TSP033 | Todd Herman – Transcription

Posted by John Livesay in Uncategorized | 0 comments

John Livesay:

Welcome to The Successful Pitch podcast. Today’s guest is Todd Herman who literally has the Spanish royal family and billionaires as clients. He sold and exited successfully from two businesses and now has an incredible 90 Day Year program for entrepreneurs. He’s also a coach for professional and Olympic athletes and he compares being an Olympic athlete to being an entrepreneur.

He said, “You really have to have an alter ego so that you are at your heighten version of yourself and that what allows you to perform better.” He says, “Get rid of worry about your potential and focus on execution. That is the key to being a top performer.” He won the top salesperson of the world in 2010 at the International Ad Festival and tells us the pitches that he gave to win that award. It’s a fascinating story that you won’t want to miss.

Welcome to The Successful Pitch podcast. Today’s guest is Todd Herman who has so many credentials I don’t know where to story. He has a very successful 90 Day Year program. You’ve heard of the four hour week, now you’re going to hear about the 90 Day Year. Todd is also a performance coach for professional and Olympic athletes. He has clients like the Spanish royal family and billionaire clients. What impressed me also was he won greatest salesperson in 2010 for the International Ad Festival in France, so we’re certainty going to ask him to talk about that and more. Todd, welcome to the show.

Todd Herman:

John, it’s a pleasure to be here.

John:

Todd, I love that you are such an expert on what it takes to become an Olympian or professional athlete, because our listeners on The Successful Pitch podcast are all about learning how to pitch to get investors to say fast and there are so many similarities between being an entrepreneur and being professional athlete and I think when you frame pitching to investor as the Superbowl of meetings that you are the expert to talk about that.

Todd:

Yeah. There was a study that just came out a little while ago that my wife shared with me and it’s all about risk tolerance and they found that of groups of people that are out there, no two groups have a high threshold for risk tolerance than entrepreneurs and athletes. It’s two groups. It’s funny because I think the threshold tolerance was like 79-82%, something like that.

The only group that actually rate just slightly higher than them were general in the military, which fair enough, okay. We’ll all bow down to them, but for me, because I really dance between those two worlds of going back and forth between working with entrepreneurs on high performance and how you can actually get the maximum of value that stored up inside of you to show up on the field of play.

Everyone uses the world potential and in my world, in my business, that was word is not allowed to be used, because I don’t believe in potential. Potential I think is a crutch that a lot of people like to lean on to basically excuse away a lot of their bad habits or poor behaviors. What I look at and the other thing really an investor is going to look at as well when they’re taking a look at a successful pitch is, okay, even if you watch on Shark Tank, people like, okay, well, we like the grand idea that you have there. That would be considered potential, but what’s the real performance. Tell me the numbers.

So, even with athletes, I want to know, well, what are your numbers? Don’t tell me about what you think you can do. I want to know what’s showing up on the court, on the field of play, and so the great thing about dancing between these roles of athletes and entrepreneurs is they’re both manic people that are doing crazy. You’ve got crazy ideas to think that you could actually go out there and somehow be the number one sprinter in the world or that you could somehow go into a meeting and walk out with $5 million for this idea that started rattling around in your head months or years ago on your coach and now you’re asking for money. So, it’s crazy people, but I love working with them.

John:

Well, I really like what you said there about the idea that you have for your product is your potential that you have, but what really counts is your ability to execute that idea. IE, what are your numbers and investors are saying we’re not going to fund anybody who “doesn’t know their numbers” and we’re investing in people who know how to execute. Todd, you’ve had a two successful businesses with great exit. So, you clearly have been down this path, but I want to go back even further. When I was watching short video you did about a life lesson you learned from our dad. Can you share that with the audience?

Todd:

Yeah, sure. I mean I was young and we were – I grew up on a farming ranch in Western Canada. I live here in New York City now, but I’m still at my core a farm kid and we were walking out of a steak restaurant and on the way up just like most people I had some meat stuck between the teeth, so very natural for me to snag a tooth pick and when I walked out the door, I tore the tooth pick out of the cellophane and then I tossed the cellophane on the sidewalk as we continued to walk towards the car and my dad is a man of very few words.

Always sort of led by example more than anything else, very respected in the community and he stopped, walked back, grab the cellophane and he always, just like most good farmers, had a breast pocket with pens and a notebook that he used for the farm and he grab the cellophane and he stuffed it in his pocket and kept on walking and I thought to myself, wow, that is a perfect example of how you win at life is by taking care of all the little things.

Most people always focus on the big stuff, but in my experience in working with high preforming people is there are fanatical about making sure the details are well taken care of. A friend of mine and someone I’ve been able to do some work with, Brian Fetherstonhaugh who is the CEO of Ogilvyone, you know, one of the greatest advertising agencies on the planet.

We were going through and we were doing a presentation together and the gentlemen who put together the slide deck had come in and then Brian and myself and his assistant were sitting there and just watching someone at that level go through that presentation with such a fine tooth comb and just picking out just micro little punctuations errors or just the slightest little alignment issues and that’s the CEO.

Most people would think that they wouldn’t care about those things, but someone who is operating at a high level does care about that impression, because just like the people that are listening are going in to present a successful pitch, you know, glossing over all those things will be picked up on by people who have a tremendous eye for detail, which are typically people who are very successful.

John:

I love that you brought that up.

Todd:

So, the analogy is just take care of the cellophane in your life, because it matters.

John:

It does. I love that you brought that up about the details on the slide, because I’ve had investors tell me, if you have a typo on your pitch deck, that’s it. That’s a no right off the get go, but what I love so much about that story about your dad is A) you’re a master storyteller and I’m constantly working with my clients to teach them how to become a master storyteller.

So, you described how old you were. You described that your father is a man of few words and that he literally didn’t say anything and by not saying anything he said volumes and then that life lesson that you took and continue to take with your and teach other people. We’re going to tweet that out. If you want to win at life, take care of the little things.

