There's a Customer Born Every Minute E-Book

Joe Vitale

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2010

Seitenzahl: 404

Beschreibung

Praise for There's a Customer Born Every Minute "Joe Vitale has created an entertaining, educational, and motivational manual-with the help of P.T. Barnum-that belongs in every hotel room alongside the Bible. Then, guests might read his inspirational book first, and give thanks to God for this worthy discovery." --Alan Abel, media hoaxer, author, consultantand lecturer on "Using Your Wits to Win" "If you're going to excel in business, learning about a showman like Barnum and applying some of the lessons he taught can give you valuable insights. Joe Vitale has captured ten of these lessons (he calls them 'rings of power') and shows how you can apply them in a way that will open your eyes and stretch your imagination. There's a lot of money-making and fun wisdom here." --Joseph Sugarman, Chairman, BluBlocker Corporation "Finally someone does it!!! Joe Vitale reveals the REAL P.T. Barnum! Vitale highlights the outrageously astute marketing of Barnum. Barnum's driving belief certainly was that there IS a customer 'born' every minute. You will glean a number of useful 'new' marketing ideas that you can instantly use in your business. And you will learn about one of the savviest marketers of a time gone by. Fun, exciting, insightful, and packed with ideas! Genius!" --Kevin Hogan, author of The Science of Influence and The Psychology of Persuasion "I love this book. If you'd like to know the real story about one of the most fascinating characters in American history, told by a master storyteller (and the person who probably knows more about him than anyone else), read this book. Barnum is not the guy portrayed by the legend attached to his name. He is much, much more, and Vitale tells his story with the can't-put-it-down passion and excitement he's become so well known for." --Bill Harris, President, Centerpointe Research Institute

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Praise

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

Epigraph

Foreword

Preface

Acknowledgments

Chapter 1 - Presenting... the Greatest Marketeer of All Time—P. T. Barnum!

The World-Famous Matchstick Guitar

How Will You Survive?

American Millionaire—Twice

How I Discovered Barnum’s Secrets

Chapter 2 - P.T. Barnum’s Amazing 10 Rings of Power for Creating an Empire

Chapter 3 - Bonus

Chapter 4 - P.T. Barnum’s Amazing Mind-Set for Success

The Amazing Story of the Cardiff Giant

Poe and Twain Pull Fast Ones

This Hoax Started a War

The Irina Hoax of 1997

The Joke’s on Barnum!

The Story of the Ugly Fejee Mermaid

The Elvis Mermaid

The Fire Extinguisher That Caused a Fire

Barnum’s Definition of Humbug

Create Alliances for Profit

How to Do It

Who Else Can Benefit?

Chapter 5 - Attention! What P.T. Barnum Learned When He Was Almost Hanged

Mangin’s Great Secret of Success

Attention-Getting Tricks

Build Attention—with Bricks?

Why Iranistan?

The Violinist Who Played—Upside Down!

Barnum Finds More Ways to Grab Attention

Barnum Turns an Embarrassment into an Empire

Houdini!!!

The Power of a Challenge

The Real Secret

Barnum Shocks His Staff

Are You Curious?

Call Yourself Names

You Can Count on This

Hang from a Helicopter

Start the Line

Become an Audacious Idea Generator

Ten Easy Ways to Grab Attention

The World’s Oldest Formula

Arrest Public Attention

Chapter 6 - Barnum Knew People Would Spend Their Last Nickel on This One Thing

What People Really Want

The Great New Jersey Buffalo Hunt

Create Fun

Barnum’s Famous Museum

How to Give Good Feelings to People

Barnum or No-Name?

Love Your Customers

Let Employees Fight—on Stage!

Barnum’s View of Customers

Chapter 7 - P.T. Barnum’s Secret for Making Unknowns Famous and Himself Rich

Barnum Gets Chilling News

Lindomania

Barnum Gets Respectable

The Value of Publicity

Elssler’s Secret

Toilet Paper Ends World War I

The Terrifying Bernays

The World’s Greatest Hoaxer

How to Get Free Publicity

How Barnum Made News

Forget Yourself

Proactive Success

How Ink Can Make You Rich

Britney Spears Helps Me

News Releases Lead to Fame

Three Steps to Publicity

How Barnum Turned Blackmail into Gold

How President Bush Was Nearly Captured and Eaten

Chapter 8 - The Shakespeare of Advertising’s Rules for Jumbo Success

Chapter 9 - How an Unknown P.T. Barnum Met Queen Victoria—and Got Rich

Introduced to Royalty

You Can Meet Anyone

Who Do You Know Who Knows____?

Join the Cary Salon

Dan’s Bake Sale

Network Online with Only E-mail

Balloon Flights and the Free Museum

Chapter 10 - How Barnum Purchased the Business of His Dreams with No Money

“Bind Me in Any Way”

How Barnum Made Tom Thumb Rich

Why Barnum Gave Lind More Money

The Swedish Bikini Team

“It’s All Negotiation”

New Jersey Man Sells Brooklyn Bridge

Getting Schools to Sell Products

Trump

Malice in Dallas

Donkey Marketing

“Friend Barnum, What Is Up?”

