Sam Salimon

Trillion Dollar Take Back Mastering Monetization Aunkh and Keidi – LIB Radio Keidi Awadu - Radio Personality Aunkh Akwaba - Interviewee Keidi Awadu: And once again I would like to say greetings to each and every one of you, Aqaba means welcome. Welcome to another round of culturally conscious communication here on the LIB Radio, LIB TV and LivinginBlack.com networks. My name is Keidi Awadu A.K.A the Conscious Rasta, week days morning we get together live from 9:00 A.M. Pacific time, 12 noon eastern time, 5 PM GMTM, 7PM east Africa time. We get together with you to deal with culture consciousness, a broad spectrum of activities related to human development and human progress. Today’s date is Thursday, the fifteenth day of June, the year Twenty Seventeen in the Western calendar. This corresponds to the year sixty two fifty seven in the calendar of ancient Kemet to which we have realigned our cultural clock. Welcome to the seventh Millennium. You have found your family and a peaceful place here on L I B Radio, L I B T V and living in black .com. We get good programs for you today as we do the best we can to have you one with us every day. We’ve had a great series this week. We've done two parts of three I'll continue that tomorrow. This series about the Roots of Greek medicine hour in Africa and with a wonderfully detailed program; one the information is really kind of been missing from too many segments. Especially of the progressive of community in our second hour today but the Irby Phillips Jr joins us as he does daily. He says on today's program it is about the power of positive change and I shall reveal my first ninety day healthy heart healing report. I've completed Phase one of my two hundred seventy day journey. To reverse the damage I have done to my cardiovascular system from nearly twenty one thousand seven hundred and seventeen days of following the sad lifestyle. I'm so grateful for having the free will to make positive changes in my life. So that's Irby topic for the second hour. I am sure you are going to find its wonderfully informative, inspiring and hopefully you will hear a lot of commonality with your own strategic plans about getting things in order for your own life or your own health. 1 This is a very critical time in human history and human progress and I cannot overemphasize the point enough. That taking control of our own health, taking control of all of the environmental factors role of the controllable factors which is determined positive outcome in our lives is so very important and that's why we have this ongoing series with our brother, who is back in the studio, back in town this week with us brother Ankaku Akwaba. Welcome to you brother Aunkh. Aunkh Akwaba: Yes, greeting to you bother Keidi Akwaba, Campbell, Otta all the other race we say greetings to you. As always it’s a joy to be back and the Studio and to shares some positive energy, light and information that you know … carefully can be transformative to all. Keidi Awadu: That’s right transformative to all of our listening audience out here today yes… yes. Ok he did break off in mid-sentence. I think he is still with me. Speak up at any given time after these (African language). Keidi Awadu: Testing! Testing! OK… Yeah we do hear yeah. Aunkh Akwaba: OK…. Keidi Awadu: Since we last had you with us you've been a world traveler again…talk to us about the last few weeks of travel. OK the phone is going in and out. You are out right now. OK tell you what we’re…Ok I think we got you back brother Aunkh. No we got a very bad connection and we're going to go ahead and take a very short musical break everybody don't even think about going away we'll be right back with brother Aunkh don’t you go nowhere. (04:33 to 06:00) *****Musical Break**** Keidi Awadu: Alright I think we do have that connection back again Aunkh Akwaba I believe you can hear me now… Alright I do have a Skype connection with Aunkh bear with us here. It's been several weeks and he probably doesn't know with the button on the left and not the button on our right. We're going to take a short pause right now and see 2 what we can do to get Aunkh on the connection for this week bear with us everybody its worth waiting for. (06:36 to 06:54) *****Musical Break**** Keidi Awadu: Alright…testing…testing… testing… We got you through to the connection now. It's been so long I guess you forget how to get on the phone now. Which one there are so many of them out there I get confused. OK…OK All right I'll let you get away with that man. It's a beautiful thing we are continuing to get you live we got you in the mix now all the buttons pushed. The topic we have for today let's get right into that Secrets of Serving Black Customers and Rebuilding Black Wealth talk to us about this topic. Why you pick this particular topic and you know let's go ahead and read into dialog. Aunkh Akwaba: Well you know, it interesting one of the concepts that...into London recently. We had a whole conversation, discussion and presentation about kind of transforming the black economy and we know that a vital component of that is actually the business relationship with the community, which has…you know up to this point you’ve done the numbers in America at least. You know that it's not been particularly good. In the last few years in particular it's actually been in decline as a matter of fact. We have been here pretty much predicting the extinction of black business as we know it now if we’re not careful but quite a bit when we get into the conversation about black customers. It is not uncommon to immediately hear black business owners go into a level of complaining about them. On a number of ways and so it's the kind of occurred to me. That we need to re-conceptualize what we're doing to understand and give all of this a kind of context and appropriate context for actually leveraging our relationships and rebuild those relationships because at the end of the day we kind of need each other and that's the quiet mind we find ourselves in. No matter how you feel about things on a kind of feelings level, emotional level. If we are failing in business and that connection between us and our community is not clear. Fundamentally we’re going to have really big problems in other areas. And there's just no way around that. So