I Asked Robert Herjavec How He Made $500 Million

0:00 Excuse me, sir. How did you get rich? I sold my first company for 30 million. I just sold my last one for many, many, many, many hundreds of millions. So, you're rich rich. Oh, I'm not rich. I'm wealthy. Excuse me, sir. Is this your Rolls-Royce? Oh, this guy. Yeah. How did you get Rolls-Royce rich, man? This is incredible. I sold a television network to News Corp for a lot of money. More than $10 million. More than 10 million. I did the first Herbal Viagra, the biggest seller GNC ever had at the time. What was the biggest shoot you ever had? What was the most amount of money you made in a year? About 17 million. What did you do to be able to get a cullin in? Oh man, I'm an investor, man. I invest in education. Education. Absolutely. What type of education? Higher education. So, I buy schools and I own higher ed institution, a college. Yeah. If you lost everything tomorrow, could you make it all back? Yeah. Yeah. No doubt. I would start an AI company.

0:45 AI is the greatest opportunity in our lifetime. You're 62 today. If you die tomorrow, if you could give me one more guiding principle to leave with the younger generation, what would that be? Mark my words. This is about to be one of the greatest videos that you've ever watched. Guys, I just flew into Beverly Hills to meet up with and interview the 9 figureure business legend and mogul Robert Hersik from Shark Tank. Guys, he is one of the wealthiest people in Los Angeles right now. And I'm going to be getting the secrets from him on how he built his empire, became wealthy, and how you can do the exact same thing. I'm getting the exact secrets he took to get rich in today's world. So stay tuned from start to finish. With that being said, let's get this video on the way. All [Music]

1:33 right, you guys. So, we're going to be meeting up with Robert very shortly. But before we do that, guys, since we're in Beverly Hills, one of the wealthiest zip codes, and not just the United States, but the entire world. We're going to go ask some of the people that are out here what they did to become wealthy. And I'm going to be going up to people in Rolls-Royces and some of the craziest cars to figure out how they got rich and how you can do the exact same thing. Come on. Hey, dude. How about this guy right here? Are we going to get him real quick? Should we try him? That's my dad. You should be for real. All right, come on. Let's go. Let's get it. Hey, if he doesn't want to do it, you got to get him to do it. Okay. Hey, sir. How did you get rich? Oh, man. Not rich, man. What kind of business are you in? I'm in the uh fitness and health and wellness. What do you What do you What do you do? I'm Jake by Jake. James. Nice to meet you, sir. All right, man. Good to meet you. Wait, real quick. Big fan of yours, man. Can I interview you for a minute real quick? Sure. Good. So, are you a business owner? I sure am. Well, how long you been an entrepreneur? I've been an entrepreneur since I'm 18 years old. How do you know? You know, I'm 67 now.

2:21 You're not 67? Yes. Is it safe to say? It's a smooth talk. Come on. Let's see the biceps. They're They're there. But they're not there yet though. Come on. It's safe to say though, money stays in shape. It definitely does. It does. It does. But you know what though? Health is wealth. It really is. Do you think a lot of entrepreneurs neglect their health? I think look, the most important thing in life is about taking shots. It really is. You take a lot of risks my whole career. And the most important thing is you have to have a partner who's with you all the way. And my wife has stood with me since the day we got married. And that's the most important thing. When you first met her, when you were dating her early on, how did you know that that was your life partner? What did you see? You just know, man. You know what? You just know. You really do. It's It's like the first house I bought. You walk in and you go, "This This is my house. I've lived my life on emotion and you never look back." Because as an entrepreneur, you win a bunch, you lose a bunch. And I've been

