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Experian hey, good morning, everybody. This is Russell Brunson. I want to welcome you to the Marketing Secrets podcast. I got so much good stuff to talk to you about today. Entrepreneur of the Year event, something funny with my kids and a whole bunch more. So the big question is this. 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 answer. My name is Russell Brunson, and welcome to Marketing Secrets. Hey, everyone. Man, I have like 12 podcasts in my head right now. I want to share with you guys from lessons from this last week. Some of you guys know that this last weekend was the Entrepreneur of the Year, the ey Entrepreneur of the Year awards ceremony. And so earlier this year, I submitted for the Entrepreneur of the Year of our region and I won it, which was really cool. And then basically all the regions get together and do a national tournament. And so I was all excited to go to the national thing and compete and see if we could win the National Entrepreneur of the Year award. And so I thought, like, if we're going to do this, we should make an experience out of it, right? So that way we can do an episode of Fun Archer tv. That way it's not just like me going somewhere on an event because I go to a lot of events and it's just, like, boring. So I'm like, how to make this memorable for me and for my wife and for anyone else I want to bring. And so we decided, hey, I'm gonna bring my parents. That'd be fun to have them come to something like this. And then Dave and his wife Carrie wanted to come too, which is super cool. And so the first thing is, like, we can just fly there. Or what if we, like, did it upright and like, rented a private plane. So we rented a private plane, flew down, picked my parents up at Salt Lake, which my mom was certain she was gonna die on the plane. She read a book about someone who got in a plane wreck one time. So because that she was convinced that she was like, certain death was the only possibility, the only possible outcome this vacation. Oh, it was really hard to convince her to go, but she agreed finally. So we flew down, picked her up, picked them up, and then went to this event that night. We got there, they. They did it right. Like, they had this huge dinner with this amazing buffet. Like, and it was amazing. Like, I've been to a lot of buffets. This was like four steps past anything I've ever been to before. This dessert bar, they literally had a donut wall. The wall, like these like pegs coming out of with like thousands of different donuts all over them. They had this thing, it looked like a big, like ice cream bar with tons of different types of ice cream flavors, but it wasn't ice cream. It was cookie dough. It was a cookie dough bar. It was insane. So they scoop out tons of cookie dough into the thing and then they had chocolate covered bacon and they had. Oh, the desserts alone were. Oh, amazing. Anyway, it was amazing. And then there was the Kelly Clarkson concert. So we were like five rows away from Kelly Clarkson. She did this huge show for us, a private event for everyone who's at this thing, which was super cool. And that was the first night. The next morning, woke up. If you watch my Instagram stories, I made some jokes, but we had a chance to see the winners of last year's Entrepreneur of the Year award. And I want to kind of tease them, but also I'm grateful for them. And so I'll talk about both sides of it, but they are a venture backed company who's trying to solve cancer, which is really, really cool. And I'm grateful for people and entrepreneurs and companies like that. But the problem, the frustrating thing on my side is that they've raised $2 billion in funding in this thing. And so I'm like, that's awesome. I'm grateful that they've done that, that they're doing that, they're trying to stop cancer. And like, that's so valuable and helpful. But it's funny because, like, I don't know if I would consider that, like, being an entrepreneur, it's like the entrepreneur in this business, like, their full time job is to go sell people on giving them more money. And then they have people they hired to go try to solve cancer. It's like you're more like a glorified salesperson who's just selling to VCs, right? Like, I don't know, I don't think that's entrepreneurship, but maybe I'm wrong, but I'm grateful for what they're. But they raised $2 billion, right? And it's interesting because most of the companies who were there had all raised money. I think there's probably half a dozen of us who were bootstrapped entrepreneurs and the rest were all like VC backed. And it was funny because I was talking with Dave about this ahead of time. I'm like, you know, in the bodybuilding world, there's two competitions. There's one that's like the bodybuilding competition. Everybody comes and there's no rules, right? They never say like, oh yeah, go to use steroids, but they don't test for it, right? And so because of that, that's. We get guys like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Lou Ferrigno and these dudes who are ins. Insane, who are just like, you look at him, you're like, that can't be human. And you're like, oh, it's because they're not human, they're on steroids, right? So there's that term, but then there's the natural bodybuilding contest where you have to like, you have to like not be on steroids to qualify, right? And those guys look way smaller. Like, they look amazing. But like, you put them like standing next to each other, it's like, well, that dude's on steroids. There's the difference, right? I feel like the same thing here. It's like the Entrepreneur of the Year award was like all these dudes who were on steroids who took venture capital, who got $2 billion in funding. And there's people like me who are the natural ones who showed like, you look at us by ourselves, look good, but you look stand next to somebody who received $2 billion in funding. It's like, how do you compete with that, right? Like, it's just, it's, it's fascinating in fact. So for those who were. I don't want to leave you in suspense. We did not win the Entrepreneur of the Year award. The guy who won in our space is