(intense music) - Okay, let's talk about million
dollar branding strategies. I have three I want to share with you. Million dollar personal
branding strategies. Number one, you want to be known as blank. Being known as blank. Okay, being known as blank. So let me give you an example. The last thing you will
ever want to appear to others as an other blank, okay? The last thing you ever
want to appear to others is another mortgage broker, another coach, another
real estate realtor, another financial planner,
another fill-in-the-blank. The last thing you ever
want is to appear to others, oh, I'm just another one of those, I'm just another one of those. You want to be known as something. As something, okay? So let me give you an example. Let me take it back to where I was many, many, many, many years ago. At first, when I got into copywriting, it's very difficult to find this shit, like I'm telling you, it's history. Many years ago, I don't
know if you can see it here, when I first became a copywriter, I came up with a term, the
wiz-kid of copywriting. The wiz-kid of copywriting. Why did I use that? Because I was so freakin' young. So, instead of being a disadvantage, I might as well just say
I'm a young dude, right? I'm a young guy, wiz-kid of copywriting, and at the time I was
using my name, Daniel Lok. Okay, Daniel Lok. How many of you, do you
know my Chinese name? Anybody knows my Chinese name? Oh come on, Collin don't count. Anybody? Okay. My Chinese name, don't laugh, okay? Is actually called Ji Fong Lok. Can you imagine, you meet me? "Hey, Ji Fong."
(laughing) Zhi Fong Lok. Zhi actually in Chinese stands for wisdom. Fong stands for sharpness. Lok is just my last name, my family name. So Ji Fong Lok. Why don't I use that name
in my personal brand? - [Audience Member] No
one will remember it. - Nobody can pronounce the fucking name. (laughing) Yes, sometimes you meet someone, how many of you have had this experience? You meet someone, you're like, that's a nice guy, I just
can't pronounce his name. And I'm embarrassed to ask him twice, so you just kinda smile,
"Oh yeah, nice meeting you." (laughing) Or you cannot pronounce their first name, but you can't remember
the last name, yeah? "Damn, I met a Tom, but I met two Toms. "Was it that Tom or Tom? "Damn, I don't remember his last name." How many of you have had that experience? Your name is actually part
of your personal brand. So sometimes I tell people if your name is difficult
to pronounce, think twice... Think twice. How do you want me, yes? - [Audience Member]
What am I supposed to do with a hard to pronounce last name? - Change it.
(laughing) - [Audience Member] Change it? - Let me, do you know Gene
Simmons is not his real name? In celebrity, they have a lot of, they have their pen name
and then they have whatever. Jackie Chan, actually Jackie Chan, has a different Chinese name. A totally, like in Chinese, it's actually Dragon is
like what it means, right? That's what it means. That's not his real name. His real name sucks. It's a stupid, stupid name. (laughing) Seriously, it's a stupid name. So like, Ji Fong Lok, it's
that kind of name, right? Nobody remembers. So Daniel Lok, wiz-kid of copywriting. Seriously, 'cause Gene Simmons, I forgot his name. See, I don't even remember his real name, but if you YouTube this, it's some very difficult
word to pronounce. (muttering) Right? Something like that. Like, I can't remember, truly. But he said, you know what, when he said, I want to be a rock star, I need something that people can remember. Gene Simmons, that's how
he came up with it, right? Yes. - [Audience Member] Like
Marilyn Monroe from Norma Jean. - Yeah, Marilyn Monroe,
same thing, same thing. - [Audience Member] Chain whips. - Chain whips, yes, yes. So that's my first brand, yes? Eh, it's not so good. It's okay, but that's what
I started off with, okay? And then I came across Joe Vitale. How many have heard of Joe Vitale? Yeah, from The Secret. And then I saw Joe at the
time, he was a great marketer. He has the term the world's
first hypnotic marketer. I thought, "That's pretty good." The world's first,
didn't say he's the best. He just said I'm the first, dude. The world's first hypnotic marketer. I'm like, okay, let me think, wow maybe. So then I set up the company
called Quick Term Marketing. So I called myself The World's
First Quick Term Marketer. (laughing) Again, don't ask me what it means. I don't fucking know, okay? I just came up with it,
I just came up with it, 'cause I wanted you to see the
progress, the journey, yes? The good, bad and ugly, everything. So the World's First Quick Term Marketer and our clients would ask me, "What the hell does that mean?" I said, I don't know it just sounds good. I'm the first whatever, okay? Then later on after a while, and that was my website at the time. Wrote some articles and stuff. Do you see any photo, yes or no? - No.