we're going to attend to that this session today and this may become a series I'm not sure I'm underneath it because I know that this 3 can kind of go really deeply and probably does require kind of an intricate study…of black consumer, black business relationships. It is not, I don't know anywhere on the planet where I have seen that intensely studied as a as a phenomenon…you know particularly over the last I don't know say for the last couple a hundred years to now, from like maybe eighteen sixty five to now. And I think that's very vital for where we need to go in the future having an understanding of the context that creates a lot of the scenarios that we find ourselves in dealing in business in black if you will. Keidi Awadu: In almost any direction returned we hear people speaking to the larger community via the articles, books, the broadcast and in lectures; workshops etc. about the critical need for this deep binding connection between black producers, retailers, sellers and by consumers we see it again but this decade after decade goes by in this connection seems to be slipping away. Why then do you think so many black business owners brother Aunk have given up on trying to win the black dollar? Aunkh Akwaba: So this at a major level for us right now, that it is not uncommon for black people going in businesses to think that their only option for success is to not go to black people. And….you know, as relevant as that may seem on a certain level is just a very dangerous standpoint to be at if you’re only possible success is predicated on dealing with other people. You are putting yourself in a very dangerous position. Now in a very dangerous position anyway in a lot of ways because it’s virtually impossible to… You know from the standpoint of the average person who is under educated about what it means to be black in business. It is virtually impossible to win the black dollar without a clear strategy. And most people really don't get it. So when we look at what is happening in our communities. You make the connection between the fact that what we produce there is a huge gap between what we consume and what we could do, right. Theoretically what we produce and consume should be somewhere close to each other. Keidi Awadu: That's right…. Aunkh Akwaba: Certainly closer than seven percent or eight percent of… what…. 4 Keidi Awadu: According to my statistic fourteen percent of what we consume is what is equivalent to what’s produce. That's not necessarily saying we buy that but it is the equivalency. Producing… consuming seven dollars, producing one dollar. Aunkh Akwaba: Yes exactly we’re consuming and producing one dollar. I'm saying you know part of that you know that’s been taken into account how much of what we're producing is actually consumed by others. It's kind of assuming that all of that is consumed by us. We are just talking about what we're consuming as a community of people. And so what is happening now of course is that according to Tom Burrell, ‘The brainwashed’ and other things is that, you know in terms of where it counts purchasing behavior. Not in terms of what's happening in our conscious minds. In our conscious minds we probably have a different identification of ourselves that we think we do. But purchasing behavior fundamentally we are organized and rooted in a sense of inferiority. And as a result of that our purchasing behavior in particular responds with the notion that anything that is not produced by us is automatically superior. Keidi Awadu: and that's illogical. Aunkh Akwaba: It is illogical but it is also happening at a very alarming rate. And a part of that is that we sensually art in this land or work you know the whole slave system was about generating wealth for other people and the phenomenon of that has not necessarily change. So even our consumer behavior search the creation of wealth from many other ethnic groups, not just like the garment group but you know whether it's you can argue that every ethnic group that comes through or most of the ethnic groups that come to our America. Come to power literally by coming into our community which has the weakened economic philosophy and political philosophy. And thereby they can set up shop and get away with a lot of things that they would not be able to get away with in any community that has its ideological orientation in place. So like all things; wealth like power concedes nothing without a demand. In other words, even if we're going to look at the possibility of retaining this money, what we have to realize is you're knocking on the door of people who have essentially said to them-selves, “This is easing money black people's money it belongs to me. 5 And I'm not going to give it up and I'm going to give it up the last place I'm going to give it up, is to those people again.” So in other words if I don't have to share a piece of the market with the Chinese community or the Arab community etc. They are all playing the same game essentially which is don't let go of the people come to power meaning us. So that's what they're doing when you look at it because we can't do the same things in that community. You can’t show me a phenomenon on the planet where we are going into those people's community and doing anything remotely like what they're going in our community. If you show me that it will be a pure anomaly of case. So we don't have access to other people's communities and to tap into the resources of their communities as it is the other way around. Which is why becomes problematic when we think that. If we don't go to our own community, we just try to go to everybody else and we assume that somehow we are able to do things in that community. It means we don't understand the game that's being played right and the game that’s being played in many ways has allows this community to be the wealth resource for everybody else that wants to rise to power except themselves. Keidi Awadu: What is the big question that our business owners have to ask themselves if they intend to seriously compete for the black consumer? Aunkh Akwaba: So you know so if you're going to seriously and if you are seriously interested in the retention of the black dollar in the black community. Keidi Awadu: I can see this is going to generate a lot of background conversation, background talk… so yeah. Aunkh Akwaba: So what we're seriously interested in retention of the dollars in our community. Then first question we have to ask ourselves is, do we really value black consumers? Now, for many of our business owners it may seem like a yes on the surface. But when you look deeper we really have to understand what we're saying when we talk about valuing the black consumer because often the way we are oriented towards black consumers even though we are often in that category. We created between us and them delineation demarcation and that's not a good place to begin if you're seriously interested in actually retaining the dollars of your community. 