Dr. Paul Hartunian
The Man Who Really Sold the Brooklyn Bridge
Bob Serling: This is 15-Minute Innovation, and my guest today is Dr. Paul Hartunian. Welcome, Paul.
Paul Hartunian: Thank you, Bob. It's a pleasure.
Bob: Why don't we start by having you tell people a little bit about who you are and what you do?
Paul: Well, in the marketing world I'm probably best known for my work in publicity, and within publicity, probably the Brooklyn Bridge story is what people are most familiar with. How in 1983, using the publicity formula that I developed, I became the first person in history to really sell the Brooklyn Bridge.
That's the most familiar thing to people in the marketing world, but also I'm known for being an authority on reprint rights and, even more than that, on professional speaking, both on training professional speakers and speaking myself on the circuit.
Bob: Great! So let's talk a little bit about selling the Brooklyn Bridge. This was a really big idea — an idea that has always tickled me and impressed me. How did you come up with that idea?
Paul: The Brooklyn Bridge idea was the "make me a millionaire" idea, very literally. That's the one that catapulted me up. And I know this may be a disappointment to some people who would like me to say in this brilliant lightning bolt of marketing genius I came up with this idea for selling the Brooklyn Bridge. I do have a lot of marketing savvy, but I've got to say that there was some good fortune in the way and good timing.
I had just developed my publicity formula, the one that I've been talking about for 20 years now, and I was looking for a story to try out the formula. By good fortune, the Brooklyn Bridge was having its hundredth anniversary and they were redoing the bridge, so the story and I crossed paths at the right time.
A lot of people feel that there are great people in history because they've done great things. I'm sure there's some of that, but I think there's also a lot of good timing. There were people who were doing great things who were before their time, so nothing ever happened, but there were people who were doing what the world was ready for, and they crossed paths. And that's what happened.
Bob: Right, but at the same time you took advantage of that timing, and I think that's where a lot of people might see an idea or product come to market and, "Gee, I had this idea, but this company has run with it." And that occurs quite often, actually. Someone my have had an idea, but they didn't do what was necessary to implement it, whereas you actually did. You saw this opportunity and jumped on it.
Paul: And I think that's what separates the mega-successful people from the successful people from the people who are still striving to be successful — and I separate those people into three groups very intentionally.
I think the mega-successful people don't have anything more inborn than the successful or the striving people, but I think they act on what they have. I know for me, a lot of people will say, "Well, you're great at publicity and reprint rights and speaking, and this is what built it all."
But there's something deeper than that, and the thing that's deeper than that is my ability to focus with laser precision - focus, see what's going on and take advantage of it, and then take action.
I like lots of quotes, and one of the quotes that I love and another quote that I don't love so much really motivate me a lot.
The one that I don't love so much that, curiously enough, a lot of people love is Winston Churchill's quote when he was supposed to have said about giving up: "Never, never, never, never, never quit."
Well, if you take that in its exact content, just those words, that's probably one of the most ridiculous things anyone ever said. You've got to know when to quit. If I add something to Churchill's quote, "Never, never, never, never, never quit, as long as you're seeing results," now we've got something right there. I agree with that completely.
And with my Brooklyn Bridge idea, I don't know, that probably was my 931st idea. But you're right — I saw that this was working, and instead of moving on to something else or losing my focus, I riveted right on to that idea and I kept working on it. I kept building it and building it, and now, over 20 years later, I'm still doing interviews about the Brooklyn Bridge, and I guess we could consider this another interview, well over 24 years later.
So it's that ability to focus that I think a lot of people don't take advantage of, and once again, it's not a unique talent that I was born with, but I know I've got it and everyone else has it, but it's your level of juice that I think directly correlates to your success.
Bob: I couldn't agree more. I really think that innovation very often is that intersection of a good, creative business-building idea and then the follow through to act on it. A lot of people, as you said, like to dream and think that a bolt of lightning strikes you with an inspired idea. Well, maybe it does sometimes, but you'd better be ready to hop to the tune of the bolt when it strikes.
I do want to go back half a step. Can you fill in a few more of the details on exactly how you sold the Brooklyn Bridge?
Paul: Sure. In fact, that's a good point, talking about the laser focus and taking it step by step.
Again, the Brooklyn Bridge and I crossed paths because of timing, but if it wasn't the Brooklyn Bridge, there was no doubt whatsoever it was going to be something else, because my publicity formula had been perfected and I just needed another story.
But if we talk about the Brooklyn Bridge and that timing that happened, I made the deal to buy the wood, I wrote a press release that followed the formula that...
Bob: I'm sorry, let me just interject another question here. How did you even find out about this wood from the Brooklyn Bridge being available?
Paul: Ah, again, that was some good fate. I was looking for a story, as I mentioned, to test out my publicity formula. So I started looking in the news to hook on to some story. I was reading newspapers, listening to the radio, watching TV, looking for a story that I could run with using my publicity formula, and that's where the timing was just right.
I was watching TV news about two weeks after I had finished developing this formula, and on the news at 7 o'clock that morning I saw a construction worker being interviewed about the Brooklyn Bridge. He said that the wood was coming off — the original wood that was 100 years old, and actually it was old, rotten wood. And when it gets down to what I really did, I was selling old, rotten wood from a 100-year-old bridge, and that made me a millionaire. (laughs)
Bob: That's wonderful!
