Marketing Secrets with Russell Brunson - Vanessa Van Edwards on the Hidden Science of Trust, Charisma, and Selling Without Being Salesy | #Marketing - Ep. 112

Episode Date: February 9, 2026

In this episode of The Russell Brunson Show, I sat down with Vanessa Van Edwards, and I knew right away this conversation was going to hit differently. I’ve been seeing Vanessa everywhere lately, and when she told me she used funnels and webinars to build her business, my mind was blown. She’s a self-described “recovering awkward person” who turned social anxiety, human behavior research, and relentless testing into a global brand - and along the way, she quietly mastered selling without ever feeling salesy. What fascinated me most wasn’t just her success, but how she got there. Vanessa didn’t chase every platform blindly. She studied people the same way we study funnels. She learned what makes someone trust you, listen to you, and ultimately buy from you - and she applied those principles to webinars, content, books, and partnerships. This episode is a masterclass on communication, charisma, and how deeply understanding people can transform your business Key Highlights: ◼️How Vanessa went from failed book launches and quitting her business to rebuilding everything with webinars, funnels, and aggressively helpful content ◼️Why most entrepreneurs aren’t bad at marketing - they’re under-signaling warmth and competence (and how to fix that) ◼️The real reason some webinars convert for years while others flop, and how balancing credibility with likability changes everything ◼️Her unconventional growth strategy of leveraging platforms (not just social media) like Udemy, MasterClass, and email lists she didn’t own ◼️The exact cues - from voice tone to body language - that instantly increase trust when you’re on stage, on video, or on a sales call We also go deep into her books Captivate and Cues, her upcoming work on conversation, and why charisma isn’t something you’re born with - it’s something you can learn, practice, and systemize. If you’re an introverted entrepreneur, a funnel hacker who loves strategy more than small talk, or someone who knows their message is good but struggles to deliver it confidently, this episode is for you. ◼️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 for a special guest who I've been seeing blowing up everywhere.

I've seen her on like a ton of podcasts. Everywhere I go, her face is popping up. And I went to Instagram or follower. And then the next day, she messes me. And she's like, hey, I actually use your stuff to build your business. I'm like, what? That is the coolest thing in the world. So I'm excited to introduce you to all of her, introduce all of you to her.

We have a really cool conversation. We're talking about a lot of stuff. She's got a book called Cues. Her name is Vanessa Van Edwards. And she is just like you as a funnel hacker who's got her message out there and is going across the whole world. And it's been really fun watching. So Vanessa, first off, it's been so cool over the last like five

getting to know you, but thanks for coming on the show. Oh, my pleasure. When I saw that you liked one of my reels, there was a celebration in my house. I was like, Russell, Branson, liked my video. So I just was, I just went into your DMs. I was like, you have helped me so much because I'm a recovering awkward person. I don't know if there are any other funnel hackers listening where we love the biz, we love the strategy, we love our product, but we don't really like people.

We're scared of them. Yeah, people are hard. I think it's the hardest part about being an entrepreneur is you have to work with others, you know? And also, I'm ambiverted. I don't, Russell, are you introvert, extrovert or ambivert? Do you know? I've never heard ambrovert. I've always considered someone introverted for sure.

What's an ambrovert? Okay, so actually 80% of people are ambiverted, which means you are not a true extrovert or true introvert. It means you can socialize and be very outgoing with the right people and the right. right settings, but the wrong people, the wrong settings totally shut you down, drain you. Interesting. And you need a lot of recharge time. So you can like extrovert. You can people for a certain amount of time, but then you are out.

Like you need to recharge. Is that you? That does sound actually more like me. I always thought it's because like I had to because like I always told people I feel like I'm an introvert and an extroverts calling. So I have to go and do things. But then yeah, afterwards I have to go back and hide and just be like, oh, give me some time, please.

And by the way, I think that like that's the most, the biggest challenge is being an entrepreneur is we do like a lot of deep thinking work, a lot of strategy work. We're like in our funnels, testing subject lines. And, you know, right in like, you know, it takes me four days to build slides. And then you have to teach them, which is the next challenge. So I think a lot of us entrepreneurs are ambiverted. And I actually think that's a superpower. I think it's a strength if we learn how to leverage it. Yeah.

It's, I remember when I was first learning about introvert, like understanding how a lot of really significant. successful people, even like actors or people who perform, it's like they, they create privately by themselves, they perform publicly. And it's like, that's like the, I feel like that skill set is really powerful versus people very extroverted. They, they figure things out on the fly like in real time, like while they're talking about it. So they're not as good as preparing.

And sometimes you can go off the rails if you're not like, if you don't have a structure to actually follow. It's interesting to watch the dynamics between them. Yes. Also, I've noticed that there are certain folks who there's different mediums where there's different mediums where they thrive. Like, for example, when I'm on social media, I'm actually by myself. This is great. Actually, I, you know, the reason I like doing so many videos, I have so many YouTube videos

is because it's just me in a dark room, you know, with a ring light. So like there's no peopling. I don't have to worry about being awkward or saying the wrong thing. It's just me, and I can edit out my awkward silences, or I keep them in because I want to be authentic and people to see my mistakes and my flubs. That is safe for me. Whereas, for example, a small group workshop, no. Like, it gives me like heart palpitrations. Like that, for me, is way harder. And so I think people listening, it's also good to think, like, what's the medium where you thrive?