6 Keidi Awadu: Yeah you have made an excellent point. I mean it's kind of like an almost self-sustaining decision that you know and I can speak from my own personal. You know I do books and other products related around health and alternative health progressive health and within the United States because my reception in the U.K. was almost the exact opposite of the way the black community in this country treat me. But within this country as a business owner publishing these books not just health books but books if black empowerment. It's very difficult for me to rely upon black customers/black consumers. It's been very difficult as much as I try. If I don’t have this other outlet of attending these multi ethnicity conferences several times a year I have to get out of business. Aunkh Akwaba: So, yeah and this is what we started off saying right. It's virtually impossible without a clear strategy. So in other words when you when you go into any market of people. Now the challenge of black business owners in black in black market is that because we have perhaps a higher degree of let use the word optimism. Especially when you have the idea that I'm presenting something that they should want and they should resonate with. You know so for instance selling house products in a market of people who have health problems go galore. Theoretically, it’s completely illogical that you could go into a multi-cultural audience like you're saying where the disease rate is not as high in that audience right and you can do better in that audience then where the disease raised and the health challenges are essentially astronomical. They should be clamoring theoretically at least for what you have to offer. But we know that there is it's more than just happenstance that there is actual meaning behind all of this because what I'm pointing out here; is that you being able to become the health voice of black people. That black people respond to then threatens in many ways the medical establishment. The money that you're getting from them because if people turn and say I don't have go with the medication so much, I can actually turn to spectrum living simple foods I could get better that way. If that really started happening that way, one you would really started doing very well. Two the community would be healthier. Three, there would be a response to this because essentially what would really be happening. Is that you would be taking essentially you know easy money out of the pocket of somebody else. Right because of the way those institutions have already branded themselves. So they have branded themselves as the authority. So even right now if Keidi walks into a 7 room as a health expert and a doctor quote and quote with a white coat and all that. You know he might have just been smoking or whatever…walks in, he's coughing you thought about ever but he says this is what you need to do and Keidi this is what you need to do and you have an audience of our people. Typically what happens is most of our people are going to go with the guy with the white jacket on. Keidi Awadu: They may not go directly but when the need arises. They're going to think of that system and not of the alternative that we offered. You know in the short run they say well, “oh no he doesn't make sense that doesn't make sense I'm with my brother over here.” All of that is, whether it's a visceral short term response, an emotional response but when it comes down to it the bottom line is they still keep going that way. We're going forward, what then does valuing black consumers really means? If you to talk to me and talk to all of us who would want to move forward in this direction you're going to use it. Aunkh Akwaba: So number one what it will mean is that you're ready to invest in. So one of the things that we see with these corporations is that they have spent an extraordinarily large amount of money to establish this authoritative status and the problem that we have, as I show in one of the shows we did many years ago. I showed that we are the only ethnic group that has a higher valuing for advertising than we do get relationships. So there was a study that was done and they showed those interesting phenomena that we didn't see you on T.V. or we didn't see you in some official advertising capacity and we have to choose between you and the thing that was advertised to us. We're going to feel to all so often, not in every case there are exceptions to every rule. We're talking about in the way that makes the biggest impact for what you're doing right. So we realize that advertising and these kinds of things helps to create an image of authority for a lot of the institutions that are getting this money and they are willing to… they've already worked out through our eye. If they put that money into advertising budget and for those of us who read the Black Consumer Reports etc. We know not only do we respond better to advertising than relationships. We know that we tend to be clued into or glued to media much more than any other ethnic group. We tend to be on T.V. more, we tend to be on social media more etc. So we tend to be more media friendly in general anyway. So we’re very open to that and yet our 8 businesses tend to be essentially invisible in our own communities and so when they show up and they have something good to say and offer because we really are more inclined to believe the corporate or the advertising really. Then they don't they really are not doing much of a competing from that perspective. Second we have to be ready to listen to them. Now this happens often whenever you hear a business owner