- No photos, okay? Hiding behind a computer,
writing copy for people, okay? Then I changed to Website
Conversion Expert. I narrow it down and say I
wanna focus on the internet and I'm gonna brand myself as
the Website Conversion Expert. And do you see my
signature at the top, yeah? So I came up with a little bit nicer, little bit signature nicer branding. Still no photo, yes? No photo. Because at the time I thought it would be, a lot of my clients are from the US and I thought it would be a disadvantage if they know, although
I speak with an accent, but I think lets not emphasize that. If they look at me, I'm too young I'm too
Chinese, I'm too whatever, they're not gonna hire me. Actually I had an incident,
I'll share a story with you. At the time I had a client, not a client, a prospect who went to the website and who called me several
times and he'd call, and we were talking about, he would hire me for
a copywriting project. And he's saying, "I'm
thinking of doing this," and I'm asking some questions. About five, six minutes
into the conversations, suddenly he stops. He said, "You know what? "In just the five minute conversation, "you make multiple grammatical errors, "how can you write copy for me? "I think you're full of shit." And he hung up. And that hurt me deeply 'cause I thought, wow, what did I do? It was so sudden and in a way, that's actually what motivated
me to improve my English, my communication skill
and all these things, that was an incident in my life and say you know what? I don't want to be
disrespect like that anymore. Someone just called me up
and assault me like that. How many of you have
ever had an experience where people call you
and they just insult you. Yeah, they just insult you. They're having a bad day,
trying to make your day worse. And very personal attacks too. I mean, that's pretty personal. He doesn't know much about me. So at the time I came up with
the website Conversion Expert. Here's the thing. How many can see it, World's
Number One Conversion Expert? And people will ask me, "What makes you say World's Number One?" I would say, can't you
see it's on my website? (laughing) It's on my website and
fuck it's my domain name! Any other questions? "I guess you're right." (laughing) Okay? Another thing I change
is that, at the time, I still remember I had lunch
with my mentor, Allen Jacks, in Olive Garden. After the lunch I was
driving him back home and in the car, we were just talking, and I was asking, hey Allen, I'm thinking of changing
my name a little bit. So from Daniel Lok. I'm thinking of shortening
it, just call it Dan Lok. What do you think? He's like, "Hm, that's a good idea. "You should do it." I said, great. He said, "Yeah, I could
see, Dan Lok, more punch. "If I can see a banner, a
website, see Dan Lok Live." "That's better than Daniel,
somehow, it sound better. "You should should do it." And I did, so I changed
my name to Dan Lok, shortened a little bit, very minor. I don't know what happened but somehow, when I changed the name I just found that I attracted more business. Very little thing. I don't know why but it works for me. How many of you think Dan Lok is better than Daniel Lok? Yeah, very very minor. And then also a lot of
friends at the time, they call me, "Hey Dan, you're the man! "You're the man, man." So I just added that to my name. So again, it becomes more
memorable for people. Hey, Dan the Man Lok, right? Does that make sense?
- Yes. - So it evolves, my
personal brand evolves. Then when I got into the
salon training business, I have Salon Business Expert. Leading authority in salon
market and management. I wrote the book. So salon business expert. Expert with missing an R. So again, when I go into the
salon industry, brand new. When a lot of people have more experience in the salon spa industry
when I got into it. Again, some other instructors,
they would question. "Well, what makes you the
salon business expert?" I said, it's my company name.
