- Hey, this is Dan Lok, I'm very excited
because from time to time, I will have special guests
just visiting me in Vancouver and Brandon here
coming all the way from New York, man, my friend.
- Oh, man, it's my pleasure to be, my pleasure, man,
my pleasure, man, I'm excited.
- King Keto, though, so we have the two kings
having a conversation today.
And now Brandon has built a very, very successful
fitness business, a seven figure business,
also came from a background with nothing,
started from scratch.
And we're going to talk about that story,
but today we're going to talk about how to use
social media and how to build your brand on social media.
Now, Brandon I know that you now have over
760,000 subscribes on YouTuber, over 140K on Instagram.
1.5 million on Facebook.
- That's right. - Amazing.
And you've used that to build your business.
Versus a lot of people that just use social media
just for the sake of fame.
So maybe tell us a little bit about your background
and how you got into the fitness industry.
- Yeah, man, I'm from Chicago, the south side.
And it's a rough environment, right.
And I got in a little bit of trouble.
You know, my parents sent me to a military school.
In Wisconsin, you know.
And I got there on some sort of
scholarship, some sort of affirmative action type
scholarship, and I was the only poor kid there
and I was the only black kid there.
And that came with its own set of challenges, right?
You know, kids would like make fun of me and stuff.
And I'd get into fights.
I wouldn't say, they weren't like racist or anything,
they were just, like kids are just jerks,
you know, kids are just mean.
And I would get in fights.
And I was like, man, you know, it would be great
to win these fights, you know?
- Not getting beat up, right? - Yeah, I want to beat people
up, I don't want to get beat up, if I'm gonna fight.
So, I said, "Man, I need to start working out.
"I need to start training."
And I didn't really know what I was doing at first.
Initially, I was just trying to figure it out,
reading like magazines or you know.
- Was it like those muscle magazines?
- Yeah, muscle magazines, right, and you know,
I'm 35 right, so like the internet wasn't what it is now,
you couldn't just go on YouTube and find--
- A bunch of videos. - A bunch of videos.
You know, Elliot Holmes didn't have no videos yet.
You know, so like I had to like try to figure it out
by myself, I had to read books and stuff,
which is probably better than going on the internet,
you know what I'm saying?
But I didn't get a lot of, I had some progress
but not really, it wasn't until that summer
I started training with this guy named Aaron Mohammad,
who's a friend of the family.
And for years he was voted number one trainer in Chicago.
And he's actually Steve Harvey's trainer.
Like personal trainer now, he travels with him.
And so he's like OG and he definitely
knew what he was doing.
And he let me like work with him.
You know, because he was a friend of the family.
And I made like a lot of progress that summer, you know.
And then I went back to school and I thought,
man, if somebody, I can't wait to knock one of these
mother, you know, but they didn't mess with me.
- Now you are.
(laughing)
- I didn't get that big, right, because it was only
a few months, but I had some like the new gains, right,
but it was more like the confidence.
- I think it's confidence.
- Exactly. - It's because now--
- The way you carry yourself.
- They think, well, better not mess with this guy.
- Exactly.
Like predators look for prey, right?
And I wasn't you know, exhibiting the characteristics
of prey, right?
And so instead of messing with me,
these same kids are like now asking me for advice.
Right, and then I said, "All right."
I started teaching them what I learned,
and I noticed I liked training people, you know.
And seeing the progress they get.
And more importantly seeing how they change,
like how their personalities change.
- Maybe before they have a lot of anger issues.
- Yeah, they got stuff going on, that's why
they were such assholes, you know?
- Working out gives them an outlet.
- It's like the guy who's writing some bullshit
on this video right now.
He's got a lot of fucking problems, man.
What's the matter with you, bro?
Happy, confident people don't behave like that.
You know, you need to work out, get some confidence.
(laughing)
Fucking weirdo, cut it out.
And I digress.
You know, we all started getting better grades, right.
School, I don't know, I just noticed, it was bigger,
we weren't just changing their body.
It was changing. - Their mind.
- Everything.
Way more so.
And I think because, Dan, when it happens,
fitness in particular, you have to set
a series of goals, like little, make these promises
to yourself everyday.
You've got to eat right, you've got to get enough sleep,
you have to train.
You got to do all these things.
And when you make these little promises to yourself,
and you keep 'em, well like, you start
to trust yourself more.
You believe in yourself more.
Because imagine if you're someone making all these
promises to yourself, like, you have some goal,
you want to do something right?
And you say, you keep telling yourself,
you don't do it, how much confidence
do you have in yourself?
- Correct. - You know?