3:06 blessed to win a little bit more than I've lost. But the most important thing is at the end of the day, you don't want to wake up when you're 60 or 70 or 80 years old and look in the mirror and say, you know, at 20 I had this idea. At 30 I had an idea. And you didn't do it. Because that's the kind of stuff that makes you crazy. I always say that the most valuable piece of real estate is in graveyards because there's billion-dollar ideas in the ground of people that never took action. One last thing. No is halfway to Yes. God bless. I need a couple more with you real quick. What was the most amount of money you made in a year? Like I sold a television network to News Corp for a lot of money called Fit TV. Give me a range. How How much was it? Put it this way. A whole lot more than my allowance was when I was 12 years old. More than $10 million. Or the 10 million. More than 100. So So real quick real quick. Real quick. Did you come from a rich family? Listen, man. I came from a really awesome middle-class family. I

3:52 was born in Brooklyn, raised in Baldwin, Strong Island, and I've been very blessed to be able to pass it on now to teach my kids. I have four kids, and it's Father's Day, I'm going to go back and hang out with my wife and my kids. Your son's right here. Let me ask you this. You're 67. Let's say me and you die tomorrow, but you could leave one more guiding principle to your son to become successful like yourself and become the best version of himself. What's that last guiding principle you would give to your son? I'll give you this, brother. My house burned down in the Palisades fire. Okay? And you think in life, especially here on Rodeo Drive, that we're all defined by material things. And that's not the case. It's really what are you made of? And that's the question I'm going to leave you with and everybody who watches you cuz you talk a lot about making dough. But more importantly is what are you made of? And that's it. And one more for you. Somebody trying to grow their business and exit for more than $10 million. Your best aunt. Don't take no for an answer,

4:38 man. Believe in yourself. Did you have people that doubted you? Every single day, man. It's not was an overweight kid with a bad stutter. My dad bought me a set of weights at 13. I love when people say no. As I said, no is halfway to yes. Take that to the bank. Got amazing advice, man. Thank you so much, man. Have a great day, man. I appreciate Hey, hey, he just killed that [ __ ] man. Yeah. Hey, hey, if if he has a handle, DM me and Z, I can tag him, bro. I watch you all the time. Absolutely, bro. Hey, that was just an incredible interview, man. Beverly Hills is going crazy. We got to go get this next one, you guys. Come on. Looks like he's pulling up in a Rolls-Royce cullinin to the valet. So, we're going to go up and try and get this interview for you guys. Come on. Excuse me, sir. Sir, is this your Rolls-Royce? Yeah. You got an interview for one minute real quick? Is that cool? Yeah, why not, man? What's up? Is that all right? I got I got the biggest like business media channel in the world.

5:24 I'll show you real quick. We do stuff with like Shaq. We just did a Oh, man. That's cool. Bunch of people. So, like what did you do to be able to get a culling in? Oh, man. I'm an investor, man. I invest in education. Education. Absolutely. What type of education? Higher education. So, I buy schools and I own higher ed institution, a college that specializes in early education, man. Yeah. Where what's the name of it? Carl's bad man. It's Theora Technical College. We're out of Carlsbad, California. So, buying universities, is that like a profitable business model to buy in today's world or if you love what you do? Yeah. And then that's what I do. So, I I found a way to mirror my passion and make a little money as doing it, too. So, man, I love what I do. So, you're an investor. What's the number one thing that you look for in either a founder or a company when you're deciding to make that investment? It's three things really. It's either people, processes, or profitability. Most companies have two out of three. If I can have value, then you get me. If not,

6:10 then I'll try to help you as much as I can so you can push your own agenda. Did you come from a lot of money? No, man. I come from nothing. I come from humble beginning. What was the most amount of money you made in a single year? About 17 million. 17 mil. What happened that year? Honestly, uh, the world crashed, right? Pandemic. This is Yeah. And we just doubled down. And for all my friends and companies that I would invest in at the time that I didn't even own, but I just showed them how to make theelves better and take opportunity and make some money doing it. So, when everybody's fearful, that's when you're like, "This is the time to jump in." Absolutely. Have you met a lot of billionaires? I have, man. A lot of people make a lot more money than me, man. Yeah. What have you learned from those people? You don't have to be the smartest person in the room. Obama used to have something we call Obama effect, right? Obama always surrounded himself by all the smartest people around to make an educated decision. But he was never the smartest man in the room. Very likable, though. He got those right people around him, though. Yeah, that