complain about a consumer is because they're not willing. Often it's not because they're not willing to actually listen to them and that, without the capacity for listening to them authentically. Then really then you can't be compassionate to them. The challenge that creates is that, in this context the way, the path forward for us to really be able to secure the black dollar is that we have to be compassionate to all the stuff that's happening. So we can’t get mad at the fact they respond to the advertising. They added these facts well they only do this and they only go with these people and they only give. They always give their money to these people etc. If we take that type of position and that type of psychological bearing what that means is we have created essentially we have enhance the divide between us and them. And what we're attempting to do from marketing stand point is to be one with them to actually understand what that is and that take a lot of work. And so we have to re-conceptualize how we are approaching this. So we have advertising disadvantage. We have a listening disadvantage when you get frustrated by the lack of things working in our favor because this is not an easy coal to crack, simply because we're talking about a trillion dollars on the table. And you got to understand that's a lot of money for some people. And you got to understand when a trillion dollars is circulating around a lot of people are fighting for those dollars. The Chinese, Arabs every community wants it and if you don't want it strong enough to compete for it and to compete successfully. If you just think you're going to show up and we're going to let you win it's not going to happen. Thirdly now, big important piece that we always talk about on our show is that you have to be ready to create value for them. And I'm talking often in the context of creating value first even before asking them for any money. And sometimes small business owners have a major problem with this…So sometimes… Keidi Awadu: That can be quite problematic because I don't know whether you've heard this brother Aunk as a business owner. A lot of other people want your product for free. 9 Aunkh Akwaba: Absolutely, so if you listen to what that is saying. They are actually saying. I am not yet convinced the problem is the idea that we come in as business entrepreneurs often. Is that because we are black there is a built in affinity. The reality is there is no affinity among people of color blackness so to speak. That it's built in from a cultural framework. We are just kind of locked into one group that there is no cultural framework around that significance like in other groups. So, in other words if you are Jewish you have a religion, you have a language, you have deep things that are locking you into this framework of now that is setting the boundaries of how you interact with others. We have a lot of wonderful cultural expressions but we don't have a unifying kind of thing. So if I'm a black person and you're a black person really there's nothing that kind of binds us together necessarily unless you know we just happen to be two that people who have a how do you appreciation of that. But even in…you can see it in especially in what we call the conscious community right. We get together we find out we know something everybody is excited and then something happens and everybody is out cuts you off. We cut you off faster than anybody else. I'm not working with that folk right there you see what they did ….they did this it was messed up…..I'll never work with them again. Like never really never! Never! And you like wow! That happens in the conscious community who knows what has happened to us over one hundreds of years and knows that there's been a lack of cultural development and so I mean …. Given that analogy anybody that rode a bicycle for the first time can expect the fall, would that be a reasonable thing to say? Keidi Awadu: Yes. Aunkh Akwaba: So we're trying to get back on the cultural back cycle as it were and learn how to ride culture again. Wouldn't be expected that if we are just starting out, we are formulating new relationships; can we not expect some falling down around here? Keidi Awadu : That’s right. It should be expected in grand form. Aunkh Akwaba: It should be expected but we have the expectation often that we should behave like you know black Caucasian men dominant culture right. So our standards are we’re looking at them and then we look at us and we say if you're not them then we’re not going to 10 deal with you. So a lot of what this is a kind of interesting kind of insanity thing that's going on because we're holding our people to something that really doesn't exist and cannot exist fundamentally but it serves the interest now of feeding further devaluation this connection and this continuity in our relationships and at some point we're going to have to realize that we're going to need to put ourselves in a vulnerable position and feel through some things and be uncomfortable in other to achieve progress and transformation. Who said that change happens while you are comfortable because it generally doesn’t? Transformation happens by moving into a realm of discomfort. And so even for our businesses this is you know I think John Hancock said you know we need a sacrificial generation alright, and you people just gonna sacrifice and recognize I may not see you know a lot of things but I'm doing this so that the future won't have to be like this. So in business this almost the same way business owners who are ready to say you know what I am willing to go through the fire of figuring out how to build authentic empowering added value relationships with black consumers. Keidi Awadu : Alright, telephone line is now open in case anybody listening audience wants to join the conversation to speak with brother Aunkh today the time right now nine thirty two A.M. on the West Coast that means twelve thirty two P.M. for East Coast listeners. It is Thursday the fifteenth of June, give us a call six four six seven one six ninety three five within the Blog Talk Radio 2 hit the one button that will send me a flag and let me know you have something you want to contribute and we look forward to hearing from you today, call in and join the conversation continuing we have a number of talking points, we're going to pick up the pace or just a little bit. What Is perhaps the biggest black consumer myth. Aunkh Akwaba: So in the black business community one of the things that you'll often hear is that black people don't have any money, alright black people don’t have any money. And so we need to look at that statement with a little bit more clarity and what do we really thinking, what's really been said to us. Often what's really being said is that black people don't value money. And that's one angle of it, another angle of it is that, well let me put it this way this way according to what they say about that this just the understanding ability on color of power, It is powerful for other people but you know it doesn't really necessarily mean much for us but just in terms of the capacity to spend. 