David F. Fagan - The Icon Making Genius

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Podcast at Vinyl Impressions dot club. For more updates and exciting content, visit our main website at Vinyl Impressions dot club and connect with us on our Facebook page, Vinyl Impressions Radio.  I'm excited to welcome today's guest, David Fagan, the visionary behind the icon builder.  As a former CEO of Guerrilla Marketing, which sold over 23 million books worldwide, David has a storied history of elevating brands and individuals to iconic status.

In the helm of the Icon Builder, he's now focused on crafting the image and market presence of tomorrow's leaders. He can also help radio station owners, of course, radio presenters, too. And those listening on the Vinyl Impressions channels can feel involved, too. Meanwhile, it gives me great pleasure to say, David, welcome. 

Thank you. That's a great introduction. I think I want you to do all my introductions moving forward here. I was going to say, just give me a nod and I'll be there. It really is a pleasure to have you here though. And David, maybe you could start by telling us a little bit about the journey that led you to create the Icon Builder.

Oh, absolutely. For years, I was in a whole different industry, had a whole different life. I don't talk about it a lot because of trading brand confusion, but I very quickly realized, the power of what is now referred to as authority marketing, 20 years ago it was maybe just being called being bold maybe being a little egocentric, I started to form this belief that I called the humility myth that a matter of fact, I included it in several of my books, including the book, cracking the icon code and the humility myth is this idea that, if we're just a good person and we live a nice life and, we treat people well.

That everything's just going to work out and we're going to be successful. That is the humility myth. And that is not necessarily the case. And it's a very fast way to have very skinny kids. What I learned is, we could not be the world's best kept secret and we did need to say. Why us, there is this question that everybody is asking themselves out there, either consciously or subconsciously.

And it's why you, why should I hire you? Why should I work with you instead of somebody else or something else? And so from that kind of belief system, came, icon business development, which became icon builder and icon builder media and cracking the icon code and icon bootcamp and so on and so forth.

So that's how it all got started is just really learning the power behind different ways to put yourself out there and become somewhat of a celebrity expert. 

When you started on this journey yourself, where did you come from? And what is your background prior to doing this? I know you said you don't like to touch on that very much, but hey, this is the 

marketing bugle podcast.

So more than 20 years ago, I was in the the mortgage business, the banking business, the real estate business, late nineties, early two thousands, right out of school, there was a very big boom going on. One of the first booms in, in, in my lifetime, if you will. And so I was involved in that, quite a bit.

I oversaw nine different bank branches before too long as it pertained to real estate and lending. And so I was very much required to speak to train, to attract referral partners, people that would refer business in the real estate industry and other industries.  And, I realized that, , I looked very young. 

I probably still look young, but back then I looked like I was 13 years old. I did not have a college education. So I realized early on, like, how do I get these people to listen to me? What does it take to get somebody to not just persuade, but attract and enroll. And so I had to get, clever at, how to quote certain kinds of people and how to read certain kinds of things and. 

Earn certain types of accomplishments to ultimately  impact, persuade, influence, have credibility, get exposure, these types of things. 

I think the concept though, of turning individuals and businesses into icons is fascinating. Maybe you could share just a little bit about how you would encourage somebody to become an icon.

Back in the 2000s, this is really when reality television started to take off. And so one of the other things that helped form my belief, as well as other people's beliefs, is that the individual consumer, the individual person, period,  we became less enamored And interested in the company, right? That you can't really hug a building.

And even though a person could be flawed,  we found ourselves as an individual and as a society drawn to people and their flaws as long as they were real, as long as they were authentic, as long as they were honest. And we started understanding that, you. And screw up, if you said you were sorry, this is even when the anti hero started to take off more and just everyday culture and it was really from that.

It wasn't really like me putting out this belief. It was more of me being an observer of what was going on around me that, this was really becoming a thing and people started having a following on YouTube, 2007, 2008, social media things like Facebook, LinkedIn come out, people starting to have a following in these places.