That’s a great phrase and a great tweet for the first 30 minutes or whatever we’re going to be talking together, but I love that. It’s so many things of take care of the little things and be a storyteller and you encapsulated all of that in one quick story. Amazing. Fantastic.

Well, as I promised in the intro, I want to hear about how you won greatest salesperson in France, because, let’s face it, when you’re pitching, you’re selling yourself and your idea to investors, so you must – there must be a great story there.

Todd:
Well, that’s actually how I got involved with Ogilvyone, because Ogilvyone and YouTube are partnering up to do this search for the world’s greatest salesperson and that was back in 2010, beginning of 2010 and now have some successful businesses and the prize was going to be a fellowship at Ogilvyone.

Now, I wasn’t really doing it to get a fellowship at Ogilvyone, but how I found out about it was a good friend of mine actually on Twitter sent me a tweet and said hey Ogilvy who I know absolutely love, because David Ogilvy’s book Ogilvy on Advertising is one of the first books I give people when it comes to just learning how to communicate or sell or market yourself.

I think it’s just, it’s still a great bible today on that subject and she said, they’re doing this cool thing, I think you could win this and so I went and saw they’re very kind of tongue and cheek funny launch video for it and what they asked people to do was just submit a two minute video of how you would sell a red brick on YouTube and so as soon as I saw their pitch video, I was like, well, I know exactly how I’d sell that red brick and I was working on an important project at the time and I was like, you know what, I’ll get to this later, which I teach all my clients is famous last words, because you will never get to it later. If you’re inspired to do it and it’s something that’s really going to make an impact, do it now.

So, I kind of did some self-coaching there, got up quickly, through on a sport coat, kind of wrote a mini little script and one hour later I had the video done, in the can, and upload to basically YouTube and my whole shtick with the red brick was that the red brick was used to help build empires, because the Samaritans who invented the red brick used it to build pyramids. It was also used to build roads to help connect us all, because bricks were originally the thing that we used on roads and then ultimately it was helped to revolutionize homes.

So, there were no longer vulnerable to whims of nature, but at the end of the day, all of those innovations started in the mind of one person and just like them you probably have an idea, a dream, a goal or something that you have never taken action on, so if you buy this red brick, it will be a message not only you but the world around you that you’ve laid your first red brick. You’ve taken your first step to a life of commitment action.

So, it kind of went on from there and then I said, you know, if you buy this brick, we’ll donate, because it was right around the time that Haiti had the big hurricane to roll through and devastate the country and I said all the proceeds will go to the Red Cross at Haiti. So, anyways, it’ll help rebuild that country as well. So, metaphorically it helps to rebuild a nation. Anyway, so that submission video got me down to a final three, final three of us then were flown over to Cannes to the International Advertising Festival.

So, I got a free trip out of it already and there was a gentleman who was like a Hollywood producer, and then a lady from Japan and then we all had to do a two-minute pitch on stage of how we would sell the new Motorola Droid cellphone. Motorola was a client of Ogilvy and now we were in the biggest theater in all of Cannes and that’s where the Cannes Film Festival is at where they put the big movies and so we’re on stage, we’ve got two minutes and me going over there.

I had never been to an advertising festival. I had no idea what to expect, what the demographic of the audience was going to be there, so I actually prepared five different pitches based on different demographics and when I got there I found out and realized after meeting with much of the people that there was going to be a big chunk of the audience that didn’t have English as their first language or really didn’t even speak English at all.

So, I was like, all they’re going to hear is like wah wah wah wah wah, but I did know, so I thought to myself, okay, well, what is a character, a story, something, that when I say the word, it’s the same word across every single culture and so I was like playing with the idea of, okay, Motorola Droid, just the word Droid is a cool cellphone, it’s a technologically advanced thing, who would use that? Batman would use it.

So, I started off my pitch with, you know, if you had to, if you had the opportunity to design your own mobile device the Motorola Droid cellphone would be that device. In fact, it would be the device used by Batman and as soon as I said the word Batman there was this crowd of Greek advertisers that were in front and I saw this one lady nudge one of her counter parts and she said, this guy is good and that’s when I kind of knew I had the audience pretty well, but there was like, 1,300 people in the audience then at the end of it, everyone did live text message voting and then the result was I ended up winning this and it was a great experience. I ended up meeting Mark Zuckerberg at the Facebook party. He came up to me and said, hey, aren’t you the world’s greatest salesperson?

John:

What a great title.

Todd:

Yeah, it went on from there and that’s how I ended up doing a bunch of work with Ogilvy.

John:

I thought there was probably a good story there, but you gave us two good stories. I love it. You know what, it’s so interesting that I want to break it down for what you did so that the people listening can really understand just why you won and why it was so good is when you’re describing something and I tell people, you know, when you tell a story, give three points for people to take away and you said, if you have a dream, an idea, or a goal, right, and it just flows so effortlessly out of your mouth, but clearly you thought that out.

So, people are going to say I have one of those three things, so this is for me and that’s so important when you’re pitching and I constantly work with my clients and say you can not wing your pitch to investors and clearly you did not win this. You had five different pitches ready depending on who the demographics are and that’s of course the key to success is know your audience. Investors are not all the same.

You have to customize your pitch to what their speciality is and what their hot buttons are and what they like to invest in and you nailed that and on your feet no less of what’s the word that resonates across the world that you don’t have to speak English and in that cash was Batman and you became the Batman and won the award. What a great story. Thank you so much. So much great information there on how to pitch and how to connect with the audience.

Todd:

To your point, I mean, there’s a reason why rules of three, you know, are influence. It’s the whole see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. Everyone knows, as soon as you say, see no evil, everyone else can repeat the next two things. So, you’re right, organizing information into threes is exceptionally helpful to the audience.