6:56 was the thing. So, if you take that model of saying, "Okay, man. I'm going to put all y'all together and I'm going to speak last." That way, you always get your agenda across and everybody feels opinionated. Everybody actually has a voice and everybody feels like they're contributing. Do you have anybody that doubted you when you were coming up? Every last one of them. Every last one of them. Everybody said, "Hey man, you can't do that. You can own a school. What? Nobody does that. But what people don't understand behind every university, every college, per se. There's somebody who owned it at one point. There's no board, you know, it's always a individual. Somebody had a dream. So, you didn't give a [ __ ] about what anybody else thought. That's actually true. I mean, I tried to stay within the lanes, but I had to do what? And my my team that I had with me, you know, believed in me and that's that's really the biggest thing. Was there a conversation you had when when somebody really doubted you or went against you that you were surprised about? Yeah, my own family. You think your family would be the biggest supporter, but there's always naysayers in everywhere you go. And um I had to be able to be strong

7:42 enough to understand that not everybody's going to see my vision. It'd be the ones you love always. But today they're my biggest fans. You got amazing advice, my friend. I mean, I appreciate you. Thank you for your time and me. Absolutely. Can I get your number? Is that cool? You can get my number. Okay, I got you. I got you. I got you. Guys, Beverly Hills has been insane. And we're headed to go interview the legend Robert Hersc from Shark Tank very soon. But listen, a billionaire once told me that a deal doesn't exist unless it's signed. And you'd be shocked how many entrepreneurs end up losing deals because their signing process is all types of messed up and outdated. But that's why I use ODU. ODU signature apps lets you customize, send, and sign documents online fast. You can add multiple signers, drag and drop signature fields, and set the signing order in seconds. It works on any device, and every step is tracked and legally compliant in over 100 countries, including the US and Europe. You can even store everything in one place with

8:29 unlimited storage and send auto reminders so no one forgets about the deal. And you want to know the best part, guys? It's completely free for life with your first app. So, if you're serious about business and closing deals, then try ODO today for free. All you have to do is go down and click the link in the description of this video. With that being said, let's go get this next interview. Excuse me, sir. Is this your Rolls-Royce? Oh, this guy. Yeah. What's your name again? James, man, the School of Hard Knocks, man. James, I I love I love your show. Thank you, man. You're from Austin, right? Yes, sir. Austin, Texas, down there with the Longhorns. How did you get Rolls-Royce rich, man? This is incredible. Oh, we're just lucky. We're lucky people. So, you believe in luck. A lot of successful people have become lucky. Oh, yeah. We were crazy hard workers. But uh what line of business were you in? We're promoters. We got in the health business a long time ago. I did the first herbal Viagra was the biggest seller GNC ever had at the time. Are you serious? Yeah,

9:15 it was in what 98. So we've been doing a lot of stuff. We're in the tele medicine business now. But uh not doing as good as you. I love watching your show. I saw you talking to uh Tom Cruz. That's my guy. Yes, sir. So many guys. I want to learn from you real quick. Somebody's trying to find a winning product in whatever industry they're in. What advice would you give to them? You found a product that was able to generate you tens, hundreds of millions of dollars throughout your career. How can somebody find a winning product in today's world? Hey, just keep your eyes open. Read a lot, talk to people, network, but just read a lot, think a lot. So, you got a lot of books. A gazillion books. What's the number one book that you give to any entrepreneur to read in today's any entrepreneur to read? Think and grow rich. And of course, Dan Kennedy's ultimate sales letter. I remember I read that in a hotel bathroom one night. Read it all night. Ch. Yeah, it was a great one. This is my genius wife. What you really need to do is find a beautiful French girl that can do anything and listen to all your nonsense. Then you're