Barnum Books an Unknown Juggler

Barnum Gets Thunderstruck

Barnum Renogiates to Win

Barnum’s Friends Try to Rescue Him

Chapter 11 - P.T. Barnum’s Secret for Surviving Disasters and Tragedies

Barely Batting an Eye

Barnum Gets Stunned

Barnum’s Secret

A Discovery at Barnum’s Grave

Understanding Barnum’s Message

Barnum’s Secret for Living at No-Stress Level

The Power of Belief

The King’s Magic Ring

Barnum’s Daily Strength

Chapter 12 - How P.T. Barnum Wrote His Own Ticket to Success

The Greatest Marketing Tool on Earth

The Barnum-Twain Queer Letters

What Do Customers Keep Asking You?

Barnum’s Bestseller

Chapter 13 - Bonus

Chapter 14 - How P.T. Barnum Got Rich Right after Going Broke

Money Getting

Defending Himself

How I Gave the Talk of My Life

Barnum’s Incredible Speaking Tips

Chapter 15 - Bonus

Chapter 16 - How to Barnumize Your Business

A Fresh Look at Barnum’s Rings of Power

You’re Not Barnum?

Wear the Head of Barnum!

Beware of Cannibals Who Attack You

How to Image Stream

The Borrowed Genius Procedure

Barnum Tells Mark Twain His Key Secret

Epilogue

Notes

Bibliography

Resources

About the Author

Index

Special P.T. Barnum Bonus!

Praise forThere’s a Customer Born Every Minute

“P.T. Barnum was quite an extraordinary human being, and this book is great. It’s time someone wrote the truth about Barnum.”

—Evel Knievel

“A fascinating look at one of the greatest and most misunderstood promotional geniuses of all time. There’s a Customer Born Every Minute is the next best thing to having P.T. Barnum himself personally reveal his money-making secrets to you.”

—David L. Deutsch, Advertising and Direct Mail Copywriter, author, Million Dollar Marketing Secrets

“This book will hold you spellbound. It is electrifying! It illuminates every creative impulse of Barnum and his timeless marketing genius. Joe Vitale has captured the power of Barnum’s successes and has given us the tools to plug in! If you want to dramatically increase your ability to promote your business, then buy this book now!”

—Allen D’Angelo, M.S., author, Explosive Marketing: 2000 Ways to Release Creative Marketing Power into Your Business to Quadruple Your Income

“Joe Vitale presents a three-ring circus of wise and profit-producing ideas in There’s a Customer Born Every Minute. The book is as easy to read as it is enlightening. It’s a must-read if you have even a vague interest in money.”

—Jay Conrad Levinson, author, Guerrilla Marketing series

“P.T. Barnum became rich and famous because he understood people. This made doing business with them simple. This book reveals the great showman’s business secrets, including his little-known negotiation skills.”

—Gerard Nierenberg, President, The Negotiation Institute, author, The Art of Negotiating and The Complete Negotiator

“At a time when 43 percent of Americans cannot recall the name of the vice president of the United States (according to a 1994 Gallup Poll), Barnum’s name remains a household word. Joe Vitale quickly dispels ignorantly conceived myths and rumors, and reveals Barnum for what he truly was (and still is)—a marketing titan whose genius must be reviewed and modeled after. Anyone who claims to be serious about business, marketing, and advertising needs to read, study, and keep a copy of this book handy.”

—Hector R. D. Baron, Marketing and Sales Strategies Consultant, Executive Project Coordinator of The Billionaire Power Summit in the Philippines

“It’s a Barnum and Bailey world, so it’s fitting that the best business book of the year is one about the most exciting and original businessman of them all—P.T. Barnum. Unlocking years-old secrets, Joe Vitale’s fresh perspective on this legendary master is a joy to read, plus it’s packed with up-to-date insights for today’s entrepreneurs. There really is a customer born every minute, and this book is the best way to learn how to win in the clown-eat-clown circus world of business today.”

—John Martin, CEO, Bold Creative Services

“Definitely a mind-stretching read.”

—Lennie Grimaldi, Publicist, author of Chased and Only in Bridgeport

“Wow! I really couldn’t put this down! This magnificent new book reveals the inner workings of a historic, inventive, and persistently positive man. Joe Vitale has taken the classic wisdom of P.T. Barnum and made it accessible to us all. Amazing!”

—Ron Kaufman, President, Active Learning Sales Training, Singapore

“This book fired up my imagination, blasted me past my limits, and launched a zillion ideas for outrageous personal and professional success. It’s fun, fast-paced, inspiring, and packed with powerful ideas!”

—Rick Butts, President, The Safari Adventure Company

“What could be more fun to read than the business secrets of P.T. Barnum?! This book is filled with practical information I can use right now, and information I want to pass on to my clients and anyone else who wants to further their stretch and achieve more happiness and success.”

—William Wittmann, M.Ed., LMP, Seattle

Copyright © 2006 by Hypnotic Marketing, Inc. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey. Published simultaneously in Canada.