11 So you know so would represent every man woman and child of African descent in America are having something like twenty six thousand two hundred dollars alright, thats actually more than enough however like we said earlier the problem is if people have been conditioned to spend it in a certain way you have to realize that your task is to try to create a new pattern of behavior and to that degree now you're trying to convince people not to spend money with you but actually change their purchase behavior. That's a different kind of issue, so in other words I might be looking at you saying I don't have any money but what am really saying is I don't have any money for that and they're saying because I spent all my money on my rent every month. Well all you people don't have money is spending money on things (In audible 34:21) Keidi Awadu : we did try, what they are spending it on just to be clear because this helps really with the conversation, clarity is that all the money that we spend on a regular basis two thirds of it goes to housing, transportation and food. Aunkh Akwaba: That's very true alright, and very important for us to realize because it would mean that if we really wanted to get the money back so to speak then we would come up with better more efficient ways of delivering the goods and services to our people so for instance in many cases we are the largest renters alright. Largest community of renters and the rates that we're paying for rent are not necessarily less than we were paying you know for a house but the way it's structured it makes it complicated homeownership to happen and so we have longer periods of time right here renting longer periods of time and then we don't really get into home ownership land ownership and other really I don't things wealth building that could be you know you can leverage people in relation to wealth building. Yet we have not created innovative companies and problems that have really looked at that and say how do we become more competitive, if our people are having trouble getting homes how do we resolve that, you know how do we turn that into a business opportunity because nobody else is going to do it so you want to see like people start getting loans for homes and those kinds of things let us figure out how to give our people homes anyway and then they realize they're going to lose that money that would normally gone to them the department or otherwise all of a sudden the system would have to shift to acknowledge 12 that that competitor shift and that and therefore begin to change the paradigm a lot so a lot of art inactivity or lack of innovation and creativity as entrepreneurs where we insisting on constantly being injustice saying (in audible. 36:10) we are all selling shape items out here for some reason Keidi Awadu: we're over representing our businesses in the personal services sector when actuality the personal service sector only represents a very small percentage I think only about eight percent of our consumption. Aunkh Akwaba: Right, and so we have to look at and think about is how can we you know begin to form collectives you know that are we really looking at the business from the problem solving angle of things how do we create the kind of institutions and I mean again when you have a problem of things like silicon or shit and all these other things everybody's trying to do something for themselves you're looking for the easiest thing for you to do by yourself right. Keidi Awadu : We do have our first phone call for today so I'm going to go right to the telephone line here we go three one zero, do give us your name where you're calling from. Herby: This is Brother Herby calling Torrance California. How both of you doing today Aunkh Akwaba: Excellent brother thank you for your call. Herby: You're welcome brother. But my question or comment is. When we see black owned businesses talk about any you know they of course say they request support black owned businesses so what about the responsibility of the existing black owned businesses to make investments in advertising. For an example what will happened if the businesses that are members of the organization baam. If they collectively put together fifty to a hundred dollars a month in advertising co-op and use that money to support media platform like LIB radio, black art media how would that be able to change the ability to communicate with the audience on a daily basis so that the audience can continue to support or increases support or tell their friends to support black owned businesses. 