Latest / Pitch to Product / Mark Cuban's 6 Rules Every Founder Needs To Know
Transcript
- Peter Bobby 10-7-26: I remember, you know, being a kid, everyone's like, you gotta get a paper route. Holy shit, no one told me that I gotta knock on doors and make my own route. Yes. I gotta go and actually sell. And they didn't give me a list of people I already had. no. Like I had to go find the I already got the paper. Yeah, I had to figure out that out on my own. I was nine years old. You gotta get up early in the morning and make sure somebody's not delivering to that house already. Nine years old in Miami. Take that. You had an easy. I had to dig through the snow in Canada to get to the freaking front door and knock on it and say, and find out you already got a newspaper. Holy crap. I'm nine years old. Have the dogs jumping a fence at you. Welcome to the Pitch the Product Podcast. I'm Bobby. And I'm Peter. And as always, you guys are fantastic. Yes. All right. This week's episode. Yeah, go ahead. It's sponsored by Clock It Golf. Clock It Golf. dot com. Go to Clock It, improve your golf game, and get one today. Again, all of our sponsorships right now are from clients. And this is what I love. I love being able to promote the actual products that we've helped make, bring to life. This is an incredible device. please get yours today. It supports the entrepreneur inventor. It's a pay it forward moment for you. So again, take a few minutes, go to clock itgolf dot com. But also very functional. It acts it the thing works really good. It'll it'll it'll improve your game. No doubt it will. No doubt. All right. today's episode, Bobby, is all about the sharkisms. We're gonna start with the Cubanisms, the Mark Cubanisms. It's funny 'cause I'm Cuban, but Mark Cubanisms. If I do the Cubans, this'll be whole different conversation. Yep. Well, yeah, they'll be in Spanish too. So good. look at the reason why we're doing this is because I I think a lot of people like look at the sharks and go, you know, I got my favorite. Ooh, that one's a bit of a an asshole. and I'm here to defend them. I'm here to say that they are giving you the best advice, educated advice from experience. And if you don't take it as verbatim or gospel, you have wasted your time. That's it. I'm here to tell you that the Mark Cubanisms are real, that we've got Mark's top six list here. I'm gonna add one more at the end. Bobby, what's the first one? 1% idea, 99% execution. And he says this very harshly. He tells you that your idea is worth. Junk. It is not worth Jack's shit. And he will be revered for saying that in the world because you need to understand execution is everything. Executing a clocket golf from where it started to where it is as a product is where the work is. All the work. And turning an idea into a product takes a lot of work. And a lot of money. A lot of time and a lot of Sacrificing and making sure everything's done. A lot of pivots, a lot of agita, a lot of ulcers, a lot like little nights. Yeah. If you're if you're not worried or nervous a little bit, you probably shouldn't be taking risk. Business business owners know this. We're not telling you anything you don't know. You own a business, you're waking up at four or five in the morning because something's always coming up. You know? Launching a product is a business. So appreciate the team that can execute for you, which We are part of that team. We're not the whole team. No. Right? I can't execute your legal stuff. I don't want to execute your accounting. I don't want to execute that stuff. That's that's part of the other team that you have to build for your business. But what I can execute, Bobby? Making your product. We can make it. We can make it market it. Make it. We can get it to you. We can land it for you. Yeah. We can manufacture it. We can market it. We can help you sell it. Like those are the things that we are your execution team. Bobby, people say all the time, Well, you know, I I can I can do that. Okay. Can you do that as well as our team? Or can you no People always say I can do that. Right. And then I go, How long do you have the idea? Haven't done it. I had a young lady yesterday talk to me about marketing and she's like, Well, you know what? I I can build a website and do I said, I'm sure you can. So can your grandmother. Your grandmother can use Wix. We're not doing it. Right. If no one buys anything and your grandma built the Wix, are you gonna yell grandma because she didn't build a website that converts that has this the click the the backlinks and everything that's needed, has the right keywords, has the right alt figures, like all that stuff. There's so much that goes into the background. And even that, you just built your casino in the desert. Nobody knows about it. Nobody knows it there. Right. So look at execution's everything. It's not whether you can or can't. You just can't do it as well as us or anybody else out there that's professional at doing it. So who has the time to do it all? That's the bigger one. Time and money, guys. Who has the time to do it all? And quite frankly, I can tell you that we in one f less than a half a failure, or for the cost of two interns. I can do the whole project for you and make sure that we don't fail you and that you don't make mistakes and that pivots aren't your conversation after you've invested tons of money in your product idea. So look at people, let's get real. It's all about the execution. That's what we do. And Mark Cuban is right or wrong, Bobby. 100% right. 