How I actually make money in Tokyo

本站添加: 2026-05-25

[00:00:00]Good morning. It's a little bit too early for me. It's about 6 something.

[00:00:04]I don't usually wake up this early. I'm going to be honest. I'm not an early riser. So, for those of you that tell you that you need to wake up to be successful, it's total BS. You can wake up on your own time as long as you get done. But today is a different day.

[00:00:16]You know, the reason why I'm up early is that we're going to Shanghai. I'm going to support my athletes, you know. And in this video, I want to talk to you about, you know, more about my business. You know, in the last video I explained how I made money, but now I want to talk to you guys about how I'm actually making money, you know, with my current businesses. And the first topic that I want to talk about that I feel like is one of the most important topics to kind of cover, especially when it comes to business, especially here in Japan, is touchpoints. I don't want to sound arrogant and all, but I really truly understood consumer psychology here in Japan, and I understand that touchpoints one of the biggest things, you know. And that's the reason why with every single brand, every single page that I have, I have over six to seven Instagram pages.

[00:00:56]I have about four to five different communities. I have, you know, multiple multiple brands as well, too, in Japan.

[00:01:02]And those are all just touchpoints. I have many touchpoints here in Japan, and I want to cover every single one of them so you guys understand which one actually makes money, which one is more for, you know, a front end marketing type of thing. But yeah, with that said, I got to head out to the airport, you know. I got to get ready a little bit. I didn't finish packing yet, so I'll finish packing right now, head to the airport. I'm just very excited to be able to watch my boys put on a show in Shanghai. So, I'll see you guys there.

[00:01:29]>> [music] >> What's up, guys? So, I just landed in Shanghai here to support my two athletes that I sponsored with the company, you know, that I made with one of the athletes called Grind Tokyo. This is the logo, and this is one of the apparels that we made. This is one of my touchpoints as well, too. This is another aspect where I essentially taught someone how to build personal brands, how to actually position yourself as a figure of authority, but also how to build a brand that like sells apparels that, you know, basically you can monetize off of. And that's exactly what I did to help Kota, you know. Kota's rise from not knowing anything about social media, not knowing anything about business and money, to now being able to have a personal brand with almost 10K followers, having a brand that really exemplifies like who he is, right? He really exemplified what the grind meaning was, right? Working Uber, you know, like quitting his full-time job and not knowing what's going to happen in his life and moving to Tokyo, you know, just trusting me.

[00:02:27]What he is really into is being able to like show his personality, share his story, but at the end of the day, he doesn't know the business side to it, and that's where I come. I'm the operator behind him [music] and trying to push it, you know? And like by even me sponsoring him in Shanghai and like, you know, being here and being able to support, you know, his mission of becoming one of Asia's first sub-60 high-rocks guys, you know? And also I have the other athlete, Kazuma, is right on the brink of getting sub-60 as well, too. And then I brought them together so they can train, so they can push each other. The amount of improvement that I've seen from both of them in a short span of 1 month has just been incredible. And this is another This is one of my touchpoints, right?

[00:03:05]This meaning of touchpoint means that like they're associated with me, but I'm also associated with them. So, the people that follow them and support them, they also know that I'm a part of them, too. So, in reality, they go like, "Oh, wow, Kazuma's brand is building.

[00:03:17]Kota's brand is building. Oh, who's behind it? Who's doing that?" And then they they start saying, "Okay, wait, who's this Yuya guy?" So, this is just one touchpoint. It's like I know it's irrelevant to like the money-making scene or like the consulting scene or even like the operator scene, but people get introduced to who I am through the people that I'm sponsoring as well, too.

[00:03:36]And that's like the very important thing that I want to talk to you guys about touchpoints is that like you don't have to monetize off of a touchpoint, you know? It could just be like, "Oh, wow, people got to know me." A lot of the problems that people only have one touchpoints, you know, you solely rely on that. But then this is the beauty of being able to help someone change someone's life, but they're also helping you at the same time. Not in a monetary way, but maybe in like an exposure way, too. Right now in Japan, I have over five touch points, and that is part of the reason why I feel like I've created a lot of success in an exponential way in the past 4 to 5 months. As you see, I'm just talking a lot. I'm very excited because my athletes are about to go try to get their PR times in the Hirok Shinkai in about a few hours. Kind of go there, get settled in, and then they race right around 7:20. I I really do believe that both of them will do really well.