And this was really before the word even  influencer came around,  but, it was something that, I noticed it caught on to pretty early.  And started observing too, that  this wasn't necessarily an accidental thing, somebody could very purposefully write books and speak on stages and serve in certain positions and put themselves out there in these ways, winning awards, serving on boards, getting testimonials client testimonials, getting celebrity endorsements and all these things started to become something that  I.

Formulated as the way to crack the icon code, right? And not to just be like an icon in the world, but you could be an icon in your industry, in your geographical area, and that people were doing it all over the place. And it didn't have to be this accidental thing, but you could become very intentional about this process.

Were you surprised by how people embraced this notion, this idea when you released your first book? 

I really wasn't.  Too shocked by it. I was obviously more surprised by the people who didn't get it because there are a lot of people out there still to this day, but especially back then there were like, I don't need to be a celebrity.

Matter of fact, I don't really want to be on TV. I don't really don't want to be on stage. And, I started doing news and media, I started doing a radio show at a cable TV show, which, further heightened my own icon status.  And that got me touring places. And what was even more fascinating is I would go to places like Australia and they have something there, which maybe you're aware of, but they call it the tall poppy syndrome, right?

And the tall poppy syndrome is right. Those little things that have the flowers and in the U S we like to pick them and you make a wish, right? You just blow the poppies away and they float away. In Australia, that's the best thing. It's like you really start to pop yourself up. People start to pump you up and maybe hero worship you a little bit and you really put yourself out there and it really leaves you exposed for the winds to come along and just blow you and all your works away.

So I was probably more surprised by the people that weren't just against it, but we're like culturally opposed to it. It was like in their DNA.  To be scared, fearful do I really want myself to be promoted as an individual? I like the idea to hide behind a company or a team or to play it safe, tuck down  I was probably more surprised by that and having to fight that humility myth that sort of developed in people and involved in people. 

And do you find now that leaders that really do become icons, I'm thinking Richard Branson's of this world and people of similar notoriety. Do you find that's also helped your cause in terms of you've got those examples to give away now to say, this is what happens when you become an icon because Richard Branson is way more than just his brand, the Virgin brand.

Yeah. 

Yeah, absolutely. It has absolutely helped a lot of people. And as always, there's that pendulum, the law of the pendulum.  We've probably swung too far. We're influencers.  Or people that are dubbed influencers have a lot of pull and power. And now we're going, what's your expertise?

What really is your claim to fame, so to speak? And the idea of fake it till you make it, maybe is allowed a lot of fakers in the world. And so we've seen the pendulum kind of come maybe a little bit backward. Hopefully it should be where now people are saying, okay, good for you.

You have a following, but what is really your expertise here? And for us to maybe challenge that a little bit what have you really accomplished? And there's nothing wrong with that. And I think we do need to do that as a society, but I think if anything, some of us have gotten frustrated with, Hey, there's a lot of us that feel like we've got We've earned that icon status that authority status that celebrity expertise.

Maybe there's some other people who work the formula. They cracked the code,  but there's really not a lot of depth. Maybe they're just regurgitating. The shallow end of the pool, they went to one Tony Robbins event, and now all of a sudden they're an expert and it gets difficult, right?

Because, who are we  to challenge some of these people, maybe they fake it till they make it, but they do in fact make it, right? So it becomes tough to you know, Separate, the real people doing the real work that have real value and the people that are maybe just a little bit synthetic or plastic or don't have a lot of depth to them, right? 

Absolutely. I think these days more than ever, it's to be famous just for being famous. And I guess, as you say, in some ways, we need to crack that a little bit so that you're famous for something. Not just for being famous, and  how do you adapt your strategies, David, so that they remain fresh and effective?

Technology is a massive part of that. Technology has just been driving us all faster and faster. And there's a ton of pros to it, but there's some cons to it as well. There's an upside to it, but there's a downside as well. Technology, like I said in the mid to late two thousands, it was really places like YouTube, Twitter Facebook, LinkedIn.

And then all of a sudden we saw a lot of things pop up. That aren't really here anymore. Things like Flickr, even Pinterest is barely hanging around. I don't know if you remember, but Google plus had its own platform. That was really supposed to be a big deal a couple of years ago.

