Latest / The Steve Harvey Morning Show / Rushion interviews Robert Foster, creator of the Shot Makers League, a virtual basketball platform

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Rushion interviews Robert Foster, creator of the Shot Makers League, a virtual basketball platform · The Steve Harvey Morning Show

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Money Making Conversations. It's the show that she
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: has the secrets of success experience firsthand by marketing and
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Brandon expert Rashan McDonald. I will know he's giving me
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: advice to many occasions. In the case you didn't notice,
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: I'm not broke. You know, he'll be interviewing celebrity CEOs, entrepreneurs,
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: and industry decision makers. It's what he likes to do.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: It's what he likes to share. Now it's time to
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: hear from my man, Rashan McDonald. Money Making Conversations. Here
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: we come. Welcome back to Money Making Conversation Masterclass. This
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: is my man. He's on the call today, Robert Foster.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: He's the father of three daughters and a basketball enthusiast.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: Growing up, he witnessed many black men around him start
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: successful businesses. That's called mentors. People who you see. It's
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: important because I'm gonna share story about growing up who
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: I saw and how they impacted infected me, affected me,
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: and I wasn't even tied to trying to be anything
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: but just a growing up black kid. But who you
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: see can't impact what you can be. You know, he
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: learned that you can achieve your goals through patients and
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: steady work. He would he went to He also struggled
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: with depression in high school and dealt with rebellious personality
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: that he had, So we're gonna talk about that now.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: He's self imployed a business owners two thousand and eight,
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: he created the Shopmakers Leads. We all know March madness
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: out there, So if you're gonna launch something, this is
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: the time of the year to launcher a virtual basketball
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: video competition platform. They offer a fun and skill based
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: experience for players, fans and brands to create, participate in
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: host competition. Please walk with the Moneymaker Conversations Masterclass. Our father,
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: an entrepreneur and basketball enthusiasts, Robert Foster. How are you doing, Robert?
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: I'm doing great, man, Thanks for having me and Robert.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: You know, I tell everybody I can play. But you know,
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: it's like a fish story. It's like a fish story, Robert.
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: You know, you know I could have fish. It was
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: the foot law, but it was three feet by the
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: time I got home. You know what I'm saying. You know,
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: he was battling with me. He battling. He took the
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: pole down. I brought it up he took the pole
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: down out of reaching the wall and pull him up. Now,
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: I say all this because you know you went from
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: being a street baller to a tech baller. All right,
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: and so now were you what were you on the court? Now? Well,
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: well did you have skills there? Rob? Yeah? I think
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: I did. You said, I think you see right there? Right?
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: So this is this this, this is what it is.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Right Like, I played with some with some pretty high
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: level guys. High level. See what you can't do it
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: like that? Rob? See, we don't know you, you know,
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: he said. You know, Michael Jordan would never say I
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: think I can play basketball, Lebron James would never say
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: I think and the late great Kobe Bryant would never
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: say I think I can play basketball. Now you know? So,
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: so I hold on, I got to come back. That
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: was as a man, as a man, as a man,
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: think of as a man, think of right, huh? As
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: a man, think of so should he be? And like
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: I said, I think I could play basketball pretty good.
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: I'm not I'm not a braggadocious type of person. Like
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: it's some people out there that can vouch that can
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: vouch for me, But I'm not gonna I'm not gonna
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: say him be like I was the greatest, but I
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: would say you this. When I played ball, you know,
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: in my era, things were very different, and I used
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: to shoot. I could easily shoot from half court like
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: no no, no, no trushing or throwing. I could just
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: I could just let it fly. Only person I saw
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: who did that in high school was Dame Lillard. Dang
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: yeah see see but see Dame Damn younger. So it's
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: a couple of cats. Man. We was doing that in Georgia,
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: like that was a thing like in Georgia. But before Dame,
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: before Steph Man, that was Lou Williams. He was somebody
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: that was doing it too. We all come from that
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: same He was Team Georgia. I played with Teams Georgia.