Thomas Sebold, which if you ever heard of Siebold, like, he's a billionaire, right? He started a new company because he's a billionaire. He just funded it and had other people fund it. And yeah, it's like, how do you compete with that? Guy like, come on now, it's not fair. In fact, Sebold is the dude who Mark Benioff, who owns Salesforce, used to work for. So he was Marc Benioff's mentor. Anyway, so it's like that's what I was competing against is billionaires. So I lost to the billionaire, but the billionaire was all roided out. So I don't feel too bad because. Yeah, anyway. Yeah. And then the usual one entre of the year overall of all the categories was the guy who started a group on, which actually was really cool. Cool group, almost his six business. And then he took it public and now this is his new business, which I've again, it was confusing, but they went from zero to two billion dollar valuation, or excuse me, a billion dollar valuation in two years. But they did it again. They haven't sold much stuff, but because all the money they've gotten from funding their value there. So once again, they're all roided out and they beat me. But it was still kind of fun to see. And again, once again, I want to step back sometimes. I. Well, in the intro of this podcast, I make fun of it companies who cheat and take on venture capital. And like, while I do feel that way, I am at the same time grateful that there are companies out there who are trying to cure cancer. There's companies out there who are trying to do these things that probably couldn't be done and buy a bootstrapped entrepreneur just because of the nature of what it is, right? It takes 2 billion apparently, in funding to cure cancer before you have the pill to go and start selling it. So you can't start selling it ahead of time. Right? So I understand it. And while I tease and I joke about, I am grateful for those entrepreneurs who are doing that, that direction. I just don't believe in it. Right. Like, I think that for us bootstrapped entrepreneurs, there should be a ward as well. So we may or may not be working on the bootstrapped Entrepreneur of the year award because I think it's something that needs to happen. Just like in bodybuilding, there's like the bodybuilding competition, then there's the natural bodybuilding competition. I think that's more interesting to me and to, I think you guys as well, because most of you don't have $2 billion in funding. And so it's like, okay, so how do we actually, in fact, it's funny, one of the panels that they were doing the interview, they asked the guy like, like, what's it, what's it like to as an entrepreneur, like, taking on the risk. And the guy was like, well, you know, like, the nicest thing about risk is I just go back to my. To the venture capitalists. I get them to, you know, give us a couple more hundred million dollars, and then the risk fear goes away. Like, what? Like, that's the worst answer ever. It's like, what do you do when you hit plateaus? I just take more steroids. Like, come on. I want to be like, that's when we freaking hustle. We recruit a team, people that believe in our vision. We work our butts off for free, and we create something truly remarkable. And then we sell it to our customers, and they love it so much, they finance it. Like, that's the answer I wanted. But no, it's like we go back and we take another hitteroids. So anyway, it was kind of interesting. So. But I digress. There are so many other cool things that I want to share with you guys. So many cool stories I can share with you. In fact, I'm sure I'll do separate episodes. Like, for example, Jennifer Gardner came and spoke, and she. It's funny. I. I tease with my wife. Like, I think everyone's allowed to have one celebrity crush, right? And she's totally my celebrity Crush. Ever since 13 going on 30. I was like, she is the coolest ever. And so she's my celebrity crush. But she came and spoke and like, she was so amazing. Not just from, like, the point that I have a crush on her, right? But, like, just, like, insanely. Like, insanely amazing. Like, oh, so impressed with her. Like, anyway, I'll tell you some stories about her in another episode. But she. Blown away by her. Anyway, just so many. So many cool things that. That happened. But the biggest thing I want to share with you guys, and this is kind of the purpose of this podcast. And I'll go deeper on other episodes about some of the. The specific things I learned. Like, some really cool lessons I learned from watching the Kelly Clarkson concert. Specific things from Jennifer Gardner. Specific things. But for this one, well, I wanted to talk about the natural versus the regular bodybuilding contest, how it relates to entrepreneurship, because I think sometimes some of us may look at those guys and be frustrated. It's like, no, just understand, like, they have a role in this. In this world, and we're grateful, but it's not who we are, right? We're. We're the natural bodybuilders. And it's. It's something to be proud of. I think that you bootstrap your company and so that's number one. But number two is, like, I didn't win the contest, right? And it's funny because so many people reach out to me like, oh, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. And. And, like, it's funny because, like, I didn't. I didn't care. Like, I wasn't going into it to do it. Like, I'm. I'm always going into these things looking for the story. Like, what's the story I'm gonna be able to tell because of this experience? I think that's something that all of us should be looking at because we all go through tough times, right? And I was saying this was a tough time for me. It wasn't. I was fine not winning. But when I'm going through something, I'm looking for what's the story that's going to happen in this thing that I can use to either inspire somebody or to sell something or to whatever, right? I'm always talking about with you guys that you need to be building up your Rolodex of stories. Like, when I do a webinar, the reason I can do webinars so fast and I can crank them out, I can sell wells because I've got this huge Rolodex of stories I've been building up for over a decade. I can pull