Clubhouse. That was all the rage, clubhouse. That was going to change us, so social media platforms.  TikTok didn't even exist more than a handful of years ago, right? Now it's probably the 800 pound gorilla, the thousand pound gorilla out there. So you really have to stay up to date with social media, and you really have to Pick your vehicles because you can't really ride in all of them.

I probably didn't get on Instagram as fast as I should have. And that's been amazing, but I held back on clubhouse and I'm glad I did because, to me, it didn't do as, as much email was really big for a long time. It's still big for, if you know what you're doing.

You got to do a little bit of everything, but at the same time, you got to pick the technology and the platforms and the ways to communicate with your base that you really want to be, on the cutting edge, the bleeding edge, if you will, and you can't do them all right. You got to do all of them to a certain point.

Then you got to pick a few of them that do really well. For us to evolve and all these industries, we've had to say, okay, we're.  We're really going to stay in this and learn this and read about this and study this and experiment. Experimenting is so important with what we do constantly experimenting in our own business and then based on what works, telling our clients, okay, here's how we've perfected some things on Amazon and the publishing world.

And that's always changing. That algorithm is always changing. And then, hey, here's what we're doing in Facebook or Facebook groups or LinkedIn, and Twitter's become X.  Videos are getting shorter. Now they're getting longer. Now they're getting shorter again. Let's get out of direct mail.

You know what? Everybody left direct mail. Let's get back into direct mail because there's no competition there anymore. So I was involved in guerrilla marketing,  the former CEO of guerrilla marketing, the only CEO ever of guerrilla marketing. And guerrilla marketing is all about the unconventional way To reach conventional goals in lead generation and attracting and enrolling people.

But it's all about the unconventional. What was once unconventional becomes conventional. And what was once conventional sometimes then becomes unconventional. If you're out there sending things in the mail, you're a griller marketer right now. You're like, wow, that's crazy. Like you're sending something in the mail yet.

15 years ago.  Everything was sent in the mail. That was, how do you create the lumpy mail? How do you put something in there? We were mailing watermelons, like we'd put a sticker on a watermelon and we would say for more green in your business, give us a call. Like we were just trying to think of crazy, cool, outside of the box ways to get to people's attention.

And there were gatekeepers like, okay, how do we get past the secretary? If we mail them a watermelon, just this, like that's got to stand out. You don't hear of anything like that anymore. Nowadays, if you did that, it's come full circle back to okay, that's clever.

That's gorilla, right? So a big part of our business nowadays is understanding the trends, understanding technology. Playing around and experimenting. It's fun and a little bit stressful at the same time.  

It sounds it. And I guess as well with things like this, as you say, things are circular.

They do come round again. Would you say it's easier now or harder now than when you started? 

Wow, that's,  that is a tough one. I would say it's easier  to get into. I would say it's more difficult to really break through. Yeah. If you want to get into this nowadays and say, put on an event. 

Because of zoom, because of Facebook live, because of all these, stream yard, all these technology platforms. It's very easy. It used to be you wanted to put on an event. You're going to go to a hotel. You're maybe getting food. There was just more real thoughts. Involved, at least it felt like it nowadays.

Same thing to getting into it. Not only is fairly easy, but it's also hard to get people out of the business. It used to be somebody went bankrupt and they're like, okay, I'm out. I got to go do something else. Nowadays, you live at home with family members. You have no cost and that.

That person that really isn't being successful, they can hang out in the back corner forever. And you don't really know, are they making 5 or are they making 500, 000? Like we, we really just don't know. So I would say it's easier to get into it. As like a lot of industries,  probably 10 or 20 percent are doing 80 or 90 percent of the business.

So there's a lot of internet marketers. There's a lot of speakers. There's a lot of authors of books. Everyone's got a book now, right? That that are probably just barely getting by really in some ways. So very easy to get into it. Much more difficult to really have a decent paying career and really, break through and have something significant.