Like, are you very good at cold calls? Like, are you good at phone calls. There are certain types of people. They're very good at phone calls. And they're bad at video. They're bad at video calls. I think, like, trying to optimize, like, the way that you're communicating, you don't have to be good at all of them.

that's permission. You do not have to be good at all of them. In fact, there are some people who thrive in podcast. They're like, I don't want to worry about makeup. I don't want, you know, I have resting, bothered face. I always look angry. I cannot do video. I thrive on audio.

Great. Double down on audio. Or there's now people who are like, you know what, writing. You know, like writing emails, that is my jam. I don't want to be on video. I don't want to be talking. Great. Like, do what you're excellent at socially.

I think social strengths is just as important as business strengths. Yeah. I think it's interesting. A lot of people think they've got to learn how to do all of it. But as you said, like, I know people who just make money off a podcast, no face, just spoken or people who just think money have emails, people just make money off Instagram, just YouTube. So I think we think we have to like do all of them. But it's like you don't.

Like you said, figure out the ones you really resonate with and focus there. You know, I don't have a podcast, which everyone's like, what? And I'm like, no, I'm not good at that medium. I don't think I'm as good at interviewing as you are or hosting in that way. And I think that when I said no to doing a podcast, that's when we hit seven figures. Interesting. I think sometimes saying no to the wrong things leaves room to double down on the right things. Yeah.

Interesting. All right, I want you back in time. I want you back in time to how you started this business. Because my people, you know, we have all of the crazy online marketers, people who are, their creators, they've got a vision, they've got something they're passionate about. And there's some phase of the journey where they're trying to figure this out. So I want to go back the very beginning of years and like, how did you decide, like, I'm going to start an online business.

And I'm going to, you know, start doing this kind of stuff. Yeah. Okay. So 2007, this thing launched called YouTube. And I was like, okay, YouTube, I can do this. And so I started filming little YouTube videos. And I was that back then I was specializing in communication for teenagers and parents. I was very young myself.

And so I was posting videos for teens and parents on how to communicate better. And they really started doing well. And this was right at the beginning of YouTube, right? Like people didn't even know what it was. Facebook was the Facebook, right? It was very, very early on. And so no one was doing educational content on YouTube. It was mostly like toys, like unboxing cats. Yeah, like unboxing videos and like video games. It was, it was, no one was really doing that. So it was really a blue ocean. Like there was very little competition. And then as I got older, I started broadening my brand to

just general communication because I was getting older. So I couldn't really speak to teenagers anymore. And then this idea happened where blogging was becoming big. So I started writing a blog along with every video post. And then you had to have a newsletter with every blog post. So every two years it felt like I was adding a channel. I started with video. Then we added blogging. Then we added email newsletters. Then we added Facebook. Then there was LinkedIn. Then for a minute there was like Periscope. Remember that? Oh, I missed Periscope. That's my favorite one. Oh, man, I know I built a cardboard house on Periscope. That was so fun.

By the way, mistake, I doubled down on Periscope. Everyone was like, guys, this is never going away, okay? This is the thing. You're going to double down on this. And boy, oh, boy, did I? And I was like, I'm going to put all my eggs in the Periscope basket and none in the Instagram basket. Big mistake. Big mess. Everyone's like Instagram.

What? I'm going to want to look at pictures. That's so silly. But like, you know, doubled down on Periscope for a couple years, ignored Instagram, and just that Instagram came, then TikTok came. So every basically two years I was adding a new channel. But the two that remained constant were YouTube and the newsletter, the email newsletter. And so I have an approach to be as a content creator to be aggressively helpful.

So I want every single email or every single video to either give you an aha moment right then in there or make you laugh. Either one. It has to do one of those two things so that when I do have to sell, and I actually do not like selling, but when I have to sell, at least I feel like I've given away a lot of really aggressively helpful content for that. Even when I'm selling, I'm trying to be aggressively helpful too. And that's when someone, Jeremy Sandow, Jeremy, if you're listening, Jeremy Sandow said,

have you heard of this guy, Russell Brunson? And this was over a decade ago, over a decade ago. The very beginning of ClickFunnels then, probably. Right. It was a very beginning. And like, you were aggressively helpful. He's like, you literally putting out this guy. He's giving us, I remember opening your book.

I got your book. And it showed every slide, every slide in a webinar. And so you know what I did? I used every single one of your slides. Every single one. If you go on my free trainings, I have 12, 60 minute webinars, one for every year, because I do one a year. And they're all three secrets to be more likable. So good.

Being inauthentic. Three secrets to being more assertive while still being nice. Three secrets to, I'm serious. It's so good. They're all like that. Do you post it on YouTube or you run this webinar separately? I live on YouTube. Live on YouTube.

Yep. Yep. And now we, you know, simulcast it. So it's on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and LinkedIn. And X, I think, too. So that was over a decade ago. And my friend Jeremy was like, you have to start doing webinars. Because what I was doing before was just selling.

via my newsletter and occasionally a social post. And it wasn't enough. Like, it just wasn't enough. I was able, I was able to make maybe 50 or 60,000 in a launch just using emails. But when I added my first webinar and I did it literally your exact slides. Like if you go walk to that original, it's still up. It's like, you know, here's my hurdle. Here's the staff.