100% right. All right. So next one, I'll take this one. Yes. I love this one. You're not an entrepreneur. You're a wantrepreneur. Dreaming. Telling everybody how to do it. You're just dreaming. All right. Now this is said to founders who love the idea of being a boss but aren't really willing to do the hard work. Or these are people who don't want to take advice and say, you know what? I I sorry, they they use the term I am going to, I might, I'm gonna try. There what did Yoda say? You do or you do not. There's no try. It's also you hire a professional to give you advice on something they know how to do. But you don't want to listen to Yeah, a wanted is gonna want to hear themselves talk a lot. A wantrepreneur is going to want to tell you how to do things even though it's not gonna work and you know it from experience. A wantrepreneur just wants to be right, but they also don't want to take action that's accountable. Cutting themselves at the knees because they're not listening to the property. So for all you wantrepreneurs out there, let's give them a pat on the back, Bobby. See you later out door. See you later. It was nice talking to you. Right. Go go figure out how to be an entrepreneur because you're wasting time being a wanted. That's it. Right. So again, Mark Cuban, right or wrong on this. all right. If you walk away, sorry, if you walk in and say, This is a ten billion dollar market, and if I can only get one percent of it, it's an immediate it's a wish. That's a wish. That's just anybody can say that. That's the easiest thing to say. Look at if I get one percent, yeah, but still dreaming. You gotta still have the product. Still gotta get it launched. You know what? You one percent of a market is a massive huge effort. Okay. Getting one percent of something when there's already good products out there that are owning the large lion's share of the market and you're trying to break in, I get the David and Goliath story. And there's a strategy to that, and that's a good one. But You I I tell people that you need to figure out how to be happy, being number 7,333 on the list, which doesn't even give you a fraction of the percentage. Can I get to 1% of the market share if I only have a thousand units? No. How many units does a thousand does one percent take? It depends on the market, but better be more than a thousand. Better be more than a couple thousand. I'm gonna venture to guess, and you can put this into AI, ask the question, and we can probably put this in the comment later, Steve. How For 1% of a industry market, how many units would I have to have at a certain, let's say a $50 price point to actually get 1% of that market share? I guarantee you it's in the millions. You there's a lot of people that make a great living being 600, 800 in the number. I I I'm in New York City. There's thousands of pizzarias. Not of them had 10, 15 chains. And they make a good living. but some of them some of them are a dollar slice and some of them are fifteen dollars a slice. Yeah, but when you sell fifteen thousand slices a day, yeah, at a dollar. Think about that. That costing you thirty twenty five cents to make. Right. You're making profit. Yep. Everybody's got their way to make a living, like the godfather said, I never I never judge a man on how he makes a living. And those dollar slices do not have rents of fifty thousand. Right. Okay. They know how to crank it out. Most of the spaces and oven. Look at be humble. That's the best advice I can give you. You're not going to get one percent of any market. You're going to start with getting into the market by selling a thousand units, then selling five thousand, then selling ten thousand. And look at I would tell you walk, run. Yeah. This is like a Sarah Blakely conversation here. She spanks. Man, twenty years, three, four years living out of her car. She was committed to her dream. She's a billionaire because she was never going to stop until she succeeded. And I guarantee that's an entrepreneur, not an entrepreneur. That's an entrepreneur. Salute to her. She did not try and get the one percent. She tried to get the whole market one sale at a time. That is the way you got to do it. So again, Mark Cuban, is he right on this or is he right one thousand percent. One thousand percent. All right. I'd rather follow. I was gonna say I was gonna say this. Go ahead. I'd rather follow the green than the dream. Same thing. Know your numbers. Know your numbers. Know your numbers. Man, how many times do people like and I I understand it, right? Because no one wants to be embarrassed. Everyone's like they they don't want to be, they're humble people and they don't want to like be greedy. And I I get that, right? You're not it so people say, Well, I'm not in this for the money. Then stop. Then don't stop. Because we everybody is. It takes money to do this. If you're not going to do everything. So I would I would have more respect if you said, Look at I don't I'm not doing this for the money for me. I want to leave something to my kids. I want to leave something to my family. I want to do something that is going to be around when I'm not. That is a better thing to say than I don't really want the money. I want a charity. I'll I'll tell you what, you try and get a charity to sponsor your event event, what are they going to want from you? Money. Somebody's got to pay for that. There's a charity. Yeah. The location to pay your name unless you pay them for their name. So if you're going to learn anything, learn from a charity that it is about the money. It's always about the money. 100%. So follow the green versus the dream. Is that is that right for Mark to say or not? That is mo that's every business person saying it. Yeah. So, you know, again, right now the if you s if you answered all these wrong, Mark would tell ya I'm out. I'm out. See ya. How how powerful is that? Those two words. it also lets you know that you're not being realistic. Dude, I'm out. It's not for me. Cause if you can't say you when you're out, you can't let somebody tell you when you're out. You gotta know when you're out. I'm I'm gonna tell you like look at that's the Here here's the issue, right? In a TV show with five other sharks, you can say that without really having like really bad Google reviews. Right. If you're a business and and someone comes in and says, Hey, can you can you take an ingredient out of the out of the you know what you're making? You can't just tell the the your your your customer that you're out. You got a restaurant, that's definitely you know allergies, people have food, yeah. The power of I'm out, you need to understand it's delivered without hesitation. Right. Well that's just the way Mark does it. It is to it's basically to tell the founder that you're a freaking idiot. Yeah, but we use it every day also. We there's clients that come to us with unrealistic products. I'm out. No exactly. I will go on further and tell you why I'm out. I think I owe you that, right? You you I appreciate you calling. So I'm not just gonna say you're out, but when Mark Cuban says it, I believe. Man, I could be wrong, but I think it's the place where to say, You're a freaking idiot. I'm out. I like when someone misses two appointments and they're trying to Get back to me. I'm like, I just text back. I'm out. Yeah, look, if you don't have the respect to make a time, I I get it. Life gets busy. If you communicate with us that, hey, I am so sorry, or hey, I I don't even need an apology. It's just, hey, I got caught up at work. I can't make this meeting. I'll reschedule for you. But when you blow us off for one or two meetings, I'm out. I'm out. Cuban right on that? A hundred percent. You may or may not be there. If you're not respecting my time. I'll leave that to another podcast, but I'm out. All right. Sweat equity is the most valuable equity there is. know your business and industry better than anyone else in the world. The best people that you've ever seen are the people that started on the bottom knew every job on the way up. Because they could talk to everybody down that downline and know exactly what they're supposed to do. I will tell you, you know, the the people that work in the stock room learn the stock, then they learn the inventory, then they learn how to put the inventory in the shelf, they learn that that inventory sells, they learn how that inventory turns into profit, they learn. How to then grow into the next department, use that same mentality. The bottom up is the way. So that's what Mark means by sweat equity. It is the most valuable commodity. Now, I will give you the other side of sweat equity. You can do a lot of sweat equity that leads to efforts that you can I can build this, I can make this, I can get that done. But what's the most important sweat equity when I have something? Well, doing it right, also having people that Do it for you. And then what do I what do I do with that? I gotta go sell the frickin' thing. Yes. Okay, the sweat equity isn't just about making it, it's about Hey, knocking on doors. Vacuum cleaner salesman. Imagine that, Bobby. Like back in the day, you had to knock on someone's door door to door and sell vacuum cleaners to housewives that were home. what was it? cut go cut cutlery. Cut co cutlery. Yeah. Door to door. Door to door, aluminum siding shit. I pull windows door to door. Yes. Okay. When I was 17 years old, they put me in a suit and gave me a briefcase and gave me like a street to go down and newspapers, right? That art is lost. Gone. Lost. Like I remember, you know, being a kid, everyone's like, you gotta get a paper route. Holy shit, no one told me that I gotta knock on doors and make my own route. Yes. I gotta go and actually sell. And they didn't give me a list of people I already had. no. Like I had to go find the I already got the paper. Yeah, I had to figure out that out on my own. I was nine years old. You gotta get up early in the morning and make sure somebody's not delivering to that house already. Nine years old in Miami. Take that. You had an easy. I had to dig through the snow in Canada to get to the freaking front door and knock on it and say, and find out you already got a newspaper. Holy crap. I'm nine years old. Have the dogs jumping a fence at you. That's sweat equity. That's sweat equity on it. Look at there's gonna be more of these. I appreciate and I hope you appreciate that. Look at This is all about Mark Cuban's 100% right. If you t if you're insulted by him or you think he's not being polite, he is the best business owner operator on the area. Yes, he did. So just from watching the show, we don't know personally. I you know this isn't based on our personal opinion. It's what we've seen on the show. Watch it. Appreciate him. He's giving you the best advice. We'll get through the other sharks in the next episodes. Thank you so much for watching. If you know somebody like us, share us, share, share, share. Share this with somebody that you know, someone that you know has an idea, someone that you know is stuck. Share it so that they can understand who Bobby is. If you have topic, ooh, come to us. Let us know. Or if you have something that you thought one of the sharks was really mean or that you thought was out of context, let's have that conversation because that's what this is all about. Thank you guys so much.