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Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Neither the publisher nor author shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

Vitale, Joe, 1953-

There’s a customer born every minute : P.T. Barnum’s amazing 10 “rings of power” for creating fame, fortune, and a business empire today—guaranteed! / Joe Vitale.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN-13: 978-0-471-78462-3 (cloth) ISBN-10: 0-471-78462-1 (cloth)

1. Success in business. 2. Barnum, P.T. (Phineas Taylor), 1810-1891. I. Title.

HF5386.V58 2006

658.4’09—dc22

2005034030

For Murray Rogow, the world’s second greatest press agent (P.T. Barnum was the first)

I fully believe that if you faithfully follow my methods you cannot fail.

—P.T. Barnum, 1891, five days before he died

P.T. Barnum. (Used by permission, The Barnum Museum, Bridgeport, Connecticut.)

The handwritten introduction (on the previous page) by P.T. Barnum comes from Dollars and Sense, one of the many reissues of the famous showman’s autobiography. The first time I saw this handwriting in a copy of the book on display in the Barnum Museum in Bridgeport, Connecticut, I assumed Barnum had personally signed the book. Apparently that’s what Barnum wanted people to think. Dr. A. H. Saxon, author of P.T. Barnum: The Legend and the Man, told me the handwritten introduction was printed in every copy of Dollars and Sense. It was probably a clever marketing strategy on Barnum’s part, knowing people would assume the book was a priceless autographed edition and more books would be sold. Hoping for the same thing, I include Barnum’s introduction in this book.

(From author’s private collection)

Foreword

Why is Joe Vitale writing about P.T. Barnum? And how do you win as a result of it?

“There’s a sucker born every minute” is a quote often attributed to P.T. Barnum. There’s only one problem: Barnum never said it.

Barnum said lots of incredible things, and you’re about to read them in a way that will make them applicable to your work because of one man: Joe Vitale, the P.T. Barnum of today.

Barnum was one of the most advanced thinkers of his time.

So is Joe Vitale.

Barnum was the consummate promoter.

So is Joe Vitale.

Barnum was a succinct and prolific writer.

So is Joe Vitale.

Barnum was a dynamic speaker.

So is Joe Vitale.

Barnum was hypnotic.

So is Joe Vitale—he even wrote the book on it.

Barnum was an idea person.

So is Joe Vitale.

And like all great men, Barnum was ahead of his time.

So is Joe Vitale.

Everyone is looking for the perfect mentor. Most people look for someone who is alive. As an advanced thinker, Dr. Joe had a hard time relating to present-day thinkers, so he turned to history to find his mentor, and found the perfect match. Vitale had the wisdom to study the master promoter and idea man of his time, P.T. Barnum, and through Joe’s interpretations, P.T. can be your mentor, too.

If Barnum were still alive, he’d be vying with Joe Vitale for the title of Internet viral-marketing king. If Barnum were still alive, he’d be writing about Joe Vitale.

The first time I came across There’s a Customer Born Every Minute, I was jealous. The book was so well done, so well written, I wished I had written it myself. I e-mailed Joe, ordered a case of copies (autographed, of course), and sent them to business friends.

Their response was the same as yours will be: Wow!

When you look at the chapter titles and scan some of the ideas contained on every page, you not only admire the years of study and research that went into creating this book, you also can’t wait to devour it. Actually, you’ll get excited.

Once you dig into Barnum’s 10 rings of power, you will become empowered.

Once you dig into Barnum’s incredible power to persuade, you will become a persuader.

Once you dig into Barnum’s power to promote, you will become a promoter.

Once you dig into Barnum’s success secrets, you will understand what it will take for you to become a success.

This book is loaded. It’s loaded with thoughts, gems, and insights that you can use the minute you read them.

A word of caution: This is a thinking man’s (okay, a thinking person’s) book. It will give you pause. The good news is, it will give you hundreds of ideas of how you can follow in the successful footsteps of P.T. Barnum. Read it twice. Study it. You’ll find, as I did, that it’s a book you can carry with you and read for an instant inspiration.

There’s a Customer Born Every Minute—and I’m one of them.

—JEFFREY GITOMER Author of The Little Red Book of Selling

Preface

How P.T. Barnum Almost Killed Me Twice (and Why I Don’t Really Mind)

I never knew P.T. Barnum, of course. The famous showman has been dead more than one hundred years. Still, his name, business, and influence are alive and well today, and will be well into the twenty-first century. There have been several movies about him, several plays, numerous books, and, as I pen these words, Elvis Costello is writing an opera about Barnum. As long as there will be a circus, the name Barnum will remain associated with it. And as long as I live, I’ll never forget how Barnum inadvertently nearly killed me twice.

I was 16 years old the first time. I wanted to be Harry Excello, the world’s most famous magician. I went to the circus when it came to my hometown in Niles, Ohio in the late 1960s with the idea of talking to the magician who worked with it. Young and bold, feeling a little Barnum and Houdini in my blood, I walked right into the tent and asked to see the magician.