Like, it's all the different things that you did. We had over six figures within the first day. So good. the first day. And what's great about it is I taught. You know, I think that I like your stuff is because I was teaching for 30 minutes. You know,

that was all teaching. So that was a real game change. That was an inflection point for me is, I think that was in about 2015, 2016, somewhere around there, where we totally transferred into webinars. And so we would launch three to four times a year.

We would close our class, offer bonuses, as you mentioned. And that's when I got my book deal, which was very, Actually, I should say, because now we're talking to entrepreneurs. I got a book deal in 2010, and I thought it would be life-changing. It was from a major publisher, and I wrote it, and I loved the book, and I put it out, and no one bought it.

Was it this one, or the one behind you? Which one was it? Oh, you don't say that. It's one we don't talk about. It is hidden. I want a copy of it. Give me a copy. No.

And, like, I will be. I really thought that, like, this was a dream come true, right? Like, I was so happy. And then it came out and no one bought it. And I realized how hard it was to sell books. It is really hard to sell books. And at that point, I had 7,000 people about on my newsletter, on my emails, newsletter. And I think, like, 13 bought it.

Like, oh, no. That was a lot of work. And I think, like, 10 of them were my mom. You know what I mean? Like, I think maybe three people bought it. And so that was really shocking. really hard. I actually had to quit. I had to quit. I like, I was out. Like, I was like, I was like, I can't do this. Like, I was basically told, like, you're never going to write a book

again. You should quit, like, you should stop. So you quit everything or you just quit the, just the writing part. You stopped everything. I stopped everything. Really? For how long? About seven months. Okay. Like, just was like, maybe I'm not meant to do this, you know. And, you know, I think when you create something, like a book and it does badly, it feels like you are you. Like I couldn't separate myself from the book. Especially how much time you put into a book. A book is so personal because you're spending all this like time with you and your brain and your thoughts privately creating something.

And you publicly give it to the world. And it's like for me, every time I release the book, it is the scariest feeling I've ever felt my life. Because you're just like, man, I've lived with it for so long. And if people judge it, like, it gets hard. I can't imagine. I can't imagine. It sounds very hard. And so I stopped.

and my husband, I've been with my husband for 20 years, so he's been with me through the whole process. He was like, I think you need to go back to this, but I think you should just do it differently. And I was like, I feel so sad and I feel so uncomfortable. And by the way, that was like very peak social anxiety as well because I think what happened was my friends were very happy for me and I would go out and they'd be like, how's the book?

I'd be like, it's total failure and I'm never going to write again. Thanks for asking. Yeah, thank you. And they'd be like, how's the biz? And I'd be like totally failing, not making any money, like taking out loans. You're like, thanks for making my mood feel so good, though. I appreciate it. I mean, and so already some social, like, lack of confidence that I had turned into, like,

I was very scared to go out and talk about the business. And, you know, entrepreneurs know this. Whenever someone asks you, what do you do, you then have to sell yourself pretty much. You know, it depends on your business, of course. but you're pitching right then and there, whether it's at a barbecue or pickup line or, you know, PTA, like right there you have this moment where you can be like, oh, you know, just marketing, right? Sometimes I always say that. Or like, well, I'm an author. And then they're like, what's the book about? Oh, actually it failed. You know, it was this was really hard. It's like really hard. So anyway, he said, why don't you write about that? Why don't you just write about how hard it is to talk about yourself, how hard is to talk about what you do? And One of the first videos that I posted after I kind of rebranded, I rebranded a science of people, was how do you answer what do you do?

Like, especially if you are embarrassed by what do you do. And I started talking about the mechanics of answering difficult questions. How do you answer, how are you? How do you answer, tell me your biggest weakness? How do you answer, tell me about your last relationship, like all those questions. And those really started to go viral. And that's built a lot of momentum back into the business. and I started talking about being awkward.

And little did I know there was a lot of smart, awkward people out there. Or resonated. Yeah. So when I got captivated as a book deal in 2015, that's when my bus had the inflection point with your formula. I was scared. I was like, no. I can't write books.

I can't sell books. My editor, who's still my editor today, Nikki Papadopoulos, was like, you can write this book differently. Like, we're going to do this different. And so that was captivate. That was my first successful book. When it came out, I was, I expected to go like full dark. Like, I was like, this is going to be terrible.

No one's going to buy it. And thank goodness the opposite happened. And it was huge and very successful. And I think it's because I approached it differently. I was like, I'm going to write about awkwardness. I'm not going to write what I think I should write. I should write the book that I wish I had had. So that was captivate.

That's so cool. And what year was captivate? published in 2017, so started in 2015, 2016, and then published 2017. Yeah. So cool. I'm curious with the YouTube channel, when you, when you rebranded and kind of shifted, did you just change the channel, putting stuff on? Like, if we go back in time, we'll go see the ones when you're talking to the teenagers way back in the day. Are they still there?

They're unlisted. No. They're unlisted. I should, you know, I should just pick one and just relist it. Relist it if I go weekend, like everyone, go check it out. I know. I'll see if I can find one that I can just relist. You'll be like, whoa.

