Marketing Secrets with Russell Brunson - Planting Seeds Of Doubt
Episode Date: May 25, 2017A cool underground way to overcome your competitors. On today's episode Russell talks about planting seeds of doubt about his competitors in the minds of potential customers. He explains how he does ...it, and why it makes it not a matter of if they become Clickfunnels customers, but when. Here are some interesting things in this episode: Why it's okay to attack your competitors as long as they are number one and you are number two, but not okay once you become number one. How you can plant seeds of doubt so that eventually you will get the customer. And how all of that is similar to how people compete in sports. So listen below to learn how to plant seeds of doubt about your competitors so you can eventually win over the customer. Transcript - https://marketingsecrets.com/blog/planting-seeds-of-doubt Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Transcript
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So, the big question is this, how are entrepreneurs like us, who didn't cheat and take on venture
capital, who are 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. What's up everybody? This is Russell. Welcome to Marketing Secrets. Today I got a really
cool episode for you guys, I think, hopefully. And it's something that, there's a lot of things
that like we're doing that people can see and they're aware of and there's things that are
happening that people aren't aware of. And so I just want to lift the curtain a little bit so you
guys can get some ideas. So part of the time you're selling to try to sell your products
and services, right? You're selling why it's good and why it's amazing, stuff like that.
And it's funny, actually on Facebook I saw an interesting thread the other day of someone
like, should I attack my competitors or should I not talk about them at all?
It's interesting watching the whole conversation because some people are like,
don't address your customers.
If you've got the best product, don't talk about them.
All these different things and strategies.
Obviously, you guys know that I talk about my competitors and we tease them and we poke at them and we have fun with it.
In fact, earlier today, Stephen may or may not have launched a new video game where you could actually compete against, well,
you have to defeat Confusionsoft to be able to fight against Loki pages and the drip armies.
And it's pretty awesome. So why do we do stuff like that? So it's interesting. First off,
it's funny. And so that helps me get through the day because there's a lot of stuff we got to do. So might as well make the day fun. But second off, if you look
at like marketing as a whole, like marketing strategy, right? Because this is a big deal.
But if you think about it, like, and there's been a bunch of books written on this. And so if you
want to study deeper, you should, because it's interesting. But I think Differentiator Die is
one of the books that talked about this, I believe. And anyway, but what they talked about is like in your marketplace that number two always needs to
attack number one, right? So Coke always attacks, or excuse me, Pepsi always attacks Coke, but number
one cannot acknowledge number two or else it jacks up the whole thing. So Coke never talks about how
they beat Pepsi. You notice that? But Pepsi's always talking about Coke, okay? Mac versus PC when they first came out, okay? Mac was number two, and they were attacking
PC, attacking PC. All the funny commercials we all remember. And as soon as they surpassed
them, you notice those commercials disappeared, and we stopped talking about it. So there's
something about that. Like, if you're trying, and maybe it's because they athlete in me.
Like, I'm a big believer, like, if I'm going to beat somebody, I need to find that person,
identify them, and, like, let the world know, like, this is who we're the world know, this is who we're going after, this is who we're gonna beat,
and then after we pass them, we stop talking about them.
That's why we don't really talk about
low-key pages very often anymore,
because we flew past them, as you guys know.
But FutureSoft's obviously the next target
that we're trying to get bigger in.
We have more customers than them right now.
I think their revenues are higher,
because they charge more for their confusing software,
but that's another story.
So that's the thing, and so for me, I don't mind acknowledging number one, because we are gaining on them, but that's another story. So that's like the thing.
And so for me, I don't mind acknowledging number one
because we are gaining on them and that's the plan,
that's how it works.
And so I don't have any problem,
I don't think it's, it's just how business is done,
it's how sports are done, it's how athletics are done.
In fact, if you guys want something fun,
so scroll down in the feedback
before we change the name of this to Marketing Secrets
when it was marketing your car,
I did a whole episode on athletes and competition.
Anyway, it was pretty funny, I thought.
So you guys should go listen to that one.
But talk about the fact that in this business world,
who are you competing against?
These people you're competing against.
I talk about how I was a wrestler growing up,
so my whole life was competition.
It was like, who's the person ahead of me?
And then literally my junior year, my first match, I lost to the kid who was returning state champ.
So I knew that's who it is.
And then I studied everything that he did for the next entire season.
We practiced against him.
We got better and better and better.
And I actually made him to state finals.
And I beat him.
Right?
Like, and, like, that's the athletic mentality.
We're all about competition.
And then in the business world, they're like, half the people in the business don't have athletic background. Like they, they were in
band or choir and things like that, which there's nothing wrong with that. But when you're in the
choir, there's no competition. Like you're just kind of hanging out and singing with each other.