How much do you believe in yourself?
Why should you?
You shouldn't. - After a while,
the track record is so bad. - Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But if you can get these wins every day,
you set these goals, little small goals,
and you hit 'em, then it's like,
well now you can start setting bigger goals.
It just builds a kind of confidence
that can't really be replicated.
In another way.
Because you have to do it everyday.
- It's so interesting because my story's so similar
to yours because I was getting beat up
when I was in high school.
I was one of only three Chinese in my school.
So I was getting beat up and bullied.
So then that's how I learned like martial art lessons.
The funny thing, after I took martial art lessons,
nobody beat me up anymore.
And I end up teaching some of the kids martial arts.
- It's the same. - It's the same shit.
- Nice. - It's the same shit.
That's amazing.
So how, so from there, I assume, you kind of develop
this passion for fitness.
And then you started training people.
- Yeah, I went to college.
And then, that was my job during college.
And it didn't pay a lot, Dan.
Personal trainers typically don't make a lot of money.
You know, you can't scale that business.
But what is good though is that was my first like
sales job, because being a personal trainer
at a big gym, you're more of a salesman
than you are a trainer.
- You work with people all the time, you talk with people.
- You actually have to sell them.
The packages.
Like you're the salesman.
And you deliver the service.
You know, like.
- You're selling and you're fulfilling.
- You're selling and fulfilling.
And it was my first sales job,
and that's when I started building
what you call a high income skill.
That's where I initially got it, this is age 17.
And I realized that I kind of liked it, you know.
And I started studying in that real heavily.
- You ever thought if you're gonna be in magazine,
like you know, photo shoot, like all these things,
like when you started?
- OK, so initially, I wanted to be a musician, right,
like, yeah, yeah, there's some YouTube videos of me
playing the guitar like on another channel.
You can find it somewhere around.
And if you do find it, you will be amazed.
(laughing)
What can't this guy do?
You know.
But I thought I was gonna be a professional musician
in some capacity.
And I actually got signed to Sony Records after college.
As a rapper, yeah.
And then I got dropped when they merged with BMG.
So I was like, man, this thing I've been kind of
working at my whole life kind of got ripped underneath me.
So what do I go back to?
Like, I went back to my selling, you know
what I'm saying.
Now, at this point, Dan, I was like,
I don't know if I want to do personal training
because they don't make a lot of money.
I want to sell something lucrative.
Right, so that's when I started selling cocaine.
(laughing)
No, that's not a joke.
- That's not a joke.
- No, no.
I started, this was a long time ago.
- Long time ago. - You guys don't need
to go like looking into this.
Any law enforcement.
Hey, way past the statute of limitations.
Sorry guys.
You missed this one, but go get the guys
who are doing it now.
Anyway.
I'm over here.
So that's why I was like, man, because, you know,
I left a lot of the story out, but you know,
from the south side of Chicago, so you know,
I was familiar with this line of work.
And yeah, I started selling cocaine, man.
One of the things I did.
I was, you said the magazines,
at the same time, I got scouted by an agency--
- To model. - Fitness, yeah,
to do fitness modeling.
Some guy like, some like real like flamboyant guy
came to me in the street and he said,
"Oh, you should be a model."
I'm like.
(laughing)
I'm like. - I love that.
- I thought he just wanted some booty, man,
but no, he was for real, man.
He sent me on a casting that day and I got it.
It was for Vibe magazine, and it was like a big deal,
you know, oh, all right, that's cool.
So I was doing that a little bit.
But all that money was going right back into cocaine,
man, I was investing it, you know, getting more work.
Right, and then, in fact, I said, I told my agency,
I said, "Hey, you know, I know you guys have a sister
"agency in Miami, you guys should send me down there
"and I'll do some work down there, right?"
No, no, no, I was doing that because I thought,
well, because I knew that it was cheaper in Miami,
and more potent.
So I get that there and bring it to New York then I can
step on it, which means like, dilute it, make more,
right-- - And then sell it.
- Yeah, and then sell more.
And it's like, yo man.
So I started doing that for a while.
And-- - This is not a joke.
- This is not a joke, I'm not joking.
- This is serious. - I was doing that.
And a lot of things happened, but around,
you know, I was making a lot of money, man.
Making a lot of money.
And living the lifestyle that like rappers talk about.
Like I was actually doing it, like it wasn't.
Like the stuff that rappers talk about,
my life was a rap album, all right.
But then everything changed when I got a call
from my sister, and she said I need to call her back
right away, I've got tons of text messages.
I didn't get a call, I got a text message.
And it was like tons of text messages I missed.
