Marshall Wayne

8/11/2019 Marshall Wayne

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Marshall Wayne: Icon Engineering

My Icon Engineering program, which Ill kind of allude to today but not fully, is the art andscience of reverse engineering, iconic images, stories, people and ads to create a brandthat matches your ideal vision. I like to do things like this because it catches attention, andonce youve captured their attention you can lead them through your sales pitch mucheasier and they are much more receptive to what youre saying.


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The main branded image for myself, again its like a cyborg concept, its about metransforming myself into the ideal vision that I want for myself to portray to the externalworld.

This video that Ill play next is just a 35 second intro to the Icon Engineering Program, andyoull get the idea.

Thats the essence of what youre going to see today. Great visuals, but I actually dontmake most of my money through branding, Im an international currency dealer so thatswhat youll see for the first half.

Im very tired right now because Ive had a flight from LA, I was up in San Francisco to filmthis car.


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Its a $2.6million car, fastest and most expensive production car in the world. Because Icreate interesting environments in my ads, I get requested from people to come andpartake in things like this. Yesterday was a really interesting journey from me.

American Dealer, this is an ad that I put up for my international currency business. You cansee it sort of emulates American Gangster with Denzel, I just essentially copied it, putmyself in a suit, and then recreated it.


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Here is what Im going to do, there is a Facebook post that I posted that got about 350likes, thats how my messages get across. Whenever you see this, then an audio of myselfreading this message will play and it will go in little chunks so youll get a little idea of whatI do for a living in my international currency business.

At twenty six years old I sat in Wisconsin waiting for the FBI agent to arrive, hesaid he would be there at 9am, he was, exactly. That was a scary morning for me.

Since I had recently started importing Iraqi dinar into the US, I didnt yet know if wasI was doing was illegal. I had considered my exits from the condo in case it wasnt.It was my repeated $20,000 wire transfers to a bank in Jordan that tipped them offthat something may be a miss. Fortunately after an hour of him sheepishly scanningthe room, analyzing my book collection, observing my personal mannerisms andasking questions to learn exactly what I was doing, he determined I was within thelaw, US law anyway, and it turned into a recruiting session. However I had otherplans than to work for the FBI, big plans, he did suggest, and I agreed, that since mybusiness is Iraqi currency Id be an easy target for terrorist money laundering andthat I report any suspicious activity through the CIA Iraqi rewards program. My

roommate, immediately after the agent left, said Mar, that was the coolest f*****gthing I have ever seen.

Sorry for the f bomb but thats what he said, I wasnt going to change it. What I actually dofor a living, after the Iraq war started it was clear that the sanctions the US put onSaddans regime would not allow people to invest in the Iraqi dinar. Well I always like to beinvolved in geo-political issues so that was my in. I just began shipping tons of this moneyinto the country, and selling it off to rich investors. I guess much of what you will learntoday is how I lost a lot of money, more than how I made a lot of money, but then I usedmy creative energies to bring it all back.


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To start that Iraqi dinar business, it was about late 2004 maybe, early 2005 when GoogleAdwords was starting to become a big thing. I just started pumping money into GoogleAdwords, the first week I was paying probably upwards of $500 per click, and then you cansee my average got down to 57cent, just through tweaking. I still use these same tacticsnow, naturally.

Youre going to see some highly produced videos out of me today, but I figured so you

dont get scared and start thinking well theres no way I could ever do that sort of thing, Illshow you one of my first videos that led to me being put on the front of the USA todaymoney section, Wire magazine, CNN, just from this horrible video.


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The question that I get asked all the time is, is my money real? Or, how can I tell mymoney is real? What are these security features on the Iraqi dinar? One very simpleway you can tell is just by a counterfeit UV light detector, and I have a real simpleone here that I will show you. Its simply, and Ill show you what it does. Lets takethese bills for example right here. Theres 10 thousand and 5 thousand dinar notesright here, watch what happens when I put them under the UV light. See that?

So you get the idea. I thought it was a good idea to put a Scar Face picture behind mewith middle eastern money, it was absolutely ridiculous. In terms of branding it was aseemingly dumb move but it caught the attention of people. You never know.