He came out and we talked. He was friendly and charming, and seemed more like a used car salesman trapped inside a magician’s role in a circus. As we spoke I learned that he loved magic, loved the circus, and loved his work. He introduced me to the sword swallower, another charming man, only he wore a Tarzan-like outfit to show his tan and his muscles. I remember thinking that he looked like a gypsy. I asked the sword swallower how he performed his tricks, but he laughed and said it was a family secret. For a 16-year-old boy in a small midwestern town, I felt as if I was walking among the legends of the earth.

The sword swallower and magician asked me if I wanted to work in the circus for the weekend. I couldn’t believe it. I could help clean up the grounds, they said, and take down the tents when the show ended the next night. Wow, I would get to clean up animal dung! I would get to see the circus acts for free and they would pay me three dollars a day. The money meant nothing. The adventure meant everything. I jumped at the chance.

I was in for a surprise. I found the circus to be a business like any other. Events started and stopped on time. People had jobs to do and places to go. They worked, entertained, laughed, cried, and complained. They were paid like any other employee in any other business. I learned that even when something was fun—like being a clown, a magician, or a sword swallower—good business kept the jobs alive. It may have been show business, but it was still a business.

This is where Barnum almost killed me the first time.

On closing night, when things were being taken down and packed up, I somehow found myself walking through the entrance of the main tent just as several elephants were being directed out of the tent. One of the animal caretakers yelled for me to get out of the way. I’ll always remember the look on his face. He looked angry as well as terrified. He knew a young man was about to be trampled to death. Me.

I froze. For a moment I felt as if I was standing in the wilds of Africa and killer elephants were coming to mindlessly crush me like a grape. I remember glancing to my left and then to my right, seeing the empty wooden bleachers on both sides of me, knowing they were too tall for me to reach from where I stood, and realizing I had nowhere to run.

My heart pounded like a wild drum. I could feel the throbbing in my ears. I can still see the elephants coming at me, their huge gray bellies swaying left and right as their feet thundered on the dirt. I quickly pushed my back against the bleacher on my left, sucked in my breath, tried to become one with the wood, and became very religious. I prayed that I would live. I prayed that I would not be flattened by a beast of the jungle. This was no way for the great Harry Excello to exit the world.

The first elephant passed without coming too close to me. So did the second. I can still smell them both, though. Even today. But the third elephant must have been related to Jumbo, because he was colossal in size and seemed destined to turn me into his next coat. He was so close to me that his canvas skin blocked out my view of the world, but he, too, missed me. All the elephants came, passed, and went on their way. I was safe.

I never forgot the experience. In a way, the near fatal trampling by a herd of circus elephants when I was a boy branded my soul with the name Barnum forever.

The second time Barnum almost killed me occurred while writing the first edition of this book.

I found Barnum to be an overwhelming character. For example, although everyone thinks of Barnum in connection with the circus, he actually didn’t run a circus until he was a senior citizen. That was one of his final accomplishments. Before that he had been everything from a lottery salesman to an entertainer, bestselling author, mayor, manager, publisher, public speaker, crusader against alcohol, philanthropist, entrepreneur, practical joker, friend to presidents and royalty, and owner of one of America’s biggest and most successful early museums.

Trying to follow Barnum’s colorful and active career throughout his 80 years, trying to make sense of his exhibitions, working to understand the time he lived in, fighting to make sense of his tendency to pull jokes on the public, digging to unearth his secrets for making any business a success—all worked to make me one stressed out adult.

In addition, I spent every penny I had on old books by and about Barnum, and for traveling across the states to visit museums and historical collections concerning him. I was also pushing aside other projects in order to write this book. I was becoming obsessed. One day, during the writing of the first edition of this book back in 1995, I looked at my savings account and saw it was empty. So was my checking account. So was my business account. I was spending all my money on Barnum collectibles and all my time on this book. I was neglecting everything else. That’s when I realized this Barnum book was literally taking its toll on me.

Many times I nearly gave up, thinking Barnum was far too big a character for me to wrestle to the ground. Many times I felt such tension that I wondered how my heart withstood the pressure. This has been the hardest book I’ve ever written. The statistics maintained on my word processing program say I’ve rewritten this book 438 times, and that was just the first edition of this book. I’ve since rewritten it and expanded it for this new edition. I spent hours, days, weeks, months, researching, writing, rewriting, polishing, testing, learning, understanding, and expressing Barnum’s business secrets. This has not been an easy task. I really felt as if this book on Barnum would kill me.

Fortunately it—like the elephants—let me survive, and once I began using Barnum’s techniques, I also began to prosper. I now live a life of luxury, with numerous books to my credit, and great wealth, as well.

That’s why I have a special fondness for Barnum today. He took me to the edge of life and let me see the true joy of living. Nearly being creamed by an elephant was, well, hair raising. (I had hair then.) Researching this book has been—I admit it—inspiring. I’ve learned new ways to help my clients achieve breakthrough success in business. In short, Barnum gave me for free what he charged millions of people to receive during his lifetime: Excitement.

