We had the good fortune of connecting with Gilberto Herrera and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Gilberto, putting aside the decision to work for yourself, what other decisions were critical to your success?
Learning that in order to be successful in life, you have to build strong relationships. In order to turn a contact to a contract, you need the letter R. The R in contract stands for relationships.

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
I am a consultant to businesses and individuals. I created a movement called the Scale You Movement and I’m the author of the upcoming book called “How to Scale You: Build a Brand, Leverage Marketing and Increase Sales”. Everyone talks about scaling businesses, but I focus on the individual. I get them to treat themselves as a brand and take them through the same process that businesses go thorough to grow. I know that if I can get them to focus on their personal growth, the business will succeed as well. Look at all of your major companies, they all have one polarizing person, Elon Musk, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and many more. I help leaders in companies achieve the same success.

What I am most proud of is being able to help over 500 companies and individuals generate over $100MM in revenue and achieve their life goals through the work that we do together.

The road hasn’t been easy. It took a while for me to find my niche because I was trying to be all things to all people. I would often work with those I had no business working with and it ended up being a bad scenario on both ends.

That’s my leads into my biggest lesson, you cannot be all things to all people. You need to draw the line in the sand and speak directly to your tribe and turn everyone else off.

What I want the world to know about my story is that if I can come from a world of gang banging and drug dealing as an undocumented immigrant in this country to becoming a business professional and adding value to the world around me, they can do the same as long as they want out of their situation. I grew up in Brooklyn, NY and during that time gangs hit NYC really hard. All my friends that I look up to joined a gang and I followed suit. It got me in a world of trouble and my family relocated me down south. After losing friends to jail and gun violence along with not being able to legally do nothing in this country until 2007, I had to become creative on how to generate income. That sparked my hunger for entrepreneurship.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
When my best friend come to my city, as soon as I pick him up from the airport we go eat at Unos Tacos in the Pizits Food Hall, and we will have a drink during happy hour at The Louis Bar while we’re there. A great friend of mine owns both of those locations.

After that I will take him to the Civil Rights District and give him of the city’s rich civil rights historic landmarks such as 16th St Baptist Church and the Civil Rights Museum. We would later go to Vulcan Park and Museum so he can go to the top of the Vulcan Statue and overlook the city.

Birmingham, AL is a foodie city so we would visit many restaurants that week. Since he is from Trinidad and Tabago and olives Caribbean food, we would eat at Jake’s Soulfood Cafe in Hoover, Cayo Coco downtown Birmingham, El Barrio Restaurant. We would also visit my friend’s restaurant, Michael’s Steak and Seafood right next to Regions Field, home of the Birmingham Barons.

He enjoys the nightlife so we would visit many bars and lounges such as Saferoom, The Humidor Room, The Plum Bar and Dirty Ashes.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I’d like to dedicate my shoutout to my late grandfather, Eduardo Coward. He was my hero and my very first mentor. I learned what it was like running a business as a kid because of him. He owned a successful paint shop in Panama City, Panama called Pinturas Junior (which stands for Junior’s Paint in English). I would go to his paint shop with him every weekend as a kid and he would show me how to mix paint, handle the books of the business, and most importantly, how to advertise. He also owned race horses and we would go to his stable pretty often. I dedicate this article and my life’s work to my grandfather.

Website: Www.gilbertoherrera.com

Instagram: Www.instagram.com/gilberto__herrera

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gilbertoherrerascaleyou

Twitter: Www.twitter.com/g__herrera

Facebook: Www.facebook.com/gilbertoherrerafan

Other: Www.howtoscaleyou.com

Image Credits
Tyrrell Pettus and David Taylor

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