You mentioned about surrounding yourself as well as being in networks with people. I know you have an event that you're currently involved in as well. Maybe you could tell us a little bit about that. 

We've got a bunch of events. Probably the 1 that's most exciting is some of these event broadcasts we do with major media partners,  big city newspapers, TV networks.

The next 1 is called the the trailblazer summit and that's in June. June 18th through the 20th. It's an online broadcast. It goes out through a lot of social media platforms different types of TV platforms, but it's all about, different pioneers, trailblazers, disruptors of the past and present Mark, Victor Hanson Dennis, Waitley, the psychology of success, John Gray, men are from Mars winner from women are from Venus Jeff Olson, slight edge.

The list goes on and on. John. Really just cool people that you would know that were really trailblazers out there, right? But also people that are like, um, 1st female SWAT team or FBI negotiator people in the coffee industry water, recycling, food, forest for food, sustainability people in the social justice world.

Excited about some of these. Mainstream events  that have mainstream media with not just people from, say, that the success industry, but from people  that have been disruptors and pioneers of all kinds of industries coming into play. So that's a trailblazer event.  Dot com, you can find out more about that.

And, you could view that from anywhere in the world. And I think when the world shut down a few years back, everyone got very international. We definitely were on the cutting edge of that. And when we broadcast things, we broadcast United Nation. 160 plus countries, 162 countries, 190 countries sometimes.

So that's very fun and exciting.  

Is that something that keeps you switched on with all of this as well? Is it something that you really enjoy immersing yourself in? 

Yeah, absolutely. I, one of the things that, you know maybe drives my team a little bit crazy. But I'm really following the market trends and it's interesting that the market trend used to be, you would develop this sort of well branded event.

And once it's this well branded event, everybody wanted to come back to it because they knew what to expect. But nowadays in the marketplace,  people really want the new thing, the next thing. And so, some of these events we've done in the past they're great, but I. Sometimes lose interest in them because I feel the crowd or the audience losing interest in them.

And, I'm excited about bringing up some of the great  legends of industries and areas,  but I want to mix in that person that maybe nobody knows about it's really out there changing the world. And that's a lot of fun for me. To have these people come to me and be like, David, you just had me published in this big city newspaper.

And I just got a letter from somebody saying, you changed my life or you saved my life. David, I didn't know that this, these people were out there and I've been doing all this work. And now I just got this letter that I made this impact and it just made all my years of pain and discomfort. And, All worthwhile because now I found my people.

I found my audience. I found my tribe. I found my community that, they're in tears coming to me because of my work. Now I'm in tears coming to you for, bringing me to the world. And that's, Probably 1 of the most rewarding things that a publisher or a publicist like me, an agent like me, can have, we really do run talent management agency in the world of publishing publicity and production.

When we find that talent, that expert and bring them to the world, and they start changing it. It's a lot of fun. And so I'm always looking for different platforms, events,  channels, networks that I can, expose people to. 

You seem to juggle quite a lot of things as well, David, which is, of course, a talented itself.

I know because of the way we run the Violin Impressions radio show syndication club. I know that you work closely with your wife as well on the agency side of things. Yeah. Maybe you could tell us a 

little bit more about that. She's amazing. She's editor in chief of a top talent magazine. She's just really good with people.

One of the things we do is these international keynote tours. We've been to Kenya three times in the last year and a half.  Speaking at universities, and she's always really quick at picking up basic of any language. So she's, she'll stand up in front of these university students, thousands of these students and just start speaking.

So I Healy to them. She comes from the pageant world, she was had different Miss California titles. So she just does really well on camera, really well on stage, really well with people. And so it makes it a lot of fun. People see me do this and they think, Oh, David, he's got to be this  extrovert that just, loves being out there with all these people.

That is not the case. I'm the guy that speaks and then afterwards goes up to their hotel room and orders room service. You say to me David, Here's 200 people that all want to meet you, just walk through and just shake hands and say hi to all of them and just tell them about yourself.  I'm not horrified of that, but that's not a good time to me.