John:

Now, the Batman thing leaves directly into one of your key areas of expertise which is creating an alter ego. Can you speak to that, Batman?

Todd:

Yeah, for sure. So, how I kind of, my first business that I started was doing mental game coaching with athletes, they weren’t pro athletes at the time, because I was just out. I was young, but it didn’t take long before I started working with professional and Olympic athletes and how I got my name was I built up a name as being the person to go to to build a secret identity or alter ego to boost performance and how that came about was I played college football.

I was a nationally ranked Badminton player and one of the devices that I used for my mental game was, you know, not going out on the field of play as myself, because Todd has had his insecurities and his worries and his concerns about other people judging him, but that’s not going to serve me on the field of play where I need to perform and what most athletes do, which is what they get wrong, is they go on to the field and they carry themselves with them as opposed to stepping into something else that’s going to perform for them. I mean it’s people naturally see actors do it. They go out on the stage and they act as a character in order to deliver the results or the emotional response to the audience that makes the story believable.

Well, if you want to make your performance believable, why not step into it as someone or something else, so I had this five-step process. I’m in the midsts of writing the book on it and I’ve been doing this for well over a decade with clients and as I started doing a lot more work with people in the corporate world or entrepreneurs.

I mean, there’s a field of play that everyone steps on. Like, when you go into a pitch, that right there is a certain rule and there’s a certain framework on how to be successful in that field or in that room. Going in there with trepidation and concern and a lot of belief in what you’ve done, maybe you didn’t prepare properly is not going to serve you by any stretch of the imagination.

People are investing at the end of the day. Yes, the idea is important and the numbers behind it important, but they’re still investing in the entrepreneur, because you and I both know the odds of the thing that’s being presented actually being 100% the thing that shows up in the marketplace is, I mean, I’ve never seen that happen personally and I invest in products and companies all the time and so we’re investing ultimately in, okay, do I believe that this person can actually steward this thing to completion. Can they execute or are they just an idea person who gets excited about something and then drops off, you know, three months later and now my money is gone.

So, building out this idea of stepping into a better heighten version of yourself on that field is the fastest way I’ve ever found to help people boost performance and the result that they’re looking for on the field and if you think about it, this is not about being fake, this is not about being unnatural, you are already doing, because who Todd is, I mean, I am, I’ve got two little girls under the age of 2.5. I am very different with them than I am as Todd the hard charging, you know, kind of a spanking in the ass coaching adviser that I typically have that avatar as being.

So, who I am in business is very different than who I am in the home with the family and then who I am with my friends when I’m out for a drink or a beer watching the game is still another version of my personality just magnified to kind of accommodate that experience and so it’s just that. When you get this you become far more intentional and deliberate about who it is that you’re creating so that you can perform at the level that would be considered the highest levels so that you get the result that you want.

John:

I’m so glad that you said that, because I was going to ask you and you answered the question before I could even ask which is how do you have an alter ego and still stay authentic and you said, and we’re going to tweet this, when you have a better heighten version of yourself, that boosts performance. That is magic. That is gold. That allows you to still be yourself. It’s a better…

Todd:

Even to challenge, because I mean, the word authenticity is a very big kind of buzz word that’s out there even nowadays and I challenge people all the time, I’m like, tell me what authentic actually means. Here’s my premise, I don’t think anyone on this planet is really authentic, because if people were authentic, the most authentic moment of your life was when you came out of the womb and you were bloody and you were shitting yourself and you were crying.

So, if you want to be truly authentic that’s how you should be behaving right now and I mean, not to be too explicit, but I mean, that’s the reality, that’s what true authenticity is and how do we all get our personality shaped, yes, after definitely being a dad of two little girls there are just things that are baked into their DNA, you know, my wife Valerie and I have had nothing to do with shaping them what so ever, it’s just in them and you can’t explain it, but there’s environment impacts, there’s social impacts, there’s the friends that we have that helped to shape that personality and so where does their authenticity begin and who they’re showing up in life as that personality begin as well, so my challenge to people is I just don’t believe in the word authenticity.

What I care about is performance. If you’re a good person to me, I don’t know care if you’re not being authentic in the moment. You’re just nice to me. What do I care if you’re being authentic? The result was my interaction with John was a good experience. So whether you were faking it or not, I don’t care.

John:

Great. The other thing that you’re really on that I find so fascinating and useful is this whole concept of positive thinking versus positive expectations and in Silicon Valley and the startup world, there’s this whole thing called the trough of despair that all startups go through and you talked about it in one of your blogs about high performers tend to battle depressive states more than other people. Can you talk about that and what causes that and how can we handle those depressive states?

Todd:

Yeah and to kind of use, maybe a metaphor to help explain it. I mean, there’s, I think of life as having two classes of fish in the sea. There’s a class of fish that lives at the very bottom. It’s cold down there, it’s dark, light doesn’t travel down at the bottom there and there’s an exceptional amount of pressure that’s down there.

Now, currents can come along and maybe the fish that’s living down there gets caught in the current and slowly that current starts to bring them to the surface and if that fish doesn’t escape the current and travel back down to where it’s natural environment is, they’ll get eaten by a predator at that level or eventually get to the surface and the sun will burn them or whatever the case is.

So, they’re built to be done there and then there’s another class of fish that’s at the surface of the ocean and they’re colorful and they’re bright and they jump and they dance at the very top and if they get caught in the current and get taken down to the very bottom, they would die because of the pressure that’s down there and so in my experience of working with thousands upon thousands of high performers at the Olympic level or entrepreneurs whether it’s billionaires or whatever, they’re the people who live at the bottom of the ocean. They can handle the pressure.

They can handle the intensity of what’s it’s like to be in these situations and so I think the real problem that people are experiencing is that there has been this one rule that’s set up in life that is life is about being happy and joyful and I disagree, because I don’t think that Elon Musk sole purpose in life is to be happy. He has said that he is here to solve really big problems for this planet.