As a result of my invigorating research and writing, you now hold in your hands the first book ever written on the sales and marketing methods of the world’s greatest showman—a man who in his day became rich beyond all measure and famous beyond all comprehension; a man who introduced the first superstars to the world and was never afraid of seeking publicity in some of the most audacious ways imaginable; a man so deeply religious that his friends called him Reverend Barnum; a man who survived our bloody Civil War, personal bankruptcy, and some of the worst economic panics in American history and still became a millionaire; a man who nearly inadvertently killed me twice—Phineas Taylor Barnum.

Let the show begin!

—JOE VITALE

Austin, Texas

www.mrfire.com

Acknowledgments

The million-dollar title for this book came from David Deutsch, brilliant copywriter and friend. Barbara Celitans showed extraordinary service by opening the doors of the San Antonio public library’s Hertzberg Circus Museum before regular hours and allowing me to look through Barnum’s original letters. Mary Witkowski, head of the historical collections at the Bridgeport Public Library, helped me locate rare books, letters, and ads by and about Barnum.

Dr. Arthur H. Saxon, biographer of Barnum, patiently answered my questions and gave me a personal tour of the Bridgeport Barnum would have known. Robert Pelton, past curator of the Barnum Museum in Bridgeport, personally guided me through the museum and photocopied special articles.

Allen D’Angelo donated his time and effort in conducting research and locating many rare articles for me. Penny Perez acted as my special assistant while researching Barnum in Bridgeport. Blair Warren helped me in San Antonio. Colleen of Houston’s Colleen’s Books and Linda Strike of Optical Insights located rare books about Barnum and his era. Ronnie Reno of Brockton Publishing scanned Barnum’s introduction at the front of this book, and his famous talk on making money at the back of this book, so I didn’t have to retype either.

Murray Raphel helped by lending me a few of his books to stimulate my thinking. Kare Anderson generously gave me leads, ideas, and advice. Paul Hartunian has been a source of inspiration. Win Wenger shared his techniques for inducing creativity. Paul Mattek, Rick Butts, and Linda Credeur let me test drive Project Phineas on their businesses. Nerissa, my love, was supportive of my investing more time in the rewriting of this book. She fed the cats and dog so I could get working.

I want to acknowledge my four primary sources for the information in this book: Bryan’s edition of Barnum’s autobiography, A. H. Saxon’s biography of Barnum and his collection of Barnum’s letters, and Kundardt’s pictorial life history of the great showman. These as well as all other sources are listed in the bibliography.

Advance readers whose input helped shape the final book include Linda Credeur, Rick Butts, Connie Schmidt, Ron Kaye, Greg Manning, Ron Kaufman, Lennie Grimaldi, Robert Pelton, Penny Perez, Larry Weinstein, Mark Weisser, Blair Warren, John Martin, Allen D’Angelo, William Wittmann, Scott Hammaker, Debbie Zimmerman, Brocky Brown, David Deutsch, Hector Baron, Murray Rogow, and Jim King.

Upon my soul, I could not have completed this book without everyone’s help. Thank you, one and all.

1

Presenting... the Greatest Marketeer of All Time—P. T. Barnum!

I know you will not consider a few words of advice from me as impertinence, but will heed them and treasure them up as a legacy.

—P.T. Barnum, 1891, five days before he died

“You here on business?” asked the man beside me.

I was on a late afternoon flight from Dallas to Houston, where I lived at the time. Most of the people on the crowded airplane were coming from business meetings in the cowboy city. The fellow beside me wanted to make the short flight go even faster by speaking with somebody, anybody, and I happened to be sitting in the lucky (?) seat beside him.

“I’m flying home after doing some research in Connecticut for my next book,” I said. “It’s going to be about the business secrets of P.T. Barnum.”

I said it with a certain pride. I knew this man beside me, whoever he was, was aware of Barnum’s name. Everybody knows it. I also knew nobody had ever written a book on Barnum’s business ingenuity. I was feeling smug, waiting for the applause. But it never came. The man beside me looked confused.

“It’s a book about the circus guy?”

I cringed. I tried not to look insulted or impatient.

“Barnum operated a circus in the last part of his life,” I explained, trying to point out that Barnum was far more than a “circus guy.”

“Long before the circus he ran numerous businesses, made unknown people famous, started dirt poor, got rich, lost all his money, and got rich all over again,” I said.

“He was the most recognized name in America and maybe in the world in the 1800s. He knew Presidents and was even considered as a Presidential nominee. He was a clever businessman and maybe the greatest marketing mind that ever existed. His techniques made his museum famous and helped make his circus something every child wants to attend today. The man was so famous you even know his name right now, yet he died more than one hundred years ago.”

I caught my breath and let the businessman beside me consider the facts I expressed. Finally he spoke.

“Didn’t Barnum say ‘There’s a sucker born every minute’?”

“No,Barnum never said that,” I replied. “Barnum respected people and gave them more than their money’s worth. He never said, wrote, and probably never even thought that stupid line. No researcher or historian has ever found evidence that he said it.”

I counted to 10 and waited for my fellow passenger to say something else that would rile me. I didn’t have long to wait.