10:01 good to go. What was the biggest year you ever had? What was the most amount of money you made in a year? Hundreds of millions of dollars. Hundreds of millions of dollars. Did you have anybody that doubted you early on? Yeah, sure. Everybody, of course. Trust me, there's all We're in Beverly Hills. There's all these little wise guys around that were killing me. You know, I, you know, just killing us. But yeah, you just keep your head down. You keep moving forward. And hey, we'll see. Were you ever afraid to go into a competitive market? No, not not at all. No, no, not not at all. The more competitive something is, that means there's an opportunity to do stuff. Yeah. You want to go to something where everybody's selling. It's like if you're going to put a gas station, the best place to put a gas station is next to another gas station. So, so talking about you see a competitive market. How do you go in and stand out? What's your unique selling angle? What's your unique selling proposition? When we came out with the herbal Viagra, it was the first herbal Viagra. We did a prostate infomercial with Larry King and we found this crazy product over in Europe that was like

10:47 it's a very different way of processing herbs. You got to find something different. There's a million guys selling the same nonsense. You have to find something different. So, you're selling biography. Look at this kid. My goodness. He's printing money to this kid. What are you like 17 years old? 18 years old. 23. There we go. Same thing. What's the difference? How old are you? 62. You look great for 62. Oh, thanks. If you die tomorrow and you had one more guiding principle to leave with me so that way I can become successful like you at 62 years old. Just keep doing what you're doing. You're hustling. It's a Sunday afternoon. It's Father's Day and what are you doing? You're not sleeping. You're not resting. You're out trying to make dough. You're trying to make things happen. You're snooping around. This is probably a great place. There's a little car show going on. Go talk to those people. No, keep keep hustling. Keep your eyes open. Keep thinking big. Think big. Just think big and never ever, no matter what, quit. Don't ever quit. We've been punched in the head so many times it's not even funny. You guys are doing great.

11:34 It's so funny. I I I look at your stuff all the time. Very interesting. You ask great questions and uh I saw you had Will Smith the other day and uh so many of these gazillionaire guys. Thank you so much for your time. I appreciate guys. The time has come. I'm headed right now to walk over and interview the legend, the business mogul from Shark Tank, Robert Hersec, to figure out how he built and sold his company for tens of millions of dollars and how you can become rich, real money rich just like him in today's world and the secrets that he took to become wealthy. Let's go meet him and go see what he has to say. Come on, Robert. How you doing? Great. Great to meet you. Likewise. Happy to be out here. Thanks for coming to meet us, man. Really appreciate that. Nice to meet you. Did you call me sir? What the [ __ ] What was Tom Cruz like? He was awesome. He was super cool. Here's the thing. I got one rule. No holding back. I want you to give them

12:20 the secrets to becoming wealthy. Can we make that happen? Who am I here with today? Robert Herbat. The Shark Tank. For those that don't know, what industry did you decide to pursue a career in? I'm one of the biggest people in the world in cyber security and now AI. But you've been in the business since like 1990 was when you started your first company. I'm actually 95 years old, but I work out a lot. I look great. No, I've been doing it for a long time since I was 21. That was earlier in a time where there was a lot of doubt about the internet, about the future of cyber security. What did you see early on that made you want to pursue this business? You can get rich by following a trend. You can get wealthy by creating a trend. So, I got ahead of the cyber security internet world. Did you come from a lot of money? No, man. We were like very melodramatic. I came to Canada on a boat. My parents crossed the border in the middle of the night. I mean, it was just a classic rags through riches story. So, what was your turning point

13:05 to financial freedom? Great question. Cuban and I had this conversation one time and Cuban said when he was 12 years old he wanted to be rich. When I was 12 years old I didn't want to be poor. That was my motivation. I think in life you're either highly motivated and I wasn't or really bad stuff happens to you and you got to make a decision. Either you accept your life or you change. Nothing changes if nothing changes. Nothing changes unless you change. I love that. That that's bar right there. If you're not willing to do something different today, you're going to lead the life you had yesterday. That's fire right there. So throughout your career, what was the most amount of money you made in a single year? 500 million. But that included the sale of a business in capital gains. On an income basis, I probably $18 million on an income basis. But here's the key. You can get very rich making income. It's very hard to get wealthy making a big