[00:04:24]>> [music] >> What's up, guys? I'm here in Seoul. Um the reason why I'm here in Korea, why we flew from Shanghai from the Hirok event to here, is simply because, as you know, I'm trying to build this compound, right? I'm looking for a space in Tokyo. Particularly, like a space where I can host a gym, host my office, a recovery zone. Something that I probably will call something like Connect House, right? It's like a It's a place where people can feel inspired, right? Through workouts, through entrepreneurship, through content creation, through podcasts, all of that.

[00:05:04]I found a cool manufacturer guy, you know, out here in Korea through social media, and we've been speaking. And there's a few like machines are these few like equipment that I haven't seen anywhere in the world but in Korea. So, that's why I came to visit. I'm actually going to the gym the gym that I'm going to model the look and the equipment off of simply because, you know, they have everything that I need. I can also host Hirok classes, too, but it's not going to be that type of gym where it's like a Hirok CrossFit. This is for like pro athletes, top-of-the-line athletes. I'm having the best equipment. Like I'm thinking six-figure plus into equipment and everything because I want to make it the best facility in Tokyo. I'm going to take you guys behind the scenes of how I'm talking to the manufacturer, the equipment that I'm talking about in Korea, and I kind of want you guys to just to understand, you know, this is part of this Connect ecosystem that I'm building. I want this to truly be the best gym in Tokyo, best gym in Japan, period, honestly. The equipment and the stuff that I'm going to have and the experience that people are going to get in there is second to none. So, I just want you guys to stay tuned and just stay excited for this story and this journey that I'm about to do.

[00:06:04]>> [music] >> What's up, guys? So, as you can see, some big packages has just come in.

[00:06:14]And this is another touchpoint in my whole ecosystem, right? The reason why I named it Connect was simply because back in 2019, I was lost, you know, I had a very rough year. I came to Japan, I didn't know anybody, I didn't know anything. I just had football and I wasn't making enough money to actually really survive. And then I started to realize that like, what is my purpose in life? I started to realize football thing is not going to really take me that far. My mom kind of dove deeper into what my name really meant, my kanji. And then I started diving deeper into it, and then I started to realize like things that like made me feel alive, the things that like brought out purpose in my life was when I was connecting things, right? Connecting Hawaii to Japan, America to Japan, connecting my friend to this friend.

[00:06:59]When I was doing that, I was the happiest and most fulfilled. That's why I named this thing called Connect, right? It's simply because I found my purpose through connection and I feel like people can find their purpose through connecting. I really do believe that connecting is such a thing that is a is a thing that lacks here in Japan.

[00:07:17]And that's why I wanted to bring it, you know, as a forefront brand, a run club, a a ecosystem here in Japan so people can really understand what connecting really means cuz it changed my life. And this is just one touchpoint touchpoint of my whole ecosystem. This is more so for Connect Tokyo, which is the run club, as you can see the apparel. The Grind Tokyo's washed version did really well. I decided to make a washed version for the Connect Tokyo Run Club. We have Connect Tokyo right here, right? And then in the back, this is the reason why I did this, I did it in this color and then I did it in the basic white. As you can see right there, boom, Tokyo Running Club. Kind of want to explain more about why I did this, right? I actually with the Run Club, I gave all the apparel away, whether whether it was the hoodie, the t-shirts, the hats and everything that I made because I'm not trying to monetize the Run Club. The Run The Run Club for me, when it comes to business, it's like the top of the funnel, right?

[00:08:10]How some people use Instagram Reels as a way to funnel them into something else.

[00:08:14]It's the same thing. I use Connect Tokyo to bring brand awareness of what I'm building and who I am. And when people come to the Run Club, they were like, "Wow." It gives them some kind of a feeling of a connection there. It makes them realize, "Okay, who's behind doing this, right?" The whole purpose is so many people try to create something and try to make money off of it. Money is not the only thing that has value, right? For me, like when it comes to the Run Club, like it's it's the trust aspect that gets built because people are like, "Okay, wait, he actually has this, right?" Building apparel, like I'm not trying to monetize everything, right? In the first release that I did, it was more so of like, "Hey, I want people to rock it and people think like, what is Connect Tokyo?" And they start asking, they start searching on Instagram, they start saying, "Hey, wow, Connect Tokyo made such amazing hoodies, amazing t-shirts. You should just go to the Run Club, you might get something for free." And then when they come to the Run Club, they're like, "Wow, this community is so amazing. Like, I want to be deeper into this community." And that's where I have Connect University, you know? And Connect University is more for the online educational platform where I teach what it really means to be a real operator, like the operations behind a creator's success or your own business as well too, right? Now, I want to talk to you about I don't know if you guys can see this.