You don’t give really big problems to someone whose lens on life is to have just a fantastic lifestyle, right, I think that people need to be careful about the rules that they’re setting up in their head and making themselves feel bad because they don’t feel like they’re happy all the time, because they’re in a stressed out state. No, you chose it and almost like and almost you didn’t even choose it, it choose you.

You’re meant to do this because you can handle it and I’ve said that to some entrepreneurs and friends that have struggled with it and one of them remarked back to me, I’ve been living in just a state of worry and self-judgement for 15 years. He sent me an email the day after. He’s like, I have never felt more free than that. You just lifted so much pain and anxiety and self-judgement off my shoulders, because I felt I was doing something wrong in life, because I wasn’t that typically very, very happy person and now it’s one thing to be able to handle depressive states.

Now, I’m not saying that depression isn’t an okay thing, but it is something that people who do big things deal with, because our roller coasters are a hell of a lot steeper, which means they’re steep on the climb and that means the very top can be incredible, but they’re steep as well and they can go a lot deeper than other people who just aren’t taking on challenges like we would be and so yeah, the trough of despair is something that is very common, but the idea that you’re a bad person for experiencing it isn’t true, it’s just the nature of the world that you’re living. You are sort of meant to handle it and it’s okay.

John:

Well, being a former swimmer, I love the analogy of the different levels of the water and I almost want to combine your two metaphors and say, if my alter ego is going to be a deep sea diver, I’m going to put on my deep sea equipment as my alter ego so that when I have that on, I know I can handle the pressure and the analogy of the water and I won’t always stay down there. I’ll come up for air when I need to, but when I need to get the job done, I’m going to be able to handle the pressure cooker. It’s really helpful.

Todd:

Yeah and so to kind of carry on of your analogy. If I’m going to give someone a tool then that they can put on and wear to help them manage those, that deep level of pressure that we go through is you’ve – people have got, it’s the first thing I try to get all my private clients to get into is meditation and it’s going to sound. I mean, here are the numbers, 10 of the top 13 private equity traders in Wall Street, here in New York City, the wealthiest people will all credit.

The reason that they outperform everyone else, they meditate every single day and that helps them avoid the emotional highs and lows that everyone else in the market is going through, because really what meditation does it flexes the frontal lobe. The frontal lobe of our brain is the part that allows us to stay focused, to concentrate and to mitigate the limbic emotionally part of our system.

So, whether it’s two minutes, studies have proven even if you do two minutes of meditation, that will, it’s proven to help manage emotional states even just two minutes and the misconception that people have with meditation is that, because people go, yeah, I’ve tried meditation and I can’t get my mind to shut off. Meditation has nothing to do with your thoughts going away. That’s the kind of misnomer or the myth that’s out there. Meditation is all about being okay with what’s passing through your mind and not getting attached to it.

So, if you think about it this way to use a metaphor, your mind is the sky, the thoughts passing through it are clouds, what most people do is they get some sort of self-judgement cloud passing through and they get entangled with the cloud thinking that’s who they are and I’m telling you, no, it’s not, and here’s the thing, we all think those thoughts. I’ve worked with the ultra high-performers on the planet and I can tell you they deal with those self-defeating thoughts too sometimes, they just don’t get entangled in it and they continue to execute and take action.

John:

That’s great. So, we’re going to tweet something out about mediation is like clouds going through your head, just say next, next, next, don’t get entangled in anyone that would bring you down, just go next. Keep the wind going, keep the clouds going, and I think that’s so helpful, because like you said, so many people are so afraid, I can’t stop my thoughts. Oh, I don’t have to, I just can’t – the goal is to just not get stuck on one and go over and over to keep reliving it. How many times have we’ve done that?

Todd:

Think about when you’re just looking at the sky anyway. Sometimes you’re just looking at clouds and you’re like, oh, that’s an interesting shape. So, the same thinking can go with your thoughts. You’re like, oh, that’s interesting that thought entered my head. Be more curious about it. Don’t get entangled into it as that’s me, that’s who I am. It’s more like, that’s an interesting thought. How about that? What about that one over there? Like, that’s kind of the more, be more observer of it rather than someone who is just identifying themselves with the thought.

John:

I love that so much, because I think that’s the key is not being attached to any one outcome especially when you go pitch an investor, you can not be attached to that outcome, because they’ll smell it and just like a date or anything else, you can’t be attached – is this the person that’s giving me the money? Is this the person that’s going to marry me? Is this, whatever, you just have to not be attached to anyone outcome and you’ll be at your top performance.

Todd:

Staying engaged in the process. That’s the key.

John:

That’s great. So, you’ve already given us a hint of your book that’s coming and you mentioned the Ogilvy book. Are there any other books that you want to recommend to the listeners before we go?

Todd:

I think a great book that’s out there, I don’t even know if it’s in publication anymore, but it’s Seeking Wisdom from Darwin to Munger. It is a fantastic book on just thinking in the context of models. Like, I’m a really big visual models person whether it’s v-diagrams, XY graphs, and pyramids and stuff like that and Warren Buffett has said that Charlie Munger is the fastest 30 second thinker on the planet and that’s because Charlie Munger has made it know that he has about, I think it’s 96 different mental models that he’s memorized from tons of different disciplines whether it’s mathematics or physics or literature or psychology so that he can think quickly. He doesn’t get entangled in the whole subject matter. He goes, okay, what’s that about? What is the idea of confirmation basis about so that when I’m listening to John give me a pitch and he’s telling me why this thing is going to be successful, is he coming at it from a point of data or is it confirmation basis, because he’s travelled down that road into this niche or this industry.

So, he’s able to think far more quickly and it’s based in real data and real science. It’s a fantastic book and it’s just a really great read. People think it may be really dry, but it’s such a great book and then I think another great book that’s out there that I actually would attribute a good chunk of maybe my messaging that I had which was successful for the red brick video, it’s called Metaphorically Selling.