I provided great videos that didnt get anybodys attention, so I still test both ways.

That experience shifted my mindset. If the FBI was worried about me, then I wasonto something. I didnt look back. I moved to Washington DC in the suburbs wheremuch of my client base resided, and sent my cousin with $40,000 to Jordan to setup her own banking system, cutting out the middle men. I lived quite lavishly, on

occasion in the top floor of the Ritz Carlton, and having national interviews withCNN, Wired magazine, the USA Times etc. Id even fly down to South Beach Miamion dates. Amidst those superficial distractions I let my guard down, that was sixyears ago. On this occasion I send an extremely large amount of money to Jordan,far more than normal. Being that Id just been featured on the front page of USAToday in the money section, and was bringing in over $300,000 per month in sales, Ifelt that any gamble that I took was going to pay off. I was more than doublingdown. My Iraqi born transporter claims he was robbed at gun point whilst bringingmy Iraqi dinar from Iraq into Jordan, to then ship it to me just outside WashingtonDC. He was robbed by people we would call terrorists. I decided then maybe itwasnt too smart to be broadcasting myself in national news, there were people who

didnt like what I was doing. That day will ultimately cost me around $3million in USdollars. Significantly more if the lost opportunity cost factors in, but I keep those


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thoughts at bay. As my family and friends can attest, this has forced me to live avery minimalist and humbling financial life.

I still dont like listening to that, especially in my own voice . A lot of people in this roomhave made a lot of money and then lost a lot of money, we dont go from point A to point Z,its a huge roller coaster.

I just put my tail between my legs and went back to northern Wisconsin. Then I thought Iwas just going to figure out a new person, I cut out everything I had ever done andrestarted. Becoming Marshall Wayne I had written on this notepad, then I justsystematically figured out how to shift and create a whole new person.


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I spent a great deal of time back in northern Wisconsin afterward, to be in theircompany and be in the comfort of home. It isnt just financial, if it were I wouldnt beall that concerned. The type of people that I owe arent the type to use collectionagencies, and they dont believe in lawyers. However as we are all in the same boatthey have trusted me to handle it. My negotiation skills had become fine tuned, but Ihave a finite amount of energy. I never negotiate outside of this ordeal, not even ifmy restaurant bill is wrong, or even when internet marketing clients decide not to

pay for the branding work I do to help myself past this, I never waste a moment onfrivolous details. Youll see me withdraw, and Ill simply remove me from your life, oryours from mine. Sometimes quietly, and sometimes on Facebook quite harshly toset an example of what I will not tolerate. There has rarely been a day in the last sixyears that I havent been scared to wake up. Im often just as scared to go to sleep,which is why many of you ask if I do sleep. Due to this I occupy my mind withbooks, movies and TV shows, its rare that I go into a social situation. I spent yearsin my mind thinking about living a movie to keep myself from thinking about reality.I started to put myself into those movies by teaching myself photography, video,CGI and photoshop. I started to digitally put myself into the suits I could now not

afford, I created my reality digitally that I could not live in real life. Initially I kept it allto myself since it seemed so childish and lonely, however I posted the images of mein a Tom Ford suit.


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This is that image. Thats actually just Tom Fords body, so its a horribly copy-writedimage, but I didnt have any money. I couldnt buy the suit so I was just figuring out my newimage with things that I could afford, which was just images from the internet that are free.Thats what I did. I did really consider it childish but I just started not to care, I became veryaloof in that time, just because I wanted to just be in my own mind.

It got such a good response that I didnt look back. I created more and more with

each new creation feeding upon itself, forming ideas. It resonated so much thatothers wanted this kind of stealth for their business. That spun off a whole newbrand, the Movie Star Entrepreneur.


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This is that image for the Movie Star Entrepreneur. I decided I needed an excuse to putmyself into these movie characters and things like that without people asking what I wasdoing, so this is a useful excuse to do so. I would often just create these elaborate images,now youve seen my Icon Engineering image thats quite more elaborate than what I wasdoing then.

