Counselor Magazine September 2012 : Page 102ASI Chicago “To effectively brand yourself and your company, you have to do so much more than anybody else does that you dwarf them.” Tony Robbins It was that message that Robbins ham-mered home toward the end of a day of dancing, jumping, self-revelations and inspiration. “To effectively brand your-self and your company, you have to do so much more than anybody else does that you dwarf them,” Robbins said. “Every person in this room could do it. You have to outwork people to build your brand.” To enforce that, he told a story of a guy in Encino, CA, who was struggling to make it as a real estate agent. He was 21 years old and not offering anything special or different than other estab-lished agents in the area. In his first year of business, he didn’t sell a single home. Then he saw a game-changing oppor-tunity. There was a six-week-long trash strike in Encino, the trash was piling up on street corners, and owners of plush homes were getting antsy. This guy then hired a company to pick up all the trash – at great expense. “He couldn’t afford it, but he cared about the community and wanted to build his company,” Robbins said. He didn’t advertise the effort, but dumb-founded and happy homeowners began to find out that he was behind it. His phone started to ring off the hook, as locals offered to pay him back. He wouldn’t accept their payments, but he told them to think of him the next time they were looking to buy or sell a home. “In the next seven years, the guy made $2.8 million in commissions,” Robbins said. “There wasn’t a single home sold in Encino that didn’t go through him. What can you do that’s different and you can build around? What do you want to be known for? Why should clients do busi-ness with you versus anyone else? Go answer these questions now, and you’ll be successful.” For complete blog coverage of the whole Tony Robbins session from ASI Chi-cago, go to www.asicentral.com/blog. Mayor Daley Provides Success Blueprint During another keynote session at ASI Chicago, former Chicago Mayor Rich-ard Daley offered the audience a unique look at the inner operations of running a large U.S. city. “My number-one prior-ity as Mayor was education,” said Daley, who held the position from 1989 to 2011. “I always felt like the greatest gift I could give to any kid in Chicago was a good education.” Viewing himself as CEO of the city, Daley took a decidedly business-based approach to running Chicago for more than 20 years. “The residents of Chicago were my customers, and I always knew that to be successful we’d have to figure out what those customers wanted,” Daley said. He told the ASI Chicago audience that there were three things he focused on to ensure success in the city: having a vision for success in the face of economic uncer-tainty, offering an attractive product at a fair price and creating a business model that is sustainable for the long term. To succeed at all three factors, Daley said he initiated many efforts to find better and new ways to raise revenue. Creative partnerships with private busi-nesses were the key to this effort. “We knew we needed to partner with the busi-nesses of Chicago to find new revenue streams for the long term,” he said. “So, we now have private entities manag-ing parking in the city and many other projects that are overseen by private companies in conjunction with the city. It provides a new stream of revenue to the city that we didn’t have previously. That’s how companies need to operate today. You can’t just depend on your traditional revenue streams.” In a lively Q&A period following his speech, Daley also provided attendees with what he feels is the number-one way to define and achieve success in business and in life: passion. “You need to have a strong passion and commitment to over-come difficult challenges and take your business to another level,” Daley said. “If you lose that passion, you can’t succeed.” To see a video interview with former Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, go to www. CounselorMag.com. SEPTEMBER 2012 | COUNSELOR 102 Publication List Using a screen reader? Click Here |