Most people wouldn’t have heard of it. It’s not like it’s a best seller, but the lady does such a great job of giving examples of how one speech without a metaphor and one speech with a metaphor connects. I mean, you were talking before about stories. Metaphors are just a micro story. You know, a very short sound byte for people. So, Metaphorically Selling is, I mean, I recommend that book to, I should probably – she should probably send me a commission checks, because I send all those darn books and maybe she has – it’s a great book and she’s a lovely, smart lady that wrote it.

John:

Well, you’ve given us so much valuable insights into how to sell through metaphors, how to look at the numbers and not focus on your potential, not get stuck in your ideas, to get out of the trough of despair. Is there any one final piece of advice you want to leave the listeners with?

Todd:

Continuously take action. That’s it. That’s just the hallmark of how you get yourself out of the trough of despair, just keep moving, and not defining where you’re at with where you’re going to be for the rest of your life. I mean, that’s not, because I want to be careful that we’re treating everyone as if we’re in this trough of despair, but just keep taking action and you never know what’s going to be around the next corner, you just don’t.

John:

That’ll be the final tweet, keep taking action. It’s that simple. Thank you so much for being on today Todd.

Todd:

John, I appreciate it. Thank you.

TSP032 | Charles Michael Yim – Transcription

Posted by John Livesay in Uncategorized | 0 comments

John Livesay:

Hi and welcome to The Successful Pitch podcast. Today’s guest is Charles Michael Yim, the CEO of Breathometer. You might know about Charles from watching him win Shark Tank. All five Sharks invested a million dollars in Charles’s idea. The first time ever, especially where he was pre-revenue and then he went on to be first place out of 10,000 startups competing for Sir Richard Branson’s startup contest before he got to go his island. He has an amazing story of success from coming out of Stanford having two other previously successful startups before he started Breathometer and now taking Breathometer beyond just testing to see if you have a high alcohol content to seeing if you have bad breath and other major health implications.

He talks about the difference between Mark Cuban and Richard Branson in this episode as well as his new book coming out where he takes you behind the scenes of what it’s like to be on Shark Tank as well as his proven ten-step guide. Enjoy the episode.

Hi and welcome to The Successful Pitch podcast. Today’s guest is Charles Michael Yim who is the CEO of Breathometer. You might know Charles from seeing him win on Shark Tank. Charles, welcome to the show.

Charles Michael Yim:

Hey, how’s it going? Glad to be apart of it.

John:

Thank you. We really appreciate you sharing your wisdom, your insights. One of the things that I really notice about someone like you is people see you on TV and they think, oh, overnight success and you’ve been doing this for quite a while and you had several successes before Breathometer and I think that’s really one of the keys that investors look for is serial entrepreneurs, because you have a certain tenacity and you learn a lot and all that good stuff. Can you speak to your background a little bit? I know you were at some other companies and huge success there as well?

Charles:

Sure, what you just said, right, you can’t just become an entrepreneur overnight. It’s more of a risk and reward scenario in that, you know, once you start, it’s kind of, I’d like to think, is hacking away, sort of hacking away at it. I think when you start 50% is complete, but I think climbing up the mountain, addressing adversities, you know, driving through a certain level of perseverance and tenacity and ambition.

That’s what kind of gets you pass the line and so, Breathometer, my current company is technically my third founding company and I built and sold my last two and so I’ve had a couple of successful exits. I would say my first company is where I kind of sharpen my teeth and that’s where I made several failures and many mistakes, but the important thing is you get back up and you learn from them and you do better the next time and ideally you do it fast enough where, you know, you can still survive whether your company can – where your business can still survive.

John:
What gave you the idea for Breathometer? You obviously you were always – you know, most entrepreneurs tell me we saw a problem and we wanted to solve it. Was it all about first helping people not drink and drive, right? That was before they get pulled over by the police they have to take a breath test.

Charles:

Right, right. I mean, in terms of inspiration it really came from Jack Dorsey’s wear product. If you’re familiar with it, it’s a pin and processing product geared towards businesses. I saw a dongle and I kind of connected the dots. You know, with the smartphone I thought to myself why couldn’t I just switch out the sensor inside for a bio-sensor instead and apply towards essentially an alcohol breathalyzer kind of product, value proposition. I used it back in college and I always aired on the side of safety and so anyway, I put two and two together. Consulted with a few trusted friends. Next thing you know I had a working, breathing prototype within about three months.

John:

What I love about that story, Charles, is you didn’t have to reinvent the wheel from scratch. You actually got inspired by someone else’s startup. What a great story. I love it and say, well, how can I make this better and what’s also fascinating to me, please correct me if I’m wrong, but from what I understand is you’ve taken Breathometer to way more than just making sure your alcohol level, it’s actually helping people make sure they don’t have bad breath. Who doesn’t need that, right?

Charles:

Yeah, there’s quite a few applications that breath can apply to. I think about 6 months into it, I started collaborating and connecting and partnering up with Stanford university alma mater as well Cleveland Clinic and Cleveland Clinic by in far basically has basically the most advanced breath analysis lab that I would think, that I’ve seen at least and anyway, breath analysis as actually been a science for quite some time. A lot of consumers aren’t aware, but there’s breathalyzer-type machines in these. I mean, they can cost as much as a quarter million and up and you typically need, you know, a prescription and some extra added fees, you can have access to one, but it ranges in terms of applications.

Everything from allergens, gastrointestinal issues, asthma, it really goes on and on and for us, we start with alcohol, but then we’re venturing into true medical or digital health applications like oral health, like health and fitness, being able to detect certain levels of fat burning through one’s body, but again, all through breath, because breath has roughly about three hundred biomarkers which by at least 25% are applicable towards human conditions.

John:

So, all the people who are buying Fitbit and keeping track of their calories could also be buying your product to keep track of their fat burning through their breath analysis for ketosis and things?

