The #Duck9 Story

By Larry Chiang

As a small business founder, I hear this advice

“Humanize your brand and connect with a personal story”

Lyn Graft (LG) (@LynGraft) 1/4/13 8:14 AM “How to Tell Your Company’s Story…give your brand (& startup) a human story” by @Nadiagoodman bit.ly/VA6jIZ

Well, while there is an entrepreneur story, the personal story is not one I will stoop to conjure up.

Here are the components of what I should do versus really did.

-1- Concoct how I used to have bad credit and created Duck9 to help college students with getting good credit. Me and my mentor hacked the Fair Isaac credit score algorithm.

-2- Talk at the 5th grade level

The problem is that credit FICO prep is not a 10 year olds problem. Its a 30 year olds problem.

It’s a 30 year olds problem that you HAVE TO SOLVE before you’re 30. It’s a 30 year olds problem that you CAN solve while you’re in college. I’m pattern replicating John Wooden. He was a perennial NCAA championship coach. His method to getting legendary results with a dozen championships was to cram 30 year-olds basketball IQ into sophomores and third-year junior UNDERGRADS’ brain.

Wooden didn’t do it talking below them. He did it taking them to the next next level while they were in college as a student.

-3- The Duck9 story has 24 irrefutable details that are all critical. Credit is loaded with urban myths.

Duck9 is an acronym that stands for Deep Underground Credit Knowledge. It has a “9” in it because it’s double entendre. 9 is a credit industry insider secret credit code. So you want to “Duck 9’s” like avoid 9’s on your credit report.

The opposite of 9 is a “1” A one is an on time payment.

I update social media status at 11:11. It reminds me to remind others that 24 ones in a row is 24 months of paying a li’l bit on-time every month gets you to a FICO over 700 as a college student undergrad.

As a college student undergrad… ENGR145’s Anchor Concept: Lemonade and Gua Gua Guacamole

It moves you to the right on the entrepreneur bell curve

CEO of Duck9 Stanford University Entrepreneur in Residence, Emeritus

Duck9 = “Deep Underground Credit Knowledge” 9 125 University Avenue/ 100 Palo Alto CA 94301 https://www.duck9.com/ass 650-566-9600 650-566-9696 (direct) 650-283-8008 (cell)

**************** Editor of the BusinessWeek Channel “What They Don’t Teach at Business School” https://whattheydontteachyouatstanfordbusinessschool.com/blog CNN Video Channel: https://ireport.cnn.com/people/larrychiang

Read my last 10 tweets at https://www.Twitter.com/LarryChiang

Author, NY Times Bestseller https://whattheydontteachyouatstanfordbusinessschool.com/blog/?s=Ny+times+bestseller

“What They Will NEVER Teach You at Stanford Business School” comes out 11-11-14

https://www.fastcompany.com/embed/c0d4562ea2049

52 Cards. Two Jokers. What They DO Teach You at Stanford Engineering