out really quick at a moment's notice, right? And so I'm like, what are the stories that I can pull out of this experience that I can use in other things, right? Like when I spoke at the 10x event and I did the $3.2 million in sales, and everyone's like, oh, my gosh, I made $3.2 million in sales. I'm like, yeah, that was cool. But I've got a story now, and that story will make me 10 times that 3.2 million to be able to tell a story about how I'm the highest paid public speaker in the world, how we did. I netted a million dollars, you know, all those things. I will sell way more product from that than I ever did from the money that I made at the event, right? I'm looking for the story. So for me, it's like this whole thing happened. I didn't win it. But, like, for me, the story is this whole thing I just kind of shared with you guys today. This natural versus unnatural. And I promise you, we are going to be building a bootstrapped Entrepreneur of the Year award and a thing, and it's going to be a movement and a big Thing based on this story, right? The fact that I lost, like, I'm so grateful that I lost because now I have this story about, hey, I lost, but I was going it up against people who are on steroids. And so it's like, it's not really. It's like bringing a gun to a knife fight. Like, let's come back and let's build the natural bodybuilding contest for entrepreneurs. Like, now I have a story I can share and a reason and a purpose and a thing that's going to call to all of my people, right? It's going to call out to the bootstrapped entrepreneurs. The people I love serving are going to hear that message and be like, yes, that's who I am. That's how. And they're going to hear my voice and they will come to me, right? And so that's the magic is like in the experience, I'm looking for the story because the story is the next phase of this thing, right? And so for you, I want you guys just to like, keep your eyes open more so for the stories that are happening every day. When you have success, there's a story there that's more valuable than the success. When you fail, there's a story there that's more valuable than the failure, right? And most of us just go through it and we're upset or happy for the thing that just happened. It's like, no, no, no, no, no. Like, that thing that happened was good, but it was not the finish line. It was the story. You need to inspire people to sell your next product, to do your next thing, to create your movement, to call new segment of people into the market, like marketplace. Whatever it is for you, the story is the key. And so keep your eyes open for the stories that are happening around you. That's the magic. That's what I want to make sure you guys aren't missing. Because if you did, for me, that whole weekend could have been a wasted weekend, right? I lost this one. Talk about it. It's like, no, no, no, no, no. I lost. Let's talk about it. That's more powerful. All right. That said, I'm home. I'm ready for the day. A lot of fun stuff happening this week. I'll take you guys on some of the journeys, but we are. My kids have. I've got a rest. Today's Monday morning. I've got a wrestling match Tuesday with the kids, wrestling match Thursday. And then Friday and Saturday there's wrestling tournaments. We got wrestling all week. And I was supposed to Fly down Friday, Saturday to go be with the Harmon brothers to work on part two of our viral video campaign with them. The problem is that it was booked on Friday Saturday, which I found out later that my boys had wrestling tournament Friday, Saturday. And so I was like, okay, my kids are more important than my company. And I'm like, I'm not missing the wrestling tournament. So I had to talk to them, move things around. And so what's happening is Tuesday, the wrestling match ends after I jump on a private plane and I fly to Boy or to Provo so I can drive to Sundance so I can be there for the writing retreat. And then so I'm the all day Wednesday writing retreat, half day Thursday, and I jump in a plane, fly back and I get back just in time for my kids wrestling match on Thursday night. And so the whole detour is costing me like 16 grand in just flights to be able to Anyway, so someday I'm hoping my kids listen to this episode someday when their father's dead and they're like, I wonder if my dad loved me. And be like, yes, he loves you a lot. He rearranged heaven and earth so he wouldn't miss a wrestling match because that's how much he loves you. So I hope that they listen to this someday and know how much I love them. They're the coolest little things in the whole world. I cannot wait to watch them wrestle. So that's my week this week. Plus we got a speaker training happening in Boise. So Tuesday, Wednesday we are training a team of 20 speakers to go out and do my presentation on the road, which is exciting. So I'm working on presentations today to train them on my the stage pitch that's happening today. And then 10x seekers, we're in the middle of launch right now. It's doing really, really well. I think I'm writing webinars. I think Monday I'm going to be doing a webinar to close out the whole thing. So I got that happening this week. Plus, while I'm in Provo at the working with Harmon brothers that night, we're all trying to get done all of our new org chart business development stuff with the company. It's gonna be insane week. If I survive this week, then I will have earned Thanksgiving next week. So anyway, appreciate you guys all. Thanks for listening. If you learned anything from this take take on your phone, you can click the buttons and take a screenshot of the screen of this podcast episode. Do that and then go to Facebook or Instagram or Pinterest Wherever you go, post the video and say I just listene Russell's story about blah. Check out his podcast Tag me so I can see it. And also tag marketingsecrets. And let's get some other people listening to this episode. Appreciate you guys. Thanks so much for everything and we'll talk soon. Would you like to see behind the scenes of what we're actually doing each day to grow our company? If so, then go subscribe to our free behind the scenes reality TV show at www.funnelhacker tv.