Maybe there's competition to be first seat, second seat, a little bit, but it's different,
right? And so a lot of times, like we get in this playground and we're now competing in business
and you've got people that, excuse me, were banned and they were in choir and all sorts of things.
And you got someone like me, whose entire life was about finding your competitor and
destroying him publicly in front of everybody so you get your hand raised and everybody cheers for
you so it's like that's who like you have to be aware like that's who you're competing against
so you can't be all mad like oh they're calling me out by name oh they're competing with me it's like
dude you're you're you're competing against a wrestler whose whole entire life that's all he's
cared about like of course that's going to be my goal like that's how's how I'm going to go. And anyway, there's a whole podcast
about that you should listen to if you scroll down to the iTunes feed. But anyway, so there's
some background kind of what we're talking about. But what I wanted to talk to you guys about is
this concept that we call seeds of doubt. Okay. And so what are seeds of doubt? These are things
that if you watch what I do, you'll see me placing all the time, these little seeds of doubt? These are things that if you watch what I do, you'll see me placing all the time.
These little seeds of doubt in the competitors.
Because I know a lot of times I'm going to talk about something and I know that somebody is using Confusionsoft or they're using Leadpages or whatever that thing is, right?
They're using something else.
And I'm coming in and looking at me and they're like, oh, you know, we have all this stuff over here I can't shift over.
And so I understand that.
So instead of me just like trying to convince them and hard sell them, I'm going to place a whole bunch of seeds of doubt.
So that from that moment forward, for the rest of their waking hours, and hopefully their sleeping hours too if I do it right,
they're going to be thinking about that thing, that seed of doubt, about the thing that they're using.
And it's always kind of running in their head like, oh, what if, what if, what if?
If you were at Funnel Hacking Live, I did a whole presentation.
In fact, if you go to followupfunnels.com,
you can see that presentation.
But I talked about like action action,
where we're going and things, stuff like that.
And throughout that presentation,
I'm placing a whole bunch of seeds
and doubt of our competitors.
Like I talk about, if you're using email marketing,
I talk about how many times I got shut down
by Aweber, iContact, MailChimp, Infusion and stuff,
like all those things.
And even if you love those stuff, all those things.
Even if you love those systems, all of a sudden now
you're like, wow, Russell's been shut down nine times
by AWeber, 11 times, all these different things
I got shut down by, and now there's a seed of doubt.
You're like, everything's good, but what if they did
shut me down?
Oh man, now that seed of doubt is there,
now you're paranoid, and so then the whole time
you're using your thing, you're like, what if I get shut down,
what if I get shut down, and most of you probably will
eventually, so it's not that I'm doing this like maliciously.
Like it's the truth.
It's the truth happened to me over and over and over again.
But I'm placing that seed of doubt so that people are aware of it, right?
I just purchased a product from somebody who was using an infusion soft order form.
I filled my whole credit card information and took me seven steps.
Seven steps after the credit card was in, seven clicks, sorry, seven clicks to give
them the money.
I wanted them to take my money. It took seven more clicks to actually give them money okay i was annoyed by that but instead of just being annoyed by it when i talked about i'm talking about right
now by the way i'm talking about it um through different platforms i'm on i'm just mentioning
i try to buy this thing for somebody using a fusion soft order form seven clicks like i would
most people would have left if i didn't want the products about i would have left and like you're
like every click in your sales process you lose a percentage of people right so my whole mind's order form, seven clicks. Most people would have left. If I didn't want the product to sell, I would have left.
Every click in your sales process, you lose a percentage of people, right?
So my whole mind is always like, how do we shorten the distance?
I want to make sure that there's as few clicks as possible to get somebody from where they're starting to where I want them to end.
Because every click, you lose somebody.
But just after, between me getting the credit card, typing it, and submitting, there's seven
clicks.
Okay?
So that's what you're getting when you're using Infusionsoft, right?
So I just did it. I placed a seed of doubt
because now you're like,
well, how many clicks are in my order form?
Crap.
Well, that's like the standard,
like you have to admit if I'm using that system,
like, huh, and then you start wondering
like this whole time, like,
what if I'm losing sales and money
and like that thought will just keep pecking away
at your mind and keep thinking and keep sitting there
and it's seeded down.
Eventually, it'll sprout to the point
where you're like, I'm losing a lot of money.