Charles:

Correct and you don’t even have to worry about calorie counting anymore, right, or quite frankly how many steps you are taking. Yeah, could you pair it with a Fitbit product or some type of step tracker, sure, but if anyone really knows health and fitness, it really boils down to 80% of what you’re eating versus 20% in terms of your workout.

So, if you nail down your diet and you’re not necessarily calorie counting, but understanding how much fat you’re really burning and optimizing that, essentially that’s the holy grail, right, that’s how you really shedding pounds and staying at a certain optimal and healthy fitness range.

John:

I think that’s what’s going to be partly responsible, if not a lot, of the incredible growth that you’ve already had. What I saw was that the growth for Breathometer was in 2013 you were, let’s see here, 2014 you were at $4 million and then you project 2016 to be at $14 million, is that accurate?

Charles:

Yeah. That’s right.

John:

I mean, that’s phenomenal growth and obviously it’s not just from awareness from Shark Tank although there’s a great story there of you were pre-revenue from the video I saw, right, before you went on Shark Tank?

Charles:

Correct. We were pre-revenue. We’ve been revenue-generating for quite some time and so next will be an even bigger year. Now we’re launching our third product and we’re already working on our forth and we already have our 5th and RND phase. All different, again, geared towards different applications, not just alcohol.

John:

What’s interesting about you on so many levels is you’ve broken history multiple times. You were the first person on Shark Tank to get all five sharks to invest with you and what’s interesting is they all said you checked off all the boxes, right. You had a great product, you knew your numbers, you were a great business person, and you were doing something that was great for society, so everybody felt good about investing in that. I mean that’s quite – did you know before you went in there that you were checking off all those boxes or is that just who you are and the way you’ve done business in the past.

Charles:

Yeah, it’s the latter. I didn’t have a necessarily checklist going in there. I mean, I would say I definitely did my fair share of preparation. I definitely made sure I knew my numbers and I run a pretty tight ship so I knew my business inside out, so I was well prepared and I think as most people kind of define luck, it was a little part of luck in it, right, where when the opportunity arises, you’re prepared and so you can take advantage of the opportunity. There was a lot of preparation that I think was key.

So, in terms of product, I mean, obviously there’s bias, but I definitely feel it’s compelling and in all that I’ve experienced and of course there’s a great cause behind it, so I think yeah, there’s a combination of factors, but a good portion of being prepared and the rest kind of being a right fit.

John:

One of my favorite quotes is from Arthur Ashe who said the key to success is confidence and the key to confidence is preparation. I’d love to have you share with our listeners what kind of preparation did you do before you went to pitch Shark Tank and what do you now before you pitch investors?

Charles:

Sure. I think with Shark Tank, which was very acute to Shark Tank was, you know, I actually met with quite a few successful fellow Shark Tank entrepreneurs that have already been on the show and did well, start interviewing them, right, and understanding are these investors are actually the real deal. Can they really add value to your business? Pro-tips if you will prior to be on the show, but in terms of just what I do in general.

I mean, I’ve been in the board room several times. Again, as a third company, I overall probably closed over $50-60 million dollars in funding, VC funding, single-handedly. So, I’ve been around the valley and I think in terms of just being prepared and knowing – anticipating questions investors will ask, that’s extremely key.

John:

Yes.

Charles:

And so, I have a pretty good head on my shoulders now and I think that just comes along with, as you say, preparation and that build confidence, but in addition to that, just having the experience underneath your belt. When you’ve been around the block a few times, you know, it gets easier, it gets easier, for sure.

John:

Those questions include everything from what does it cost to acquire a customer to what’s your vision, right, there’s so many questions to be prepared for and anticipate. I want to brag about you. You closed $2 million in 2013 and now you’re going for $20 million. Is that accurate?

Charles:

That’s right.

John:

That’s…

Charles:

Yeah, we already closed a good chunk of it already. More than 50-60% and we’re closing the rest of it now.

John:

And when you go from that kind of $2 million to $20 million. That’s such an incredible growth and obviously based on huge success, do you get different questions when you’re going for $20 million than you do when you’re going for $2?

Charles:

Certainty you do. Definitely, right. You know, especially when you have a company that changes from, transitions from pre-revenue to revenue, right. At that point, you know pre-revenue is more about product validation and ultimately product launch and assessing the risk points of the company in terms of at least being able to at least ship the product, right. Then when you’re in the second phase where we are is series A, it’s user acquisition cost.

Like, how much does it cost to bring on a user. What’s the LTV and lifetime value of the customer? What’s the cohort analysis look like? So, how long are you retaining your customers and how long are they staying with you, right, and are they happy? Are they satisfied and if they’re not, you got to quickly address them, right, and then additionally what’s your roadmap and do you have the team that can support that? Do you have the engineering? Do you have the product? Do you have the financial assets or foundations to be able to support something like that? What are the markets you are targeting? Who is truly your demographic? Who is your customer at the end of the day, right, so you need to know quite a bit more about your product or products and your customers and then mechanics and foundation of your business, because at that point you no longer an infant.

You’re not like a toddler and I would say we are in the transition and the interesting phase where we’re a toddler now, but we’re massively transitioning to become a true teenager. So, there’s different certain level of expectations based on a lot of growth stages that you’re in and there’s always good and bad with that, right.

There’s going to be natural pain points, there’s going to be grown pains and so scaling a business, hiring quick enough, but hiring quality individuals that can truly add value to the business, finding the right investors, support partners, and dealing with distribution, international scaling, localization, regulatory. We’re a medical company at the end of the day, so we have to deal with the FDA, so there’s complaint regulations we have to address, legalities, right.