13 Aunkh Akwaba: Yeah I want to thank you for the question is a very significant one. So I start by giving an example of phenomenon that I personally experience. Years ago I use to write for a black paper in South Florida the side shout out to the brother bobby and rehu who runs it. And they were a part of a collective of black newspapers across the country now this is newspapers is different from the model you're talking about but it still applies because it turns out that that that black people actually pay attention to black newspapers, a lot more than they pay attention so when you say newspapers a day for instance that would not necessarily be as true in the black community especially for the black people who support black newspaper because they see it as a very significant part of their media guide that because they recognize that mainstream media is not necessarily giving them the full thing so when you talk about LIB we could fall into that category on some level of internet base etcetera . So in this particular situation what was happening in this I was at a conference where they were essentially doing a whole conference now particularly for the attention of the major companies. We the GMC You know the big brands who and what they were trying to do I consolidate their services fifty of them working together and they would be able to essentially sell a package deal because for most of these companies you know five million dollars would be like a drop in the bucket for their budget and so they were kind of swinging for the fences as far as if I get one contract like that really good we solid, we can continue to exist for most of those companies you know thats how they work and I actually question are you know I said, why is it that there is not a huge why is it that there is not a connection between the black media and the black business to any significant degree and I've written for papers and I've been on in the media and I've noticed that phenomenon that black businesses often seem to not get the connection of the significance of the role of the black media in getting them access to black audiences and to be a part of the whole process of black media is supposed to be doing which is essentially you know you know telling the real story right I think Kitty calls the the quote about the The lion and the hunter right. And the lioners to tell the story on the hunt but always reflect the glories of the hunters sometimes about it. And that's the phenomenon we're locked into right now and and so yes it's a major issue it is something that I think any serious business people should begin the part of it 14 is locked into this fundamental idea of inferiority now we have at a psychological level now we can to the average black person and say do you think you're inferior they will absolutely this is really bad I haven’t meet with anybody and I dont who they are will believe that they're equal to the most part ninety eight percent. However when you look at how we behave when it revolves around money right you say well so quite black media then all of a sudden the tables of this equal policy change you don't think it's equal they get the same amount of leverage advertising with less exact media versus marketing with our advertising with other media and thats the problem and that's something we have the really like as a community begin to figure out what are the dynamics of that and how do we begin to change that because all of them are dying as a result of this is this problem right. So the media is dying, you know the businesses community is dying that and we need each other and we're not really seeing how we can be a part of a force and helping our communities to appreciate who what we are. Keidi Awadu: But there are follow a comment or question. Herby: I thank you for that answer I mean it is very comprehensive I agree with you whole heartedly and I just you know want to encourage African American consumers especially those who listen to LIB encouraged the black owned businesses that you support to set aside a few dollars to support LIB radio and so that the voice I mean business people really don't understand the importance of being able to have your message before consumers every day seven days a week and that type of campaign can only be done through a daily newspaper daily radio, daily television and it's just I just see it as fundamental or we're talking about changing it and attracting more of those dollars back by growing black owned businesses. Keidi Awadu: Alright Aunkh Akwaba: I would agree with that or I would say that we you know at the appropriate time we the business community what has happened with that has been problematic is that the most successful of our businesses have been the ones that essentially when you don't like those resources the least and have essentially in what I called Invisible companies in other words how the most core outside of kind of being aligned with like a celebrity 15 brand which is kind of When you become a celebrity you're not necessarily black in this culture right and that you kind of transcend I think you talk about it you kind of transcend racism on a certain on a sort of level when you that you have to become a brand right you seen in a completely different way almost. You just see it in a very different way so that's one strategy so you see companies that way and then you get a lead by themselves or I So I go productions over a company would be an example of that but then you see the other companies who are are still you know minuscule compared to most companies but what they do is that there is nothing about the company itself that expresses what we were in other words if you walk into those companies today you wouldn't necessarily know that you know the black company so most of the wall kind of strategy for us for success has been in whatever you dont be black. And the problem is only a small percentage of us can get away with that one level of the very small it was what we see there was the group was recording so we can all go out and try to pretend not to be who we are to be successful. But it's not going to work for everybody not everybody's in that turn or somebody some point somebody's going to crack and say you know what I can take this any more I'm already pissed off whatever. So it took a major effort for not trying to try to become that sort as we know so in that extraordinary and exceptional we should miss so you know everybody in this same not without their expectation so is a very very big question that we're talking about because you know even when you turn to the most successful businesses and you say give us business advice. What essentially they would be saying to you is don't be who you are. If you want to make money. That's a very tough one I mean it does worked I'm not arguing that you know but it's a tough one. Keidi Awadu: Alright, brother, Harby Yeah we got a lot of talking points and little amount of time your final thought. Harby: Thank you, my final thought is thank you Keidi Awadu: Alright we appreciate your brother Harby always a respect to you or anyone else 16 wishing to call area code six or six seven one six ninety three five and of course you will