It's time to make the shift. It's time to do the right thing and that's my whole goal because I know that
not everyone's gonna sign up today but they're gonna sign up eventually I was
so people it's not a matter of if you're gonna become a member of clickfunnels
this when so my goal is like there's not right now I need to place the seeds of
doubt so that throughout your system you're always thinking about like me
coming and doing that thing and when's it gonna happen and how's it gonna
happen and things like that so that's kind of concept sees it out so, you're always thinking about like me coming and doing that thing and when's it going to happen and how's it going to happen and things like that. So, um, that's kind
of the concept of seeds of doubt. So as you're doing your marketing and it's not just like,
I know some of you guys are like, Russ, where do I place my seed of doubt? And it's like, no,
it's not like, it's, it's like you're, you're, you're sprinkling that in as you're doing stuff
as you're doing Snapchat or Instagram is your podcast or your videos or your whatever it is,
like wherever you're at, like you're just sprinkling those seeds of doubt
against your competitors and making those things known
so people are aware of like,
wow, I didn't realize that that was even a thing.
I want to make sure those things are out there
and that people are aware of them.
So that's kind of the concept.
And it's a really good thing.
In fact, in wrestling,
we would do the same kind of things
with our opponents, right?
We go to a tournament and and during weigh-ins,
you'd see who were in your weight class and stuff
and it's always kind of like a mental game
because you're just like,
oh my gosh, that guy looks bigger than me.
You know, all these kind of things.
So it's like how you place seeds of doubt.
A lot of it has to do with your confidence.
Some of it has to do with how you shake the person's hand.
All those kind of things because in sports,
in business, in most things, honestly,
it's a lot less of
like the physical and a lot more of the mental. It's funny, when I started doing jiu-jitsu,
I'm not a jiu-jitsu guy, I'm a wrestler, but I started doing jiu-jitsu and it was funny
because I think it was my second or my third tournament I went to, I went out and I'm up
a weight class because I was kind of overweight at the time. So I'm up at like almost heavy
weights. You guys are big dudes that I'm going against. class because I was kind of overweight at the time, so I'm up at like almost heavy weights.
These guys are big dudes that I'm going against.
And most of them have been in Jiu-Jitsu for a couple years.
Like they're blue belts and I think it's brown after that
and whatever and I just came in, I don't have any belt at all.
I just do no Gi so you don't have to actually have a belt.
So I came out there and as soon as I went out there
I was like these guys are going to kill me.
I don't know what I'm doing.
But I was like because of that I have to place seeds of doubt
in their mind that they are going to be able
to beat me fast.
Otherwise,
I'm going to be choked out
and tapped out really quick.
So what I did
is my very first match,
because everyone's like,
your weight class,
everyone's sitting close
to each other in the match.
So I came out
and I'm like,
okay,
I'm a jiu-jitsu guy
but I'm a wrestler.
I got to scare this first guy.
So I came out.
Instead of coming in
and doing the jiu-jitsu thing
where they,
I came out like a wrestler
and came in and started running and started pounding start running after bound on his head boom boom
boom push him push him knock the dude over and the guy falls out of bounds and he gets up and you see
like i placed the seat of doubt and his eyes were just like oh crap he walks back in the circle
and that point it was like everything shifted his whole countenance he was like nervous and
awkward and like i thought he was easy it was like wrestling like a little soft puppy it was so easy
after that right what was cool was that all the soft puppy. It was so easy after that, right?
But what was cool was that all the other guys
sitting around the mat, they saw that as well
and they were looking in and they're like,
oh my gosh, each of the, when I did,
I wrestled, I rolled with, that's what they call them,
Jiu Jitsu, and I rolled with the other guys.
I came out there and it was funny
because as soon as I came out there,
I could see it in their eyes.
And all of them started backing up and they were just like,
because they didn't want me to rush,
they didn't want that pressure that I was bringing.
And you could see in their eyes.
And then that spurred me more.
But that seeded out was set.
And it was just like all these guys who were bigger, stronger, faster,
and better at jujitsu who probably should have beat me if they would have had the mental belief that they could.
They didn't because they had the seeded out.
And they were like, I don't know what to do.
And that's like, that's all it takes.
So hope that helps you guys.
It's kind of fun. Think about how you could do that in your communication with it takes. So, hope that helps you guys. It's kind of fun.
Think about how you can do that
in your communication with your audience,
and hope that helps.
And that's all I got for you guys today.
Thanks so much for everything, you guys.
And tonight we're actually launching Funnel Hacker TV,
the TV show, and all,
so if you go to funnelhacker.tv,
you can see the behind the scenes show.
We've got eight episodes of that right now,
and tonight we're having the first full,
I'm not sure what we're going to call it yet
full documentary or whatever
and then some other cool things
when you go to funnelhacker.tv
check that out
and then you'll notice at the top
there's some cool tabs
one that takes you to Marketing Secrets
which is this podcast
and one that takes you to the blog
and anyway I'll share with you guys
the strategy behind that in the near future
but I think it's pretty cool
so that's all I got you guys
thanks so much for everything
and I'll talk to you soon
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