So, there’s a ton of stipulations that we have to go through and you know, it’s just a complete different set of questions from where we once were first airing on Shark Tank. So, it’s a different ballgame and just to remind you, you know, we are truly a Silicon Valley company at heart. When I say Silicon Valley, what I refer to and what that means to me is that we’re very much a technology company and we’re a combination of both hardware and software and I think Shark Tank, if at all, gave us a considerable boost, but you know, we’re an atypical company in terms of how we’ve gone to where we’ve gone and kind of the momentum we’ve built so far.

John:

Can you speak a little bit about the team? I saw on your LinkedIn profile, you know, you have some of the same people from your previous successful companies working with you again, so obviously there’s great synergy there when you have your team following you and you guys have a shortcut. You know, they know what you expect from them and vice verse and that’s so important for investors is who is the team and you mentioned it. Anything you can do about how you find your good team? How you keep them from company to company?

Charles:

Yeah. That’s a great question. I think repetition is pretty key, right. You need to be able to treat your people and your team members well. I think there’s a certain level of mutual respect there. I think naturally it’s going to lead to basically a kind of, I would say clan, if you will. A group of you that kind of go from one company to the other and creating success at one place and then hopefully repeating that, right, making that a recurring situation.

So, yeah, I think it’s a lot about that. It’s just great teamwork, team synergy and treating each other with an equal amount of respect and I think that naturally occurs and the second part of that, just team building. You know, I think that’s probably one of the most important assets or talents that one founder can have when you’re building a company, because if you for instance don’t know certain aspect or you don’t have an in-house expertise on it on a particular topic for a business, maybe you don’t know, but you could hire someone that does, right. So, you can hire, believe it or not, a lot of way out of your problems as startups. So, if you don’t know it, bring someone in-house and they’ll figure it out for you.

John:

So, we’re going to tweet that. I love that so much. The teamwork is built on respect and collaboration, which is really what you’re saying is collaborate with people who have skills maybe you don’t have and then everything is stronger than it was before. It’s really fantastic insights. Let’s talk about not only – do all five Sharks engage with you equally while you have that many investors?

Charles:

No, I think it’s more on an as needed basis. When I first got funding and it was from all five at the very beginning, it was yeah, pretty much all five cylinders pumping at the same time. It’s pretty tense, but once you start scaling to a series A and when you establish a rapport and built up the relationship, you know, it’s more on an as needed basis and we’re no longer that little tiny company that we once were, right.

So, now it’s basically on demand kind of basis more so than anything. We have now institutional investors that are involved, you know, hence why we have a much larger round and in addition to that we have a formal board now, which is very different, so I’m not the only one just kind of calling the shots. I have a legitimate board that come from the institutional investor side that help kind of mandate policy and make decisions with me.

John:

You know, we haven’t even gotten to your other big accomplishment which is winning first place out of 10,000 other startups with Sir Richard Branson. Congratulations on that. So you have Richard Branson and Mark Cuban backing you. I would think that’s quite a nice calling card for investors. Tell us a little bit about the Sir Richard Branson experience?

Charles:

Yeah, so Richard Branson, it was more of his version of Shark Tank, if you will, and it’s an opportunity for the community to basically, I would say add fuel to the fire, so if you already had something going like Breathometer did at the very time we entered the competition, it basically acted as a catalyst and expedited our growth. So, we were exposed to a lot of investors. That’s kind of what lead to our series A and a lot of basically partnership opportunities as well. You had a lot of opportunity to interface with Richard Branson himself, his team, was able to go on his private island, Necker, so that was pretty cool. I’ve been twice since.

So, it’s just a phenomenal opportunity to meet great people, really exposed the brand to a great community and there was just nothing but kind of give, give, give and take, take, take in terms of just a mutual exchange and so, yeah, overall it was a great experience and probably had equally as difficult if not more difficult odds in terms of coming through, but pleasantly surprised took first place. It was an amazing ride.

John:

I bet. What advise did Mark Cuban and Sir Richard Branson give you? I would assume they have different points of view and since you’re one of the few people who is fortunate enough to able to know them both. I would love to her your insights and how they compare.

Charles:

Yeah. I can tell you what I was able to take away from each so far. I think what I get from Mark Cuban, you know, he’s a very much of an entrepreneur/investor type that is all about building a business, right, doing the grind and just getting things done, right. I definitely got that from him. At the end of the day, he just wants to make sure that you’re doing your best and you’re building a real business.

I think what I get from Richard Branson is creating authentic genuine value. We have for instances a potential application for lung cancer and he was really just focused on that. He’s like, great you can build businesses, a lot of people do build businesses, but if you really have a lung cancer application, I mean, you talk about really saving lives and so I think what I got from him was just kind of the bigger picture in that contributing back to the community, contributing back to the world. Doing something great while building something that you’re passionate about. That’s the winning formula there, right.

John:

Building something great while making a difference in the world. We’re going to tweet that out. That’s a great line. I love it. It’s really helpful and as if that’s not enough, you were also going to be an author. Tell us about your upcoming book.

Charles:

Yeah, so I’m writing a book. It’s going to be three parts and my inspiration was from the show because, you know, after airing on the show now I’ve been apart of five episodes and soon to be airing on a spin-off show Beyond The Tank as well. I’ve developed a public personal, if you will, so I get approached quite a bit in public and I have parents coming up to me saying hey, you inspired my kid to start his on business and blah, blah, blah or they want to learn from you and so anyway it got me thinking in that, hey, maybe there’s something to hear and that inspired me to write a book and the title may be something like Making of a Shark, you know, meaning that if you kind of take some of the tips that I provide, you know, perhaps you can build something of your own and so anyway it’s three parts.

It’s part one kind of my bio background. It’s kind of brief background of me and how I came to be as a lemonade stand kid to a full entrepreneur. Part two is kind of my behind the scenes behind Shark Tank and then Richard Branson’s tech challenge and part three where I think the majority of value in the book is kind of my ten step guide, if you will, of how to come up with an idea, how to validate the idea, go to product discovery whether it be product or service. You know, get investment for it whether it be crowd funding or personal investors and then taking it and releasing it to market, right, and then eventually scaling it.

