Aligning Your Will With The Marketplace - The Russell Brunson Show

Podcast Summary

The Russell Brunson Show

Episode: Aligning Your Will With The Marketplace

Date: October 31, 2017

Host: Russell Brunson

Episode Overview

In this episode, Russell Brunson takes listeners beyond conventional marketing tactics and into the heart of what drives lasting business (and personal) success: the power of aligning your will—not only with higher principles but with the reality of your marketplace. Drawing on a recent meaningful meeting with a senior church leader, Russell explores how spiritual concepts parallel entrepreneurial wisdom. He delivers an engaging, story-packed reflection on humility, listening, and letting the market—not your ego—be your ultimate guide.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Life Updates and Personal Stories (00:00–05:10)

Russell starts by sharing a personal, lighthearted story about installing trampolines and spending time with family.
He jokes about not being able to grow a "cool" beard like the Dollar Beard Club guys, despite researching their business growth and off-boarding processes.
- Tone: Chatty, warm, and self-deprecating.

2. Meeting with a Church Leader and God’s Will (05:11–07:32)

Russell recounts a significant experience meeting one of the Twelve Apostles in his church, which led to deep self-reflection.
- He acknowledges not sharing every detail but focuses on a relevant insight for both faith and business.
Key Insight:
- Rather than imposing one’s beliefs, a person should strive to understand what God believes and "bend" their will accordingly.
- Quote:
  
  “My job as a human here is not to try to convince God that, like, no, no, no, no, you're wrong... My goal is to look at what he believes on the topic and then bend my will towards that...”
  (Russell Brunson, 06:38)

3. Drawing Parallels: God’s Will and the Market’s Will (07:33–13:18)

Russell transitions to comparing the obedience to God’s will with how entrepreneurs should approach the marketplace.
Many entrepreneurs fall into the trap of pushing their ideas too hard, ignoring or resisting what the market truly wants.
- Quote:
  
  “The market in this situation is kind of like God... the market doesn't care who you are... The market is what it is. You put your thing out there and it will tell you.”
  (Russell Brunson, 08:58)

4. The Only Market Opinion That Matters (13:19–15:35)

The ONLY way to gauge if a product will succeed is if people are willing to pay for it—not what friends, surveys, or even mentors think.
- Quote:
  
  "I let the market decide. I create the thing the best I know how... and then I send some traffic to it, and I let the market vote. And I don't let the market vote through quizzes or surveys or things like that... The only thing that I care about is people that actually pull their wallet out of their pocket and swipe a credit card. That is how the market votes."
  (Russell Brunson, 13:32)
He shows off his ClickFunnels wallet sticker as a playful nod to the connection between product and profit.

5. The Fatal Mistake: Forcing Your Will on the Market (15:36–17:48)

Russell warns against becoming too attached to personal ideas and trying to "jam" them into the market.
- Entrepreneurs who ignore feedback often "struggle" or experience years, even decades, without real success.
- Quote:
  
  "The market doesn’t care about you. All the market wants is what it wants."
  (Russell Brunson, 16:40)

6. The Path to Business Breakthrough: Alignment (17:49–19:44)

Success comes from finding out what people want, how much they’ll pay, and aligning your offerings accordingly.
- References his foundational principle from Expert Secrets:
  
  “Find a hot market, ask them what they want, and then give it to them. It does not say, find a hot market, decide what you think would be awesome to create, and then jam it down their throats.”
  (Russell Brunson, 18:09)

7. Closing Reflections and Universal Application (19:45–20:58)

Russell underscores that whether or not you believe in God, or in a product’s value, that doesn’t change the objective reality—the truth is what it is.
- Quote:
  
  “Whether you believe in him or not, he's still there... whether you believe [your offer] will sell or not, it doesn't really matter. It's what the market believes.”
  (Russell Brunson, 19:54)
Offers a quick recap: The world and the market reward those who observe, listen, and align.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

"You gotta figure out what [the market] wants, and then you align your will with that."
(Russell Brunson, 16:56)
"The market votes with their credit card."
(Russell Brunson, 13:40)
"If you fight against that, you struggle... If you do that, you become rich."
(Russell Brunson, 16:44)

Key Timestamps

00:00–05:10 | Family stories, beards, setting the episode’s tone
05:11–07:32 | Insights from meeting a church apostle: “bending” your will
07:33–13:18 | The parallel: Bending to God’s will and the market’s will
13:19–15:35 | How the market REALLY votes: not by opinion, but by purchase
15:36–17:48 | The struggles of forcing ideas on the market
17:49–19:44 | The business breakthrough of alignment (“Expert Secrets” principle)
19:45–20:58 | Final thoughts: Reality trumps belief—align and succeed

Takeaways

Success—in business and beyond—demands humility and a willingness to listen.
Don’t try to "teach" the market or dictate your will to it. Instead, observe, test, and adapt based on real-world feedback.
True entrepreneurs don’t fall in love with their products—they fall in love with serving what people want and need.