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: I play. So now we're getting the simple Robert, you
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: know saying you mentioned the name. We know sweet okay,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: sweet see. But even Sweet Lou, Sweet Lou was was
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: younger than us. But he he, he was in that
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: same vein like in Georgia. You know, pulling from deep
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: that was a thing like before Steph Curry made it popular,
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: like being able to pull it from half court, you know,
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: being able to you know, stretch the defense like that,
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: Like that was something we did in Georgie, Like that
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: was a part of Georgia basketball. We were some flat
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: out shooters and not just shooters, like we'll we'll pull
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: it on you from deep and then we'll also take
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: it to the basket too. Okay. See see, I'm just
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: letting you know we're getting into a good conversation here
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: because we're about to get to the shop makers league. See.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: See what you can't have them is a guy who
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: can't make shots. Then call his his his platform shot makers.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: See already he's telling me I can make the shots
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: with shot Oh yeah, let's go to the physicality. What's
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: what's your measurement? Is not taller year? Could you leap
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: fix six two sixty three on a good day? Um? Yeah?
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: I had seen my thing with hops like I had.
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: I had hops like they would come and go. I
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: could never just maintain them like I could always dump.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: I could always catch catch the alleu. But like that,
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: I have like periods of times where I could go
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: between the legs, but then three months later I couldn't
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: keep it going because it just wasn't that wasn't my my,
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: that wasn't my game. My game was predicated on on
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: really on shot making, like that was my thing. Like
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: I could shoot it from anywhere with anybody, anybody on
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: me or in any space. I could get it off
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: and make it. But yeah, I wasn't like the fastest guy.
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: I wasn't the wasn't the I had a quick first step,
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: but you catch me after that first step. I've been there.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: Like I said, I'm older than you. And in college,
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: you know, I went to the University of Houston and
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: I graduated with Keema LaJuan Okay and Clyde Drexel. He
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: went to the pros the year before because they were
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: because they lost the championship in eighty three. Clyde with
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: pro and then this year I Keema Lodge one he
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: went pro for you know, first pick in the draft
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: of Houston Rockets. And so so I was one of
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: those guys. I wasn't you, but bare I had the
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: mouth of you though. You know what I'm saying. You
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: know I had to I could tell you I was Jordan,
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: But I played like the last gat on the bench.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying. What means I deserve to
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: be on the team. But do what I mean, I
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: should be taking that shot, you feel me? Yeah, And
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: so I'm having fun with you, Robert because of the
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: fact that when I've talked to entrepreneurs, I'd like for
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: people to know what that type of personality, because because
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: when you have a dream and you start building that
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: dream out, it's tied to a certain level of enthusiasm,
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: but also could lead to a lot of frustration. And
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: so talk about you know your your street baller got
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: a game, how if from a tech standpoint, did you
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: start making that transformation? Did this idea can be have
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: a value in the virtual world? Well, so this is
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: what happened, Uh in twenty nineteen, you know what, I guess, well,
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: you know something may talk about my journey, but like
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen, I wanted to do street ball, right,
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: so and one was huge in street ball, and you
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: know they kind of disappeared. You know that that documentary
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: is just came out kind of let everybody know the story.
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: It was incredible documentary. If you have not document any one,
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: an incredible docummunitary. But see that's that gap. There was
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: a huge gap. And I noticed that there was a
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: gap there, right, there wasn't there wasn't like you still
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: you had online things. You had you know, ball this
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: life like they're doing their thing. You had over time
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: they're doing their things, and you had all these different
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: media pages, but there was this this space that was
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: kind of still missing. And with Steph Curry, with Dame,
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: you know, shooting has now become the new dunking right
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: where everybody wanted to be Michael Jordan and lebron and
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: and you know, even Kobe to an extent, with the
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: Duncan Vince Carter. You know, shooting Dame and and and
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: Steph made it. They let they let it. They made
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: the They made the common man feel like they could
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: play on that level, right because if you could shoot it,
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna make you down. I can't believe you're gonna
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: leave one of the greatest dunkers you from a Georgia right,
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: Georgia Right? Oh yeah, I know who You're gonna say.
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: How are you gonna leave him out? Huh? It wasn't
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: It wasn't intentional. It wasn't intentional. I actually, man, that's
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: a whole other side story. But man, I used to
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: work for Coca Cola and I used to work my store,
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: my route Dominique Wilkins. That was that was his Kroger
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: that he shot. That was the store that I service
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: for Coca Cola. And he I see him all the
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: time in there. Man, I's talked to him a lot.