“Barnum’s methods might work for a big company or for some corporation with a huge general audience, but I don’t see how I can use his ideas in my little business.”

I realized here was an opportunity to expand this man’s thinking. I asked him what he did for a living. He said he owned a small company that refurbished vans. When I asked him how he marketed his business, he said he went to trade shows.

“And how do you make yourself stand out at these trade shows?” I asked.

“We get a big table.”

I had him now.

“How many other people get big tables?” I asked.

“I guess most of them do.”

“Do you realize that if you pretended you were P.T. Barnum, and acted more flamboyantly, more brashly, more boldly, you could have a trade show booth that would be the talk of the entire trade show?”

He still didn’t get it.

“Look,” I began. “I wrote a book for the American Marketing Association on small business advertising. I know that it is no longer enough for you to just advertise your business or attend trade shows. There’s just too much competition in today’s world. You have to stand out in the crowd. You have to do something more daring to bring attention to your business.”

“What do you mean?”

“You have to be like the businessman who hung from a towel that was tied to a flying helicopter to show his towels would not tear. You have to be as bold as the publisher who threw a media event announcing his new magazine by hiring the Beach Boys to sing.

“Look at Cal Worthington, the car dealer who ran television ads featuring ‘his dog Spot.’ Every week his dog was some animal, from a dog to a goat to a pig to a giraffe. That’s Barnum-like thinking. These publicity stunts helped Worthington become the most successful auto dealer in history. And it’s that kind of thinking that made Worthington a millionaire. A hundred years ago it made Barnum a millionaire. It can also make you a millionaire today.”

I let the businessman consider my argument while I looked out the window at the Texas sky. If nothing else, the conversation made me more aware of the fact that people don’t really comprehend just how phenomenal this character called P.T. Barnum really was. Not everyone realizes that the sales and marketing methods Barnum invented can be used today. But my daydreaming was soon interrupted.

“We use promotional gimmicks like pens with our name on it and calendars with our logo,” my fellow passenger said. “We get stories done on us in the trade papers, too.”

“And how’s business?”

“It’s good. We nearly went bankrupt at first, but we’re moving along and growing.”

“I’ll be blunt with you,” I announced, preparing this man for the radical honesty I was about to say. “Unless you do something with more guts, you will remain one of the little guys.”

“How do you figure that?”

“Because you have competition and sooner or later that competition will rear its head and take a bite out of you. Whether you survive or not will depend on how stable you are, how smart you are, and how much outrageous marketing you do.”

“Outrageous marketing?”

“Look at Robert Allen. He wrote an investment book called Nothing Down. Well, who cares about another money book? There are 2,000 books published every week. To separate his from the crowd, Allen issued a challenge.”

“I think I remember it.”

“He said, ‘Take my wallet and all of my money, leave me with one hundred dollars in cash, drop me in any city, and within 72 hours I will have a piece of prime real estate.’ ”

“He did it, didn’t he?”

“You know it. And that stunt got him front page coverage in the papers, brought him national publicity, helped make his book a bestseller, and made Allen a multimillionaire.”

“Yeah, but—”

“And look at Tony Robbins. The man was so poor he used to wash his dishes in his bathtub. To make himself stand out in the crowd, he started conducting seminars on firewalking. That grabbed media attention. Now the man lives in the Fiji Islands and spends more money in one day than he used to make in a year.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Or look at Ted Turner. The world thought he was nuts when he created a national cable network. Now CNN gets studied and copied by the other networks!”

“Yeah, but—”

“You can’t be an also-ran in business and expect to survive and prosper,” I continued. “You have to stick your neck out. You have to wedge your name into the minds of your prospects. Once you break into their awareness, they won’t easily forget you. That’s what Robert Allen did. And Tony Robbins. And Ted Turner. And P.T. Barnum. They forced themselves into our minds.”

“Yeah, but—”

“If you want your business to rocket to Mars and back, you have to be willing to take the next step. And the next step just might be off the top of a tall building.”

“Coffee or tea?” interrupted a smiling flight attendant.

Neither of us wanted anything.

“And let’s not forget Houdini or Ali or Stanley Arnold or Edward Bernays,” I said.

“Who?”

“I’m writing about them in my book, too,” I answered.

“Yeah, but Barnum had it easy,” my friend said. “He lived in a time when there wasn’t much competition.”

This guy was getting to me now.

“Barnum grew up with our country, that’s true, but he had competition just like everyone else. And more importantly, he took people and places that others had tried to promote, used his own methods, and made his enterprises known around the world. The museum he bought had already been around when Barnum made it a colossal success. He brought Jenny Lind, the famous singer, to America and made crowds flock to see her. But when Lind tried to promote herself without Barnum, she flopped and soon returned to Europe. No one thought the midget Charles Stratton was special, until Barnum renamed him General Tom Thumb and started to publicize him.”

My passenger just looked at me, his eyes blank.

“Barnum was the key,” I explained. “His methods turned otherwise passable people and shows into money making—even historic—events. And you can use his methods today. That’s why I’m writing this book. I’ve discovered his 10 Rings of Power for making any business into a money machine. I’m writing this book to convey these techniques to people just like you. You need it.”