13:52 income. You got to have capital gains. You got to build something of value that you can sell. Have you ever been [ __ ] over in business? Oh my god. My first company, I had this lady who worked for me. She quit and then she started crying. And I'm like, "Oh my gosh, I'm such a great boss." She's sat to lead. She says to me on the way out, "Your sales manager has a company on the side and he's stealing from you. He's bringing one order in and then putting another order into his own company. He was steal literally stealing from me for a year. I had no idea." How do you deal with that when you find a cancer in the company? How did you address that at the moment? Or maybe something you learn from that if somebody's dealing with a similar circumstance in their business that they're running. Barbara told me this a long time ago. People assume when you're successful that you don't have bad days. Barbara said this to me, "The difference between successful people and others is how long they wallow in misery." So what did I do? I felt really sorry for myself. I cried. I mean, I

14:39 swear to God, I cried. I'm like, "Oh my god, I'm losing money." And you know what I did 5 minutes later? I said, "Fuck it. I just got to get up and I got to do it again." It reminds me Elon Musk says that entrepreneurship is like eating glass and staring into the abyss. It's so true. You know, Elon said to me one time, I said to him, "I heard a rumor that you're a micromanager." And he said, "Absolutely not true. I'm not a micromanager. I'm a nano manager. As a multi-figure entrepreneur, what is the best financial advice you've ever received? Maybe very contradictory cuz I'm not a I'm not a big investor in stocks and that I have a lot of money in stocks, but real estate. Charlie Mer said to me one time, "If you want to become rich in life, never sell a house. Always keep every house." I've never lost money on real estate. Do you have to have a lot of money to start creating wealth in real estate? No. You have to be able to hang on to it. So, if you can hang on to a property for 10 years, for

15:26 sure you'll make money. The problem is from liquidity if you have to sell it within 10 years. Are you a good salesman? Oh, I'm a great salesman. Give me your best sales advice right here. You've been at the table with some very heavy hitters, but you sold to massive companies. Give me a quick sales master class right here. Before I teach you to sell, tell me who I'm selling to. Biggest mistake people make in sales is they have a pitch and they apply that pitch to every single person. Before I open my mouth, before I tell you how great my product or I am, I got to know who you are. I got to know your need before you sell. Find out the need. What's more important in the business world? What you know or who you know? what you know absolute [ __ ] When I started out in business, my mom was a receptionist. My dad swept floors in a factory. Every person I knew in business said this [ __ ] advice to me. It's not what you know, it's who you know. And in order to make money, you need money. I was screwed. I was 23 years old

16:13 starting with nothing. If you don't know anybody, you got to become the person other people want to know cuz successful people aren't just going to go spend their time with somebody. I always like to say that you want to network with successful people. Become successful. You want to network when you provide something of value. Build your own brand. Other people will come to you. Among yourself and the most highly successful people that you study and know, what is that one trait that they all have in common? Obsession. Obsession. Absolutely. Motivation is easy. Passion is easy. But all that stuff fades. Obsession lasts. I've never met somebody ultra successful who doesn't absolutely love what they do. They're a little crazy. Oh yeah. You got to be a little crazy. You have to have the ability to see not the way the world is, but you have to have the ability to see the world for what you want to make it. And that's either obsession or