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: And you're gonna you're gonna mention Lebron, who is never
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: participated in a dunk contest, by the way, everybody now,
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: but he was known for them in game dumbs like
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: you know, back in that in that time, in that
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: space he was. He was known for putting one on
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: your head. But I would taste the problem. You're keeping up, though, man,
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: I mean, I'm I'm hitting you low. You stay straight up.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: I try to cross you, you block my shot. You're
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: pretty good, Robert, You're pretty good. Now. You're pretty good now? Yeah, yeah,
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: you know. I'm just having fun, man, just having fun.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: We're talking ab my language and now we're talking basketball.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: What everybody need to know. And then so so when
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: you when you have to in twenty and eighteen, you
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: had this idea and like m one had dropped off
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: the map, and now there's a there's a market out there,
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: there's a need out there, there's a need for something
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: that's out out outsourced beyond just basic basketball. What idea
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: come from? So? So what happened? You know, I again, shooting,
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: that's my thing, right, and shooting had become you know,
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: a premium around around basketball period. Um, so I reached out.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: I made a call call to hoop it up three
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: on three, which was, you know, a tour tour based
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: three on three tournament that had grew in the US,
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: like I played in it when I was a kid. Um.
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: They used to come to the Forts and County Stadium,
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: you know, the old Turner Field. They used to come
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: there and take over and fill it with cores and
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: it'd be sponsored by Slim Jim Gatorade. We won one year.
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: I think I was like fifteen or sixteen the three
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: on three tournament. But I made a cold call, looked
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: him up, made a cold call, ended up getting in
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: touch with the CEO, Dan Dan. I said, look, man,
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: I want to learn your business model. I want to
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: do what you did with the three on three, but
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: I want to do it with a shooting competition. I
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: don't want to do a three point shootout, but I
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: want to do this. I want to travel city to
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: city and find the best shooters in every state and
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: then at the end, I want to bring them all
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: together and do like a finale and crown like the
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: number one shooter in the country and you know, regardless
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: of age. And he was like he loved it. He
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: was like, hey man, yeah, you know again twenty nineteen.
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: Rolling into twenty twenty, he's like, hey man, yeah, we're
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: gonna kick our two off, and may you know you
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: welcome to come. I'm gonna senior to tour dates. You
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: welcome to come. He's like, come to the first five dates.
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: He was like, after the first five dates, he's like,
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: is this way, says He's gonna give me a court.
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: He said, I'm gonna give you a court at each
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: of our first five tour stops. He was like, um,
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: you can. You can run your competition, you know, test
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: it out. He's like, you know, I'll help you out
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: some things, show you how we how we run things operationally,
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: all that kind of stuff. He was like, you know,
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: you just got to bring yourself there. If you can
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: get yourself there, I'll give you what you need while
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: we're there, giving you a court, giving you, you know,
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: a grailing, and maybe even give you give me some
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: staff members to help you out. He's like, that's no problem.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: But he was like he was like, no, I'm more
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: than willing to help. So during the time, he was
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: going through an acquisition, so Kevin Garnett's company, the Big
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: Ticket they ended up buying who put up three on three,
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: So they were they were at like the last stage
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: of an acquisition. So Dan was still on board running
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: the company, but he was about to be out. Ye
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: about he talking to you, but he really not talking
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: long term to you? Well, yeah, no, he told no.
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: He told me everything he taught, he put He put
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: it all up front. He was like, He's like, this
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: is what's going on. He's like, you know, I can
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: show you the business model. He was like he thinks
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: what I'm doing. He's like, you know, it sounds like
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: it's vible. He was like, but the best way to
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: test it is to get out there and do it right.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: So again this was like maybe this was in the
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: twenty nineteen. The first time we talked was maybe in December.
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: We talked again in February when he sent me to
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: tour dates because the tour dates started started and we're
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: talking about twenty twenty February right now, it's twenty twenty February. So, um,
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: I'm back in Atlanta. I'm gonna come back to Atlanta
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: and make Atlanta my home base. The name of the
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: company at the time was called the Doorde Tournament. And
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: during that time, you know, I'm I'm getting ready, I'm hyped.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: So I'm trying to think of all these different ideas
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: that I can that once I, once I get out there,
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: how can I capitalize from the traction. And then COVID happens.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: You know, COVID happens, and I had had this idea
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: of a video submission shooting. Let's talk about what happening though,
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: because okay, it's all you know, you gather momentum, you
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: got friends, you telling everybody is going to happen. Yeah,
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: and then COVID hit. Where were you at emotionally? And
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: you know, because we didn't all know it would last
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: that long? We thought of it. Oh no, No, I
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: was like I knew it was like I thought it
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: was gonna be a week, right right, Yeah, And so
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: I don't want to miss that moment from you right there,
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: because at least to frustration as an entrepreneur, because we
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: talk about to being an entrepreneur right because you put
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: your time in. You know, you probably blocked off some dates.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: You saw everything you're traveling set up, and all of
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: a sudden, this is getting in the way of your dream.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: Tell us about that emotional moment and that and that
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: big pumping the brake moment for you in your brain. Um.