be catching the other Harby here at the top of the hour which is why we're going to go to brother Aunkh. Then we got a number of talking points and limited amount of time so we have to make the responses as brief as needed to the best of our abilities so the problem that people constantly describing black people don't have any money what's that really about. Aunkh Akwaba: Yeah we kind touch it but the crux of it is that we're in a state of value competition where money goes to whosoever is seen as the highest provider and when you have people who have been conditioned to think themselves inferior often the highest value Is anything that I've confirms that. Ironically and problematically alright. So the question for us now as a business community is are we really really willing to invest in the creation of new behaviour patterns of purchasing for our products and services for our people alright. We talking about creating a new and doing that we really need not creating a new value system. We talking about breaking the shackles of this inferiority psychological complex that we have and replacing it with a more you know you use the term liberation something powered viewpoint of where we need to go right and to do that anybody who knows anything about human psychology knows that changing behavior is incredibly complex and it takes a lot of energy. And so again it make sense that what we're trying to do as a black business owner in terms of trying to change their behavior it makes sense but it's not easy so your strategy has to take that into account. If I know that I'm going into war against you know Arsenal where everybody is really sharp fighters and all that kind of stuff I know this battle is not going to be easy right, doesn't mean I can't win but I understand the nature of it what is the need just going up and I'm fighting you know two year old baby. I would look at that very differently than going up against the thousands seasoned Warriors eccentric etcetera. My strategy would not be the same. And I think often what we're doing as business people is our strategy for getting money from black businesses is like approaching you know a two year old three old baby as I'm a good as opposed to give it to us just because we actually (in audible 49:40). Thats not a good structure. 17 Keidi Awadu: And I do definitely agree with that continuing here. What is it what do our businesses like owned businesses seems to misunderstand about the very purpose of being in businesses itself. Aunkh Akwaba: Ok. So the purpose all business is cultural empowerment right. So the biggest businesses in Western culture right are good very good because cultural stabilization right. In other words they employ tens of thousands of people but they make day life for all these people. They secure you know the the national status and all that so if you look at for instance in London there's a very interesting pronominal right if you look at the top one hundred companies and in the U.K. These are the companies that you essentially you can actually follow that stock chains and you can predict the economic stability by looking at the biggest companies. And what they're doing is telling you everything. Where how stable they are is telling you how stable essentially in many ways there are other variables is not everything but they have such a huge impact on the sustaining of the culture because those hundred companies probably hire over a million people in the culture as an example there so the impact of that the impact that they have on driving the economy on the spending patterns of those people etcetera that are so use by the is very interesting because according to one of the articles I read when I was there these top two hundred companies are colectively some of the top of a percentage of them are heavily invested turns out invested in Africa. To the tune of over a trillion dollars. A trillion Dollars same thing we're talking about here. Imagine the level of and this is just a few company so this is just so we're talking about fifteen million people in our sense having you know actually and where we're talking about one hundred companies. Having assets over trillion dollars of you know that's far more different scenario because that's not money they are spending as money they're getting. So I get this kind of ironic that also coming out and being extracted out of Africa which is ironic because we're talking about that in extracted that of our product pockets here so we see kind of a aligning the parallel of his wealth extraction happening where ever 18 we go alright. So these these businesses are actually the pillars of a culture and so if African culture in America is to thrive again a big part of it will be the creation of the businesses that help to stabilize the culture itself. And so that may be a system of businesses that secure living accommodations terms of homes etc. as your real estate has always been in the situation it might be some type of energy type of a company it might be you know an educational system that's independent that works in other groups but always a potential if people sat down and said OK what can we really make and support collectively am sorry, if we don't do me in the face of a lot of things we're dealing with if we don't have the institutions that actually help us to stabilise, them much of what we're doing it doesn't really matter in a sense and because it cannot have the same impact in other words that we could create what we are able to create right set aside instead of spending a trillion so you know ten billion of that you know mark that towards the creation of one hundred companies that can solve all the problems that we have major living problems, incarceration problems etc make those enterprises with business support, coming with great plans for that. Literally we would be able just if we were able to support and hire a sixty percent of people who are those companies. Just those hundred companies could probably hire and eliminate unemployment in our communities just that alone will be completely revolutionary. Keidi Awadu: How then do negative feelings that black people as consumers have about black businesses, how does this contribute to this low level of sales for our businesses. Aunkh Akwaba: So, when you have to