It Doesn't Take Money To Make Money | Brandon Leibel | TEDxSDSU

Raise your hand if you have heard the saying that it

take

s

money

to

make

money

, yes, so I thought I am here today to prove that in 2018 this saying is complete. I think not having the money to set up a business could potentially be the best thing for your business, it will

take

you places you've never been and force you to do things you never imagined. A lot of people think we're on Shark Tank raising money and getting a deal. Robert. Herjavec is the reason we were successful and that couldn't be further from the truth. The truth is that in the three years leading up to Shark Tank, that's what really made us successful, it's the things in those three years that money can't buy. determination and passion when I was a student at SDSU I thought the opposite I thought you needed money you needed a rich father rich mother rich grandfather to lend you money to start a business I didn't think there was any possible way to do without it I was about to graduate With $30,000 in student debt, how the hell do I start a business?

So I took the traditional route. I got a secure job at a big insurance company in San Diego, in a cubicle that stank after 11. For months, the millennial and I decided that this wasn't going to last and that it's not acceptable, so we met with my two best friends and co-founders, Stephen and Bruno, and we decided we had to get out of here and bring the world something they really need better beach towels. This was our billion dollar idea, so we left it the next day. We went out. We call our parents. We tell them what we did and they are very happy.

They are good for you. Better do it. I'm just kidding. They thought we were complete idiots and were very confused about how we are going to pay for this. They knew we were broke but we didn't care. We went out to celebrate. We were so high. life we ​​were very excited for the next chapter, but the next day reality hit us when we woke up and realized that our parents were probably right, we don't have money, how are we going to pay for this? But that's where the magic began instead. Focusing on this, the fact that we didn't have money, we took it as an opportunity to channel our inner creativity and ingenuity, but ingenuity

doesn

't pay the rent.

I wish I could, so we decided to move into a two-bedroom apartment where Bruno will sleep. in the loft on the floor we will cook beans and rice every day we will withdraw our 401k that had nothing we will sell our we will sell everything in our apartment we will take out five credit cards each We will say that Steven will become a driver of birds to pay the bills. Bruno will cash in his Apple shares to pay for our first batch of towels. Boom. We have a company. We know that social media is where we needed to be.

To build a millennial-driven brand there was no other way and none of us knew anything about social media. I don't think Snapchat existed at the time, so we didn't have the money to pay someone to teach us, no one, no marketing. The agency is not an expert, we had to do it ourselves, so we decided to walk the beaches of San Diego for three months, every day, we approached each person on the sand to get them to take out their cell phone and add us on Instagram at the time we did this. for six hours a day for three months and we got our first thousand followers with this approach we realized that money can buy followers, it can buy likes, it can even buy comments on your photos, but it can't buy a first impression and this Strategy is what built the foundation and foundation of our brand, now we have some followers, we have some momentum, we have a product, but we don't have a website and none of us know anything about how to create a website.

I don't think I even had a computer at the time, so Bruno became our in-house website developer, he was the cheapest person we could find, he cost euros, so he locked himself in the loft for three weeks and literally He taught himself how to create a website through YouTube videos by calling his friends and family who were experts using the Internet using resources reading blogs doing whatever it took and finally one day he came down without shaving in a few weeks and introduced us to this site web to Stephen and I and it was complete, I think even he would do it.

I admit the images were blurry, the product descriptions had typos, the design was horrible, but Stephen and I were ecstatic because we had a website, so we have a website, what do we do now? We have a thousand followers and we know we have to do it. grow our following because eventually these people will turn into money, eventually they will turn into sales, but we knew that walking on the beach every day just wasn't sustainable, it's not possible, it won't work, it won't happen fast enough. We have to discover something else, so we become social media experts.

Back to YouTube, come on, we watch every video on social media marketing strategies. How to reach people, when to post, what to post, how to post, what a hashtag is, we did it all. We literally watched every video, we stayed up at night direct messaging thousands and thousands of people on Instagram telling them about the shameless promotion of our company, we didn't care because in that month we went from 1,000 to 10,000 followers on Instagram and we did it. for $0 so now we have 10,000 followers feeling better we probably made three sales on our website probably from our moms and we're still broke but we know there's something here there's something about getting people's attention getting eyeballs, get followers, get impressions. that they read about us, that they learn about us, that they understand why we do what we do, then the idea of ​​a public relations agency arises, but we can't afford one, they are incredibly expensive, so we decided to reinvent what a public relations agency is. public relations.

YouTube means in a digital world, what more do we need? We learned how to become our own public relations agency through the tools that exist and are accessible to everyone. We learned who to contact, what subject lines to use, when to email them, when they are. back from vacation who's your boss who your bosses bosses how to communicate with them and before you know it we're featured on over a hundred blogs a ton of magazines newspapers podcasts influencers we even get picked up by The Huffington Post at some point and no. I think we would have had over $100 in sales, I guarantee it, without a PR agency they wouldn't have gotten us a third of that press, they wouldn't be able to match the level of urgency, passion and just plain desperation that we had at that time.

At that time we were sick of eating rice and beans, so where do we go now? We appear in the press and continue driving in Uber trying to pay the bills. We're still hacking Instagram, reaching out to people and one day I'm sitting down. in my office, which is our kitchen, and I get an alert from Uber that someone needs a ride and I'm like, yeah, I need, I need to

make

some money, except give someone a ride around the corner. I'm going to pick him up, it's a young couple. and a girl gets in my car, the guy gets in the back, we start talking like always, I try to sell them a towel, they don't want it, but they say okay, this guy is doing something, he has a company and then I find I found out she's a Channel Six reporter and I'm like hell, yeah, jackpot.

She won't leave this car until she gives me her phone number, so I take a few wrong turns. I missed the exit and finally reached her destination. I have built enough relationship. Right now, when she just hands me her business card, she says, "Send me an email. I'll email you the next night the next week. She's at our apartment with a full camera crew. The next night we were on channel 6 and that night we did eight eight online sales and then in my opinion we went out to eat tacos money can't buy these experiences that are out there that are free for everyone When they don't.

You have money, you are forced to take matters into your own hands and do everything you can. That super experience is an example of how you can take advantage of any moment and turn it into an opportunity. Normally I wouldn't have just talked to her. been driving around playing music trying to get there. Coming back stressed but because we were desperate we had to do it ourselves, it forces you to do things you would never normally do, so fast forward to today, we have five hundred and forty thousand followers on Instagram, we got a deal on the shark tank with Robert Herjavec.

We have made millions of dollars in sales in revenue, not profits, and we have donated fifty thousand dollars to various non-profit organizations, which we are very happy with and we don't know what the future holds because Brad comes and goes every day , but what we do. What we know is that the ideas, the strategies, the hustle, the blood, sweat and tears that got us to where we are now will never stop and that's something money can't buy, so next time someone tells you that it takes money to make money, tell him. Tell them that your lack of money will finance your ingenuity and make you successful.

Thank you.