Yeah. Whoa. It's funny for me, like, one of the highest close rates I ever had is I found my very first presentation I ever sold. And I showed that when I was trying to teach people how to sell from stage. And like, because people saw how awkward I was. It gave them so much belief that then they went in anyway. So just people would love to see the very, the pre beginning of your stuff.

I'm going to go unlist one because like they're sitting right there. And they're so raw and so awkward that I think if people don't believe me when I'm like, I was, I'm a recovering awkward person. They do not believe me. and then they will. So that's a good idea. I will. That's awesome. Chalcepted. So the next part of your story is leading up to this book and stuff and everything. And maybe it's just because I've, you know, seen you more, more. It feels like you're in this like, like, a lot of stuff happening right now, a lot of growth, a lot of like attention happening. Like, what was it that took you from captivate

to like this crescendo to where you are today and like getting more media and more things and more, you're like, yeah, I'm curious like what that transition part looked like. Yeah. So virality. really and I hate to say that social media made that big of a difference but before that I was really focused on putting out aggressively helpful content which was usually living in newsletters and long form YouTube that was that and a long form blog to go along with it a lot of long form then I started focusing a lot more on virality like very quick tips that would really help and then going on other people's platforms including learning platforms so that's when I started partnering with other people who have bigger audiences than me not partners like other

entrepreneurs, platforms. So for example, I launched a Udeme course. I had like five or six Udeme courses, and they had at that time, they were really big. And so I was the only person on Udeme doing social skills content. At the time, Udeme was really all technical content. It was programming. And so I had this course like human light detection, body language 101, body language for entrepreneurs. And so a lot of, I noticed coders were taking it as like their lunch break. It was like their like their treat course. And we, I remember this. I post. on you to me and I was like, you know, I invested like in a little camera and a little light. And I was like, man, this was $90 on Amazon.

I better make back this $90 thinking at the time. And I was like, if I could just make $100, you know, $100, I'll pay back. I'll break even. I'll make $10. I'll buy me two coffees back then. I think that was three coffees. And I posted it and within 24 hours, it got approved. We had thousands, thousands of sales, thousands and thousands of sales.

So Udeme started putting me in their email announcements. And this is something that's a very weird hack, but I think it works, is there's always a platform that is really big in the moment. So it was Udeme, then it was Creative Live, then it was Skillshare, then it was LinkedIn Learning, then it was Linda, right? Like all these platforms. And so what I would do is I would go to each platform as they were crescendoing, like as they were getting big. And I would offer them content either for free or for pay. And what I would negotiate is, please put me in an email blast because I knew that just being in search would not be enough, especially if I didn't have any reviews. And so in my negotiations with every single one of those platforms, I asked, I'm happy to create this content for you.

One, tell me all about your users and their searching habits. So I knew what people were searching in the search bar. And I knew that if I could build a course based on those keywords, I would come up and search higher. So I asked in the pre-negotiations, could I have search information? And then second, will you promise one to five email blasts? And then third, if I could do it, I asked, can you put me in your ads? Because what I realized was all of these platforms had funding. So I didn't want to take out ads on my own stuff, but they had tons of budget for ads.

So I said, will you do ads for me? I'll film them for you if you want to do ads. And so then they would put 100,000 to 300,000 in ads of my course for me. And I wasn't having to spend it. So if I pre-negotiated those things, it almost guaranteed that the course would do well. And then I was able to go from a platform to platform. Like, for example, I just did a master class. And that's, you know, a beautiful platform.

They make beautiful courses. And so when I talked to them, I was like, please run ads. Like run ads. I will do whatever you need to run that ad. I'll give you, you know, we can co-lab on my account so we can do co-ads together because they have the spend for those ads. And then I was like, how many emails are you going to send? What are you going to send them?

Can I help you? Can I create content for those emails? So I think that whatever business you're in, whether it's content creation or learning, is what platforms, not social media platforms, but what platforms could feature you, your knowledge, your business, your product. And then how can you get into their search? Because almost every website now has search into their emails and into their ads. So smart. I've never heard anyone really talk about that because everyone's so focused on on the social platforms.

But man, that's really cool. Well, I know what I'm going to be doing this weekend now. I'm going to be focusing on calling people like, dang, I want to get a master class. I don't even think about that. So cool. I'll introduce you to them. Let's do it. For sure. For sure, you should have one. And I also think like speaking of, I think that we also have to think about, We think about search engine optimization a lot, right? Like I knew about search engine optimization SEO from my blog for many days. But we don't realize is that every search engine, every social platform is a search engine. Every course platform is a search engine.

Every blog is a search engine. And so if you can be optimizing for their search and then their email blast, everyone's sending out email blast, whether you're a flossing company or you're a shower curtain company. It's like everyone has an email newsletter. And so getting into those email newsletters is key. like I have another book launch coming up in October. And I was like, I don't even want to do a podcast tour. I want to do a newsletter tour.

Like I want to take over people's newsletters and write aggressively helpful content for their newsletter. And then I want to ask them if I can be in their ads. It's just a very different way of thinking about your product and your content. Yeah, I love it. So cool. I'm curious, because you had so much success also getting on like bigger podcasts and things like that, for my audience who's like, that's like a lot of them their dream, like how would I get on a podcast? How do you, like, what's your process?