So, this is kind of a proven formula, if you will, that I’ve done personally with my last three companies so I know what works, but I broken it – I’ve distilled it down to very simple points where any average consumer, someone from middle America can pick it up and read it and go run with it, right. So, it’s my way of just kind of give back. I think it’s great if you’re successful, but if you can give back a little bit, that’s when the win is and so I’m being repped by one of the top agencies in Hollywood, they’re called APA, yeah, so they’ve done Kim Kardashian, they’ve done Restaurant Impossible. They’ve done, you know, Gordon Ramsey, they’ve done a bunch of stuff and so, anyway, they’re repping me at this point. So, once we pick up a publisher then I’ve already started writing a book, so we’ll probably launching then in the next I would say 8-9-10 months.

John:

How exciting. It sounds like a great content. It’s got enough celebrity hook, the behind the scenes with two major people with Mark Cuban and Sir Richard Branson and then the actual meat and potatoes. One of the things that jumped out at me when you were describing the book which I want to pre-order the minute it is available is the idea, so many people have so many ideas, how do you know or any tips you can give us in advance of your book, how do you know that this is the right idea to really pursue? Do you test it with crowd funding or do you test it with consumers or check out the competition, what’s your criteria for knowing that, this case, you know, Breathometer was going to be the right idea?

Charles:

Yeah, speaking of which, right, like you hit a lot of the main points. Again, it’s essentially you need to one, validate the idea, right, and that can be done through crowdfunding, secondarily you need to do research, figure out what the market size is like, you know, is there a predicate device, is there a market, and so the third part of it is what truly is the potential penetration or traction of it. So, anyway, those are kind of three of some of kind of the primary characteristics or profile requirements, but if you see and recognize a potential, then at that point it’s a matter of execution. So, yep.

John:

Great. I also know that you are involved with the Stanford StartX Accelerator program, which is another way of giving back obviously. You must hear a lot of great pitches just to get into those accelerator programs is extremely competitive, almost like trying to get on Shark Tank, right, the number of people who apply and the number of people who get in. I’ve recently been the pitch mentor at StartFast in New York, so I know that experience, but I would love to hear your insights as what’s it like working with the Stanford Accelerator?

Charles:

Yeah, so like you said, it’s a tough accelerator. I entered, applied, being a Stanford alumni and that’s one of the main requirements, but aside from that, you need to have a legitimate idea or product or service. Anyway, if you are selected, like you said it’s tough, then you can go to the acceleration program. So, we did that and we did well. We gained a Chief Medical Officer. We got funding from Stanford University, so that was nice and now we’re working with them on the essentially respiratory side of things.

So, moving forward, I now, like you said give back. I’m actually now a mentor for the Stanford StartX Accelerator personally. I do get exposed to quite a few pitches. I think my two cents there is a lot of people get really caught in the, hey, I’ve got a cool idea and it sounds really cool and what if it was this, what if it was that, I think my advice there is I always and this is in my book again, that you should think about when you create a company or product or service for that matter is always look through the lens of a problem-solution framework, so what I mean by that is your target should be are you solving a real problem, right, and if you are and you have an innovative and a legitimate solution, you will have more than likely built a product or service that can provide real value and if you do that’s when you have a basis for a company or a business, but I find too often that, you know, I would say beginner entrepreneurs that just go out in the world wanting to create something but in actuality they’re just creating something that doesn’t mean that they’re generating or I should say, create a business, right.

John:

Right. I mean that’s incredible valuable. Who do you help and what problem do you solve are two of the key questions that I think startups need to have in their head before they ever get to an accelerator let alone an investor and be able to say this isn’t just something that’s fun, it’s actually solving problem. So, in addition to your upcoming book, are there any other books that you’d like to recommend to startups?

Charles:

Yeah, that’s a good question. I am a big fan of Guy Kawasaki. That’s actually how I broke into the startup world. He has a book called Art of The Start that’s pretty big for me. Let’s see, I think Eric Ries has a pretty good book. It’s called Lean Startup. He kind of gives you an idea of how to run lean and mean and kind of the fundamentals of running a startup and surviving and then there’s also Tim Ferriss, right, 4 Hour Work Week.

I’m a big firm believer in working smart and obviously working hard, but working smart goes a lot further than working hard, so believe it or not, I run this company and probably in the middle of launching another company and it’s just juggling the two axes where if you can get your current company or the company you’re working on to a stable state, a manageable state where you know you have senior management and at that point it’s self-significant and you are really delegating responsibilities, then potentially you’re at a point where you can actually start something else and make the best use of your time and staying active, right, it’s all about a juggle act and it really comes down to how good you are at multitasking and so I think that’s pretty key.

John:

I love it. How can our listeners follow you, be sure they know when your book comes out, Twitter, LinkedIn, what’s the best way to keep track of, you know, you have a blog or anything that you want people to read?

Charles:

Yeah, so I’m pretty active on social media. I have a pretty significant following, especially after airing on Shark Tank and what have you. So, I am quite often pretty active on Facebook. You can find under CharlesMichaelYim. I technically go with my middle name as well. On Instagram, Twitter, I’m always under CharlesMYim.

So, you can follow me on there. Otherwise, you know, there’s always constantly I’m always in on the news or on TV with Squawk Box and CNBC and then potentially CNN soon and what have. Shark Tank and now Beyond the Tank. So, you can follow me on TV as well and I’m constantly involved in blogs whether it be TechCrunch or Mashable or Venture Beat.

John:

Fantastic. Charles. I can’t thank you enough for being on the podcast today and sharing your wisdom. Congratulations on all your success. We’re looking forward to your new book and watching you on Beyond the Tank and other shows as well.

Charles:

Cool, awesome.

John:

Thanks again.

Charles:

Thank you.