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: So once I once, I you know, like everybody else,
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: once you grab a hole to what COVID actually is
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: and how it how it's affecting everything and how it's
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: changing things. Um I'm a very I'm very resilient man.
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't I don't know where I
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: get it from. I do know I've been through a
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: lot of different things in my life. But I have
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: a real I'm like a basketball man. You throw me
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: up and I land, I'm gonna bounce right back. And
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: that thought, that thought, I won't go to break when
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: I come back up from the break. I want to
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: make sure that we don't want to interrupt the story
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: of talking to Robert Foster. You know, shop Makers, that's
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: a virtual game of basketball game, and that's where we're
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: having fun talking about his basketball skills because he's taking
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: his basketball skills from a game E loove and he's
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: become an entrepreneur and launching something doing March Madness, a
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: virtual video game, is being done by a black man.
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: Were right back, Robert Foster. Don't you go nowhere. Money
• 14:24
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• 14:29
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• 15:43
  Speaker 1: I am the host and everything kind of you know,
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: shut down and all all and especially like toward like
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: maybe month three, and it was really real. It was like, oh,
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: you know what, the world is really shut down. It's
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: like this probably isn't going to change for a while.
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: U my my psyche instantly was like, you know, okay,
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: well let's prepare as much as we can. Right, Let's
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: let's get as prepared as we possibly can because when
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: the world does come back to normal, you need to
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: be ready to go, Like you can't just you can't
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: just let this go. I'm a firm believer in and
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: if I fail, I'd rather fail. I need to know
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: for myself that I failed, Like I'm not gonna let
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: somebody else or let some circumstance tell me that I failed,
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: Like I have to actually had to actually put together
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: the competition, put together the tour, or put together the platform,
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: and then it flopped for me to know that I failed.
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: But other than that, I wasn't just gonna stop because COVID,
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: So I tried to figure out what ways I could.
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: So then the virtual stuff started kicking off, right. You
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: had soon you had more people engaging on social media,
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: you had people you know, doing all types of you know,
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: so the virtual was a blessing for what you are
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: talking about in a way, Yeah, it was. It was.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: It was because it made me put more of a
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: focus into tech. Like the tech aspect for me in
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: the beginning was just it was just an idea. It
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: was just a just a just an idea that I
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: knew could could be something, but I didn't have the
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: time to focus on it. So I just kind of
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: I literally on my first website it was the Doordot Tournament,
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: and then under the Doordot Tournament, I had coming soon
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: shot makers leave. It was just like a just something extra,
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: extra caveat we were gonna do at some point. Um
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: And so you know, again getting out that I'm that
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: I'm switching my mind to tech. So there's another piece
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: that happened. Right before COVID. I had just gotten into
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: the gathering spot and the gap at the gathering spot
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: or I'm sorry. When I learned about the gathering spot,
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: I had also learned about this place called the Atlanta
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: Tech Village, and I had briefly told this lady she
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: saw one of my shirts. I used to have the
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: test shirts out, so like even the Shotmakers League shirt,
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: it's just a test run. I'm kind of testing the
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: idea out on a shirt. See how I feel about it,
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: How does it look, How do I like it. I
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: had a shirt that said put your money where your mouth,
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: put your money where your shot is. And so the
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: ladies saw the shirt and we ended up I ended
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: up making her shoot into a cup and then I
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: bought her a shot at the bar and she was
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: like no, seriously, like what is this? And I told her,
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: you know what my plan was, And she told me
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: about the Atlanta Tech Village, and she told me about
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: why Combinator in the gathering spot, and so why Combinator
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: was out of my range at that point, or at
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: least I felt like it was. Please explain exactly what
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: they did is why Combinator? What is that? Okay? So
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: why Combinator is the world's largest tech accelerator program. So
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: companies like door Dash came out of Y Combinator. Airbnb
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: is a Y Combinator company, And so what why combinator does.