Are you pitching people to come into you? Is there a strategy behind it all? Yeah, I have a strategy. I don't pitch podcasts. I want them to notice me. So the way that I think about this is I have a list, always a running list of like 10 podcasts that I want to be on, specifically that I think I could be of service to their audience.

Like, there are podcasts out there that are very big, but I don't know, I don't think their audience would find me helpful. Like, I don't do makeup content. I don't do health and wellness content. So, you know, I'm not aiming for those ones. I'm aiming for really smart, talented entrepreneurs or professionals. Maybe they want a little bit of social help. So I'm like, okay, who are they listening to?

I have a running list of 10. So make your list of 10 where you know you could help their audience. Like not just you like them, but like you know that whatever you have to say or offer could be super helpful for them because it can be a way easier pitch. Then you should write five hooks that you think their audience would like. So like, let's take, for example, let's take Mel Robbins, for example. So I was a big fan of Mel.

I loved, you know, she's a lot of very smart listeners. And I noticed that her viral content, her best content, had very specific kind of headlines. So my team and I sat down and we made a list of what topics we thought would go viral for her. Not for me, but for her. Then I went and I made that content. Either I made it myself, like in my YouTube channel here, or I went on a smaller podcast.

tested the content, clipped that content from that podcast, and tried to get it to go viral, so that her team would see that content, I could recreate it for her. And so that is exactly what has happened. I would say over 50 times is I've created content and then we remake it.

Or I make it myself, or I make it on a podcast where I'm testing the material. Like, you know, all my content, it has to be packaged the right way to be helpful. So, like, for example, for a long time, Let's get very specific. So I had an idea to encourage people to break out of their social awkwardness with social exposure theory, which is basically this idea that you go out and you know that you're going to fail,

but you say hi to as many people as possible. You feel their rejection and realize you're okay. That's a very specific challenge. So I've been trying to teach that content on a couple different podcasts. I tried it on my YouTube channel. It didn't go very viral. I tried it in a story. It didn't go very viral.

I then tried it on three or four different podcasts. podcast, like trying to explain it to the host only kind of went well. And then I nailed it on a medium size podcast. Like I got the, I got it right. And it got like 20 or 30,000 views, which is kind of viral, like in our world, kind of viral. And that got the attention of Jay Shetty's producers, or I think one of those did. And I went and redid it on his podcast because I knew I was ready for it. And then that content hit and helped so many people. And that is like, has millions of views, that clip now. But I had practiced that clip 12 times before it made it to him where it was ready to be, like,

used and digested. So if you want to get on these bigger podcasts, brainstorm the hooks that you think could be most helpful and then deliver them on your own channel, try to get them to get some clicks and go viral, you can then send it to the producers, or you can try to hop on medium-sized podcast to try to get that word out that that's one of your big tips. Yeah. I think that's so cool. It's interesting, too, because I think a lot of people are just hoping they're going to

say something that happens to go viral where you're like, okay, here's the person. What can I say? What's the story? And like thinking through it and then creating like the viral moment as opposed to like hoping there's just magically going to happen. You know what I mean? It's so interesting. And by the way, there are some very talented people where that does happen.

Or for example, sometimes you'll be verbalizing something and you're like, whoa, that came out really good. That was really good. That can happen. But don't leave it up to chance. You know, like, like I think strategizing, I remember, I think the intention here is helpful, right? Like, yes, virality, but like, what is going to make people want to take out their pen and take notes? Yeah.

That's, that's the goal. Essentially, I look at my content very similar. Like, the thing that I'm best as long form, like, I'm, my shortest, like a 90-minute webinar to a five-day event, right? So, like, I'm much better longer form. And so for me, though, to fill up five days of me speaking on stage, for eight hours a day for an event, like event we're doing. It's like, I have to have a lot of stories, but I do the same thing you're talking about. It's like, I don't just like show up like, I hope I got a story for today.

Like for the last two decades in my life, like, I'll have an idea or something. And then I'll, I'll be at the gym and I'll tell it to my trainer. And then like, and then I get home and I'll say to my wife. And then, you know, every time it's like, I didn't really land. Right. Let me change. And I go to the office. I'm like, hey, guys, check this out.

And I say to the office, see what they say. And then I'll record a little podcast on my phone and put it out. You know, like, I'll do like 10, 15, 20 variations of it until it's like, okay, and I know how to tell the story in a way. It's going to just drop the second I needed to. And then, yeah. That's it. Like, I think like, yeah, we should have like 10 practice people.

Like, yes, my trainer. My poor trainer has to hear all my tips. Like, well, I'm like lifting. I'll pay you a monthly for my training fees instead of the other way. Let's talk about overcoming limiting, limiting beliefs for a second. You know what I'm like lifting because I'm trying to get this right. Yes. Like, I think that there's a mistaken belief that you have to be expertly charismatic on the first go.

And the way you deliver something, there is a science to delivery. And so you don't have to get it right the first time. It takes a little bit to practice verbalizing something in a way that's going to land. And really, really good speakers do the work ahead of time. They're like, I'm not going to make my listener parse this out. I'm going to do the work to make sure I have the right conflict and challenge and words and metaphor. It's not too long. It's not too short.

