‘The Apprentice’ winner gives business advice to students

Published: Friday, October 10, 2008

Anything can be used as a brand name or trademark to promote a business or person, including a hairstyle, said Sean Yazbeck, winner of the 2006 season of Donald Trump’s reality TV show, “The Apprentice.”

Yazbeck gave the keynote speech at the 18th annual USU Partners in Business Customer Service and Marketing Seminar, on “lessons in sales and branding.”

Yazbeck kicked off the seminar by telling attendees of his experience on “The Apprentice.”

“It’s nerve-wracking, one of the most stressful things I’ve done in my whole career,” Yazbeck said.

One million people applied to be on the 2006 season of “The Apprentice,” Yazbeck said, “It’s like ‘American Idol’ auditions except instead of screaming girls you have a bunch of professionals standing around trying to look business like.”

Yazbeck said during auditions he was first sent to a board room with twelve other people where they were asked “heavyweight questions” like, “How do you feel about the war in Iraq?”

“All of us were trying to scream over the top of each other, and finally I said to everyone that we should do it in an organized manner, and that’s what got me to the next round,” he said.

After that, Yazbeck said he was flown to Hollywood with 50 other people and given a psychological examination for two days.

“They ask you literally thousands of questions, which at the time were really random like, ‘Do you talk to yourself?’ But at the end of the two days they were able to tell me things about myself that were spot on,” he said.

His strategy, Yazbeck said, was to “keep my head down, let all the stupid people get fired, and then half way through I said, ‘OK, I could really win this,’” and he did.

Yazbeck has now worked for Trump for two years, and said through that experience was able to start a successful new company, WAVSYS, by “leveraging the Trump brand name.” Yazbeck said he started WAVSYS with $10,000, but is now invoicing over $1 million a month.

Yazbeck said he attributes his quick success with his association with The Apprentice has opened many doors for him.

“I can call up the COO of T-mobile and say, ‘Hey, this is Sean Yazbeck, the apprentice, phoning from the Trump Organization,’ and they will say, ‘Oh yeah! C’mon over, we’ll have lunch,’” he said.

Yazbeck even told attendees the secret of Donald Trump’s hair-do trademark.

“I asked him, ‘Mr Trump, what’s up with the hair?” He said, ‘Do you know why I do it? Because people talk about it,’” he said.

Yazbeck told the seminar attendees that brand names and trademarks like the Trump coif lead to success, and anyone can market themselves, they just need an original trademark.

“I’ve always been the English guy, and I’ve always milked that,” Yazbeck said. “ I know my time as ‘The Apprentice’ has a shelf life, so when it expires, I will just go back to being the English guy.”

During the rest of his speech, Yazbeck gave four tips to being a good salesman.

First, he said, people like to do business with their friends, “it’s not who you know, it’s who knows you.”

Second, talk friendly, not professionally, Yazbeck said.

“If you’re not likable then you shouldn’t be in sales,” he said.

His third piece of advice was sales people should also be able to adapt like a chameleon, and lastly, he said to never make cold calls, give good service, and then rely on referrals from satisfied customers.

As his final comment, Yazbeck offered two pieces of advice particularly for students, on how to succeed in the job market.

“Do something you are passionate about, and do something you know,” he said.

Photo by Britney Brent