“In order to run the game I learned how to be strong, brave, and to suppress my emotional side.”—Molly Bloom

When Molly Bloom moved to Los Angeles in 2003, she was just looking to take a break before applying to law school. She had never planned events, let alone played poker, but ended up running the most famous and popular poker game in L.A. and New York for ten years.

Bloom went from poker novice to poker entrepreneur, building up her own multimillion-dollar poker enterprise from scratch. She started as an assistant for a weekly celeb poker game at the Viper Room, where she scheduled games and players. Bloom moved on to collecting debts and paying out winnings and then running her own high-stakes poker game.

While most people might read Bloom’s engaging memoir Molly’s Game for the celeb name-dropping or the exciting middle-class-to-riches story, Bloom also talks about her growth as an entrepreneur and the values and rules that helped her build a successful multimillion-dollar enterprise. These same rules could easily be applied to any business.

Molly’s 11 Rules for Success

1) It’s always about the money. Throughout the book, Bloom repeats that the poker game is about the money. When she began running the games, she concentrated on ambiance and service. She provided each player’s favorite alcohol, had pretty girls serving the drinks and said “yes” to any reasonable request or desire by a player.

But all the ambiance in the world did not matter if the players lost. She knew other poker games were played in dingy rooms on ratty card tables, but those players were happy as long as there was money to win.

In business, no one particularly cares how nice your logo is or what snacks you provide in the lobby as long as they get a good deal.

2) Bring in new business. The first poker game Bloom worked included a core group of celebrities and rich people. In order to keep the core group happy and coming back, it was necessary to provide new players who could either entertain them or lose money to them. So Bloom was constantly recruiting new poker players for the game.

The same goes for any enterprise. You have your core clients, but to grow and thrive, you need to constantly bring in new business.

3) Be irreplaceable. Bloom started working the poker game as an assistant. She arranged the game for her boss, co-owner of the Viper Room on the Sunset Strip. She could have been replaced at any time, so to ensure that she kept working this lucrative venture (she was paid in player tips), she made sure she was irreplaceable. She did everything that was asked of her: soothe clients, attract new players, and settle accounts. By the time her boss was ready to fire her, she had learned everything she needed to know to be able to take over the poker business.

If you want to be a successful entrepreneur, learn everything about the business.

4) Say yes all the time. When dealing with the rich, the famous, and the entitled, Bloom developed a rule for her staff: say “yes” to any request that was not illegal or demeaning. If a poker player needed travel reservations (make them), a phone charger (get one), or a special scotch while playing the game (pre-order it). This way she was always exceeding expectations.

In business, say yes as long as it is reasonable and legal—your customers will keep coming back.

5) Synergize for success. The key to running her poker game was always recruiting new clients. To ensure a steady stream of poker players, Bloom made alliances. She paid bottle service girls at high-end clubs for good recommendations, worked with Vegas casino managers to trade players, and even aligned herself with a rival poker game in New York City, to share debt collection.

By working with others (and providing financial incentives), Bloom was consistently able to recruit new players for her game and collect debts.

When not in direct competition, make alliances and work with your rivals for success.

6) Make the fun effortless. When running her poker game, Bloom made it essential that all the effort involved was behind the scenes. Poker players didn’t see the planning that went on to set up the rooms, order the catering, or provide their favorite essentials. Like Apple products, the poker game just worked.

In business, if you make everything simple for your customers, they’ll keep coming back.

7) Do customer research. Data collection was instrumental to Bloom’s business success and growth. Bloom would vet her poker players for criminal connections and financial stability. She didn’t want players who would bring police attention or couldn’t pay their debts.

Once players were accepted to the game, Bloom would collect data about their likes and dislikes, so she could provide for their needs and wants to keep them coming back.

In business, understanding your customer base is essential to business growth and to maintain existing relationships by providing relationship-based extras.

8) Use social pressure for payments. Customer payment is always stressful for a business owner. In Bloom’s business, where there was no legal recourse for debts, she found social pressure from other celebrities and desire to be in the game ensured quick payment. It’s human nature not to want to be seen as cheap. Bloom learned what behavioral economists and social psychologists all know—social pressure is stronger and faster for getting customers to pay than using the legal system.

In business, use social pressure in your client messaging to decrease defaults.

9) Know your sales pitch. To entice rich people to play her poker game, Bloom had to know her sales pitch. She would hint at celebrities, pretty girls, and beautiful locations that rival games could not provide. Sometimes she pre-suaded people by bringing along former Playboy playmates who were working with her.

In business, knowing what makes you different from the competition is your key to success.

10) Keep oversight of the details. At the height of her business success, Bloom was running several poker games a week, sometimes two poker games a night. While she had delegated some authority to her staff, she made time to visit the various game locations to ensure that everything was running according to her standards.

In business, have confidence in your employees, but also check on them to keep things to your high standards.

11) Suppress your emotion. To run a high-stakes business, literally and figuratively, Bloom had to suppress her emotion. While she said “yes” to clients with a smile and made the fun look effortless, the business was always about the money. When her boyfriends became liabilities to running the game, she let them go. When players were slow to pay, she kept her cool. She focused on the problems and solved them. In this way, she was able to build and run a multimillion-dollar enterprise from scratch.

In your business, when your home life and clients are creating stress, stay calm and focused on the business problem.

Recent article published in Business 2 Community: https://www.business2community.com/books/mollys-rules-entrepreneur-molly-bloom-built-multimillion-dollar-enterprise-scratch-02022070