I'm going to do the work for them so that when it hits their ears, they're like, yes, click. And so I think it's about doing the work for them. I also would say, like, even with webinars, so I try to give one webinar a year, sometimes two webinars a year, literally using your exact format. So I use, I've changed it a little bit over the years because, like, I found my own way to do it. But I've even noticed if I could add a layer on top, what works and what doesn't work, which is charisma, very charismatic people, have a perfect blend of warmth and competence.

I noticed that if I deliver a webinar and it's all competence, numbers, data, science, research, formula, steps, it doesn't land that well. It's actually too much cerebral. And they, in the research, they literally say, competence without warmth is like leta leave us feeling suspicious. So you have people who are listening to the webinar and they're like, okay, but can I trust you? Like, am I feeling this? Am I clicking with this person? I don't want to buy. Like literally,

confidence about warmth triggers that feeling of suspicion in a buyer or in your customer who's listening. When I deliver all warmth, so I've had a couple where I've tried a lot of stories.

So warmth is stories, gifts, case studies, personal opinions, humor moments. Those also don't convert because people think, I really like you, but I can't rely on you.

I really like you, but I'm not going to buy from you. And especially if you have a higher-priced product, You know, we've tested everything in our product ladder from a $10 book all the way up to a $3,000 course, right? It doesn't even matter the price point. If you have too much warmth, people also feel like, I don't think there's enough credibility here. Like it's too much likeability and not enough credibility. So in my webinars now, with your formula, I try to balance for every warm slide.

I have a competent slide. So you'll see I'll start with warmth, like a GIF or something cute or funny. then I hit them with like a really good stat, like a shocking stat. Then I'm like personal story. Then I'm like, wait, some science and research.

Then I'm like case study. Then I'm like, wait a minute, there's a formula here. Did you know it? So I think that the layer I would add on top is we've seen our webinars. We have some webinars that do great.

Like they convert for us seven years later. Like they are still making money. They are still earning money for us. And then we have some webinars that just never quite hit. And it's because we didn't have enough of a balance. And so for anyone who's creating any kind of content, especially in a funnel, I even do the same thing for an email. Like in my funnels, we are, I love a funnel. I love a funnel.

I write all my funnels. Like I, there's an art and science to them. I also think for, I, I, I rotate warm email, competent email, warm email, competent email. So like, I'll have an email that's all a story, like a very, very heartfelt story, either for me or a case study. And then it's like research that will blow your mind with a step-by-step formula on conversation. Then it's a really inspiring story about how I overcame a challenge and no links, just like a story and a picture for my childhood. Then it's like super competent. This is exactly what to say to earn more money.

This is exactly what to say to sell. Super competent steps, fill in the blank scripts, and then you can have a buy button. But you have to have both even leading up to it in the funnel. That's cool. I want to ask you some more specific questions also about your books cues, talking about the secret language of charismatic communication. And so with our audience, there's a lot of people now who are moving to try and train how to do webinars and challenges and get on state and stuff like that, right?

And I think that we talked about us the very beginning, but there's a lot of us, me included, who feel awkward doing things. I love to talk about some of the cues that they can learn also like as they're trying to be someone who's presenting when they don't feel comfortable presenting. I feel like I did where I'm an introvert in an extroverts world and I don't feel comfortable here, but I know I got to do it because I got a message I got to get out. Like, what can we help them with to help, you know, make that part easier? Perfect.

Okay. So the good news is, is there is a formula for this. So this is something that you can learn. If you are not naturally charismatic, if you are not naturally a people person, it's fine. You can learn it. As long as you have true competence, so you know your product and you know your stuff. And true warmth, you are not trying to trick people. You are actually trustworthy.

I can teach you the cues. It doesn't really work to fake it until you make it. I just don't, like usually that comes across as inauthentic. So one is know your stuff, know your brand, know your numbers, know your product. Second is be trustworthy. Don't do anything naughty. Don't do anything evil. Be a good person.

Be a good person, right? Yeah. So that's one. That's the baseline. Then we can add the cues on top of it. And I like to use a shark tank as an example, whenever I'm talking to entrepreneurs about presenting. So I love the show Shark Tank. My team and I analyzed 495 Shark Tank pitches looking for patterns. We wanted to know why are some when you, you know, like you watch Shark Tank, they walked

on the hallway and you're like, this is going to be good. They got the swagger. Yeah. They are going to make money. Like you just know, like something about them in the first few seconds. And there's some where you're like, this is going to be a train wreck. You just know. There is something happening there with their walk and those first few lines. So first, your first impression matters. How you take the stage, how you walk into a room, the first thing people see when they pop on video, how you're waiting in the meeting room, those matter just as much as your presentation. And that is a mistake a lot of entrepreneurs make is they think that their impression happens the moment they start presenting. No, it happens the moment someone first sees

you. So that's okay. That means we have a couple seconds to work with there. There's a couple things you want to make sure of you are nailing the moment someone first sees you, whether that's on video, on stage, in the room. Like, for example, I speak in front of a lot of ballrooms, as to you. I know my first impression happens the moment I walk in that ballroom, even if it's off to the side. And it's especially happening as I walk on stage. Same thing in Shark Tank.

