The Art of the Deal
In the last few months — like many people — I’ve become a YUGE Trump fan. And watching several of his rallies on YouTube, he often mentions his 1987 book, The Art of the Deal. Well, he aroused my curiosity enough that I went out and bought a copy from Amazon.
Now being a self-employed market analyst in the tech industry, I also figured the book would give me some profitable ideas for my business, which it has.
So what’s my opinion of the book? Well, it’s a highly interesting read, and any business person, I think, can get good advice and motivation from it. Most of the book’s content describes the planning, salesmanship, obstacles, and successes around some of his famous (pre-1987) deals such as Trump Tower and the Atlantic City casino he bought from Hilton Hotels. And the business lessons in the book are widely applicable beyond real estate.
Now each “deal” in the book is actually made up of several supporting deals — agreements/contracts with many parties — which all need to come together to win the business. For the Trump Tower deal, for example, there was the property lease, the building license, the air rights, bank financing — even city permits. So the fun of the book is learning how the jigsaw pieces fit together and reading about the many unforeseen twists and turns that happen, and how Trump flexes his original plan to inevitably close the sale.
The book isn’t all success stories. Trump also discusses his attempt to create a big deal through his USFL football franchise, the New Jersey Generals. That deal — a long shot bid with a potentially big payoff — ended when the opponent, Pete Rozelle’s National Football League (NFL), defeated Trump and his USFL partners in a close court case.
For me, the meat of the book is in the Trump Cards chapter. Here’s where Trump distills the basic principles he follows to win deals and grow his business.
And reading this chapter is where I started noticing many parallels to the techniques he employs in his presidential campaign. So that’s the genesis of this post. I thought, “Gee, I’ll bet many FReepers would enjoy reading about how Trump’s 1987 Art of the Deal principles are being applied in his 2016 campaign.”
So what follows are some excerpted lessons from Art of the Deal (in italics) and my observations on how they relate to what he’s doing in his campaign.
Hope you like it. Look forward to reading your comments.
Think Big
To me it’s very simple: if you’re going to be thinking anyway, you might as well think big. . . I wasn’t satisfied just to earn a good living. I was out to build something monumental — something worth a lot of effort.
Bigness has become synonymous with the Trump campaign.
- The thousands of people who attend his many rallies create the aura of a large movement and massive voter support.
- Arriving at the Mesa, Arizona rally (120 min.) from his Trump Force One Boeing 757 is the kind of showmanship Americans love. It signals he intends to accomplish big things when in office.
- And the courage of a business man running for the Presidency with bold and aggressive plans to turn the country around certainly testifies to big thinking.
Get the Word Out
You need to generate interest, and you need to create excitement. . . One thing I’ve learned about the press is they’re always hungry for a good story, and the more sensational the better. Trump is taking the art of public relations to new heights in his campaign:
- Barbara Walters and ABC’s 20/20 did a up close look at Trump’s family called Meet the Trumps (37 min.).
- Magazine coverage has included Time, Rolling Stone. and the New York Times Sunday Magazine.
- Major TV interviews have appeared courtesy of the 60 Minutes (8 min.) and the Wall Street Journal (12 min.).
- Loading the news hopper with sensational stories is the role of his witty jabs at opponents on Twitter and his tell-it-like-is comments during rallies. Trump ensures the news media always has something controversial to speak with him about.
Enhance Your Location
You don’t necessarily need the best location. What you need is the best deal. Just as you can create leverage, you can enhance a location, through promotion and through psychology. .
In a short six months, Trump has YUGEly changed the rules of presidential campaigning:
- In the 2012 GOP primary, a superior position (or location) meant raising the most money from donors. But today, Trump has gained his position of strength not through money but from constant media coverage and his ability to stake out early leadership positions on issues Republican voters care about.
- Who came up with the idea of photographing a real bald eagle perched next to Trump at his desk?! It’s pure genius. Time Magaine’s story, The Donald has Landed echoed that magical moment when America put the first man on the moon. There’s even an uncanny likeness between Trump’s and the eagle’s head of hair. LOL! In short, the symbolism is rich. Whether Time intended it or not, the story psychologically positioned Trump as a POTUS-in-the-making — and an eagle among men.
Contain the Costs
I believe in spending what you have to. . . The point is that you can dream great dreams, but they’ll never amount to much if you don’t turn them into reality at a reasonable cost.
Though Trump has plenty of money to spend on his own campaign, his campaign has been remarkably frugal and efficient:
- The bare-bones campaign headquarters is on an unfinished floor of Trump Tower and was explored in a story by Bloomberg Politics (7 min.).
- Campaign manager Corey Lewandowski explained that the campaign is run like a business where every expenditure must earn a return on its investment.
- Through the end of 2015, Trump’s campaign actually spent less on paid campaign advertisements than other GOP candidates, but led the pack by a wide margin in the polls.
Fight Back
I’m very good to people who are good to me. But when people treat me badly or unfairly or try to take advantage of me, my general attitude, all my life, has been to fight back very hard.
America loves a fighter, and Trump has proven to be an expert counter-puncher in his campaign:
- Trump counter-attacks his opponents and thereby dampens the effect of negative campaign ads and the unfair statements his opponents make. And Trump is an equal opportunity opponent-basher. If you're a woman or minority opponent, it doesn't matter — you get the same fire and brimstone!
- Given how fed up people are with weak politically-correct double-speak, Trump actually grows his support by doing the opposite — honestly expressing what he believes. Wow, honesty in politics. What a novel idea!
- However he doesn’t hold a grudge forever. For instance, in a recent tweet, Trump said, “I never thought I’d be saying this but I’ve really enjoyed @RichLowry on television lately, and he was terrific hosting @seanhannity”.