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: It'll you submit an application which your idea, your pitch,
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: your team, and essentially they'll give you half a million
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: dollars in funding to get you going, and they accelerate
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: the process of your company. So with tech companies, it's
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: usually all about acceleration, building fast, you know, uh, iterating
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: fast and scaling and growing as quickly as possible. Like, look,
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: how fast Airbnb just kind of took off right Well,
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: that acceleration is in part due in a large part
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: due to Y Combinator, because once you get into that network,
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: that tech network, and the media coverage of it, it
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: just it just takes off really quickly because it's software,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: you know, it's something that can that can instantly be shared.
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: It's quick, it can go viral, you know, overnight, and
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: that's what that's what happens to a lot of those
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: companies that come out of Y Combinator. And so she
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: was just kind of, you know, schooling me on on
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: this this idea that I had. She's like, you know, look,
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: I think you got something. They're looking at these places
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: and see what kind the resources they have. I still
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: was focused on the tour base thing. But I but
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm one of those people. I don't think
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: you have conversations or meetings for no reason. I don't
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: believe in coincidence. So I did look into y Combinator.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: I looked up the Tech Village, thought it was really cool,
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: put in the application, and I put in the application
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: at the gathering spot. I got accepted into the gathering spot.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: At the Tech Village. I was told that my tech rolemap,
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: which I didn't even know what the tech rolemap was,
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: that my tech rolemap wasn't wasn't quite there, and that
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: I needed to build what they called a proof of concept. Again,
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: things that I at first I kind of just let
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: go over my head. But during COVID I had a
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: lot of time to think, so so I really took
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: a hard look at proof of concept. So I started,
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: you know, I got into YouTube University, man. I looked
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: at a lot of videos from the Atlanta Tech Village.
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: From y Combinator. The gathering spot had some virtual resources
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: that I tapped into to learn about how to turn
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: my idea into a tech company. Um, and fast forward
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: to twenty twenty one, I had through using up work,
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: through using fiber, I had found different vetted and found
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: different uh freelance developers. Put together this rough proof of
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: concept and ran ten weeks of virtual competitions, and I
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: ran it like a TV show from my Instagram page
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: and ended up getting some attention from all his life.
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: Had a couple of NBA players that reached out. UM,
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: gave me some guidance, some early guidance. Uh. Derek Anderson
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: with Anderson Derre. Anderson used to play for Kentucky. He's
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: a Memphis right, U. He's he's he's in Kentucky. Yeah. Yeah,
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: he's a businessman. He's a good bit Yeah yeah, big, big,
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: big businessman. And and and you know, and so thinking
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: about Derek again, I'm you know, other parts of my
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: background of of of of sales and marketing and stuff
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: like that, I'm not shot with cold calling people. So
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: I looked up Derek you know, his primary page. You know,
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: he has a lot of a lot of followers, all
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. Then I saw that he had
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: you know, some other smaller businesses, and so I went
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: to those pages and you you they have phone numbers
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: on them, and so, um, I ended up reaching out
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: through one of his like training pages, and I'm thinking,
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: I'm probably gonna just get you know, one of his
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: assistants or somebody like that. Man it was him. He
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: picked up the phone right right, and I ended up
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: talking to him, told him what I was doing, and
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: uh yeah, man, he like probably for about I say,
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: about two months and even to this day, like I
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: still have his phone number. I've talked to him a
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: couple of times, um as I progressed and what I've done, um,
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: just to kind of get feedback from him. You know,
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: he's not a he's not an easy person to sell.
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: So he gonna so the feedback he's gonna give you,
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: it's gonna be it's gonna be crucial. You know, it's
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: gonna be something that you can actually taken and grow from.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: It's not He's not a yes, yes man type of person.
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: CO called him. He gave me, gave me some good
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: gave me some good stuff. That basketball community all brought
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: together on this one idea shot Yea. So right now,
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: if you go to shotmakers League dot com, you can
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: fill out a profile. We'll be launching we're gonna launch
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: during March. March maddens, We're gonna start doing our first competitions.
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: The platform has grown so before we used to control
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: all the competitions, but now, uh, you yourself can create
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: your own competition. You can create a challenge just for
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: a friend that you can text to them, or you
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: can post it for the community for somebody else to
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: take your challenge, and so um. In a lot of ways,
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: we're like a lot like a roadblox, you know how
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: the kids they get on there to create these different
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: games for each other to play and engage with and
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: build community. We're doing the same thing, but within the
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: basketball game. I ask you this, let me this is interesting.