Here I started doing more elaborate videos. This would be a look at a cinematic video thatI took from my branding practice and then brought back into my currency business. Thosethings got of attention in my currency market, as you can imagine those are just little clips


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out of what was a fifteen minute sales presentation. It was just things that people hadntseen before in the investing world, it worked very well.

After that I was doing more and more branding for clients that were living in Lahoya, AndyJenkins was the first if you know him, Video Boss. I moved in and just started takingphotographs and positioning myself as an interesting person in Lahoya, and within a weekI knew everybody. That was useful, then from there you kind of meet everybody else.

This is Steve Jobs obviously, next to him is a carved pumpkin that I carved, but this is howI met a guy named Kevin Nations. I was in the grocery store going to get a big pumpkin, as


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I was walking out Kevin was walking in and we recognized each other from Facebook. Ihad this huge pumpkin in my hand so it was a humerous moment for us, it broke the iceright away. That Steve Jobs pumpkin is how I met Kevin and he has been one of my mostinfluential mentors. In fact right now hes at Vegas in his place with his high levelmastermind group, and Im not there this time because Im here.

This is called my style presentation. I often feel like in the internet marketing world a lot of

people only focus on certain things like how to make x amount of money in x amount oftime, doing no work, and I dont believe in that. Ill put in a few months on something thatmay not even make me any money just because I have such a neurotic obsession with thecreative aspect of things. So I wanted to position myself as a guy with style, and this is aFacebook tab by the way, envision this in a Facebook fan page tab with this video playingin it.

That was a video that got of attention in the market. A lot of people had just downloaded aPDF, and in that PDF I put sales pitches in there for different things that people want, myservices etc. Its a way where in a marketplace filled with people who will show you stuff if

they have an affiliate link for it, a lot of things like that get passed around freely with noaffiliate benefit whatsoever.


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Here is a thing Kevin and I have been working on. His style for instance, he is alwaysdressed so classy, he carries himself well, so we just have been trying to take everythingto the most minimalist form. Thats just him, looking super badass. It just says contact andKevin Nations, so obviously the ads that go to that, there is a process to get there, thatwouldnt be that effective if nobody knew who he was. We position him in a way that whenpeople finally go to this, its Im Kevin Nations, you know who I am, click the contact buttonif you want to here from me. The image says it, we didnt have to say that.

So, my Icon Engineering program. The rest of this presentation will just be showing youdifferent images that I do, its more of a lead by example than telling you what to do.


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At Kevins events I consider myself a live event branding specialist.

This is a picture of me sitting in the back of the room whilst Kevin is speaking. I just sit andwatch people and wait until I get the candid moments, then put it up on the internet,market it, sell it, so that people who arent at the event can feel a twinge of jealousy thatthey arent there. Its effective, especially in a $25,000 mastermind group, the whole point

of it is secrecy. This is a way to bridge that secrecy, but also promote the thing in the timethat its going. Its much more effective to promote something at this moment than it is insay three weeks later, when you get the videos and photos back. I just do it immediately.


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Heres some images of the people at the event.

I stage a lot of them too. This is clearly the rat pack of course, then we had Jo lay acrossthe pool table, this is at Kevins house outside of Vegas.


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Jody Jelas.


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You can see I make his people look super cool so that for one, they feel more of a kinshiptowards Kevin, but secondly they post these to their Facebooks and have tons ofresponse and their friends ask them what they are doing and what its all about. Itseffective.


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The last part of the presentation will be things that probably dont pertain to this group atall, but there are side benefits of putting out creative things in the world. One of mygreatest friends, my best girl friend, her name is Molly Mernard and her dads name isJohn Mernard, we are from the same town in Wisconsin. According to the latest forums heis lists at $7billion, so I get to hang out in that sort of world quite often. I made a video

about that, and Soulja boy, hes a platinum selling rapper, took my video, stripped theaudio of my voice, and used it to intro his song gettin paid.


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This is another example, Ive been more and more, Im getting in these rap songs andthings like this. Im not sure why, heres a YouTube video that I put out. Sometimes late atnight, I think it happens to a lot of us, you get these though streams. Well I video tapethem all so I can see them the next day and often they are quite insane. This one was justblatant egotistical, but it wasnt meant to show anybody. Now Im showing everybody, Illshow you the video and then youll see the song that got made of it. I had no influenceover it, it just got found and made.

