, I think I can echo what Jay is saying, but also, you know, the beautiful part about being at the event is, you know, there are going to be some people there that are just, you know, really, really high level marketers. And so I like having really open discussions so they're gonna be certain who, if you need to know from me, you know, where, where our markets going that I see or trends and, or very specific things on vetting and some kind of financial products or strategies and going into two things like I can, I can obviously give people that and because I, because I see probably a year, I probably see over, obviously I probably pitched over 1500 times a year, you know, real pitches where I go into the companies and dive deep into them so I can give People answers on that, but more if it's not an area, expertise. The beautiful thing about, you know, attending your event is I end up learning just as much as I hopefully I can share with others. So I'm open for very fluid conversations, too, just not anything general. You know, when people just go and say, hey, what do you think about my business here in general? I mean, I like Jay saying, I can't answer that. It's going to take me, you know, an hour and a half to get to the information that I need to even give you some kind of educated, you know, answer. So they have to either be very, very specific or if it's an area that is not in my category and that we maybe will learn together and we'll have, like, a session like you and Jay and I are having right now.

Awesome.

Awesome.

Love it. Okay, so let me ask you the final question, because there's a lot more things I could ask you, but I also want to. To be respectable of everyone's time. So what questions didn't I ask that I should have asked you?

Both.

And if you do have one, what would your answer have been?

One of the hardest questions always are, what keeps you up at night? Probably, I think that every entrepreneur has a different answer and the same. I may leave most of it for the day that we're there, but, you know, what keeps us up at night is how to progress in the business. But also. So sometimes one of the biggest things that I realize that we all are doing here is either selling or selling somebody time or trying to save time. That's the most valuable asset that we all have. And I think the only thing that I can never answer because it always changes, is when people say, how do I separate business from personal time, you know, from health and from family, from faith all the way to business? How. How do we have that time and that balance? And I'm always looking for the answer. So that's one of the things that keep me up at night. How do you. How do you take yourself into. Where are you going 2020 and where are you going 2030? What is your projection? And how are you going to change as things are changing this fast, Sooner or later, whatever business you're doing in the form you're doing, it is going to be obsolete. So how are you going to move this? Whether you're sharing information where you're selling a service or you're sharing a product. Product. How are you going to move it into 2020 and 2030? And how are you going in and Being more on the offense than on defense. How are you going in your company and or your business every day and not just putting out fires, but using that percentage of time that you can use to create an offense. And those, those are probably the things that we haven't touched on, but I'm sure we could touch on that day.

Yeah, totally awesome. That's great.

Well, I think that. And by the way, I'm going to give you a plug because you know, I've been a great advocate, champion and admirer of what you've created. And what I like about it most is the humility and the collaborative unhedged observation I've seen that people make to one another for the betterment of each other. And that impresses just the begalies out of me. So the one thing I would like people to know, and you should have asked, but it's not out of critical, is what more than anything else do you want people to know about their business? And the answer is that there is virtually, and I know you have some masterful and huge marketers that are probably much wealthier and successful than I am.

But I'm going to tell you that.

This clinically and I have the background to be able to support it. Not just me, but all the different organizations I've helped who dealt in variability and performance enhancement. There is no business anywhere that doesn't have a multitude of elements, processes, distinctions, revenue, brand, market, marketing, elements that can't be made to perform better ethically. And the thing that I learned, and I think is so profound is if you can identify 20 elements of a business and they can each be increased a modest amount, although some could be increased a profound amount, the aggregate 10%. 10%. 10% is not 10% becomes 400%. And the profit dynamic is amazing and.

Just a lot more you can do.

With whatever you've got. That's all.

Yeah, just like your book, you know how to get the most out of everything you got. And I think that will definitely be happening at not only the Genius Network event, but our. But our half day event.

So your book is cool too.

Well, no, thank you. And I mean I now have. Yeah, everyone's. If anyone's going to be wondering how do I do marketing? How do we create A big premise of my book is what I call how to develop an ELF business. How to have a business that's easy, lucrative and fun versus hard, annoying, lame and frustrating or hard, annoying, lucrative and frustrating. And I also preface the book with saying anything that ever becomes elf is probably not going to be very easy in the beginning. I mean, you're probably going to have to go through some pain and you're going to have to figure things out like we all have. However, just having unnecessary pain that could be eliminated because of what you can learn or knowing what to drop. I mean, one of the, as you both know very well, one of the best ways to get what you want done is knowing how to eliminate everything that is preventing you from doing that. So people's not to do lists are more important than their damn to do list. So my marking book will be available there too. Because at the end of the day, I want people to come to this event and I want them to leave with not only great connections, great relationships, but a hell of a lot more capabilities. When you spend the half day with me pretty much hosting Damon and Jay, you're going to walk out of there with a hell of a lot of business capabilities, a lot of perspective. And I want it to not only be a game changer for everyone, I want Jay and Dave to really feel this was time well spent and that they enjoyed it and that it was impactful not only for you as someone attending Genius Network, but also for them. I want this to be a total win win for everybody. And then we all are happier. For people that are not coming to the event that are Genius Network members or there's a handful because of daughters or sons getting married, we have a couple of those or something that they cannot travel. We will get you a copy of the recordings of this half day session with Jay and Damon. And for people that would like to find further information out about both of you other than read Damon's book is a great place. Read one of Jay's book is a great place. If you guys want to give out any websites or anything where people can go deeper on what both of you are doing. What would be the best places to do that? Then we'll, we'll wrap up this great conversation.