“I need it?”

“Don’t you think there’s an outside chance that Barnum knew something you didn’t? Isn’t there a remote possibility that there are sales and marketing techniques you haven’t used or heard of yet—techniques that just might make you rich?”

“I never really thought about it.”

“Look. The San Antonio public library’s Hertzberg Circus Museum has courses where they teach children business skills, graphic arts, and advertising principles by letting them start and run their own little circus. That’s pure Barnum. And if this information helps kids learn about business, don’t you think it might help you, as well?”

“They’re teaching your Rings of Power to kids?”

“No,” I replied, smiling. “They’re teaching kids how to run a business with the circus as their metaphor. They haven’t studied Barnum like I have. Besides, Barnum wasn’t involved in the circus until after he was sixty years old. I’m teaching adults how to create empires by telling them how to use Barnum’s 10 Rings of Power. I call my program Project Phineas.”

“But I don’t think my customers would enjoy seeing me do wild stunts.”

“Do you think people enjoy seeing Sir Richard Branson fly around the world in a balloon?” I asked.

“Well, he’s likeable.”

“He’s likeable because he’s daring,” I said. “Besides, people won’t care as long as you deliver what you promise. Barnum had few complaints from his customers. Tony Robbins, Robert Allen and Ted Turner also get few complaints. Why? Because they deliver. They give legendary service. Their customers leave feeling incredible. The idea behind publicity stunts is to get attention. It’s no longer enough to advertise or hand out flyers or sit at a trade show. You have to think more outrageously and act more boldly, and you have to deliver what you promise, or else.”

“Or else?”

“Or else you’re history.”

The World-Famous Matchstick Guitar

My neighbor looked away from me. I think he had had enough of my arguments in defense of Barnum. That’s good, as I had had enough of him. I picked up the guitar magazine I had brought with me to pass the time and flipped to the back. I chuckled to myself as I read about a matchstick guitar made in 1937.

Seems a certain sailor named Jack Hall collected matchsticks and made musical instruments out of them. He first created a fiddle, then two mandolins, and then a guitar made up entirely of 14,000 used matchsticks which he painstakingly glued together. This particular matchstick guitar was finally played in public in 1991 on BBC television, two years before Hall died.

What a waste, I thought to myself. Barnum would have taken that unusual guitar and its creator and put them on a world tour. He might even have rented out the guitar to be placed on display at trade shows like the one my fellow passenger attended. The guitar would have brought attention to his booth, made people talk, and helped increase his business. Visitors would walk away and talk among themselves, asking each other, “Did you see that wild matchstick guitar over at the refurbished vans table?”

Instead, the people who knew of the matchstick guitar let an opportunity for fame and fortune slip through their fingers. And the man beside me was content to sit at trade show tables and struggle along in business. As I wondered why, I closed my eyes and tried to imagine what it must have been like to live in Barnum’s time....

How Will You Survive?

Imagine you are in business in the mid-1800s.

Four-fifths of all Americans are farmers. There are only three large cities in the country, and New York is the biggest with barely 400,000 people. Most of the wonderful tools of technology have not yet been invented. You cannot advertise on radio or television, because they don’t exist. You cannot send out news releases by fax, use a computer to track results, sign on to the Internet, call prospects on a telephone, hail a cab or drive a car to present your case to a client. You can’t even take a train to many places until after the Civil War.

You don’t have electricity to light a sign or send a message. Most of your customers don’t have indoor bathrooms, and bathing once a week is the norm. If your customers get sick, they probably die, as surgeons during this period washed their hands after surgery, not before it. Indian wars are still terrifying people. Gun fights still occur. When the Civil War hits, a large percentage of your customer base gets destroyed. And then you may be restricted to conducting safe business in only the Northern states.

Talk about living in stressful times!

How will you ever survive?

American Millionaire—Twice

Yet these were the conditions in which P.T. Barnum lived. And he managed to amass a fortune, lose it, and then create an even greater one.

He was probably America’s second millionaire (after John Jacob Astor). He was incomparably famous. A letter mailed from New Zealand to “Mr. Barnum, America” made it without a hitch. General Grant said everywhere he went around the globe, people knew of Barnum. President Garfield called him “the Kris Kringle of America.”

Barnum knew every important person of his time, from presidents and queens to celebrities and inventors. He went buffalo hunting with General Custer. He was friends with Mark Twain and Abe Lincoln. He took unknowns and made them international stars. He built the most unusual mansion in the country, watched it burn to the ground, and built yet another. A total of five huge fires wiped him out—temporarily.Yet he got back on his feet almost instantly. He was a famous speaker, a best-selling author, a politician, a showman, an investor, an entrepreneur, and a marketing genius.

In his youth he sold lottery tickets and ran a newspaper. In later years he became one of the world’s first prohibitionists and spent much of his time lecturing about the evils of alcohol. He invented the beauty and baby contests. He made a large fortune in real estate, inventing a clever method of selling alternate lots, financing the purchasers so they could build homes, and then collecting profit from the enhanced value of the lots in between. He donated land to his favorite city and watched his own stock in land rise as a result.