(laughing) It's literally, it's my company
name and it's my website. "Okay."
(laughing) And I've got a book, dude. "Oh, then you must be a
salon business expert." Now there's a lesson here, okay? Here's the lesson I want you to get. Don't wait for others
to give you permission to claim that spot. Nobody will show up at your door, at your home and say,
finally you are knighted. (laughing) Here's a sword, you're good
enough to call yourself blank. No association, no organization, nobody will show up at your door and say you're good enough to call yourself that. It's better to just call yourself
that and then back it up. Back it up with your work. What happens is most of
you are just so afraid to claim that spot and say, "I only have five years of experience, "I cannot call myself an expert." Now you have 10 years of experience, "Well, I'm a little intimidated by that "and what will people think of me?" They're so afraid versus going
into the marketplace saying, you know what, I'm the guy, I'm the girl, I am it, I'm the best! Boom! Suddenly when you make that claim, it catches people's attention. Now they want to kind of
learn a little bit more. "Okay, you say you're
pretty good, show me." Okay, then you show them. You fulfill your promise,
get some clients. And funny thing is, you go into it, and you have such
confidence and conviction, people started talking. Oh yeah, he or she is the expert. Oh okay and then other people
are gonna spread the word. He or she is the expert,
very very powerful. And now my personal brand, I shorten everything to just my name, Dan Lok, that's it,
that's my personal brand. And you notice, how many can
see the changes in website? The brand? Yes, question. - No, but they're saying yes.
- Yes. So the changes, the
photo, everything you do and I'm just in the process
of revamping my brand again to take it to the next step. And you'll see the new website coming out maybe in a couple months and it's a higher level of branding. High level branding. So I'm always constantly pushing, how can I make it better? So that's just my name, okay? So, again, let's take three minutes. How long?
- Three minutes! Discuss what you've learned so far, go! (chatting) Okay. Okay, have a seat, have a seat. Hey, it's not a break, it's
not a break yet, Jesus. We're gonna have a break
very shortly, have a seat. So... What do you want to be, a couple things, a couple things. First of all, I misunderstood. I thought Tom was coming
from the States to here and staying couple days and then happens to be on the same day. He actually told me he flew
from the States just for this. Just for this.
(applauding) I appreciate that, I appreciate that. And also, no pressure for me. I always deliver.
(laughing) And another great point I want to make is if you actually don't own
your name as a dotcom, we've got a problem, okay? So your name. Whatever your name is, you
better own the dotcom, okay? Some of you know the story. Many years ago a client of mine, I asked her to register her domain name and she told me, "Oh Dan,
my domain name is taken." I said shit, okay, let me
type in the domain name. Who owns it? And then it redirects to a porn site. (laughing) - My dotcom's a porn star.
- Dotcom porn star. (laughing) Can you imagine the family searching? "I didn't know you have
a side profession." (laughing) Oh my goodness, oh my goodness. Yes, Nathan? - [Nathan] What if you put
dot-ca, do you want it dotcom? - Okay, okay, good question. What about dot ca? Now I'll just tell you what have. I have danlok.com, danlok.net,
danlok.ca, danlok.org, I own all fucking of them.