Know Your Market
Some people have a sense of the market and some people don’t. I like to think I have that instinct. That’s why I don’t hire a lot of number-crunchers, and I don’t trust fancy marketing surveys. I am a big believer in asking everyone for an opinion before I make a decision. . .
Better than any other presidential candidate, Trump knows his market and has correctly read the mind of American voters.
- Trump took tremendous heat from the media when he first proposed building a great wall across our southern border and publicized the fact that some illegal Mexicans were committing terrible crimes. But Trump correctly understood where voters stood on the issue. Soon enough, securing the southern border and having illegal aliens returned home gained wide public support. And Trump's poll numbers spiked upward.
- Powerful issues lay dormant till Trump brought them to light. He sensed that veterans were being given a raw deal and gave a speech aboard the USS Iowa (15 min.) to reinforce his commitment to the better health care of veterans. The result? Trump now owns the issue of better veteran affairs in the mind of the public.
- Trump trusts his own instincts. He has not hired high-paid consultants or focus group experts to advise him. Rather, he gets input from his small staff and seems to listen at a deeper level to needs of the American people he seeks to serve.
Maximize Your Options
I also protect myself by being flexible. I never get too attached to one deal or one approach. . . Once I’ve made a deal, I always come up with a least a half dozen approaches to making it work, because anything can happen.
The “anything can happen” crisis became real with the brutal ISIS mass murders in Paris and San Bernardino:
- Prior to Paris, the most crucial issue of the Republican primary was stopping illegal immigration — and Republicans voters made Trump the clear leader on that issue. But almost overnight, ISIS terrorism and the Syrian refugees had become the top concern.
- But Trump's flexibility and courage allowed him to capitalize on the new focus of the 2016 Presidential election. He raised the issue of Islamic terrorists living in the United States, recalling that Muslims in the U.S. were cheering in the streets when the Twin Towers were attacked on 9/11. The media then went on a full-scale attack saying Trump’s claims were false. But soon enough, various police reports, eyewitness accounts, TV news videos, and comments by Dan Rather on the David Letterman show (6 min.) confirmed Trump was right.
- The media fiercely attacked again when Trump recommended a temporary moratorium on Muslim immigration to the United States. But Trump understood the mood of the public, and shortly thereafter Trump’s poll numbers jumped once more. Surveys revealed that voters now considered him the strongest candidate to battle terrorism.
Protect the Downside
People think I’m a gambler. I’ve never gambled in my life. . . One of the best examples I can give is my experience in Atlantic City. . . before I spent hundreds of millions of dollars and several years on construction, I wanted to make sure I got my gaming license.
Protecting the downside is evident in the way Trump has prepared for his presidential run.
- For years Trump has been practicing and testing his run for the Presidency. And by dipping a toe in the water, he learned what national campaigning would be like, and these experiences enabled him to refine his strategy.
- Many months before he launched, he tested his major campaign themes by speaking at the CPAC 2015 (24 min.) conference in February.
- What captivated my attention early on was Trump’s clever choice of the slogan Make American Great Again. When I did a trademark search, I found Trump’s team had diligently applied for that trademark way back in November 2012. Trademarking that terrific slogan protected his campaign from copycats. It also allows Trump to sue any company who tries to sell or manufacture campaign hats, buttons, and other things that use his slogan.
Use Your Leverage
The best thing you can do is deal from strength, and leverage is the biggest strength you can have. Leverage is having something the other guy wants. Better yet, needs. Best of all, simply can’t do without.
Trump’s celebrity status and broad name recognition created a virtuous vortex of publicity for him.
- Trump has single-handedly turned the Republican presidential debates into a huge money maker for television media. The first debate (110 min.) hosted by Fox News achieved 24 million viewers. The kind of viewership Trump gets is a profitable boost for TV networks — and Trump has fully capitalized on that.
- He has leveraged his TV viewer popularityinto a steady stream of live and call-in interviews. He’s also gotten tremendous talk radio coverage. For example, Rush Limbaugh has been covering Trump almost daily because so many in Rush’s audience are hungry to hear his analysis of the latest on the Trump campaign.
Deliver the Goods
You can create excitement, you can do wonderful promotion and get all kinds of press, and you can throw in a little hyperbole. But if you don’t deliver the goods, people will eventually catch on.
Trump has “delivered the goods” big time in his campaign:
- He has showed up and delivered YUGE rallies for his fans at the incredible rate of 2 to 3 a week. People get what they come for at these rallies: honest talk, a good bashing of the media and his opponents, a mix of serious talk and humor, and a down-to-earth, conversation-style speech — no teleprompters allowed! I especially loved his pre-Christmas rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan (60 min.).
- His detailed position statements have been posted on his website and elaborated upon in his recently published book, Crippled America.
- His on-line live book signing (90 min.) for Crippled America was one of the best events of all. It featured 90 minutes of informal discussion with Trump hosted by San Diego radio personality Mike Slater.
Have Fun
Life is very fragile, and success doesn’t change that. . . Anything can change, without warning, and that’s why I try not to take any of what’s happening too seriously. . . The real excitement is playing the game.
Despite his passion to win and beat his opponents, Trump has truly shown his love for the game itself.
- His compassion and humanity are clearly seen in his rallies when he jokes with his audience. He definitely feels the “love in the room” and says so.
- His appearances on late night talk and comedy shows such as the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon (6 min.), Saturday Night Live (4 min.), and Jimmy Kimmel Live (5 min.) demonstrates that while he’s serious, he doesn’t take himself too seriously.
- In turn, fans have produced videos, such as Darth Trump (7 min.) and You Can’t Stump the Trump (7 min.), that highlight the humorous side of the Trump campaign.