My wife, Isabel, on the other hand, it's absolutely, she's the life of the party, let's do karaoke. We go on these cruise ships like the marketers cruise, right? And I like to hang out in small groups of people and talk to people and everything,  but I'm in bed by 11, 12, like that's late for me, right?

I'm getting up, going to the gym, she's in the hot tub, she's doing deals at the bar, people are like, I don't even see you guys together on the ship. It's our lifestyle sometimes, or the way we do business is a little bit different. She's the big time socializer life of the party.

I'm more of the, let's have a very on purpose business meeting and have an agenda and, and I'm very intentional, right? I'm not transactional. I'm very relationship based as well,  but I'm more intentional in that way. She's more let's just go have some fun, see what happens.

That's great. I guess as well in many ways, that's why the relationship works so well because you've got that equal balance of both bases are covered in that respect for anyone who's looking to build their brand into iconic status. What are your top tips, David? What would you say that they must do? What must they do first?

That's really good. I would really sit down and take inventory of your accomplishments. We have a list of 15  accomplishments really to focus on video testimonials, celebrity endorsements, being featured in the media, speaking on stage. Publishing a bestselling book, the list goes on and on to get really intentional about those accomplishments.

Those accomplishments  should become your bio. They should become your answer to the question. Why you. Why you? Why should I work with you instead of somebody else? Something else? Why you instead of nothing at all, right? I could just sit here and do nothing. Why should I, make an investment of time, money and resources into what you're doing?

The answer to that is really those accomplishments. Get out there and, give, serve and share. Those three words are very important in the beginning and will continue to be important. How do you very strategically give, serve and share. If you want more fans, right? Fan is short for fanatic.

Winston Churchill has a pretty good quote about that. Fanatic is someone who, can't stop talking about you and won't change the subject. And, it's, you We want those kinds of people, right? Who just can't shut up about us. So, you got to give, serve and share.

And when you do that in the right way, helping other people get to where you want to be, that's a kind of a Zig Ziglar quote, another kind of legend, in order for you to get to where you want to be, you have to help a lot of other people get to where they want to be. Give, serve, share. 

That's how you're going to get fans. Icons have fans, celebrity experts have fans. And you give serve and share. So by that, you can get testimonials. You can get endorsements. You'll get opportunities to serve people in places. Those things can become accomplishments that you can share with people and start to win people over.

It's how you can develop a following, right? If you want to have more people subscribing to you, I'll tell people that, really focus on how you make people feel in my book, word genius. I tell people there are 7 feelings that will really help people move forward.  And so stop focusing on kind of the numbers and the analytics and start focusing more on how do you make somebody feel? 

They need to feel like you're the authority. They need to feel like there's a perception of value to what you do. They need to feel like there is a sense of urgency. There's 7 of those feelings. I'm not going to give them all. They're in the book where genius, but, there are some early things that anybody can do to give, serve and share, create that following, create those feelings and inadvertently, Yeah.

Whether you realize it or not, you're going to start to become the authority in something. You're going to start to become the celebrity and expert in something. You're going to start to have a little bit of icon status, in your industry when you're out there becoming that super connect. 

Yeah, really good advice.

Really good advice for those interested in learning more about your work and also maybe seeking your expertise. Where can we find you? What do we need to do? 

My website right here is davidtfagan. com. There's a place they can even, book a very short interview with us,  but really more of the company is toptagency. 

com and at toptagency. com, you'll see a lot of the books we've published for people. You'll see an example of a lot of the Media, we've gotten clients in, there's a lot of frequently asked questions and answers of the organization. Personal, maybe a little bit more davidtfagan.  com. More of the company and organization toptagency.

com. Those are two websites, but I'm not hard to find, you Google me, I'm probably going to come up in a lot of different places. 

Absolutely. David T Fagan. Thank you so much for your time. It's been an absolute pleasure chatting with you. Thank you for your insights as well.

And we wish you all the best with your next event in June. Yeah. Thank you, my friend. Thank you for listening for more details of any of our podcasts, please visit vinyl impressions dot club.