(laughing) Seriously, I own them all. Now what if dotcom is taken? Something, .net, .ca, anything
is better than nothing, 'cause you need to own your name. If you're gonna build a personal brand, how can you not own your own domain name? Make sense? You have to have it. If you don't have it, get
it immediately tonight. If you have it, good, it's awesome. And if actually somebody
owns it and it's for sale... Get it. Couple hundred bucks
whatever, it's worth it. Can you imagine if I actually
don't have danlok.com? And I have to buy something
like www.realdanlok.com, (laughing)
that would suck. Yes, it would suck, it would suck. It would not be good. So I own my name for many many
many years, many years, okay. So I want you to take couple
minutes just by yourself, we talked about you want to
be known as something, yes? So I gave you some example. What's a conversion expert, salon business expert, the world's first quick term marketer. I want you thinking in terms of what you do in your industry. Let me give you a couple
minutes just by yourself. Think of what you want
to be known as, a blank. Not just something generic term, what you want to be known as. Take three minutes, just
think on your own, okay? And then we can discuss and share. (chattering) Shh! So what have you come up with? Share with me, I'll
give you some feedback. Just go to the mic, what
have you come up with? You got one, not yet? Anybody? Yeah. (laughing) - So this is David again.
- Hi, David! - Hey, everyone. So I'm making a living as an
app developer for many years. - App developer, okay.
- Right. But I've got a deep interest
in medical technology and have done some projects, not too many. - [Dan] Okay. - I think I wanna double down on that so I think building on the
recent win of Alpha Go, I'd love to become the world
expert in deep learning applied to medial diagnostic imaging. So you could build a computer system that would replace a radiologist. - [Dan] So shorten that for me. You want to be known as what? - The expert in automated radiology. - [Dan] Not bad, not bad. - The designer of the
first robotic radiologist. - Okay, not bad. Let me give you also a quick strategy. Sometimes what you could do is you should try to take two
words and combine into one. - Okay.
- Okay? Two words, like you take the
first part of certain word, last part of certain word, and you combine it, okay? You look at this thing for
Joe Vitale's example... He's a copywriter back then, but he just wrote about
hypnotic copywriting. So he's like hypnotic is one concept, you take another concept
and you put it all together. And when I say the word hypnotic writing or hypnotic marketing, certain image comes to your mind right? So when you combine that,
it's very very powerful. Or sometimes you can take two words and just combine into one. Firstly, not too bad, okay? But refine it a little bit more and usually no more
than three words, okay? Round of applause.
(applauding) Shawn. - My name's Shawn.
- Hi, Shawn. How many of you noticed
he just changed his name? He just changed his name. Before the name was? - [Shawn] Don't worry about it. (laughing) - I fucking love it. By the way, high school kid. High school kid.
(applauding) - I'm the youngest high estate, blank. So whatever it is. You said combine the two right? - Yeah. - [Shawn] High estate is a
heuristic word, high quality. So youngest high estate marketer, youngest high estate copywriter, youngest high estate whatever. - Yup, and as you get older? - Change it to I don't know yet. (laughing) It's perfectly fine 'cause
I have copywriting wiz-kid and as I get older, I'm
not a kid anymore, right? So I just change that,
man, perfectly fine right? So when I'm 50 I'll be Dan the Old Man. (laughing) Round of applause, I love it.
(applauding) - [Willy] Hi everybody my name is Willy. - [Audience] Hi, Willy. - Hi, what is it?
- Willy. - [Dan] Willy, hi, Willy. - I do video production.
- Yes. - And I would love to be
known as creative genius. - Okay, let's take that for example. Creative genius. What's the problem with that name? - Not descriptive enough?
- Yup. 'Cause when I introduce myself. Hey, my name is Dan Lok, I'm
known as the creative genius. - Too broad.
- It's so broad. In what industry? Are you a graphic designer? Are you an app person?
- Film maker. - Are you a film maker? Are you an animator? What if I introduce you? Oh, this guy's a creative genius. It doesn't help me right? So how can we make it better? - [Off Camera Woman] Will,
your name should be Will. - Okay, seriously.
- I'll have to call my mom. (laughing) - Mom, I want to be, just
change my fucking name. Change it to Dan Lok, no but seriously. How can we make it a little bit better? - It could be creative
genius in film making for at least to be descriptive. - Okay, so he's a creative
genius in film making. We can see it's still. It lacks punch, right? - Film Will.
