Marketing Secrets with Russell Brunson - Kaylee Chu’s Bold Experiment That Took Her From Introvert to International Speaker | #Success - Ep. 119

Episode Date: March 16, 2026

In this episode of The Russell Brunson Show, I sat down with Kaylee Chu, and we talked about one of the most powerful personal transformation stories I’ve heard in a long time. Kaylee started out extremely introverted, struggling with confidence after immigrating from Hong Kong to Australia. For years she stayed in a small bubble, avoiding conversations and feeling like she didn’t belong - until one moment of embarrassment in a meeting pushed her to do something radical: schedule 100 lunches with 100 strangers. What started as a simple New Year’s resolution turned into a life-changing experiment. Those lunches didn’t just help her learn how to talk to people - they opened doors to mentors, business partners, and opportunities she never imagined. One connection led to writing a book, which led to her first speaking opportunity, which quickly turned into a full-time career traveling and inspiring audiences around the world. It’s a powerful reminder that sometimes the fastest way to change your life is to step outside your comfort zone and start connecting with people. Key Highlights: ◼️The “100 Lunches with Strangers” experiment that helped Kaylee overcome extreme introversion and build life-changing relationships ◼️How one unexpected connection encouraged her to write a book - which eventually led to her first speaking opportunities ◼️The behind-the-scenes story of how she transitioned from a shy financial planner to a full-time keynote speaker ◼️The difference between keynote presentations, webinars, and TEDx talks - and why a TEDx talk focuses on a single “idea worth spreading” ◼️How Kaylee and her team created the Next Top Speaker competition to give everyday people a platform to craft and share their stories We also talk about why speaking is one of the most valuable skills any entrepreneur can develop, how telling your story can unlock opportunities you never expected, and why the people who succeed are the ones who simply make commitments - and keep them. If you’ve ever wanted to share your message, step onto a stage, or just become more confident connecting with people, this episode will inspire you to start. ◼️If you’ve got a product, offer, service… or idea… I’ll show you how to sell it (the RIGHT way) Register for my next event →⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://sellingonline.com/podcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ◼️Still don’t have a funnel? ClickFunnels gives you the exact tools (and templates) to launch TODAY → ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://clickfunnels.com/podcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Do you have a funnel, but it's not converting? The problem 99.9% of the time is that your funnel is good, but you suck at selling. If you want to learn how to sell so your funnels will actually convert, then get a ticket to my next selling online event by going to sellingonline.com slash podcast. That's selling online.com slash podcast. This is the Russell Brunson show. What's up, everybody? Welcome back to the show. I'm really excited to have somebody who has become a friend in last year, a business partner and someone I have a lot of respect for.

And this episode is specifically, at least the first part of this, eventually it'll be for the extroverts. We'll get towards that, towards the end of this. But for the beginning, it's going to be for the introverts like me and Kay, Kaylee, who kind of, I think started this business less external outgoing. And she went through a really cool process that we're going to talk about. She's written a book about a bunch of other things. But I think for a lot of you guys, it's going to be really fascinating, interesting,

maybe a way for you to kind of broaden your horizons and get out there. So I'm excited. our guest is Katie, too. For those who don't know her yet, you're going to fall in love with her. She's really, really cool and I'm excited to have you here on the show. So how are you feeling today? I am feeling extremely honored. It is like my wildest dream to be in this podcast.

That's, wow, how did I get here? That's how I'm feeling. Oh, man. Well, I'm glad to have you here. And it's been fun getting to know you over the last year. You've done so many cool things and you're working on so many cool projects. But the one I want to start with is kind of the beginning of your journey. And, you know, I think, again, I got in this business very introverted, not planning on ever being a speaker, which now I'm obviously speaker.

You're doing, you know, you're a speaker. You talk about speaking a lot. But when you got started, you started differently. I love for you to kind of tell that story because I think it's fascinating. I think it's such a cool way to get out of your comfort zone, but then meet cool people and then just the foundation for what has become who you are today. We got to tell us the, the Hunter Lunch's story? Sure. I'm just like a lot of immigrants have so many limiting beliefs.

I don't know how many of your audience were not born in the, you know, where they're living in at the moment. So I grew up in Hong Kong and moved to Australia when I was 17 years old. And because of that, I feel so self-conscious. And I only surround myself with people from Hong Kong. And not only that, I was the only person in the entire Hong Kong community that grew up in a government school and everyone else in private school. And because of that, I think I'm just extremely self-conscious,

thinking that I'm the minority of the minority, and I just didn't want to talk and become extremely, like, introverted and shy and, like, and confident. For a long, long, long time. Life wasn't bad, but for 12 years, I was just living in my little bubble thinking that life is okay. I'm going to put all my dreams and hoping everything to my next generations, to my two sons, unfair for them, not great,

until I hit a war that I couldn't talk to people. I literally couldn't talk to anyone that's non-Asian. No, no offense, please don't put me to jail. I'm not racist or anything like that. I was just too scared to talk to people because I was just so, so shy. And because of that, one day I couldn't say a single word in an entire two hours meeting. I was so embarrassed. I said, this is not okay.

I can't live like this anymore. And I know there's more in me. I thought, what if I do something crazy? What if I get out of my comfort zone to connect with more people? But more importantly, I just want to be able to talk to people. And that's when I started to, you mentioned before, decided to have 100 lunches with 100 strangers so that I can start to talk to people. But little did I know that experience changed my life entirely, opened up so many doors,

and help me realize that there is more in the world can offer than just living in my little bubble. And from there, I get on stages, tell people that doesn't matter if you're a woman, doesn't matter if you're an immigrant, doesn't matter if English, not your first language, and I'm still making grammatical mistakes. We can still own our story. We can still be confident. We can still be happy and we can still, you know, do what we want to do instead of putting our dreams to the next generations, which is not fair to them. Yeah.

Well, it makes you feel better. I still make grammatical mistakes all the time too. So, you know, you're a good company. I'm curious when you start this idea, like was the first idea like, I'm going to do 100 lunches or is it just like I'm going to do 10 or one? Or do you start with the vision before you started doing it? I actually started with 100 because I don't know if you know where that number come from. I know I want to do lunches because as a mom with two young kids at a time, two and four, dinner time, evening time was just chaotic.

As you know, Saturday, Sunday I want to reserve for my family and I was working full time. So the only time I've got for myself is lunchtime. That's why I go, let's have some lunches because that's the only time that I have for myself. And one lunches, one lunches, see, I make medical mistakes still. One lunch, two lunches. I don't think that's going to make a big difference. And also, as we all know, new year, we like to set ourselves a new year resolution. So 2018, I thought, let's do something that's going to make a difference.

And let's pick a number, 100. I believe that after 100 lunches, things will change. And it did in a much better way than I could ever imagine. So interesting. This is a little different, but like in expert secrets, I wrote something because I was like, some people come to my world and they want to be an expert to share their ideas. And I was like, I told them, like, if you publish every single day for a year. So that ends up being 365 days.

But if you do that, I believe at the end of it, you'll have financial freedom because you'll like have found your voice and things will like things will shift when you're doing something consistently for long enough. I think that's very similar to you with this is like you're picking 100. Now were you doing a hundred in a row or like what did that what did that look like what was the structure of it all? It took me 11 months to finish the 100 lunches for strangers. So every day I try to book something in. But of course it's not always possible like that's rescheduled. That's postponing. And also there are people that you like so much and you want to have lunch again and again and again. or second lunch, third lunch? Do those count?

The second and third lunch towards a hundred or no? No, it counts only the first 100 strangers. But I haven't stopped since. I think I've had about 400 lunches, one-on-one with strangers. It only slowed down because of the COVID and chance to sit to the online space.

But I love that because it's like an in-person funnel, right? You meet 100 people. You don't expel 100 new best friends. But 100 people, you connect well with 50 of them and 20 of them give you a really good idea that, oh, wow, maybe I can do this. Maybe I can do that. Expanding my world.

And 10 people, almost every lunch, 10 people would really change my life and take my life to the next level. And I'm just super grateful for all those kindness for the strangers. So cool. How did you do the very first luncheon? How did you find the person? Did you post us somewhere? Or what was the process for finding these 100 people initially? For the first 100 lunches, I would say majority of them, at least 95 out of those 100 is through LinkedIn.

Because I want to stock them a little bit first. And also I feel safer in that professional platform. And I just literally message them and go, hey, I looked at your profile. You've done something really, really cool. And this is who I am. I'm a mom. I've got two kids. I'm doing financial planning at that time.

And this is my new year resolution to have lunch with 100 strangers. Is that something that you'll be interested to be part of? And from there, the first lunch wasn't that great. I was awkward. So awkward. And I was having that keto diet at that time. That means that no bread, no pasta, no rice, no. nothing and I tried to eat chicken wings with a knife and a fork with being super awkward

the end of what to say and it was not a pleasant experience for him I don't think and we didn't stay in touch. But when I was so committed, I booked three lunches in one go in the same days, but I'm so glad I did because otherwise I probably have given up already. But the second lunch was better than the first one. The third one was better than the second one. And within three lunches, I know that something shifted in me already that, oh, this is not as bad as I thought it would be.

And also something, a little bit of background information. I haven't even dated anyone other than my husband because I met him when was 13 years old. He's the only person that I've dated. And going on the lunch with a stranger was something really scary for me at that time. But it really changed my life and open up my whole world for possibilities. And because we don't know what we don't know. And talking to people helped me understand myself and do the world much better. What was the first one that, uh, the first lunch that like you've,

feel like had like a you said like you know 10 out of 100 will change your life when the first one we had an experience there's like something happened that changed like literally change your life I'm curious about that there are so many of them that really changed my life in so many different ways I found my best friends through lunch I've got business partners through lunch I've got my mentors through lunch but if I have to pick just one that's unexpectedly changed my life was I would have to say a guy named mark and when I'm met him, he's just a marketing person and didn't, you know, didn't tell me a lot. But after the 100 Lunches with Strangers, he was the first person that told me, hey, Kayla, you've got an interesting

story. You should write a book. And I haven't thought about writing a book at that time. And he said he used to work in a publishing house. That's, oh, yes, that's the book. He said, let's do a book together. Yeah, that's right. And from there, I'm like, okay, let's make it happen. And then he shared my story on his own Facebook profile and his friend, Cheryl, that they used to go hiking together, saw my post and Cheryl said, hey, this is interesting. Would you like to come to my office and do a speech for some of the people that I coach for? And I'm like, okay, I have never done speaking before, but why not? So I went to her office and I share a little bit about my story. And little did I know, the managing director was sitting at the back of the

office listening the whole time. I'm glad that she didn't tell me. Otherwise, I would have freaked out. And his name was Michael, Michael Russell. And he completely changed my whole life because he gave me my very first speaking opportunity got me to share my story on stage. And from there, he picked up his phone and called his other CEO friends because he's a CEO. He called his other CEO friend. I go, you should talk to this girl named Kaylee. You don't know her, but she's really cool. And she's got an interesting story that you should use her as a keynote speaker. And within a few very short period of time, like a few weeks, I've become a full-time keynote speaker traveling around Australia, delivering my keynote speech to inspire people to get out of the comfort zone,

to connect with people. But I didn't meet Mark to meet Cheryl. I didn't meet Cheryl to meet Michael. But it's really about connections like all those funnels, right? Opening doors and opening doors and crazy things happen. And my life changed completely. Think about 100. Like most people, they may know 100 acquaintances on Instagram or you know,

whatever might be, but to actually sit and talk to 100 people. I don't think, like, I wonder if I've done that in the last year. You know what I mean? Like, I wonder how many times you actually talk. And then how many connection points it opens up. for the next thing, the next thing, and just so fascinating. I'm curious, like, obviously you were scared to go on the first lunch. We were that nervous for your first speech as well?

Or was it less nerve-wracking or is it more nerve-wracking? It was so nerve-wracking because I have no idea what I was doing. And they allocated a whole hour for me and I finished speaking in 15 minutes. And I thought that was an hour speech, but 15 minutes and I stopped and I have nothing more to share. But because I was just being myself and I believe that's what next top speaker. is next stop speaker is not about being super polished. It's about being you and sharing your story.

And at that time, I was just sharing my story. This is me. This is what happened to me. And this is a few lessons that I've learned. And it opens up a lot of Q&A sessions that people are asking me questions. And I just answered the question. It lasts for the whole hour, which is great. That's what I'm supposed to do.

And that's what we believe in is sharing our story. And you never know who are you going to help. Yeah, it's so cool. Okay, so I'm curious now. So you started in the speaking gigs, you got connected. Were you getting paid for the speaking gigs? You were doing it for free? Like, what was the next step in the journey looking like for you there?

I was extremely lucky because, like I said, that was my very first sharing. I didn't get paid for that, of course, because it was just my first share. But then because Michael, he's the CEO of the company, and that was, he invited me to do his conference, share my story at his. conference that is like a few weeks away and he purchased a hundred copies of my book just to give to all his staff and so technically that was my very first paid speaking gig for you know a hundred books sell and from there he introduced me to his friends so they all paid really well and that's how i get to quit my job very quickly to become a full-time keynote speaker but i know most people's journey is not as smooth as that but that was my journey yeah it's such a cool journey um now the first time i

became aware of you. I saw you and Richmond were both putting on doing these cool events. And the first time I kind of saw what you were doing in Richmond, I can't remember if it was an inner circle mastermind or if you voxed to me or something, but you started telling me your story about different things you were doing. And, and I would love to you to tell this part because I don't know how this is all connected. There's something you do with TED Talks, right? When you walk through like what that part of this journey started happening because you were doing them, but you were coaching people on them, I believe. And I love to understand that as well. So yes, I've done a TEDx talk myself in 2020, 2020, just before the COVID started.

And that was a cool experience. It opened up so many new doors for me. That's people's biggest of their brand. We all know important of your personal brand and people associate stats. And it really opens up door for me. And from there, I start to learn more about the speaking world and people ask me, how do you do that? And I start to coach people on, this is how you speak. This is how you put a speech together.

this is how you build your brand. This is how you get on stages. And yes, that's what I'm doing for my coaching side of the business. And then I even got my 11-year-old son to TEDx, which is really, really cool. That is an 11-year-old TEDx speaker. And we found a way that you can build a brand and get on stages. As 11-year-old, that's so cool. So I applied once for TEDx talk.

This is probably eight years ago, and they rejected me. So I've never actually done it before. So you've done something I haven't yet. had a chance to experience. I'm curious though, because I think they just didn't like my topic or I don't know what it is. But when you're walking somebody through doing a TEDx talk, what is the what is the structure look like? Obviously, I'm very much like I structure presentations, like the perfect webinar or things like that I have, I have a structure. Is there like a perfect structure that you teach, you walk people through for delivering like the perfect talk on a TEDx stage?

Yes, I think we have three different speeches. Like the TEDx speech is quite different to a keynote speech that you do on stages for 45-minute speech, which is quite different to the perfect webinar as well, because a perfect webinar is that to teach people something, and then ultimately there's a call-to-action to the next level. And the keynote speech, usually we talk about a few different points to help people to get to the next level of their live, and a call-to-action likely could be something like, go and have lunch with strangers and get out of your comfort zone and those things like that. And Tatic speech is different, again, because it's more about an idea worth spreading.

Not five ideas, not three ideas, just one clear idea worth spreading. And the maximum length of cathetic speech is 17 minutes. But because people's attention span getting shorter, they're looking for usually 12 minutes speech. So 12 minutes, how do you get the message across to people in a unique different angle that's hopefully no one ever talks about before? So are they shrunk them to 12?

I didn't know that. The maximum is 17, but now they are talking about to make it shorter and shorter because people's attention spent. Yeah. But you can still go up to 17 minutes. It depends on the organizers. It's funny with my kids.

I try to sit down and watch movies with my daughter. And like a two-hour Disney movie is too long for her now. She's like she wants to watch YouTube Rills or whatever where you're watching like, you know, 90 seconds of time or two minutes of time. She's like, dad, these movies are so long. I'm like, this is a 90-minute Disney movie. This is not that long, but they're, you know, their attention spans. So I just figure, you know, eventually TEDx talks. will be 90 seconds, I'll be able to where we're going to eventually, which is crazy.

So, um, okay, I want to walk through. I want to talk about, um, uh, top speaker, next top speaker competition. And, and, you know, obviously you're going through you started with the lunches, then you wrote the book and you start speaking and then you're coaching people how to get paid to speak and then you and Richmond put together this, this concept, this idea that became a magazine and a, a challenge and a bunch of other, uh, our competition, not a challenge, more of a competition. about like when you guys were first thinking about this like back when it became like your

your idea that you guys were like kind of crafting of i love to like i just think about like when we were in the room thinking about click funnels mapping it out like was there was there a time like that where you guys were sitting now kind of mapping out this whole idea at the very beginning of it and so what was that what was that like uh i feel like we achieved so much more when there's a deadline and i think iloma said that right if you give yourself three months it takes you three months. If you gives yourself three days, it takes you three days. And because I've been coaching all the speakers to put a speech together to get paid to speak.

And one thing that I realized that sometimes they're taking way too long. And we started to just internally, very small little tournament just for fun and getting them to, hey, this is the deadline. You have to craft a speech before these tournament and make sure that they get it done. And because of that, they actually get so much result much faster because of the deadline. And I work with Richmond and Richmond's my coach. He changed my life as well. Thank you, Richmond, if you're watching.

And Richmond said, this is really, really cool idea. Why are you doing it so small? Why are you thinking so small? Why are you limiting to just your community? Why don't you make it bigger? And I go, I've never thought of that. Maybe this is possible. And he said, I think there's something in it that we encourage so many people to own their story,

craft their speech, share their message, giving them a platform to help people. And from there, we start to bring some, okay, what can we do? What if from this tiny little tournament to the biggest tournament, in the world, just like the Olympic for speakers. And we start to come up with the name, and we start to come up with a plan, and within very, very short period of time, next top speaker was spawned.

And now, just the last one, we had more than 7,000 registrations for the next top speaker tournament, and we do it every six to eight weeks, and we're really aiming to be the biggest tournaments in the world. It's so cool. I remember the very first one, I don't if it was your eyes' first one, but the first one that I saw.

I saw. I was on vacation with my family and I'd seen that registered for it and it was late at night. I remember my kids had gone to bed. I was laying in bed and I picked my phone and so I clicked on the notification and popped up and I started watching it and it was it was so cool because I didn't know what I was expecting. I think I was expecting you know these professional speakers who were going to be doing their thing and and it wasn't it was like it was these people who probably didn't picture themselves as speakers initially and they'd gone through your process because obviously So they register for free. They go through your process.

You teach them how to do it, how to craft a presentation and put it together. And then they came and they delivered it. And it was cool because I saw some that were kind of goofy and then other ones that were like emotional and other ones that, and I was just like, this is so cool. And it's giving all these people this really cool platform

to get up because a lot of times like, you know, I want to be a speaker, but nobody will ask me to speak. You know, like, I get that all time. People are like, well, how do I get on other people's platforms? And I'm like, I don't know. It's not easy at first, right? Like after you've been on platforms,

it's easy. you got other ones, but the very first is like, it was hard. You're giving people this platform to actually get up and to, and to practice. And it wasn't just like leaving them to their own devices. Like you gave them a structure and framework and coach them through it. And I remember afterwards, I was messaging Richmond. I was like, I want to be part of it. I don't know what this is, but I want to be part of this.

It's such a cool, a cool idea. And you're like, the way you're developing these people who want to be speakers. I think a lot of times people like me and you who started very introverted who this was not our plan to be a speaker. Maybe we thought about it or like, I could never do that. you know and giving them a platform and a place and a process to be able to kind of figure it out um so it was really magical watching it from the outside how many how many have you guys done live now altogether uh we are doing our fifth one this saturday so very very exciting number five's

coming up that's so cool um what are some of the stories of people have gone through the process like uh who went through it all and maybe we're scared or nervous then end out with a presentation then what's happened any of them since i'm curious on the some of their journeys um Even just for the last season, the winner's name is Stephanie, and she just shared with us last week that since she won the tournament, her life changed completely because she doesn't even know that she can be a speaker. And when she joined the tournament, this is something that we love and passionate about, just like what you're doing with, with ClickFunnels.

It's more about not just the top speakers. It's for everyday people. If you've got a story, you've got a message, you've got an experience, you've got some wisdom that you want to share with people, come and join us, be a coach, and help other people that experience what you've experienced before. And this is the same, except that we are more like a speaking focus. And she hasn't done speaking before.

She literally got on the stage at her house with the curtain behind her. It's like super just super casual. But she's got a story that move people. She just shared about her story about how she overcome some of the personal challenges that people can resonate with. And she won the tournament. And she's now getting invited. I think this week is particular interesting.

because it's an international swimmer's stay, and she told her she's got three speaking geeks line up in these two weeks just because from all those opportunities that opened up doors for her. So that's what I'm hearing again and again. And not even just a winner. Winners great, but even people that didn't even get to the top 10, top 50, even they're just getting into the tournaments, doing the work, sharing the story in the Facebook profile, for example. They said, like, they inspire other people. One of the quotes that I love is when you start to shine, you subconsciously,

and unconsciously giving other people the permission to shine. And sometimes it's really like that. When we start to own our story, we're seeing people that around us, our friends and families that we've met, I don't know, lunches and dinners with, suddenly they're owning this story, sharing the story.

It's like giving other people that, oh, if she can do this, maybe I can do this too. And I believe that this is giving a platform for everyday people, own their story, share their message so that we can help so many more people together. Yeah, so cool.

I think it's such a good launching ground for someone too, you know, like, again, in the past, I've always helped people like go fake, go live on Facebook or Instagram or YouTube and like there's so much fear of that because you know, it's live. But this is like giving them a chance to think through and create a story and then put it together and put it out there. And like after you've learned the skill set, then it becomes easier to go and do that again in other formats, different places and things like that. And, uh, and also like it's cool because after they finish the tournament, they have the video of them doing their presentation, right? Like, when I first wanted to speak in other stages, again, I had a couple awkward things to me on stage. It's all I had. So like, I took those videos and I found people at stage and I sent them videos. Like, here's me telling my story.

Can I tell it on your stage? And it started opening things up. It was similar to like, in college. I was, uh, or sorry, in high school, I was wrestling. I wanted to wrestle college. So my dad went and took video clips of me, all my, like, the best moments to be wrestling and the best matches and put on videotape. And he went and, like, burned all these videotapes. Then he was sent him to all the college coaches.

And then that's how they found out. about me. And a lot of times that's the same thing. People are like, well, how do I get on people's stages? It's like, well, you got to get on a stage first. So you have a video of it and then sent it somebody and like, hey, this is what I can do. Like I have a really cool story. I think this gives a lot of people a chance to make actually create something good that they can then use to potentially, you know, get on a different stage or be on

someone's podcast or whatever their their dream is they're trying to actually pursue, you know. I agree. It's like the one comic club for people crafting their first story, first speech and then getting on stages to. open up so many bigger doors to get to the two commerce club and three commerce club all the way to three I love it okay tell us more about about the magazine as well you got right back in the magazine is called top speaker so we are inviting the top speakers such as Russell just that cover

model is great whoever that is to inspire people that's hey if you keep going this is where we can be and also of course education is helping people that these are the steps that we need to take to become the top speaker and that's why the tournament is called the next top speaker because we're looking for the next top speaker how can we one step at a time becoming a top speaker okay so i know there's a challenge or a speaking competition happening right now so depending on when they listen this might they may be able to register it might be too late maybe they didn't even register for the next one but um walk them through the process if they decide to go and register where they register out what it look like, what should they expect and walk them through the process they know what to do?

Thank you. Thank you for asking the question because we are welcoming everybody, everybody with a story, with a passion. If you've got a message that you want to share with people, we'll love to hear from you. You don't need any experience at all. Just go to nextopspaker.com. We have all the details there. And once you register for the next topspeaker.com and we run these tournaments, like I mentioned

before, every six to eight weeks because we want to give more opportunities for people to share their message. And from there, we have an information day, which will explain all the details for people. And then from there, we even provide a five days training for free, which we used to charge a few thousand dollars to help people to put a speech together. But we thought, this is such an important skill that once we own our story, once we know how to speak better, it helps change not just our life, but people around us. So from now on, all those training are free to put the speech together. So you've got a message, you've got a speech, and then you're ready to go and you submit your speech. and the top 100 people will get on the actual tournament stage from 100 to 50 to the top 10.

And we have some head judges to decide who are the next top speakers. And they will take home some amazing cash prices and even featured in the magazine and opening so many doors for them. That's so cool. So they go through the five days of training and then they make, they actually record their speech and then they submit it to you and the team. And then the last challenge, how many people submitted videos? This is the thing.

I feel like one of the reasons why entrepreneurs or people don't get what they want is they give up a little bit too early. So I don't know what's going to happen for this round. So for last round, we have about 5,000 something people registered for the tournament. And we have about a thousand something people completed the challenge, crafted the speech, but we have less than 1,000 people submitted the video. Like we have a few hundred people submitted the video, but I think this is again, another funnel, right? And see who is the next top speaker?

Who is the one that who puts Sophia to the end? And really, really want to share the message out. So a few hundred people submitted the video for the last round and then the top 100 speak on the day of the tournament. And yeah, and then keep going to understand that because being successful in any area of life, it's like if you just show up and do the thing, you beat most the people. It's like, people are like, man, it's got to be so hard and competitive in business. I'm like, nope, it's not. I show up every day.

And so that beats 99% of people. There's 1% I'm competing against. You have 5,000 registered, 1,000 finish the training with 300 actually finished the video, which those numbers are actually really good. Like I'm surprised that you had that many that submitted. But that means of the 5,000, 4,900 or whatever the math is. You know, 4,700 and da-da-da-da, whatever. Got excited.

I'm going to be top speaker. I'm going to do the thing. I'm going to put in the effort. And then they didn't. And so like a message for everyone who's listening to this is like, if you want to be successful in this or any area of life, you have to stop stopping. Because you started the process. You went into it. You registered.

You committed. And then you stopped. And I always tell people like the people that are most successful in life are people who can do two things. They can make commitments and they can keep commitments. And it was interesting is that almost everybody makes commitments. Like, oh yeah, I'm going to lose weight. Oh yeah. I'm going to do.

I'm going to start a business. Oh, yeah. I'm going to become a speaker. Oh, yeah. I'm going to. And then they don't do the second step, which is keeping the commitments. And those who make commitments and keep commitments. commitments are ones that are successful. So towards the end of the podcast here, I want to challenge

everybody to do two things. Number one is to make a commitment, okay, because I don't care what business you're in. If you can speak, that business will make more money. I don't care if you're an e-commerce, if you're network marketing, internet marketing, if you're an agency owner, if you can speak, you will make more money just by the fact you can speak. And so I want to challenge everyone to go and make the commitment to go through the next challenge and become a speaker and like learn the skill set. You'll serve you in every area of your life for the rest of your life. And number two is after you make that commitment to actually keep it,

which means you got to show up, you got to do the work, you go through the five days of training, you got to actually make the video, you actually submit it. And maybe you won't make it on the top 100 or top 50 or top 10. That's fine. Okay, that's outside of your control. But what's in your control is actually making the commitment

and keeping the commitment and doing the actual thing. And I've seen you've got some people who are like young kids who have done this, who've done it two or three times in a row. one of my inner circle members, you know, their son is amazing. And I've seen him do it. And I don't think he's made it to the top 100 or top 50, but every time he's jumping in, he's doing it. He's getting better every single time.

And he's so excited and like eventually someday, I guarantee he is going to win this thing because he's so dedicated to keep on showing up versus other people who are like, I'm not going to make the video. What if someone laughs at me? What if I'm just too busy? I can't, whatever the,

whatever the thing might be. So that's my, that's my encouragement to everyone is to go and make the commitment to become a speaker and then keep the commitment and just follow the process. And what can happen on their side, it could literally change your life forever. Like the person you said who won last month,

you said that she had no, like she probably didn't think she was going to have a shot at all, right? When she did it. And then she went and actually won it. So. Yes. All right.

So where are people going? One more time, what's the link for them to go and actually get started to go and register? Nexttopspeaker.com. Next top speaker.com. Go get signed up and become a speaker, you guys.

I promise it'll change life. It changed my life. I was never going to be a speaker. I wanted to be the internet nerd who hid behind my computer all day. And then I got forced into this world. And it was probably the best things that ever happened to me. And it's been, it's been awesome. I think, you know, Kaylee, for you as well, it seems like the same thing.

Like you started the journey just like me, very introverted. This 100 lunches got you out there. You learn how to go speak and get paid to speak. And now you're training other people to do it. And just think what you're doing is so cool. And just appreciate all that you're doing for our community and helping people to find their voice and share their message. Because I think it's the most powerful thing that people can do.

So you're awesome. I appreciate you being on the podcast. And share it. Anything else want to tell our people before we kind of wrap up for the day? I just want to say thank you so much, Russell, for giving me this opportunity today. And if anyone's listening, believe in yourself because I never thought I would achieve even this podcast today and being with Russell and helping people to find their voice. So just keep believing and just keep going. And who knows, you can be the next top speaker.

So awesome. So good luck everyone's competing this next week or so. And then Kaylee, I'll see you, I think here in Boise in a couple weeks. right? I'm excited to hang out again. Yes, I will. It'll be awesome. Thank you. Awesome.

Thanks so much. And everyone, next topspeaker.com. Go sign up right now. We'll see you guys there.