understand where the negative things are coming from and I'll go they are often reference to experience they're coming from a much more much problematic place and in marketing one of the things I talk about is meek marketing. So in the same way as you see myth becoming history right, so you will notice that there are several goes with no history no there are several people in history that have simply been written out of history or if they were people that look like all of a sudden they became people that look different etc. So you know they have to create a different mythology of the personality to set to perpetuate what the culture is intended to do. So it can happen even in business as a matter of fact and marketing right. So we have to now rate kind of we have to tell stories to move our products. Product move because of the narrative of the story what it will do if you accept etc. So what has happened is that there's been under that same brainwashing campaign the brother talk about there 19 has been the myth of the inferior black business. So almost anywhere around the country you go and ask about black business you hear almost the same complex complaints wherever you go. Just think about the complaints you've heard of black businesses and you'll notice that pretty much anywhere you go in this country for the most part there's almost no where you go and there's exceptions to that rule is very interesting. At that point you realize well something is gonna be wrong if you can go everywhere and hear the same kind of crap because it's a part of a narrative. So what happens in our community often is that when people have a positive experience with a black business it doesn't register as anything. So you just has had a positive experience that's what they expect OK well it just happens so there's no emotional kind of reverence there's no emotional something as borne out of having a positive I mean how often have you heard people really talk about their positive black business experiences. Yes so you know sit down and talk about that and read about that now how often on the other side of the fence do we talk about the negative. Keidi Awadu: We are down to our last two minutes of the show and I know you had several talking points yet to get through so why don't you just take these two minutes going come press as much as you possibly can and then let people let people know as well how they can maintain contact with you. Aunkh Akwaba: Absolutely, so you know what I'm getting at ultimately is that, is that you know are this this trillion dollar situation that we find ourselves in is a lot more complex than many of us are making you know them a lot more elements a lot more hands in the basket or hands in the cookie jar and we have to realize that we have to be s strategic as we've ever been if we are to win if we're going to do campaigns that are by black oriented our intended. Then we have to make sure we're not coming from a place of entitlement where we're expecting black people to support us just because they're black that's absolute insanity in a certain sense. Not so much because at its core it's not that there's not something dear but that happens in a cultural construct that has to be something that culturally unifies people and when that's not the one that's not asked and you cannot expect the level of circulation that you see for instance in the Jewish community or an Asian community etc. That have their culture in place even under the bigger banner of being 20 American right. So people of their culture and place never really are threatened or don't feel like they have to give up one identity or the other. That’s really not unique situation. So we have to get that place where we recognize that and then we can actually leverage the idea of actually competing for the dollars you know in a different kind of way which means then one we have to make it very close very clear the impact of our people giving away their money through we education campaign in other words the biggest in many ways the biggest crime should be this black poverty, black marginalization and so on in America in many ways from a certain perspective is our purchasing behavior it's us it make sense. Not that means that there's not a reason for that but then the result creates the result and so we haven't done enough campaigns to show the connection between your children being in jail and you shopping at Wal-Mart. We haven't made that connection yet your children being shot down in the street and then you going out and buying skills and buying you know these things, there's a connection between you, and we have to really begin to educate ourselves to a new educational philosophy alright. Which is we're not going to give to people who don't play a game of reciprocity among us. If you're not giving back to us in a significant way then why do we need to give it to you I don’t care how nice your stuff is. Keidi Awadu: To reciprocate they're gonna have to know how to get in contact with you brother Aunkh Akwaba, how can they best to sell. Aunkh Akwaba: So that's always the best way to reach me is bettermarketingmastery.com That’s the website bettermarkettingmastery.com you can sign on there will put out periodically newsletters and for trains for you we are about to come with a monetization mastery’s club. It’s a Crashed mastermind group that will give people more access to me and then we'll have more time to really focus on how we master the game of monetization and our we begin to be one of the lethal marketers, entrepreneurs and well is that we need to be in our community so stay tuned for more info on that. 21 Keidi Awadu: All right, great to have you back in the studio with us back on the program brother Aunkh I always appreciate the insights that you share good things are happening because some of us Brother Aunk, we are listening and we're listening very closely. Madase Madase, thank you very much as (inaudible 1:01:30) for all you do. Aunkh Akwaba: kabebu kabebu Keidi Awadu: And on this show we take a short poems, don't even think about going nowhere brother Irving Phillips with this program experienced the rebirth is going to join us here in just a couple of minutes here on the LIB radio, LIB TV and livinginblack.com Don't go nowhere we'll be right back with you. 22