In 1853 he started New York’s first illustrated newspaper and helped it achieve a circulation of 500,000. He was a deeply religious man who was imprisoned for writing about his beliefs, and at the same time got his first taste of publicity. He was once in partnership with the tycoon Commodore Vanderbilt, acted as a bank president, and ran for Connecticut legislature, fighting to free slaves. He was on intimate terms with several U.S. Presidents, was named as a possible Presidential candidate in 1888, and was Mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut. He made a fortune, lost it with a bad investment at the age of forty-six, and then succeeded in creating a still larger fortune before his death at the age of eighty in 1891.

How I Discovered Barnum’s Secrets

So who was P.T. Barnum? And what were his Rings of Power? How was he able to bring international attention to his famous museum, his singers and side-shows, his still legendary circus, and even to himself? And more importantly, how can you use Barnum’s methods to promote your own business today? Is his genius translatable and are his techniques transferable?

To answer these questions I studied books about Barnum, read stacks of his letters, listened to a rare Edison recording of his voice, watched the various movies and commentaries made of his life, visited with collectors of Barnum materials, went to Bridgeport, Connecticut and San Antonio, Texas to research the Barnum materials there, and reread his lively autobiography, titled Struggles and Triumphs, the primary source to read if you want to know about this fascinating man’s life.

Barnum’s classic book was first published in 1854 and revised and enlarged numerous times. Barnum sold over a million copies of his famous autobiography (further evidence of this amazing man’s marketing skills). In the book, Barnum tells of discovering a tiny four-year-old boy by the name of Charles Stratton, how he named him Tom Thumb, taught him to sing and dance, gave him status by calling him “General,” and promoted him to the world by personally introducing “General Tom Thumb” to editors of major newspapers in New York City.

Barnum also writes of discovering and presenting Joice Heth, a black slave said to be over 160 years old (Barnum said she looked much older) and alleged to have been George Washington’s nurse. Other famous Barnum successes include his American Museum (the Disneyworld of the 1800s), his promotion of the famous Swedish soprano Jenny Lind, his infamous promotion of the bizarre (as Barnum spelled it) “Fejee mermaid,” his creation of America’s first superstar, and of course his still thriving “Greatest Show on Earth,” the Barnum and Bailey Circus, which formed as a result of Barnum running into a businessman just as shrewd as himself.

While Barnum had more than his share of failures, his success rate as a marketing wizard has never been beaten. Why? What can we learn from him? How did he make people stampede to his place of business? What did he do that most of us in business today aren’t doing? What were his sales and marketing secrets? That’s what I will reveal in this book, the first ever written about the marketing methods of P.T. Barnum.

I don’t know whatever happened to the businessman who sat beside me on my flight to Houston. I hope he’s not just sitting at a big table at a trade show.

I hope he heard some of what I said to him that day in the Texas sky, and that he is now stretching his mind, lining his wallet, serving people, having fun, and seeing his business grow by starting to think just a little like the greatest marketeer of all time, P.T. Barnum.

2

P.T. Barnum’s Amazing 10 Rings of Power for Creating an Empire

Every man’s occupation should be beneficial to his fellow-man as well as profitable to himself. All else is vanity and folly.

—P.T. Barnum, The Humbugs of the World, 1866

When President Lincoln and his family entertained Tom Thumb and his wife at the White House during the Civil War, the sad eyed, weary Lincoln asked Tom if he had any suggestions about handling the war.

“Mr. President,” Tom replied, “my friend Barnum could settle the whole thing in a month.”

Barnum was never given the opportunity to solve that ugly war, but Tom’s answer reflects the high esteem most of the country held for the talents of P.T. Barnum’s creative powers. It makes you think: What would Barnum have done to stop the war?

And in our bloody shark eat shark current business environment today, what would Barnum do to leap-frog ahead of the competition? What were his essential keys to success—keys you can use right now to solve the expensive battle of getting and keeping new clients in a time when most people regard business as war?

I found 10 keys to Barnum’s astonishing success as a businessman. Because so many people associate Barnum with his three ring circus, I decided to call these keys Barnum’s “Rings of Power.” In a nutshell, here they are:

1.He believed there was a customer born every minute. This man did not think small. His American Museum, one of the three great passions of Barnum’s life, was so popular over four million people visited it during his lifetime. At twenty-five cents a head (children half price), Barnum made a tidy sum of money. But Barnum did not aim for a tiny segment of the market. He went for the world. And he captured it. He took Tom Thumb to Europe several times, and he brought Jenny Lind from Europe to America, both by ship (which took two weeks to make the journey in the 1800s). He was probably the most famous man—and one of the wealthiest—on the planet in the mid-1800s. Why? Because he didn’t limit his target to his local neighborhood or even to the city where he lived. He aimed for the planet itself. In Chapter 4 you’ll learn how to expand your customer base, and discover new ways to reach those customers quickly, easily, and inexpensively.

2.He believed in using skyrockets.