17:00 you're just crazy. Is it safe to say that you've lost your mind a little bit? Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's why I work out so much. I have to keep my sanity. Yeah. How old are you? 62. You don't look 62. What's the secret to looking this young at 62 years old? They say money stays in shape and you're, you know, living proof of it. We're just talking about this today. The biggest flex of wealth today is being in shape. It's not a nice car. It's not a new jet. Although those things are super cool, it's staying in shape. If you're not using your money to stay healthy, what's the point? How many companies have you invested in? 40 50 through Shark Tank. What is the best industry somebody should be looking to get into in today's world? It depends if you if you're starting with money, if you're not starting with money. If you're starting with money, you have to use capital as a leverage as a barrier to entry to others. So, commercial buildings, data centers are really big now. land, that

17:45 kind of stuff. If you have no money, e-commerce, I mean, well, because you don't need They say it's saturated, though. No, I don't think so. I don't think it is. It depends on your brand. I think it's easy to build a brand today online. You invest in people or ideas? People always a great person can make a bad idea good. A bad person can take a great business and completely screw it up. I love that. I have to ask you, one of my favorite pieces of content I've ever seen on the internet is you talking about beware of the man in the t-shirt. I love that. Oh, thank you. Can you break that down for people that may not have seen that before? Mark Cuban was on our show. This was his last year. And when I first met him, I love to dress well. Love a good suit. And I meet Mark. He's dressed in a t-shirt like a slob. I walk by his trailer and literally he's got this $5,000 suit. It's in a pile on the friaking ground. And I'm like,

18:32 "Dude, care a little." He looks at me and he says, "I don't have to." And I didn't understand it at the time, but later on I realized you walk into a room and there's 10 guys with a suit and one guy in the back with a t-shirt. Beware the man in the t-shirt because that guy in the t-shirt worked his ass off to get to a point that he or she can wear whatever they want. He doesn't have to dress to impress. Mark is not selling people. People are selling him. If you lost everything tomorrow, could you make it all back? Yeah. Yeah. No doubt. What would you do? Let's say you had to start from zero, but you kept your contact book. Oh, I would start an AI company. AI is the greatest opportunity in our lifetime. What part of AI? All of it right now, but the consumer element of AI is going to go away. I like the data infrastructure part of AI. Are you using AI in all your businesses? Yes, 100%. My wife just wrote a movie script using AI.

19:18 Give me one hack that a business owner can use to leverage AI. Train your AI model to the way you work. So, we spent a lot of time training our version of AI to write like me, and it now writes better than I do. My AI is more like Robert HVAC than Robert Herzvac. You're 62 today. If you die tomorrow, if you could give me one more guiding principle to leave with the younger generation, what would that be? Sell joy. Sell what? Sell joy. Joy. Joy. When I have nothing and I didn't understand computers or cyber or anything. I used to call on clients and I filled their day with joy and happiness. So, whoever dealt with me always remembered me as the nice fun guy. So, emotion is an important component in business. It's not what you say, it's how you make people feel. It's really true. And so, the less you have,

20:04 the nicer and the more engaging you have to be. What's the deepest life quote you've ever heard? A friend of mine who's a priest said this to me one time. You'll never find anything in life as fascinating as another human being. And I'm deeply Christian and so I try to approach every human being that way. Everybody has a story. Everybody has something to tell. And if you go to them with open fascination about their life, you'll learn them. And that works in sales, too. Faith has been important for you. Faith is very important to me. I love it. You got amazing advice, sir. Oh, thank you. Thank you so much for your time. I really pleasure. Guys, that's one of my favorite interviews that I've ever done. I need you guys to stop right now. I need you to like and subscribe for amazing content that I've got coming every week. Going all over the world to interview the wealthiest and the most successful people for you guys. And if you are not a member yet, guys, I give you direct access to the

20:49 multi-millionaires and billionaires I interview every single week on this channel where you can ask your questions directly to nine figure entrepreneurs just like Robert Hersbec. Imagine getting on a live call with a guy like Robert and getting mentored by him. Watch what would happen to your business, your life. I guarantee you that it would double, triple, maybe even 10x if you got a room with a mentor like that. And I give you that access every single week. So go down to the link in the description of this video to join the School of Mentors, the number one community for business owners. With that being said, I'll see you in the next