The podcast, The DEAL FLOW Show, hosted by JP Maroney and Paul Nicolini, invites the father of infomercials and the Original Shark of ABC’s Shark Tank himself, Kevin Harrington, to teach burgeoning and experienced entrepreneurs alike the secrets of taking a $5 million company to a $1.3 billion company by mastering the deal-making process!
So, kick back for a bit and prepare for the recounting of one of the most exciting success stories of the ages. As we break apart this podcast brick by brick to show you how to pioneer your own success through shark-infested waters.
This podcast overview will be broken down into the following sections:
THE DEAL SHOW | EPISODE
This second episode of the first season of The DEAL FLOW Show podcast aired on October 7, 2020, with the title “Shark Tank’s Kevin Harrington On Taking a $5 Million Company to a $1.3 Billion Company” and hosts JP Maroney & Paul Nicolini.
The episode starts off with the introduction of Kevin Harrington himself, a lifetime entrepreneur, father of infomercials, and widely known to be the original Shark of ABC’s Shark Tank. He arrives on air to share his tried-and-tested Deal Marketing strategies and tips:
EPISODE | KEYPOINTS
- Jump back into the early 1980s as Kevin Harrington, who was a real estate and business broker at the time, stumbled upon the birth of infomercials while watching television in the middle of the night. A fateful encounter that led to his involvement in over 500 product launches that made over $4 billion worldwide.
- Learn how Kevin Harrington embodied one of Winston Churchill’s famous quotes: “Success is being able to go from failure to failure without the loss of enthusiasm.” To overcome the fear of failure that plagues entrepreneurs at all stages of the life cycle.
- And how creating content and branding yourself and your products or services can boost you up to the top-of-the-top. And maybe even bag you a leading role in the opportunity of a lifetime! Like Kevin Harrington’s illustrious experience at ABC’s Shark Tank.
- And finally, how his new book, Mentor to Millions: Secrets of Success in Business, Relationships, and Beyond, can help you how to be a mentor, how to find a mentor, and how to be a good mentee so that you can experience all that the business space has to offer and breakthrough all the obstacles that get in your way.
MAIN HOST | JP MARONEY
The main host for The DEAL FLOW Show podcast is JP Maroney, the founder and CEO of Harbor City Capital Corp, which is a global alternative investment group that specializes in buying, building, and monetizing digital assets.
He is a proud entrepreneur, investor, and philanthropist that has over 27 years of experience in his industry. In one of his more recent interviews, he was asked how Harbor City Capital had been able to consistently produce above average results for his clients, and answered with:
“Our buyers get to tap into our substantial investment of time, capital, and expertise without the prohibitive upfront costs of doing it themselves. They get guaranteed results and pay a modest, fixed price per lead and they can scale as big as they want. Strategic investments in technology, testing, an expert professional team, and lead data have given Harbor City Capital an edge over its competitors and created a substantial barrier to entry for others.”
Of course, now he stars as the main host of his very own podcast, one that was developed to “bring together people in the capital markets” to unveil the secrets and hidden strategies of the world’s greatest deal makers.
GUEST STAR | KEVIN HARRINGTON
Whether you’re part of the ‘older’ crowd or the millennial generation, you’ve probably seen at least one infomercial in your life.
Before the rise of digital marketing or influencer marketing—which came about like a storm with the unveiling of smartphones and the internet at large—television was one of the biggest marketing channels available.
And one of the foremost pioneers of this age was Kevin Harrington. Who, as we’ve referred to previously, is the father of the infomercial.
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves, let’s dial things back a bit and revisit the early 1980s:
EARLY CAREER | THE BIRTH OF THE INFOMERCIAL
Late one night, in the year 1984, Kevin Harrington had been watching television when he realized that, sometimes, the only thing on the screen was the color test bars that stations showed when they ran out of things to air. As innocuous as this occasion may have been, it became the birth of one of the biggest marketing successes of that age.
During that time, Kevin Harrington made his money by becoming involved with over 500 product launches that resulted in sales that earned up to $4 billion worldwide. He sold products in at least 100 countries and 20 different languages.
Kevin Harrington describes it best with this quote taken directly from the Podcast:
“And that’s when the light bulb went off… All of a sudden, boom, boom, boom. I was filling airwaves all around the world. Not only in the US, we went to Europe, we went to Latin America. And we grew the company to a dollar a share, up to $20 a share. That was what my early days as an entrepreneur were like.”
And, a handful of years later, in the early 1990s, after earning himself a net worth most people could only dream about back then, Harrington was officially deemed as one of the best entrepreneurs in the world by Entrepreneur Magazine.
Oh, and by the way, if you’re wondering about Kevin Harrington’s present-day net worth, it’s currently at $450 Million!
2000s CAREER | THE ORIGINAL SHARK
One of the topics that always comes up when Kevin Harrington is on air, is Shark Tank — a TV series on the ABC Channel that first aired in August of 2009, where a panel of potential investors meets with entrepreneurs that are eager to start selling their products or services.
When asked about how he got involved with the show, Kevin Harrington explained that it all started with a realization that he needed to put himself out there and start creating content. Which led to his first book “Act Now: How I Turn Ideas into Million-Dollar Products,” and a nationwide gambit doing radio interviews and podcasts promoting said book.
All of which, consequently, led to him catching the attention of Mark Burnette, the producer of Shark Tank himself, and earning an invite to the show and the title of ‘First Shark’ or the ‘Original Shark’ of ABC’s Shark Tank!
For the late 2000s, Kevin Harrington was a recurring cast member of the show for its first two seasons, before he left to pursue other business ventures.
PRESENT-DAY CAREER | MENTOR TO MILLIONS
One of Kevin Harrington’s latest accomplishments is the publication of his newest book, Mentor to Millions! This book was co-authored by one of Harrington’s ‘mentees’ Mark Timm, who is just as deep into the entrepreneurial world as Harrington is himself.
This book chronicles how his mentee, Mark Timm, had transformed, through Harrington’s mentorship, into the man that he was today: A man that could pivot between work and family and combine the best of business, family, and his personal life.
In Harrington’s own words, however, the book is where, “We teach you how to get a mentor, how to be a mentor, how to be a good mentee, how to find where the best mentors are, and how to structure relationships with them.”
The book, so far, has been quite positively acclaimed. With Forbes having listed it as one of the top “6 Books Every Business Leader Should Read In 2021!” Describing it as a book for entrepreneurs that match the following description:
“This book is for you if: You are ready to understand the value of relationships in your business life, if you are struggling to manage your personal and professional worlds separately, or if you are looking for some inspiration from a successful entrepreneur.”
IMPORTANT INSIGHTS | KEY TAKEAWAYS
And now, we finally get down to the fun bits! The secrets that you were all waiting for. Carefully extracted from this episode of The DEAL FLOW Show so that you can really assimilate all the tips and strategies that were mentioned. Starting with:
INSIGHTS | SUCCESS STRATEGIES
At the beginning of the podcast, one of the first things asked by Host JP Maroney was, “What is your process for due diligence and analyzing an opportunity to see if it makes sense for your business, for your mission, for your overall growth strategy, and how it all fits together?”
And Kevin Harrington replied, first, with, “I focus on the product” — to describe the internal ‘checklist’ and ‘checkpoints’ that he follows whenever looking into a new venture. This means that he always starts off by learning all that he can about the product involved before even thinking of jumping into the deal.
He exemplifies this process by introducing a product that he had gotten involved with 5 years ago — an energy drink called Celsius, which, when he discovered it, had been worth 10 cents a share. He explains that he had gotten involved with the product and accepted the board seat because he was able to start from the “ground floor,” so to speak. That is, he was involved way before it had even begun making waves. And now, that same company, which, at one point, had had a $5 million market cap, had grown to the $1.3 billion company that it is today.
INSIGHTS | DEALING WITH FAILURE
It’s Co-Host Paul Nicolini that asks our next insightful question. Prompting Kevin Harrington to share how he goes about dealing with failure.
To answer this, Harrington throws us back into the 1980s once more, early in his ‘early days’ where he still got “very upset” over failures and “losing money.” Going on to say that:
“We wasted a lot of time until I finally figured out that my business was… a business, and that not everything was going to work. I had to understand that.”
And that overcoming this facet of his personality had taken pretty deep ‘soul searching’ until he found his answer in the wise words of Winston Churchill.
“Winston Churchill said it best… Success is being able to go from failure to failure without the loss of enthusiasm.”
Now, he sees business failures as just another lesson learned. Saying that, “It’s okay. That’s life. You get up, dust yourself off, go back and, and try a new approach.”
INSIGHTS | SUCCESSFUL BRANDING
One of the last bits of advice that Kevin Harrington offered while on the show was to remind The DEAL FLOW Show audience about the importance of successfully branding yourself and your products or services.
“Ten years ago, I was sitting with a nice track record of successes, but nobody really knew who I was.” He explained. And that’s when he decided: “I needed to start creating content. So, I started writing books… And that’s what got the attention of Mark Burnett, who called me up to become a Shark on Shark Tank.”
So now, he advises that all Entrepreneurs do the same. “Whether you’re at the beginning or you’re up the top of the top, you need to be creating massive amounts of content… This is the wave of the future. So, that’s my main tip of the day. Write a book, do a podcast, get out there, get your hand up, and get your head out of the sand — get it up there high.”
OVERVIEW | THE SECRETS OF DEAL MAKING
And so ends our recounting of this end-of-the-year episode from The DEAL FLOW Show featuring Kevin Harrington.
If you want to learn more about Harrington and the main host JP Maroney, or if you just want to listen to the podcast yourself, the episode is available on the TheDealFlowShow official website!