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: Now you know that's any one to interested ear. But
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: now your money making master class conversation. Now let's go,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: because you know is that my number one thought would be,
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm just gonna build this up. Okay, I'm
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: gonna build this up, and then each one of these
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: teams I have in the league have a value. Okay,
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: whether it's a million dollars or whatever. Okay, So what
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: you're saying that Roushan people can create their own leagues
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: on this platform, I'm saying, why can't you just hold
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: these teams and just let the value, you know, just
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: keep going up, and every time somebody sell their team,
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: you get ten percent of the team. Well that's that's
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: that's a possibility within it. But if you look at
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: platforms like let's take a rope again, let's take a
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: Roadblocks right right, the thing that makes Roadblocks the most
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: valuable is because where you can have one, let's say
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: Roadblocks wanted to be the only developer, right typically, so
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: just like a league a developer, right, a league, Let's
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: let's put league and developer in the same space, right, Well,
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: Roadblocks is a community of developers. So now you have
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: thousands of video games housed in one place. And so
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: that makes Roadblocks worth twenty two billion dollars, where if
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: they were just one video game, maybe they're worth one billion.
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: But because it's so much going on, it's so many
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: other they become the platform, the place for so many
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: other developers or leagues to be able to sustain themselves.
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: So that's what I'm doing here. I've created a platform
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: where leagues themselves can be housed and they can operate
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: in a virtual world on Shotmakers League like they can
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: they can run their leagues and so instead of it
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: just being one Shotmakers League, it can be thousands of
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: other leagues sitting with on the Shotmakers League platform. Congratulations,
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: I gotta say that again. You know an idea like
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: so many of us, you know, we just love the
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: game of basketball played in the streets. And now you've
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: taken this using tech tech down technology now to being
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: afraid to call somebody and pitch your idea, now to
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: being afraid of the word no, being consistent and educated
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: yourself into building something that I feel it's going to
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: be a franchise that's going to be a huge money
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: maker for you. And I just want to say congratulations, man,
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: I appreciate it. Man to work, work, still still still
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: working at it right now, still working, still working, but
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: now I definitely appreciate. The hard part is the idea
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: is real, and so the Shopmakers League, founded by Robert Foster, is,
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: like I said, the virtual platform, virtual basketball video competition
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: platform that can expand again, tell everybody how they can
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: find this platform and how they can contact you. Oh yeah,
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: right now you can go to ww dot Shopmakers League
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: dot com, create a profile, and again you can you
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: can start you can create your own league right now,
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: and you can start charging people to enter into your competitions.
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: We're going to be fully launching very soon within I
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: want to say maybe a week or two, but definitely
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: before the Marchman, this tournament is over with, and then
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: you'll be able to again create your own profile and
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: start your own league within the shot Makers League. If
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: you want to reach me directly though, I also am
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: on LinkedIn at Robert Foster Um. I love to connect.
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: I also am a podcast podcast host. I have a
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: show called The No Cap Table where I teach people
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: and teach people about starting to startup, how to be
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: a non technical startup founder. We have a lot of
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: a lot of other non technical founders and technical founders
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: that come on our show and tell their stories. We're
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: associated with Fooboo Radio Cool. I appreciate you, Robert for
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: coming to my show. Appreciate this story. Man. I knew
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: we started out having fun, but man, in the end,
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: but you brought the You brought the heat with the
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: information and inspired a lot of people with your story
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: because your story is one of the I'm just an
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: everyday guy, man, I'm grinding just like everybody and gets
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: what I'm turning that grind into reality. Thank you for
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: coming on Money Making Conversations Master Class. Robert Foster, all right,
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: thank you for having me again. If you want to
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: listen to any our stories, you can go to Moneymaking
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: Conversation dot com. But more importantly, I'll be back Tuesday
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: with another show with two more incredible guests that will
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: be telling you how you can change your life because
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: their life change when they started believing in themselves. We'll
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: see you next Tuesday, and thank you again. Forward listening
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: to Money Making Conversations Masterclass. I'm the host, Rushan McDonald.
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: Let me tell you about the host of Money Making
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: Conversations Rushan McDonald. He's a social media influencer. Eighty percent
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: of his one million plus social media followers or female.
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: Rushawn's a two time Emmy Award winner, three time in
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: Double ACP Immage Award winner, sitcom writer, stand up comic,
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: and former IBM executive, and he has a degree in mathematics.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: More importantly, Rushan McDonald will interview his business and celebrity
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: relationships to empower you with tips to succeed in your
• 28:52
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• 28:56
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