[00:09:27]All right, I want to talk to you about Connect University. Connect University is another touch point that I have. It's it's a vehicle, one of the touch points where I monetize, you know? And it's been doing very well. I started it back in January, you know, because this is something that I was actually very passionate about and a lot of like Japanese people struggled with and I I found a huge problem in Japan. In business, it's all about finding a painful problem that people have and having the solution for it. I was able to find it through my 6 years of being a business owner and a entrepreneur here in Japan. And simply what Connect University is, it's a university, an ecosystem, an an area where creators, normal 9-5, whoever you are, right? You can learn the system that I've created, that I've been able to assemble from amazing mentors, amazing business people, and amazing partners in the United States, and be able to create it tailored to Japanese consumer psychology. As I mentioned in the last video where I started with like an entrepreneur trading community in the beginning, I was able to make seven figures from that. And before I even did that, I made seven figures myself trading and investing. And the reason why I started this business, right, about operations and everything, it's not because I don't want to like I don't believe in the trading or the entrepreneur space or whatever that is, you know? It's just that I just found that this is such a huge problem that people in Japan have. Everyone wants to be creators, everyone wants to monetize online, but they don't understand back-end operations, front-end marketing. They don't even understand touch points where I'm explaining to you and what the importance of it as well, too. And even like this concept of an ecosystem, too. So, this is what I'm teaching in Connect University now.

[00:11:01]Usually, the problem with a lot of creators or business owners here in Japan is that they're trying to do too much. And as as someone that has done both sides, I've done too little but also done too much, I found the sweet spot of what exactly it is to actually become successful in this day and age, especially in 2026. This is what I teach with my girlfriend in Connect University, you know? Like Like I said, we've both been able to really understand like how to truly create a real brand that makes people feel some type of way. We understood that and we kind of teach that. And that's why like with Connect University to me and like I'm so passionate about it because it's something that anybody can do. The beautiful thing now with Connect University is that so many new people come in there not even having an Instagram maybe, not even knowing what to do on Instagram, but they're like, "You know what? I'm going to take a shot and I'm going to try to learn to see what I can do from you, to see what I can actually learn from Connect University and what I can learn from you." And we make it so simple because all we do is we do live calls. We actually do interactive things where the people basically research the creators that they would want to support or like, you know, businesses that they want to support. My girlfriend and I, we we we do a deep dive of like the whole business behind it and exactly what to do. People learn so much from these live calls. They take action right away. We don't bust out 50 A watch 50 videos and do all of this. Here's all these PDFs.

[00:12:22]No, we don't do any of that because to me I've realized the more things that people have to do that aren't really necessary, it's not going to help them.

[00:12:30]So, that's why we keep everything simple. Attend a live call, put your questions in a Google form, we'll answer those questions, and literally we're going to do a hands-on workshop interactive workshop every single day on a live. And the results have been just truly just amazing, right? For me like I really do believe that I can really scale this university to eight figures, right? Eight figures USD. And I want to do that because by doing this, I can then be able to create an actual bigger bigger area. Like like I have told you in like I think it was like the fourth or the fifth video I've created on YouTube. There's nothing against the university systems here in Japan, but I want to create my own actual physical university. I want some of these kids to stop having to go to Australia and Bali, all these places, Dubai just to find inspiration. I want people to find inspiration in their home country.

[00:13:18]That's why I'm creating a gym so they don't have to go to Bali to find good gyms, you know? That's why I'm creating run clubs so they don't have to go to Australia or Bali or Dubai to go to run clubs. They can come here and that's why I'm creating Connect University so they don't have to go to the United States or all these other places to find good schooling. They can come here and learn what to do and they don't have to spend 4 years in learning something that they're never going to apply. They can actually learn something in a few weeks and apply it right away and get results and monetize and make money [music] and create freedom. Like I want this to be the hub where people can come and just really truly find their fulfillment and their potential. So everything is flowing, everything is good. I don't want any of these like YouTube videos to be scripted. I just want to just speak from my heart. I want to just speak about all these things. If you have any questions, just put it down below and just ask me anything cuz like all these YouTube videos now, I'm not all about that cinematic stuff. I just want to give you guys value. I want to know what you want to know from me, right? And I want to be able to just give you everything because at the end of the day like I'm here to try to give you as much value as possible. But I just want to say I appreciate you guys for always [music] watching the video, always supporting me, you know, your support means a lot. Even the negative comments, everything like that. I actually learned a lot from it. I don't take it as negative. I take it as feedback and I appreciate all the comments, whether it's good, whether it's bad. I'm going to be doing a lot of crazy cool things these [music] upcoming months so just stay tuned because hopefully, you know, these YouTube videos can get better and better. But I just want to provide more value. But other than that, I appreciate you guys. You guys have a good one. Take care. See you on the next one.