And I called her and she said my father's missing
and he left a suicide note.
And that's when, sorry.
- How old were you?
- I was in my 20s, like early 20s, yeah.
And I couldn't believe it, right,
he's like my best friend, my role model,
and so I fly back to Chicago,
and you know, it was true, man, it really happened.
And I feel like I needed to change.
- You never saw him after that?
- I mean, I could have, I went to his funeral,
but I didn't want to see him, you know what I'm saying?
So like yeah.
It was a closed casket, right?
So.
You know, that's when I feel like, you know,
I needed to change my life.
Because he was doing, I don't want to get into his stuff,
too, but he was doing some stuff that he probably
shouldn't have been doing, he shouldn't have been doing,
as well, I had another friend, around that same time,
I grew up with him, his name was SV,
he got sentenced to life in prison, you know,
for being a criminal.
And then another friend named Esko, he was found
in New Jersey, we were in the same line of work,
he was found in New Jersey, he was murdered, you know.
And I thought, man, I really need to change my life,
you know, like, you become like the people you're around.
So if the people I'm around are like--
- Like that. - Like that's what's
happening, that seems to be the trajectory of my life.
So that's when I said, "I'm stop doing all crime
"and I'm gonna go 100% like focus on,"
you know, something that would help people,
something, you know, something I could really
something, you know, legal.
And. - So, it's your father.
He's passed away, that incident made you realize, OK,
maybe I, I think it's a wake up call.
- 100%. - It's a wake up call.
And maybe in some way, deep down, just guessing,
where if you continue on that path,
that's gonna make your dad proud, right?
- Oh, it definitely wouldn't make him proud,
but also maybe even worse, I saw what it did
to my mom, I was there, I was with her when
the cops told her they found his body.
And so imagine if she lose me, too, you know?
But even, a wake up call's a good way to put it
because like now I have to take care of her.
- Yes.
You cannot be the reckless person anymore, right?
- Yeah, I was thrust into this position where I'm like
the man of the house, of the family, you know?
For my sister, her, my mom's mom, who's like,
you know, old and you know, my sister's son,
everybody's like, I'm the guy now.
You know and I had to provide.
And be able to take care of them because no one else would
at this point.
And myself, right now, because I was just a reckless kid.
So that's when I got serious, Dan.
And so I went back to what I knew, personal training.
Right, but I wasn't making a lot of money.
It doesn't make a ton of money, so,
especially not the money I felt like I needed to make,
you know, for my family.
- To provide for your family.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And even the lifestyle I wanted.
Like, I like things, you know.
I like comfort. - Yeah, have a good life.
- And so I got two jobs, two additional jobs.
I started working for a moving company in New York.
In New York, moving is different because not a lot of places
have elevators, so all day I'm lifting stuff
up and down, you know--
- Building those biceps.
- Yeah, hey, hey, you know.
And then on the weekends I managed my buddy had a restaurant
in Queens and I was the manager of that restaurant,
working moving companies.
Training people like in the hours I had.
And. - So working kind of
odd jobs, here and there.
- Yeah, just like trying to fill my fucking day
with work seven days a week.
And I wanted to have,
I knew I wanted to do something in the fitness industry,
and I wanted to build a business,
and I figured I had to do it online.
- So you had the aspiration. - Yeah.
And I knew that online was the only way to do it, you know.
And it started.
I was so, all that work, and then trying to build
an online business at the same time, you know,
it was basically like two years of just struggle.
- What were you trying to do online?
Like, were you trying to offer, get more client
personal training or? - No, no, no.
Because, you know, you can't scale that.
So like I had a program, like a workout program
I was trying to sell, and then also, I saved up
enough money to start my supplement company.
- OK, so a supplement company.
- We had one supplement, just the fat burner, T-Rex.
And it was just those two things, and I was trying
to build up, trying to figure it out.
Like I didn't know what I was doing, you know?
I didn't know what I was doing.
And but it worked.
I mean, it worked like after some time
and fast forward today, now we have about 15 employees,
you know, big office, penthouse office in Manhattan.
It's not as nice as this one.
But hey, but it's nice.
And yeah, no, we got like customers all around the world,
an office right next to Central Park, you know.
You know, I got an award from Click Funnel,
you know, we've got a seven figure business.
Yeah, that's basically the story in a nutshell.
It was like a wake up call, you know.
- So that's part one of the interview
with Brandon Carter here.
Now make sure you go watch the next video
we're gonna talk about exactly how Brandon uses social media
to build his brand and build his business.
Click on the link below and make sure
to also follow Brandon on social media, as well.
YouTube and Instagram.