I think in the beginning he was a speaker. People pay him to give motivational/ religious talks, especially those government department/ university student bodies.

Because he is a Chinese Muslim convert so people want to hear his story of how he convert. Normal lah human instinct, we always want to hear other people say how good we are and they want to join us. Its like is some ang mo decide to migrate to Malaysia and people like to hear him talk about why he made that choice and how great it is here. Can make a lot of money one, especially when its some gov agency that decide to hire him to speak about how great it is and why he made that choice.

When he make more and more money then he use marketing lo to promote himself. In the end alot of people want to contribute to him.