You are judging their warmth and competence the moment they walk in that room and your very first word. So here are some of the patterns. One, when people first see you, you, if you can, want to show visible hands, ideally your palm. And that sounds really weird. But eye tracking studies, we like to see people's hands. In fact, if I were to do this entire video and Russell couldn't see my hands,

one, I would become a worse speaker. Susan Goldman Meadow found that our gestures make us more fluent. It also helps comprehension. So one is the moment I hop on video, I say, morning, hi everyone, good to see, show a palm, right? Like a little palm flash. The moment I walk on stage, like literally as I'm walking up the steps or walking across the stage, I say, hey, everyone, good to see you, happy to be here, or just a visible palm. There is something in our amygdala that deactivates.

So visible palm and keeping your hands out of your pockets, not behind your back. Like, that's very, very first thing, baseline. Second thing is you want to start your first word on your lowest natural tone. And what I mean by this, and they've actually measured it, is when we get anxious, both men and women tend to go up into the highest end of their range. They talk up here. Now, if I were to give this entire interview like this, it would drive you crazy. It'd be like, why is she talking like that?

Now, that's natural for me. Like when I'm talking to my daughters, I might be up here. Hey, girls. Yeah. But when you're trying to learn from me, buy from me, get to know me, you want me in my lowest tone. Because when I'm using my lowest tone, it's called a maximum resonance point. It's super resonant. My voice is relaxed.

My shoulders are down. I have lots of volume. And your brain goes, oh, she knows what she's talking. about I can relax and listen. The mistake that people make is they give away all of their vocal confidence in the first word. They go like this, hi, or morning. And in the audience, without even realizing the audience is like, ooh, they're nervous. And we don't like to buy from or learn from nervous people. We just don't like it. So when you say hello, I want you to say hello on the out breath. Most people take it on the impasse. They'll answer the phone. They'll be like,

hello all the way up here. Like, just try it with me. So Russell, say hello and take a deep breath in and say hello on the top of your breath. Hello? I don't like that one. Right. That's too high, right? Hello?

All the way up. So instead, I want you to say hello your first word on the out breath. So it sounds like this. This is the bad one. Hello? Versus, hello? Yeah. Hello?

That's much better. Okay. Much better. And I want you to try this at, home so you can hear yourself because the way that you sound at the top of your breath, if you are ever speaking in that tone of voice, you are giving away vocal confidence. That's too high in your range. If you speak on the out breath, as your vocal cords are relaxing, when you speak on the out breath,

you actually force your vocal cords to relax. That hits more of your resonance point. We like it. Like it immediately tells our brain, ah, this person knows what they're talking about. So first word on the lowest end of your range. So hands, low vocal range. The third one is a little bit weird, but across cultures and genders and races, we are always trying to gauge someone's perceived pride. We like people who feel proud because usually

proud people are confident. They know their stuff and they're trustworthy or they're not hiding anything. So we're always trying to gauge. Do you look more like a winner or do you look more like a loser? That's a very hard way of saying that. But the way that this works is the amount of space that I take up dictates how confident I feel. University of British Columbia, they looked at research at, they researched athletes across cultures and they found that when losers win a race, they take up a lot of space. They tilt their head towards the sky. They roll their shoulders back.

They often might even have their arms out and they keep their torso nice open. Loser athletes do the opposite. They typically tilt their chin down. They roll their shoulders in. They tightly press their arms to their side or even cross their arms in front as if they're showing defeat.

The problem is when we are starting a meeting, what are we typically doing? Checking our phone. And checking our phone looks just like a loser. It literally looks like a losing athlete. lead. So when someone pops on video or you walk on stage or you're walking into a room, do not be checking your phone because literally it's accidental defeat body language. Instead, I want you to maximize two distances. Very specifically. I want you to maximize the distance

between your earlobe and your shoulder. So this should be as maximize as possible. Now watch me, I'm going to shrink my shoulders down. If I were to have my shoulders hunched up and my head down with very little space between my ear and my shoulder, I would look like I'm not confident, right? Russell, like, I don't, you would not want to take advice from me. And so the more this is maximized, the more someone is, we see that they are proud enough to leave this down to not protect themselves. And the second distance is the distance between your torso and your arm. When we see someone have space here, we think, oh, they're not being protected, they're

gesturing, they're open, they're free. It's a very quick way that we judge if someone looks confident or not. So you want to maximize those distances on video, on stage, in person. And those are just a couple of the first, first impression ones. I have a lot, but those are okay. That's, those are all like insanely cool, not that hard to do, but like really powerful. So in your book, in your book, is that what you're going through how many, like, how many cues you have? 97.

97. 97. Yeah, 97 cues in the book. And by the way, there are 97 cues in the book. Some are warm, but they're very, very warm cues. Like, for example, a head tilt is a universal cue of warmth. When we expose our ear to the side, you perceive. perceive me as warmer. Like if I were to listen to you and deliver with a head tilt, you would

perceive me as a little bit warmer. There's also competent cues. There are cues that make someone look smart. These are cues that smart people do. People in positions of power typically do. There are some cues that are so good. They're both warm and competent. Those are like the best ones. And there's danger zone cues. Danger zone cues are cues that immediately take away from your perceived likeability and competence. And I do want to make a note here. This is all based on foundational research. It is not my research. It's based on Dr. Susan Fiske's research at a Princeton who found this model in 2002. It's been replicated many times of how we judge warmth and competence. But here's the problem. And this is what took my breath away when I read the study the first time. This is not

your actual warmth and competence. It's your perceived warmth and competence. And this is the problem and the curse of very smart people. All of my students are high achieving very smart people, but they don't always show it. In fact, they have exceptionally good ideas. Typically, they're like, my data speaks for itself, my product speaks for itself, my numbers speak for themselves. And so they prepare for the content, but they don't practice the delivery. And so they under-signal competence and under-signal warmth.