A guy took that, took the words out of it, and made a song called Im That Man just usingmy voice.


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Ive since had another one but I didnt get a chance to put it in the presentation. I alwaysfind that its useful to ground yourself before you come to the event, now I have a pair ofblack shoes on, but at Yanik Silvers Underground event I had bought these red, I callthem ruby slippers. A lot of you have seen that post I think, so I thought I would brand theshoes and they take on a mystical element when you get to the event, they became a

thing there. This had like 150 likes on just a pair of shoes, I got called Dorothy a lot. It wasfine. I tried to rebrand myself as the wizard but they werent having it. Anyway, just a pair ofshoes can do you well to set up what you are going to do at an event.

This was when I got to the hotel at Yaniks thing, I had this image in my mind of before yougo on stage you are always wondering what people are going to think of you right. I tookthat photo, just with my tripod when I was alone, and took that shot of me looking in themirror and posted it saying what will they think, that got a lot of response too. I alsodrummed up more interest seeing my presentation, and I think its important that peoplehave an eager expectation of you, either meeting you or seeing you, either way.


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This is the first branded image that I posted for my Icon Engineering program. OnFacebook I never sell, people could go and find how to buy my stuff or ask me, but I dontblatantly sell. What I do is I post things like this and say hey this program is coming out,would you like to promote it? This got 33 people, some of the biggest names in internetmarketing that asked to promote just because I posted this image. People want to promotethings that make them look good. Often in this market there are things that will make youmoney but wont necessarily make you look good, you wouldnt want to tell your wife you

promoted a lot of the products that get promoted often, so I think its important to try andhelp make the people who are promoting for you to look good.


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This is a video promotion.

That was another piece to influence people to become affiliates and joint venture with me.It was essentially saying Im going to take that market in a new direction, its going to behighly creative, more akin to Nike ads than long form sales letters is what youre going tosee from here on out, jump on board or get left behind. That was the message for that,

Jack Reacher style since the movie was out.

This was for a branded webinar piece that I havent marketed yet, you will see it soon.


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This is another one, this kind of had sexual undertones. I sometimes like to do thatbecause youll get cocky comments, but those cocky comments at least keep your stuffgoing to the top of the news feed. It says at 4am when youre in bed sleeping, MarshallWayne is also in bed, but hes not sleeping. You can think what you want, but then it sayswhat makes some people more successful than others? Theres no magic about it, itsmerely sustained work over a long period of time. That image got a lot of response, not as

much tacky stuff as I thought. I emulated that from a Rolls Royce, I just take a lot ofinspiration from advertising.

This is all I have, so if you guys want to get in contact with me heres my email, or Im onFacebook its just Marshall Wayne.


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I do have one more, this.

P.s, on Friday March 1stat 9:30am, Ill be back in DC taking the stage and revealingthe biggest part of what made this story. The moment I take that stage I will havecame a full circle back to the place it all began. What I present there could quitepossibly take care of the last of this ordeal. In my mind it couldnt possibly be morepoetic, god speed.

Thats it. Thanks guys.

Audience Q: What are you shooting your video with?

I use a Canon 700d, its a photography camera but it shoots amazing video.

Audience Q: I saw you in there with your iPhone.

That was because it was late at night, I dont feel like setting up really nice cameras then.

That got shown to you guys but they usually dont get shown because they are prettyridiculous. So I just grab my iPhone real quick. I do shoot on my iPhone a lot just becauseof ease of use.

Audience Q: I dont think anybody in the room is going to argue that its a differentworld of talent when it comes to this type of creativity. As much as we all think wecan do some amazing things, thats a different level. Where for you, was it youth,this type of inspiration for creativity comes from?

Im not sure. I think a lot of it is just wanting to, I dont know, look good for people. Somaybe there is a little lack of confidence that makes all of that stuff come.