This episode is a motivational and philosophical guide for entrepreneurs and creators—reminding us that real influence and profit come when we authentically align with the truth of our audience and the world around us.

Transcript

A (0:00)

What's up, everybody? This is Russell Brunson, and welcome to the Marketing Secrets podcast. So the big question is, how are entrepreneurs like us, who didn't cheat and take on venture capital, were spending money from our own pockets. How do we market in a way that lets us get our products and our services and the things that we believe in out to the world and yet still remain profitable? That is the question, and this podcast will give you the answers. My name is Russell Brunson, and welcome to Marketing Secrets. Hey, everyone. Hope you guys are all having an amazing day today. Whoa. Juggling my phone as I get in the car. So crazy day. So we're just leaving. I was about to leave the house today. I walked out and Nora was outside on the trampolines jumping. So some of these are my crazy stories. We had a big side yard that was just kind of a big empty weed field. So we decided this year to go a little crazy. So we put in a football slash soccer field, volleyball court, basketball court, baseball, a track that wraps the whole thing, and then nine underground trampolines. And they got nine underground trampolines up this weekend while we were gone. So we spent all day last night when we got home jumping. And then this morning I was about to leave and I could hear little giggles outside. And I went inside. Nora was jumping. So it's. It's a little bit cold out here. But I went and jumped for the last little bit. Now I'm heading out. So buckling up my car and we're ready to rock and roll. So it's funny, we were gone this week. We went and drove to Burley where my in laws live, and we dropped off our kids and from there we drove down to Salt Lake. Cause I had a meeting that I'll tell you guys about here in a second. But it's funny because on the way home we went camping, stuff like that. So I haven't shaved in two days. So my face was all like prickly, you know what I mean? And I was picking up Nora yesterday and like her curly hair is like Velcro on my. On my beard. And I just like, I tried for two days and I hated it. So I just shaved it this morning. I was like, ah, I feel so much better. But I hate it because like, I've been watching, we've been studying Dollar Shave Club and Dollar Beard Club's off boarding process. In fact, I wrote about in Funnel University this month and like, I don't know what it is. Like all the beard guys just seem cooler. Like And I just, like, part of me is like, I want to be cool like the beard guys, but I just can't. Two days gave up and it was horrible. And so I'll never be as cool as the beard guys, but I will give them credit. They are definitely cooler than a shaved guy. So, anyway, hopefully someday I'll become a man and be able to grow one out, but that day is not today. So, anyway, so I want to share something today. And some of you guys might be thinking, Russell, this is a marketing podcast. Why are you talking about God? And it's like, because he has to do with everything. It's really important. And the lesson I learned this weekend has to do with God, but it also then relates back to you guys in your market. And so I think it's really, really important. So I was in Utah and I was. I had a meeting with someone who is one of the top leaders in my church, in the Mormon Church. We believe in our church that there's a prophet and there's 12 apostles, similar to when Christ was on earth. And my meeting was with one of the 12 apostles, which was really a huge honor and scary and exciting and all those things all wrapped into one. And I had a chance to meet with him. And so this whole week prior leading up to it, I've had a lot of thoughts about just life and how things work. And then obviously meeting with him. And afterwards, it was really neat reflection time. And there's something that came out. There's a lot of stuff I wish I could share in the context of this podcast, but it's probably not appropriate or in the right spot, so I won't. But there was one thing that kept ringing through my head that I wanted to share because I think it's important and it does relate back to marketing. So there you go. Is that right? If I relate back to marketing, talk about God for a few minutes, hopefully that's okay. So what's interesting is if you look at the world, what the world tries to do is they. Is that they see kind of like. And I don't want to get political because I don't care about politics at all. So I'm not going to get political. But I see this mostly it's amplified in politics, right? Where it's like, these are the agenda items. People believe this, they believe this, and they fight back and forth and who's right, who's wrong, all sorts of stuff like that, Right? And it's kind of crazy. And it's been interesting as I've My life. And I'm not perfect this by any stretch. Like, this is what I aspire to be. But when I look at an issue, right, or look at something, it shouldn't be like, what do I believe? What does Russell believe on this topic? It should be, okay, I believe in a God. So what does God actually believe on this topic? And then my job as a human here is not to try to convince God that like, no, no, no, no, no, you're wrong, right? Because he's not. So my goal is to look at what he believes on the topic and then bend my will towards that and say, okay, this is what he believes, therefore this is what I believe. And that's how it should be. If you do believe in an all powerful creator who created the heavens and earth and everything, I think we should like bend our will towards him. Be like, okay, this is what he thinks, therefore this is what I think on any topic. So it's like, you know, like, I think that's it's important. We're trying to set up our beliefs and what we're for and for against those kind of things. Like, it should be less of. Like, this is my opinion, this is what I think is right. This is what I studied or I read and should be like, what does God actually think? And then sit back and pray and find out what he believes. And then be like, cool, I will align my will with yours. I'll align with that because that's what you believe. And so I was thinking about that and again, something I probably wouldn't normally share inside the podcast, but I