The Learning Annex - Founder - BILL ZANKER - INC MAGAZINE - Bill Zanker & The Learning Annex

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(Free-Press-Release.com) June 12, 2009 --

As Bill Zanker tells the story, he rang up the Donald's office and got the secretary, who refused to put him through. When she asked what business he had with Mr. Trump, Bill Zanker replied that he wanted to book him as a speaker and was willing to pay $10,000. Not interested, she said. "She didn't even bother to ask him," Bill Zanker recalls. So he called back and upped his offer to $50,000. When he told me this story he was sitting on a chair in his office, but as the story's momentum built he hopped up onto the seat and assumed a squatting position. Bill Zanker offered $150,000, at which point the secretary said--still having yet to relay any of these opportunities to her boss--"Donald makes a lot of money.

Make him a reasonable offer."

"I just went crazy," Bill Zanker says. "I took a walk, went to the bathroom, and offered $1 million." Robbins, he says, gave him the strength to do something so bold. "Not three minutes later my cell rings. It's Donald himself. He said, 'How many people can you get?' I said 500 or 1,000." Not enough for Trump. "He said, 'You promise me 10,000, and I'll do the deal.' He never once mentioned the money." The deal that was eventually signed gives Trump $30 million for 20 appearances.

I promised Bill Zanker that if I did one thing at the Florida Expo, I would watch Robbins perform. He says it is the moment in the Expo--the end of Day One--when people go from hoping they will become rich to knowing it's going to happen.

"He's America's success coach!" says the emcee, and then Bill Zanker sprints onstage and howls his introduction in front of a giant image of Robbins's head. "There has never been a speaker like Tony Robbins. He changes lives! He changed my life!"

Out comes Robbins, full throttle, his black baggy pants billowing in front of AC units that blast the stage. He is a large man, but his presence is positively massive. "I'm not a big believer in positive thinking," he says. "I do believe in energy."

In print, most of what Robbins says comes off as hokey:
The ultimate resource is human emotions. It's not resources; it's resourcefulness.
Whatever your limits are, they're self-imposed. They're not physiological; they're not financial.

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