- Cinematic genius? - Cinematic genius, little bit better. - [Willy] That's pretty cool. - Okay, is that more specific?
- Yes. - Slightly better, I like
that a little bit more. Yeah, not bad. - [Will] Coming up with creative solutions to business problems
using the power of film. - [Man Off Camera] Is it a specific type of film that you use? Is it like sepia, retro, like
old school or new age imaging? Or do you use a spectrum?
- It's a really good question. A spectrum. (whispering) - How many can see he
needs a little bit of, you need to think it through a little bit. - Will the Video Wizard.
- Ooh! - No, I do like Will the
Wizard, that's not bad. That is actually not bad. Like if someone tells you, this guys known as Will the Wizard. That's pretty interesting. Harry Potter comes to mind.
(laughing) - [Will] I could have a scar. - The glass right, spectrum! Whatever right? But think it through a little bit, yeah? - Round of applause.
- Thanks. (applauding) That's why you gotta brainstorm. You gotta talk through it. 'Cause once you identify what that is, you put it in all your marketing. You wanna make sure you get it right. Yes, Earl.
- My name's Earl. - Hi, Earl.
- Hi, Earl. - [Earl] I'm trying to aim
for the evil marketing genius 'cause people call me that anyway. - Yeah, 'cause you're
so evil, what can I say? No but evil marketing genius. And you show it to me and
I say I don't like it. I'll tell you why I don't like it, because the word evil.
(laughing) - [Earl] Funny thing is it's
attracting more clients. - I know, I'm not saying it's no good. I'm saying the word evil, has such an emotionally charged word that people might think of, of course your attracting
certain types of people. But I suspect you're
rebelling a lot of people and we want to do that. But what I'm saying is sometimes
people think in terms of, if I tell you, hey, I just met Earl. He's an evil marketing genius.
(laughing) And then if you have
any kind of integrity, you're like wow, you know what? What I sell. Okay, he's very smart but it sounds to me he might use some questionable, manipulative kind of
marketing techniques, right? Ladies, how many would be
not comfortable with that? Put your hands, if I say
evil marketing genius, right? So you see the problem? - [Audience Member] What if
he called himself almost evil? (laughing) - How about little bit evil?
(laughing) Just little bit, not all,
just little bit evil. Somewhat evil marketing genius. Somewhatevilmarketinggenius.com,
how's that? You know, not totally evil. - [Earl] The previous brand
was mind over marketer. - Mind?
- Mind over marketer. - Mind over marketer?
- Yeah, mind over marketer. So I had mind over marketer and then I had evil marketing genius. What do you think of this
evil marketing genius? My friends would go,
"Well what makes it evil?" - Yes. - [Earl] The funny thing is
that started opening questions. - Yes. - And someone like the BBC instructor, 'cause I spoke at SNU and
a bunch of other places. He said, "I like the evil one "but you should make
evil stand for something "that's not evil." - That could be okay. No, no, no, no that's
a different story, yes. - Maybe I should start doing that. - That's a story, yes.
- How about evilly good? - Well if you just use dots, then? - Yeah so if I put dots
and it could be E.V.I.L. - That's okay. Now actually I'm gonna go
into a little bit later about coming up with a concept like some kind of acronym. But you could, E.V.I.L
stands for something. - We always have a giant list of things-- - So it could be, it could be, I'm just making this up, okay? So E stands for, elevate your brand or something like that, right? I stand for something, V stands for something, L stands for something, right? So you could do that. So if you do it that way I
think I'm okay with that. - [Audience Member] The
perception is still the same. Like we are still stuck
at the same problem. The initial perception--
- Yeah. - [Earl] The funny thing is
when people ask me stuff, they presume marketing is evil anyway. (laughing) So because they feel that
marketing is evil anyway-- - But it's interesting 'cause
I know the personality, right? So you attract certain
type of personality. The one's who are more, let's call them hard nose, money grabbing business people, okay? So you attract certain types of people? - [Earl] I've attracted
more intelligent clients. - No, no, not saying
they're not intelligent but I can tell with this brand. How many of you are familiar
with what I teach Gems? The four personalities?