Audience Q: The pauses that you have, I play music and the expression in musichas a lot to do with pauses otherwise it would just be constant sound and you


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wouldnt differentiate, you have a gift of your pauses and is that something you areaware of or do you just do it naturally?

I dont know what comes naturally, I dont think too many things do. I just watch greatpeople, great ads, and see what they are doing. I know a lot of the times in our market, inthe internet marketing world, people like to rush through presentations and they think if

they dont get it out quick people arent going to like their page. Im more like, if you dontwant to watch this then screw you. I kind of intentionally, then it forces me to make itcreative enough to where, alright he isnt rushing through it so Ive got a decision to make,is it creative enough where I want to sit here and watch this artistic expression, or am I notinterested. Likely if they arent interested in how I operate they arent going to buy my stuff,because it wouldnt be for them anyway. I dont know, Im not sure, all I know is it workswell for me.

Audience Q: I have a question that will hopefully help everyone in the room who isknew and just getting started. If someone comes to you and says hey, I have nodirection, I want you to brand me. What are the first steps you take to getting themon the road?

I get a lot of my stuff from movies or TV shows or books, so a lot of times Ill just ask themwho is their favorite movie starts or favorite TV shows, because you can learn a lot by aperson. Thats why Facebook asks those questions, because you can learn a lot by, if yousee a person that reads say Harry Potter is different to someone who reads motivationalbooks.

Audience Q: Do you feel like you need to know them and their attitude and how theyare, do you start from there or just say hey look Im going to build what I think a

brand should be for you?

No, I want it to be their ideal image of themselves. Sometimes its hard to match becausewho they are in the moment and what their mind would like them to be, its a big gap atfirst so I cant, if I make a great image for them, people dont necessarily think it matcheswho they are. We have to figure out a happy medium and then progressively move up aswe go because people will adjust their mindset of you, but they dont usually do it in hugeleaps.

Audience Q: You say you watch a lot of movies, did you consciously choose a kindof film narration style?

Yeah absolutely. I do it a lot. Add me on Facebook and youll see a lot of my images arefilm noir style, the Rat Pack imagery, I love that stuff.

Audience Q: I paid Jack Trout for a full day of branding like six years ago, as inTrout and Reece. I told them weve got toner cartridges blah blah blah, but he goesat the end of the day its really hard to brand potatoes, and Im like oh thanks.Hope that cheque clears. So I go about as the Refill Man, but I dont go aboutwearing a cape or anything.

Thats how you brand inanimate objects, you become a character of sorts. Whether its acharacter or you just have a personality that is expressive to sell things that arentexpressive. Car dealerships do it well, although cars are very easy to brand. Justbecoming a character, often in stuff like that it might be the lowest price that you have, but


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its also people want to go to who they like. So you could be likable, they dont really careabout the cartridges, theyd go to anybody, but theyd rather go to you if youre likable first.

Audience Q: Dont you have trouble branding internet marketers because they seemto be so much themselves.

I dont work with a lot of internet marketers to be honest. The internet marketing world kindof stemmed from long form magazine ads, so they still have that mindset, youve seen theevolution. Those things work, but we are evolving into an audio and visual culture so wehave to shift a long. We cant still pretend we are writing an ad for a magazine, we use thesame words but we have to present it in a different fashion. If you really listen to my videosinstead of watching them youll see some great writing. I spend far longer on the writingthan I do the video, because I never know what to do for a video until I write it out. Youwouldnt know, a video is only a great script visually presented. Kevin Nations is aninternet marketer, theres a reason I love working with him. He buys into the simplicity andelegance of what I like, but hes that way so it works for him.

Audience Q: I was wondering, when you first started with your brand if you will,were you just posting on your Facebook page to get attention or YouTube, how didthat come effect before people noticed you for what you do?

It was just YouTube, Facebook wasnt around yet. YouTube was that first dinar video Iposted, where I was sitting there in front of the scarface thing, that was my branding but itworked. I was smart enough to know one thing, the reporters were looking for newsources, so I knew that if I just blanketed YouTube with videos of that nature they wouldfind me. I could speak english obviously because Im not middle eastern, so I became apopular figure right away because of that.

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