How Rich Dad Poor Dad Became the #1 Personal Finance Book of All Time

It all started with a self-published book that wasn't selling.

“I have something for you.”

In 2017, over dinner, my dad gave me a copy of a purple book with yellow letters at the Food Terminal in Alpharetta, Georgia. I remember devouring it in 2 days. There were things I suspected about money, freedom, and “The Matrix” for a long time, but Rich Dad Poor Dad finally confirmed them to me.

The original copy my dad gave to me when I was 24.

So started my ravenous, determined quest to live a life outside The Matrix, which began during the pandemic as my first business, publishing nonfiction audiobooks online from a course I saw a Youtube ad for.

Over time, and accidentally becoming an influencer in the topics I was publishing in, I learned enough about books and book marketing that Robert Kiyosaki became famous in entrepreneurship because of authoring the Rich Dad Poor Dad books, not because he was entrepreneur. It was a meta, eye-opening moment. I realized that the thing I was doing, relentlessly marketing and selling books, was the same activity that catapulted Robert to fame and respect. This can happen for you too.

When you author a book, and market that book like crazy, you become an authority.

In 2023, I participated in a book marketing program hosted by Steve Harrison, one of Robert’s first marketing coaches that helped the originally-self-published Rich Dad Poor Dad gain its first bit of traction. It is now my delight to share with you the details I learned from that experience about how Rich Dad Poor Dad became the #1 personal finance book of all time.

A Garage Filled with Books That Weren’t Selling

Everyone thinks that Rich Dad Poor Dad shot up the bestseller lists easily and quickly, but this is not true.

One day in 1997, Kim Kiyosaki, Robert’s wife, called Steve Harrison’s office and told Steve that their garage was filled with cases upon cases of self-published books that weren’t moving.

No one was interested in them.

What Steve shared with Kim would change the course of the Rich Dad Poor Dad marketing strategy forever: