Marketing Secrets with Russell Brunson - Level 10 Opportunity - Part 2 of 2
Episode Date: July 1, 2020The exciting conclusion of the presentation I gave at Stephen Larsen's OfferMind event. On this episode you will hear the exciting conclusion to Russell's presentation from OfferMind about level 10 O...pportunities. Here are some of the things to listen for in today's episode: Find out how level 10 opportunities came onto Russell's radar. Hear how Russell met Todd and see what they thought their level opportunity was going to be originally. And see how they managed to build Clickfunnels, after Russell had been trying to develop something similar for 10 years prior. So listen here to find out how you can be on the lookout for your own level 10 opportunity. Transcript - https://marketingsecrets.com/blog/323-level-10-opportunity-part-2-of-2 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Hey everybody, this is Russell Brunson.
Welcome back to the Marketing Secrets Podcast.
I hope you guys enjoyed last episode
on finding your level 10 opportunity.
So this is gonna be the exciting conclusion
to that presentation that I gave
at Steven Larson's Offer Mind.
And it's not the whole presentation,
but it's the intro.
I talked about 30 minutes
about finding your level 10 opportunity.
And I think it's the mindset I think
so many people need to get.
You know, they hear me talk a lot of times
about one funnel away, you're one funnel away,
and they think that they're waiting for this funnel
that's gonna change everything.
And it's no, no, no.
Like you have to do multiple funnels. Like the first away, you're one funnel away, and they think that they're waiting for this funnel that's going to change everything. It's no, no, no. You have to do multiple funnels,
like the first funnel, your second, your third, and keep doing these funnels until you find your
thing. And that's what I wanted to share with you guys. So that's kind of the context. And with that
said, I hope you guys enjoyed the conclusion of this presentation about how to find your level 10
opportunity. So the big question is this, how are entrepreneurs like us who didn't cheat and take on venture
capital, we're 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.
I want to fast forward to eight or nine years ago.
I'm so bad at years.
Some people are like,
1996, I can never remember.
I was in Kenya.
That's all I remember.
So I was in Kenya
and it was my wife and I
and a whole bunch of marketing nerds
and most of them had wives too.
And this is back before there were too many female entrepreneurs.
I don't think we had any female entrepreneurs on that trip.
And the last time I went to Kenya, we had like half of them were female entrepreneurs,
which is a huge testament to the females.
I love it.
It makes me happy every single time I see that.
But back then, we were all hanging out.
And I remember because we did this long ride inside of this little Jeep. And it was like my wife and I,
and then two or three other couples and all the dudes were talking business and all the wives
were like annoyed. So we got to like the stop where we had lunch. And then all the wives were
like, do you guys mind if we go in this Jeep over here and you guys go in this Jeep? Cause we don't
want to hear you talk anymore. Right. But it's like a four hour drive. Like exactly. We do not want to go for four more hours with you guys. Like, Oh, I guess like,
all right. So we jump in the other Jeep. I'm sitting next to this guy named Bill Harris,
Bill Harrison. Um, anyone here? No Bill. A couple. Yes. Okay. Bill is, um, uh, probably the smartest
marketing dudes I've ever met. So for context, um, he's married now, but when I first met him, he was probably,
I don't know, 50, never been married.
I might have got that wrong,
but was obsessed with marketing.
And like his house, I saw pictures of you going to his house,
matching like a bachelor pad, but he's rich.
So it's a big bachelor pad.
And every room from the floor to the ceiling
is marketing and sales books.
There ain't no bookshelves anymore
because he can't handle it.
So he's just, every single room is just piled with books. In fact, he used to send me boxes of books, like his gifts. He's like, hey Brunson, I just sent you a bunch sales books. They don't even have bookshelves anymore because he can't handle it. So he's just, every single room is just piled with books.
In fact, he used to send me boxes of books, like his gifts.
He's like, hey, Brunson, I just sent you a bunch of books.
And I show up and there's like a microwave box
with like 500 books in it.
And I'm like, are these good?
He's like, oh, they're all good.
I'm not gonna send you crappy books.
I'm like, this is amazing.
So Bill is like one of the smartest dudes I've ever met
when it comes to marketing and sales, like obsessed.
Like, if you guys think I'm obsessed,
he's like, that's the next level.
Like, he's awesome. Anyway, so we're sitting in this Jeep geeking out about all sorts of stuff, having a bunch of fun. And we're like two and a
half hours into this like bumpy Jeep ride talking. And, uh, he tells me this story that just, um,
man, it rocked everything. Like my whole, my whole world. And I'm probably, I don't know,
six pages into this funnel building thing at the time. Like I've done a million different things,
launched a bunch of stuff, had some successes,
had a lot of losses, but as a whole, we're doing really well.
And we're sitting there in this Jeep and we're talking.
And he says, man, it's so interesting.
He's like, he's like, I feel like I've, I'm one of the best marketers in the world.
He's like, Russell, I feel like you are too.
Like we're like some of the best, like most passionate people who geek out about this
the most.
But he's like, do you know what the biggest problem is?
I'm like, what?
Because I would love to know, like I'm doing well, but I'd love to do more. but he's like, do you know what the biggest problem is? I'm like, what? Because I would love to know, like, I'm doing well,
but I'd love to do more.
And he's like, we have the wrong opportunity.
Like, what do you mean?
He's like, and he goes on, he says,
I have this friend who,
he's not a good marketing dude at all.
Like, he's maybe like a level two skill set
of like being a marketer.
But he got into this opportunity with this big company
and he was able to apply his level two skill set
into a level 10 opportunity.
He's like, they just took their company public
for over a billion dollars.
He cashed out and made insane amounts of money.
He's like, because he had a level 10 opportunity.
He's like, if I look at this,
as I sit in this Jeep, he's like,
I feel like I've got a level 10 skill set.
And my company, while it was really, really good,
he's like, I feel like it's like a level three
or maybe level four opportunity with a level 10 skill set.
He's like, because I'm only able to get to a certain, a certain level.
He said, same thing's true for you, dude.
He's like, you're at a level 10 skillset.
You're looking at a level, maybe level two, maybe level three opportunity.
That's why you're stuck at this, at this thing.
And I was like, oh my gosh, I never, I never thought about that.
Um, and, uh, I was a little frustrated.
I was like, well, crap, what's my, what's my level 10 opportunity?
I don't even, I didn't know what that, what that is or what it could be. Like I thought all the stuff I was a little frustrated. I was like, well, crap, what's my level 10 opportunity? I don't even know what that is or what it could be.
I thought all the stuff I was doing was good.
And if you look at the world through my lens,
I'm doing better than all the people around me,
like my friends, my family, stuff like that.
I'm making more money.
But man, what is actually possible?
And I didn't know.
And I remember coming home from that trip
and just thinking, well, what's my level 10 opportunity?
I didn't know, but I didn't stop everything.
I'm like, well, I'm just going to wait until it comes here.
I was just like, okay, now I know that I'm's my level 10 opportunity? I didn't know, but I didn't stop everything. Like, well, I'm just going to wait till it comes here. Okay.
I was just like, okay, now I know that I'm looking for level 10 opportunity.
And I want to make sure that as I, that when I find it and I'm ready and I'm prepared for
it.
Okay.
If they would have handed me quick funnels eight years ago, I'm like, here, run this
thing.
Guess what would happen?
I would have crashed it to the ground and burnt it.
And it would have been a really bad, painful public humiliation in front of everybody. Okay. Um, I wasn't ready for it. Okay. But now I knew
like I have my eyes, I'm going for level 10 opportunity, but until that happens, I'm going
to move forward. I'm gonna do the next one. And the next one, I'm going to try, I'm gonna try this
one and this one and this one and this one. And hopefully in that journey, I'm gonna have faith
as I'm running as fast as I can. I'm looking for opportunities. I'm trying to find stuff and figure
things out that the right people are going to come to my life. I'm going to be introduced to people. I'm going to find
opportunities. And maybe this was not the big success, but maybe that it opens the door for
the next one or the next one. Maybe I meet somebody through the dealer. I don't know what
that's going to be, but I'm going to run with faith as fast as I can. And just do funnel after
funnel after funnel, but I'm going to have my eyes open looking for like, what is that level Ken? Thank you.
And that's how it started. So from that point forward, I started looking.
And as I started looking, these weird opportunities started coming into my path. And some of them weren't really pleasant. One of them was I built a huge company up and the whole thing burnt and
crashed to the ground. And that was really painful really painful. Um, firing 80 people overnight is like,
is not, not fun. And I'm not going to get deep into the pain of that story, but it,
it was bad. Um, and I thought like, man, this whole thing, like I don't have a level zero
opportunity now. I got nothing, but I kept moving forward. And as I was moving forward,
I was trying thing after thing after thing. And I remember, uh, in this process of trying a bunch
of stuff, I remember buying this website. Cause I was like,. I was like, this has got to be level 10 opportunity.
I bought this site.
It's called championsound.com.
Anyone here ever heard of Championsound?
No, because it never, one person, yeah.
Because it's one of the ones on the list.
It didn't do anything though.
I bought it off flippa.com.
I tried to launch it.
It didn't work.
We had some people sign up, start buying it.
The software crashed.
It was like an email and text message autoresponder for bands. I was like, oh, I thought this was going. It didn't work. We had some people sign up, start buying it. The software crashed. It was like an email and text message
autoresponder for bands.
I was like,
God,
I thought this was gonna be level 10 opportunity.
Maybe they,
you know,
and I'm doing this thing
and in the pain of this thing not working,
I was trying to find a developer
to help me fix this,
help me fix this,
the software.
And I'd go to,
what was back then?
Upwork or Odesk.
I can't remember what.
I was trying to find somebody to hire to fix the site
and I was trying thing after thing
and I couldn't find anybody to fix it.
And finally, I was just frustrated.
I'm like, all right, this isn't gonna work.
And so I sent an email to the host
to basically shut down the site.
It's not gonna work.
Like, I don't wanna support the people
because it doesn't work, I can't fix it.
And then I was walking out the door to leave.
And as I'm walking out the door,
I had this like thought.
And the thought, I just heard for a second,
it said, there's probably someone on your list who could fix this
for you. I'm like my list, like my list isn't that big. That's not people that are developers.
It was just like, but I'm like, all right. I've tried to listen to when I hear voices like that,
like, all right, let's say I walked back in the office. I turned my computer back on. I sent an
email out and says, um, if you know Ruby on rails, I'm looking for a partner. And I kind of told him
the story. I got the site. It's not working. It's broken. I'm going to throw it away., if you know Ruby on Rails, I'm looking for a partner. And I kind of told him the story.
I got the site, it's not working, it's broken,
I'm gonna throw it away.
But if you know Ruby on Rails and be a partner,
email me back.
So I sent it out there.
And an hour later, I get an email from this dude in Atlanta who looks like he's younger than me,
which is kind of funny.
He's got a beard.
And I click on it and read the thing.
He's like, I'm a Ruby Rails developer
and I'd love to look at it.
So I send the login.
He logs in.
I go to bed, and I wake up in the morning.
He's like, all the issues are fixed.
Here you go.
And that was Todd Dickerson,
who came into my world.
And what's crazy...
Yeah, it's Todd.
Todd...
Todd, it, uh, it's, it's fascinating because, um, Todd came into my world at the bottom of
everything. Like, like, like broke, broke, like out of money, nothing left. And he came in and,
um, and, uh, he came in in a weird spot and he's like, you know, I want to come and work with you.
And I'm like, I can't pay you. He's like, that's cool. I'll just work for free. And he came in a weird spot. He's like, you know, I want to come work with you. And I'm like, I can't pay you. He's like, that's cool.
I'll just work for free.
And he worked for free for over a year coming in because he was just like the same thing.
Like I'm looking for an opportunity.
I'm looking for an opportunity.
And so we're like a year into this relationship, friendship, working on different projects.
And we went to a traffic conversion event together.
And I can tell how, I remember how broke we were because we shared a room.
This is probably seven years ago now.
So we're sharing a room.
And that night we're walking around hanging out and I see Bill Harrison and we bump into each other again.
We start talking.
And somehow in this conversation,
the whole level 10 opportunity thing came up again,
which was kind of random
because it's just like a freak thing.
We talked for like 15 minutes and we left.
And it reminded me of this thing in Kenya
that happened a couple of years earlier.
I was like, oh my gosh, I forgot about that.
And so then I told Todd, I was like,
look, this is the deal.
I told you guys about Level 10 Opportunity.
And Todd's like, dude,
well, what's our Level 10 Opportunity?
I'm like, I don't know.
Do you know?
He's like, no.
I'm like, crap, we gotta figure this thing out.
And then we're like, oh my gosh,
I know exactly what it is.
It's this thing, and it's gonna be called WP Undies.
And we got the WordPress logo,
and we got someone to design it with underwear, tighty-ities on it. And we're freaking out, excited. And Todd
started coding this thing. And it's one of the things on this list down here. Uh, I'm not sure
which page it is, but where I do, this is like, this is the big idea. It's going to be this thing
that you put on your WordPress site, like underwear that helps protect it. And like a third of all the
websites in the world are on WordPress. It's going to be the huge, like it's going to be insanely big. And so we're so freaking out about our level 10 opportunity.
We start working, we start building this thing and we're doing it. And as we're building it,
we find out that like it's WordPress sucks because you plug in it up, you plug in a thing.
And then it could be on like 8,000 different hosts. And like somebody shifts the hosting over
here, over here. And like, after we got the thing out there, we're trying to support like five
customers, right? Oh my gosh, this is the worst business we ever were in. Like,
this is not our level 10 opportunity. Um, we started freaking out and we're not sure what to
do. And Todd's flying back to Boise to plan like, okay, what's the next thing we're going to do?
And on the flight over, uh, Todd's in Atlanta, lives in Atlanta. He's in the airport. Like it,
I don't know. I was still asleep here in Boise. And, um, uh, it was the same day.
Somebody has haven't heard the story for it. It's the same day that lead pages got $5 million in
funding. And so Todd's jump on a plane, reads this article, and then he forwards it to me
and he jumps in there. He's in the air for four hours flying to Boise and he's flying. He's just
livid because Todd is like the most genius developer in the world. And he knows that
lead pages sucks. And he's like, I can build this today. And so I wake up in the morning and I read this article. I'm like, Leadpages? Like,
that software sucks. Like, we could build this today. He shows up at the office. He walks in
like little Todd. He's all angry. Like, oh, like what? He's like, Leadpages got $5 million. Like,
what are they doing that we're not doing? I'm like, I don't know. He's like, I can build Leadpages
today. Do you want to build it? I'm like, yes, we're going to build Leadpages. We're going to
take them out. We're all excited, right? Like, this is our level 10 opportunity.
We'll get $5 million in funding too.
It's going to be awesome.
And so we're so excited.
And then Todd asked this question.
He's like, well, if we're getting started from the ground up,
do you want to make it better than lead pages?
I'm like, heck yeah.
He's like, what do you want?
And I'm like, oh my gosh, are you serious?
Let me show you.
And I started showing him all of these.
I want to be able to do this by myself without you guys. Because you all of these. Like, I wanna be able to do this by myself
without you guys,
because you guys are way too,
I wanna be able to do this.
I can't do Photoshop and Front Page
and all these people to do this.
And I started this journey on ClickFunnels.
So let me show you guys real quick.
If you can pull my slides up.
Level 10 opportunity.
And this is kind of a side story. Before, somewhere in this journey here,
actually before I even met Todd, it wasn't like ClickFunnels was a unique idea.
I wasn't the first person to think like, we should build software that makes it easy to build funnels. Like I wasn't the first person. In fact, this was in 2005. This was the
first time I tried to build it. And we called it click.com.com. That would have been confusing,
huh? I would tell people that like, so click.com and like, no, no click.com.com. Like, wait, so
what? I know it's anyway, but this is the first time. So I was like, if we could build this,
it'll be huge. And so that was here in Boise. Um, I ended up hiring, anyway. But this was the first time, so I was like, if we could build this, it'll be huge.
And so that was here in Boise.
I ended up hiring six developers.
I was selling all of this crap,
and I was trying to take all the money to build this.
I'm like, this, I thought it was gonna be huge.
2005, so this is like almost 10 years earlier,
we tried this.
And this is all different pages.
If you look at it, it's kind of funny because I think we called it,
it was before sales funnels,
we called them sales processes and sales flows
before we ever called them funnels. But we had built the whole software, we designed it, we tried to build it, and it shouldn it, it was before sales funnels. We called them sales processes and sales flows before we ever called them funnels.
But we had built the whole software.
We had designed it.
We tried to build it.
And it shouldn't, it's funny because I talk about
how like if I would have got ClickFunnels 10 years ago,
I wouldn't have been able to do it.
And that's what happened.
Like we tried it 10 years ago before I had Todd.
I didn't have the right people.
And it crashed and burned.
Again, we spent probably two or three years
trying to build this.
Ran out of money during that whole crash.
We gave up on it.
That's why when I did meet Todd and I asked him, I'm like like, we build it. I was just like, part of me was like, I've tried it before. I know other people tried it. I had a
lot of other, uh, business partner, not business partners, but friends who sat down like and tried
it as well. And she didn't, it just didn't work. Right. It was a good idea. That's just wasn't
simple to do. Um, but we met Todd, um, and then Dylan Dylan and made it possible. So this is 131 funnels
later. This is the night that we started on the ClickFunnels project. It's the only picture I
have from that night. Like I wish we'd have done more. So it's Todd here on the right-hand side.
So he has no Todd. On the left-hand side is Dylan. And Dylan's no longer part of ClickFunnels,
but he was one of the original co-founders with us. Dylan's the one who built the original editor.
So if any of you guys like the editor, that's Dylan's brainchild.
He had spent six or seven years prior trying to build a website editor for himself.
We started doing ClickFunnels.
We partnered together and plugged it all into one super system.
But I wanted to share this story with you guys because as soon as we were aware of a level 10 opportunity,
our eyes started looking for it, but we didn't stop.
Okay, and I just want, hopefully it gives some,
a lot of you guys out here,
especially ones who've been doing this for a year
or less than that or a couple of years
who just haven't hit it yet
or you've had like marginal successes,
like don't stop.
Like the key is not waiting for the big opportunity.
I'm waiting for my quick funnels.
It's do your thing as fast as you can
and keep doing it, keep doing it, keep doing it.
And as you keep doing it, you'll get better and you'll get better and you'll get
better. And eventually you'll get worthy enough that when the level 10 opportunity shows up,
you'll be prepared for it. Okay. That's the key. Okay. So don't get upset. Like, oh, my funnel
didn't work. Oh, this thing didn't work. Oh, well, like it's going to be tough. There's gonna be
frustrations. Things aren't always going to work the very first time or the second time or the
third time. But if you keep doing it, keep doing it for me, it was 131 times. Okay. Before I hit my big thing. And
I'm hoping for you guys, you get a lot faster than that. Um, okay. But even if you don't,
it's worth it. Okay. I'm now, man, 16 years in this business. And you know, it's funny. Cause
I get people all the time. They're like, you guys just came out of nowhere. And it's like, yeah,
16, that's a long time time I've been focusing on this.
But something I've been obsessed with.
I just kept doing it, kept doing it, kept doing it.
And when you keep doing your thing, the opportunities appear, they show up.
And if you've done that, done the work, you'll be prepared and ready for them.
Hey, everybody, this is Russell again.
And really quick, I wanted to invite you to join arguably the best thing that we've ever put out inside the ClickFunnels community.
And it is a challenge we call the One Funnel Away Challenge.
You know, everyone in their business, in their life,
they're one funnel away from something.
Some of you guys are one funnel away from quitting your job.
Some of you guys are one funnel away from getting more impact.
Some of you guys are a funnel away from growing your company to the next level.
And so we created this challenge to help you to create
and launch your first or your next funnel.
No matter where you are in your business, this challenge is going to help you to create and launch your first or your next funnel. No matter where you are in your business,
this challenge is going to help you to help you understand the strategy,
help you understand the tactics,
hope you understand all the things you need to be successful with your funnel.
So I recommend you do right now is stop everything.
Pause this audio,
go online and go to one funnel away.com.
That's one funnel away.com and join the next challenge.
There's a challenge starting in the next few days. So go get started right now. One funnel away dot com.