Paul: So the idea that you need this extravagant wild thing - forget it. And when I saw that interview, I just knew that was my story.
Paul: So the idea that you need this extravagant wild thing — forget it. And when I saw that interview, I just knew that was my story.
How did I know? Well, it was just a feeling. How do you know when you go to a dog kennel that this is the right dog for you? How do you know that this is the right woman or man for you? How do you know that this is the right food for you at a restaurant? You just get that feeling.
And I had that feeling, so I took that first step, and I made the deal to buy the wood.
I took the second step, which was to test out my press-release formula.
I took the third step, which was to get the press release out to the media, and then the whole story actually took off on its own because the media people went crazy and I knew I had a winner.
Bob: And they did go crazy. Can you talk a little bit about the type of coverage you got?
Paul: I think it would be easier to talk about the type of coverage I didn't get, because it was just literally all over the world.
And I probably have to give a lot of credit to one person and one group, and that person is Johnny Carson. I know you've seen my Johnny Carson clip, Bob. Carson did probably seven or eight minutes on a show about my Brooklyn Bridge adventure, and CNN was the one who broadcast it all around the world.
Bob: Yes.
Paul: And media people literally again — Radio Peru, the BBC, these media outlets that I had never even heard of, saw it on CNN — and for years, now over 24 years, I'm still doing interviews about the Brooklyn Bridge.
Bob: What I'd also like you to add because I think it's just mind-boggling, is what do you estimate your total cost was to procure the wood and put together your campaign that ended up getting this international coverage?
Paul: So what was my total cost in becoming wealthy and famous and getting my freedom and living in this beautiful home? Is that what you're asking? (laughs)
Bob: Exactly.
Paul: The wood cost me $500, and the publicity campaign — this was done in 1983 and I put the press releases in the mail, and there were fewer than 100 copies of the press release that went out, at a cost of about $20. So $520 maybe?
Bob: That's amazing. The reason I asked you is that is because it's an excellent example for companies that are starting up, and even for companies that overspend on publicity or marketing, to see what can really be accomplished on a very limited budget.
Paul: You can do a very serious, effective publicity campaign for $10, and I mean that literally. For $10 you can get your press releases in the hands of about 200 key media people, and each one of those could lead to an interview that tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of people read, listen, see, and then respond to. So this is like ridiculously inexpensive.
Bob: That's fantastic. Now let's shift gears a little bit and come forward to the current day. When you have a problem to solve — a business problem or there's a great business opportunity — do you have a process that you use to come up with a big idea to either solve that problem or take advantage of the opportunity?
Paul: I do. Like many very successful entrepreneurs, I am a one-man band. I don't play well with others (laughs), so I don't use lots of test groups and discuss things with a lot of people. I will refer to some of my friends. I'll ask some of them about some of the points that I may not be clear on.
But one of my keys in coming up with ideas and solving problems is the last thing I want to be is an innovator. I do not want to innovate. I want to use what's already been done, tested, tried and works — to save time, to save money, and for a whole lot of reasons. I'll let the inventors and everyone else come up with the innovations. And there's nothing wrong with being an inventor or an innovator, but I don't think that's what my strength is.
So if I have a problem or if I want to come up with an idea, the first thing I will do is go through my library, talk to the marketing friends that I have a lot of respect for, and see if it's been done already on some other track.
So, for example, I may be thinking of coming up with an idea for a plumbing product, and I'll want to see if a dentist has solved a similar problem, and I'll just translate that from dentistry into plumbing, which is very, very easy to do.
I will refer to marketing newsletters that I have. I stay on top of the newsletters that I enjoy that I think are very effective and valuable and the books, and I have a pretty good memory for that, so even if I can't recall exactly what was done already, I'll recall that it was done.
Like on our mastermind call, Bob, that we have once a month, the four of us get together and toss out ideas and toss out questions and ask each other, "Have you ever heard of this being done before?" I want everything shortcutted, and I want to use what's already been tested and tried, and I'll adapt it myself.
Bob: Sure. In my business — my product development business — I have a term for that, and I call it "transportable innovation", where you very literally do what you said. You transport ideas and concepts from one industry, whether that's products or marketing strategies or business ideas, from one successful application over to a totally different application. It's a great shortcut and it's an excellent, proven path that works extremely well.
Paul: And so many people waste lots of time, if not their entire lives, trying to innovate. I don't remember who it was — was it Emerson who said, "Build a better mousetrap and they'll beat a path to your door?"
Bob: Right.
Paul: Boy, has that been misinterpreted? And that is just dead wrong. People are trying to build this new mousetrap instead of trying to catch mice.
Bob: That's a great point. And with that, we've just about come to the end of our time today. My last question is how can people find out more about you and your company?
Paul: I'll give them several ways to contact me. My website is simply my last name, www.hartunian.com. They can also call my office. The number is 973-857-4142. Or they can email me directly. Again, it's just my name, paul@hartunian.com.
Bob: Great. Again, what are some of the services and products you offer?
Paul: Helping people get publicity for any product, service, profession, cause or issue. The second is working with reprint rights and licensing. And the third is becoming a professional speaker, or if you are a professional speaker, building your speaking business.
Bob: Well, Paul, this has been very illuminating. I always love hearing the Brooklyn Bridge story and all the nuances to it, so I thank you very much for your time today.
Paul: Bob, it has been my pleasure. I thank you for the opportunity.