Sure. You can find me on any of the social media platforms at the Shark Damon. The Shark Damon, my name is Felt like Damon, like Raymond with a d. And also I have daymondjohn.com perfect.

And UJ, you have abraham.com and anything.

Else if you want. If you want. We have a lot of very, I think, impressive and eclectic things and we just, we try to be benefactors. We don't even ask for opt ins. So they go to abraham.com. it's cool. But there's a separate dimension that's very provocative and it's abraham.com and then you do a slash the number 50 and shades and it's quite eclectic. But sure. And that's great. There's a lot of good stuff and you don't even have to give us an opt in. But Joe, thank you. You're a great interviewer.

Yes, absolutely.

Well, thank you both. And that also helps with having great people to actually interview. And you know what, we're going to touch on this one. I am looking down at my notes and I didn't ask you, Damon, about the President's Council. I'd like you to go deeper into that when we actually meet. But what are you doing there? We'll just give people a sneak peek and then you can kind of go into it because I think a lot of people would be like, wow, that'd be pretty cool. So what are you doing?

Sure.

I've been appointed by the President to become a page ambassador. That's Presidential ambassador for global entrepreneurship. And the reason why the President appointed myself as well as about 20 other individuals, Brian Chesky from Airbnb, Steve Case, Tory Burch and a couple out there is because he wanted to try to bring entrepreneurship into the White House so we can not be stuck by bureaucracy and things of that nature and bring private sector of entrepreneurs and the thought process that we have to the White House. And our job is three folds. One thing we domestically and abroad, our job is to go out and educate people and empower them on, on the fact that they can become entrepreneurs. Number two, we have to show people how to get access to capital. And you would think that, you know, like, like power broke people, you know, sometimes think capital is a million dollars, a hundred thousand dollars dollars and it's not, sometimes it's micro lending and you know, and in Egypt where somebody needs, you know, $70.

Right.

And number three is show people how to scale. The reason why the President wants this to happen and has been really a proponent behind it is because the reality is, is when somebody is in say Kenya and they need $20 a week to run the house and pay the bills and keep the lights on. If they don't have that money and a man or a woman can't feed their family, then there are a lot of people out there in the world who will prey upon this. The fact that they don't have hope and they'll tell them to go pick up a gun or carry a bomb or, or give them this vital information to something and it is, it is threatening, you know, our safety on a global scale. But when people do have just a couple of dollars and they know they can get the basics, the fundamentals to what they need to run their life, then they will not go out and do those things. So whether it's in Cancer, Kenya, Nairobi, or whether it's in Compton, you know, where somebody that might wear a color to do something, it's not in the best interest. And entrepreneurship is, of course, infectious, and it's very empowering. So I, I joined the president in Nairobi, and I also went with him to Cuba where this, you know, this, obviously this country that has been challenged for many, many years are now starting to understand the value of entrepreneurship. And Airbnb just opened up 4,000 host in Cuba, and Carnival Cruise Line just opened up the port in Cuba. And if you really think about it, Cubans only have probably about 5% of Cubans have access to the Internet. And now I think it's grown over to now 12%. So we're just, you know, that's our job as entrepreneurs. And it's really amazing if you would have never thought a little brown boy from Queens would be hanging out with the President of the United States, right? And, and, you know, and hopefully my other entrepreneurs listening to this. And, you know, we often are not celebrated for all the hard work we do, and we're so busy, you know, trying to solve problems, and we don't take some time, you know, to sit back and understand, you know, the power that we have when we, you know, when we just hire that one other person and they get to, you know, raise their family and do things of that nature. So it's really empowering and it's a celebration, I think, of all of us. If I can make it there and.

Work with the president and the White House, that's fantastic.

Love it.

Well, so that'll give everyone even more perspective of the.

From the.

From the vantage point that you have coming to you with, with Damon and Jay. So thank you both so much. I really appreciate it. And for all of our listeners, if you have any questions whatsoever, the. If you want more details about just the lineup, this is going out to people that are obviously already ready register for the event. Like I mentioned earlier, the main ballroom is completely sold out at the time that we're actually recording that. There's maybe 10 spots left in the Genius Lounge, which is where we live, cast it into there, then this event will be sold out and we will be completely turning people away like we did last year for $10,000 a person. So this is a very high level event and you're going to be surrounded by very smart entrepreneurs and this is a very special space session that we're doing with Jay and Damon. So the website is geniusnetworkevents.com if you want to get the latest lineup of everyone that you're going to be seeing and learning from. And if you have any questions about the event with Jay and Damon, then make sure you just ask any of my team. You can call my office. JoePolish.com has all of our contact info there and really look forward to seeing everyone there. So again, thank you.

Thank you Jay and thank you Damon.

Thank you.

Thank you guys.

Really fun.

Thanks for listening to this episode of I Love Marketing. If you'd like to learn more about the Genius Network annual event, go to geniusnetworkevents.com that's geniusnetworkevents dot com if you would like access to the full presentation, the show notes and the special resources for this episode, please visit ilovemarketing.com power that's ilovemarketing.com power.

SA.