If you under-signal, you are telling people to doubt and dismiss you, because your cues tell others how to treat you. So if you are sending signals of warmth and competence, you will be treated with more trust and credibility. You also inspire it. Cares on people are very contagious. If you under signal, you are stoic, you are sterile, you don't show enough of the warmth and competence,

people cannot believe you. They're not getting enough of the social signals from you to be able to say, ah, I can trust this person, I can rely on them. And video has made this even harder. Because on Zoom, you can't see my feet, you can't see my body positioning. We weren't able to handshake or hug. You weren't able to smell me. Like, all those things are happening in person.

And so when we only have video or even only audio, we're really limiting the number of signals we're sending. So we have to work even harder to show people you can trust me and you can believe me. That's so cool. Well, I'm excited to dive a lot deeper into your work and understand it all. It's so fascinating. You have your next book coming out in a couple months or one month or even, right? Anyway, what's the next transition?

because I'm curious, at least for me, I've got evolution of my books as they go through the process. Like, what's after cues? What's coming next? Okay, so Captivate was first impressions and memorability. Cues was body language, a little bit of verbal in there. And this one is called Conversation. I just love those C-words. I just love them.

I realize that there is a blueprint for conversation. And people didn't know it. It's actually researched by Dr. Dan McAdams, who looked at how we connect with people. And there are three levels we have to move through in a conversation to be able to be able to feel connected. And it is why we have bad small talk. The reason why awkward people like me were having awkward conversations is because I did not know how to get out of level one. I was trapped in that small talk. So how are you? How's the fan? Been busy? I could not get out of that trap. And so there is a way to get out of it. And so this book is on those three levels. And then I give

nine power questions that I hope that people will use. and ask everyone in their life to be able to level up if they so choose. So it's literally a decade of work and research to develop these nine questions. We started just, I think you're a you love data. I had this science. I knew about this science, about these three levels. I was testing it. I was teaching it with my students.

We have, you know, thousands of students in my course people school. And I would have them test different questions for me. And we had a list of 60 hypotheses, 60 questions that I thought maybe these could be unlocks. And so we would run speed networking tests. And I'd have my students test these questions narrowed down to nine. Like only nine were the unlocked ones because it's a very hard of the question to balance cracking someone open, but also social acceptance.

Like I wish I could just start every conversation with, what's your greatest fear? But we cannot. So these are like socially acceptable questions. So that's common. That's amazing. And then is that going to be the trilogy? you put them all together and then you're going to be more after that or you think that's it? You never know.

I might I might pick a different, a different letter. Yeah. I might make the next trilogy I. I'm thinking I. I won't tell you the word. There's an I word and there's an E word I'm thinking about. Okay. I like when things match.

I like, I can't help it. Yeah. No, I love it. It's so cool. Well, this has been so much fun. I don't get to do a lot of interviews like this. And so it's just really fun to see the way. you look at the world and how you see everything and I'm really excited to dive a lot deeper with

everything and glad to finally connect and get to know you. For all of my funnel hackers, my people who are in this journey somewhere along the way, what's the best place for them to connect you and learn more about you and like plug into all this stuff you're doing? Yes. So I am Vanessa Van Edwards on all the socials. I think at Van Edwards on Instagram. I would love if you would join my email list. I am a funnel hacker and you also will now know the science behind my email newsletter. She'd be like, oh, I know what she's doing. Got a warm one here. I've got a competent one here.

And that's at scienceofpeople.com. That's my brand. And I give a free icebreaker, a social tip every Monday. So my goal is that you'll use the icebreaker in your team meetings or your family dinners or your date night or your friends. My whole goal is just to have better conversation. I promise to be aggressively helpful. That's my, that's my promise. And Russell, I just want to thank you so much for, I was saying to my brother, my brother's with us here at my house with me.

And I was like, Russell gave away, like, just like gave away his business secrets. Like, I was so shocked when I read your book for the first time, expert secrets for the first time. And I was like, he's just telling us the secrets. No one shares this. And I'm so grateful because I don't know if I would have been able to afford to keep going without that. You know, I wasn't able to financially figure out the financial piece of the business until I started doing webinars and courses.

So I'm just so grateful for you being so aggressively helpful and sharing that content because it's it's it allowed me to be able to do this work. Yeah. Well, thank you for for doing the, like, I'm sure you're the same way. Like the most rewarding thing in the world to see people take your work and do something with it. And like, there's nothing better than that. So I got your message. And you're like, you know, I learned from you. I'm like, ah, this is the coolest thing.

Like that was the best gift I could have gotten. So one day I'll share, whenever you want, I'll share my numbers with you so you can see like how good, how good they are. Like how much they convert. They convert really well. I'm going to go watch them all. They're on YouTube, right? Yeah, they're on YouTube. Oh, my goodness.

Don't watch the old ones. They're embarrassing. I was like figuring it out. Oh, that's cool. So thanks so much. I appreciate you. And I really enjoyed hanging out today on the podcast. Thanks so much for everything.