started thinking about this from the business standpoint too, because there's always correlations between all things, right? And it's funny because a lot of the entrepreneurs that I work with, it's interesting, like what they do is they have an idea, right? This is this product I want to create. It's the greatest thing in the world. It's going to change mankind and I want to charge this price for it and this is how I want to deliver it. They have all these things that they want to do because it's their idea, right? It's their baby. And they go out there and they put out the market and the market crushes it. And it's like that idea sucks or that price point is not right or whatever it is, right? And the market goes and does its thing. And the market in this situation is kind of like God, like, like the market doesn't care who you are. Not that God and God does care, but the market doesn't care who you are. Right? The market doesn't care how good your ideas are, what the market is, what it is. Like, you put your thing out there and it will tell you, like, that idea sucked or that it was amazing or whatever. Like, the thing in between there is. Right? And so for our job as entrepreneurs is not to try to, like, convince the market that our idea is the best. Our idea is to find, like, what does the market actually want? And then align our will with that. And when you do that, that's when things explode. Right? That's why, like, when we test funnels, like, we'll test them like, oh, the market said no. We try it again, and we test to tweak the messaging and the pricing. We keep moving things around. So we figure, like, what does the market actually want? Like, what are they? Like, how much they want to spend for this? What's the price point where they actually want. They even want this product. A lot of my ideas, they didn't want, like, as grave an idea as I thought they were. The market did not care about it. And the market is the only thing that actually matters. And so, like, I always tell people, like, drives me crazy. People in. In my coaching programs and Facebook groups and everything, they'll come in and they'll be like, hey, what's the. Like, what's your opinion on this? I'm like, dude, don't take my opinion on it. Like, I don't even trust my own opinion on my own stuff. I let the market decide. I create the thing the best I know how to do based on what I've seen the market respond to in the past. I make that thing and then I send some traffic to it, and I let the market vote. And I don't let the market vote through quizzes or surveys or things like that where they're like, oh, yeah, I would buy that. The only thing that I care about is people that actually pull their wallet out of their pocket and swipe a credit card. That is how the market votes. They don't vote with their mouth. They vote with their credit card. And yes, I do. For those watching the video, I do have a click funnel sticker on my wallet because that is what fills my wallet full of the stuff that we need to buy. So anyway, so that's how it works. So for you guys, as entrepreneurs, it's important for you not to get so caught up on your ideas and what you believe. It is important to figure out what the market actually wants, what they actually believe. They believe this is worth this amount of money. They believe that this is what they want to buy. You figure out what the market actually wants, and you do that, you become rich. If you fight against that, you struggle. And I've seen people go years, sometimes decades, and never have success because they are trying to jam their beliefs down the market's throat. And the market doesn't care about you. All the market wants is what it wants. And so you got to figure out what it wants, and then you align your will with that. And that's it. And so, as I was thinking about this weekend, with God and with our responsibility, not so much to try to dictate what we believe and try to shove it down his throat, but to figure out what he believes and then align our wills with him. It's the same thing with the market. And when you understand that, that's when business becomes a lot easier. It comes back to Expert Secrets 101, like, page three or whatever. Like, find a hot market, ask them what they want, and then give it to them. Okay. Does not say, find a hot market. Decide what you think would be awesome to create, and then jam it down their throats. Like, that is a hard business to run. Okay. It's the opposite way. Find a hot market, ask them what they want, and then give it to them. That's it. And the market will tell you. So market will tell you if you're right. Market will tell you if you're wrong. And if you're wrong, don't be mad about it. Just change your approach. Change the pricing, change the hook, change the angle, change the product, change the service. Like, create what it wants, and then everything else will take place that you needed to. So there you go. Is that okay if I weave a religion into this thing? Because even you guys don't believe in God, it doesn't mean he's not there. Like, that's what's interesting. Like, sometimes I have people friends. Like, I don't believe in God. You shouldn't talk about it. I'm like, whether you believe in him or not, he's still there. Like, that's the interesting thing. Like, people, I don't believe that this will sell. Like, whether you believe it or not, it doesn't really matter. It's what the market believes. Let's go find out what the truth is. Let's align our beliefs with that. That's in all aspects of life. So there you go. That's Preacher Brunson preaching on hope. You guys don't mind anyway, but regardless, hope you got something out of that one. And hopefully you guys understand that that's how the world works, how the market works. And when you understand that and you align your wheels towards it, that's how to grow a company. Find a hot market, ask them what they want and give it to them. Alright guys, I'm at the office. I gotta go. See you guys all soon. Bye. Everybody want more marketing secrets? If so, then go get your copies of my two best selling books. Book number one is called Expert Secrets and you can get a free copy@expertsecrets.com and book number two is called Dotcom Secrets and you can get your free copy@dotcomsecrets.com Inside these two books you'll find my top 35 secrets that we've used to become the fastest growing non VC backed SaaS startup company in the world.