- Yeah. - Okay, factor doesn't help okay. Anyway there are four personalities. - Very ruby.
- Yeah very ruby. Like not pearl, just like I don't wanna
touch that at all, right? - [Earl] But I close
the sale faster on ruby. - I'm not arguing. So you could have a brand that's just for certain types of people. - [Earl] I'm keeping both
just to make it clear. I'm keeping both 'cause
you have more than one persona, personality.
- Yes, yes. - [Ear] So the evil marketing genius-- - [Audience Member] What about
marketing hacking expert? - Okay so now the word hacking, hacking is still, right? A lot of negative. When I say the world hacking, what comes to mind? - Jail.
- Jail! (laughing)
Shady, right? Although it's a very
millennium kind of term, right? Life hacks or growth hacking,
all that stuff right? Again, depends on who you sell to. Depends on who you sell to. Yes? - [Audience Member] When you
put evil in the thesaurus, it brings up wickedness and
wicked I think is a good word-- - Yeah, wicked is smart, it's savvy. - [Audience Member] 'Cause the
street term is the reverse, it means it's cool it's kind of wicked rather than it's evil.
- DJ, buddy? - [DJ] I think the brand works for Earl just for this once stand point, it filters out clients
that he wants to work with or will work with.
- Yes. - [DJ] We all know part of what designing our personal brand's about, is actually filtering or
pre-selling our clients so that we don't have to
spend so much time working-- - Yes and I'm gonna get into that as well. - [Earl] I'm personally into ruby types. - Yeah, I'm gonna get into that as well. Yes? - [Audience Member] It really
would be the type of people that he wants to work with. What Earl's finding is he's
already attracting people that are thinking a long his lines, they're gonna be a lot
quicker to work with. He's an aggressive marketer by nature. - Yes, no shame. - [Audience Member] He needs
to attract aggressive clients in order to grow quickly, so that brand, that works for him. - Yup. (whispering) - [Audience Member] Based
on your personality, Earl, you are so not evil that
anyone who takes a look at that and meets you-- - Are you sure? Look at his face.
(laughing) I'm teasing, I'm teasing him. - [Audience] Based on the way
you talk, you're a great guy. And anybody who takes five
seconds to talk to you is gonna say, "Oh this
guys pretty personable "because he's saying I'm evil." But it actually draws people in, from my standpoint at least, and makes you seem a
lot more like somebody that I would want to work with. - Very nice. Last one. - [Audience Member] And
this is exactly my point because my perception
of you is very different and you don't know what kind
of clients you miss out on. Maybe if you rebrand
you will attract clients that you will enjoy working with. - Here's what's interesting. There's no right and there's no wrong. He's like you could be, you know what? I just want to work with certain clients. I don't want the other clients. - [Earl] The funny thing
is the mind over marketer attracts the other guys,
it attracts more pearl. - It all depends on who you
want to work with, right? If you want certain personality or he prefers to work with more savvy marketing
people, business people. More kind of bottom line,
return on investment, produce results. Evil, I don't care evil or not, you can move my product, I'll hire you. It's okay, it's your personal choice so there's no right or wrong. One last one, yes. - [Audience Member] Just one more idea based on what Dan said, he's a businessmen for the most part, part evil. What about no shame
marketing or something? - There's a great, I think
her name is Debby Allen, she wrote a book a number
of years ago called Shameless Promoter. Shameless Promoter and that's
pretty good, it's pretty good. So that's her best selling
book and that's her brand. Shameless Promoter. It's about aggressive, it's
about pushing yourself, and that's okay right? So that's kinda interesting. Round of applause. - [Narrator] 10 times your finances. 10 times your business. 10 times your marketing. 10 times your life. Hit the subscribe button now!
