The Russell Brunson Show - The Buzz Behind The Birthday Announcement

Episode Date: September 23, 2019

Have you been watching the buzz that we've been creating? Listen in on my thoughts about what we're doing and why. On today's episode Russell recounts how an announcement he's making on Clickfunnels' 5 year birthday got so much buzz. Here are some of the exciting things you will hear in this episode: How so many rumors about an upcoming announcement came from a simple two minute video. What some of the rumors going around about Clickfunnels 5 year birthday announcement are. And how studying the story of P.T. Barnum helped Russell see why creating buzz would be a better way to make announcements. So listen here to see how so much buzz was created around this announcement, and don't forget to watch Facebook Live on Monday to find out what the announcement actually is. Transcript - https://marketingsecrets.com/blog/243-the-buzz-behind-the-birthday-announcement Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

With TD Direct Investing, new and existing clients could get 1% cash back. Great! That's 1% closer to being part of the 1%. Maybe, but definitely 100% closer to getting 1% cash back with TD Direct Investing. Conditions apply. Offer ends January 31, 2025. Visit td.com slash dioffer to learn more. What's up, everybody? Good morning. Good morning. This is Russell Brunson. I want to welcome you back to the Marketing Secrets Podcast. Today, I'm going to be reading the second half of the Traffic Secrets book. 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. All right, so I'm not actually reading it on this podcast. That'd be the longest podcast of all time, but I finished the Traffic Secrets book. Did I tell you this already? So we're back from Fiji and right in front of Fiji, we submitted the final manuscript to the publisher, and they have their editors go through and then send it back to us, and we have to do our last edit.

And then next Friday, a week from today, I have to submit it, and at that point, I can never touch it again. So I was kind of freaking out about it because when I read the dot-com secrets book and the expert secrets book, and when I finished those, after I got done, I went and, uh, and I remember, um, I recorded the audio book versions of them. And as I was recording the audio book versions, I found all these like these mistakes and errors that I hadn't, I hadn't found even though I'd read the book like a hundred times through. And, uh, and so, um, but because I was publishing those to a smaller publisher, I was literally able to like, um, like make the audio book, make changes,

send to him. They changed the last minute and then we started printing them. But with this book, like the book doesn't come out until May 5th. It's like, I don't know, seven or eight months from now. Um, which makes me sad because I want to start selling it tomorrow. Cause that's, you know, what I do. Um, but we have to wait for forever. And so, um, my, my audio book, I'm probably not going to record till like next March or something. At that point, it'll be too late to like make edits and stuff so it's kind of freaking out so i thought you know i'm gonna do is i'm gonna just do a live reading of it so i can read out loud and i can edit it um and so that was the plan and then i was like well maybe i should invite my traffic team so they can hear my thoughts on traffic and make sure we're all in alignment so i'm by the traffic team

and then we're like wait a minute if we're doing this anyway might as well record it because who knows maybe something cool will come from us like We're like, well, if we're going to record it, we should set up a big set. It's kind of that book, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie. So then we set up the big set. We're like, this looks amazing. We should sell access to it. And so basically for anyone who bought a Funnel Hacking Live,

take a buy right now, gets to come and listen to me read the Traffic Seekers book live. So I read the first half of it yesterday. It took like eight hours. It was really tiring and exhausting, but I did it. Woo. So we did the first half of it yesterday for, it took like eight hours. It was really tiring and exhausting, but I did it. Woo. So we did that first. And then, um, and then, uh, when that was, um, and so then today I'm reading the second

half. So that's, what's been happening over here. And, um, and, uh, it's kind of fun actually reading that way. Um, it's interesting as, um, as I'm reading it, um, for the most part, I'm liking all of it. There's a couple parts I'm just like, oh, like this read, reads really weird or like, I don't feel it here. I'm getting bored reading this part or like this part was really fun and exciting, you

know, and there's definitely different, different, uh, different parts. And it's also funny cause I found things that like the editors edit and I'm like, oh, like I, I don't like how that was said or I don't like how this thing, you know what I mean? So it's like, I gotta change this back. I gotta add my voice back in here. Anyway, I remember my grandpa, my grandpa was a professor at BYU, history professor, and he wrote like, I don't know, 10 different books on like Columbus and like all these old history things that he's, he obsesses about.

My grandpa obsesses about history. Like I obsess about marketing. Anyway, but I remember him telling me back in the day when I was a kid, he's like, he's like, yeah, when you, when you write a book and send it to the publisher, um, he's like, when you get it back, you know, the editor, he's like, when you, you won't even recognize the book doesn't sound like you anymore. I remember him saying that. I was like, that doesn't make any sense. But then like, I totally see that. And luckily for me, my editors have been really good and they, they've kept my voice in. And for the most part, they're just cleaning up punctuation, things like that.

And, you know, things where I say that, I'm saying things repetitively. But it's just funny because there's some things that they keep changing. I'm like, I'm not changing that. This part has to stay in the book. Anyway, so it's just kind of fun. So anyway, so today's lesson, nothing to do with what I just talked about.

But as you may or may not know, ClickFunnels is having our five-year birthday on Monday. And so we are making some changes and having some fun things. And so we thought, well, we need to get people to come on a Facebook Live so I can announce these changes. And we thought, you know, we'll just do a Facebook Live. But if we did that, who knows how many people would come on. And so we decided we were like,

I wanted to make more of a formal presentation and there's some big changes and some updates and some things happening. So I made these, I was talking about these changes, but like now we need to get people to show up and be excited for this thing. And so how do we stimulate growth and excitement? And it's fun because I've been studying over the last year a lot of like P.T. Barnum's life. And P.T. Barnum, if you haven't seen The Greatest Showman, like the book or the movie is amazing. But if you studied P like pt barnum's life and pt barnum you haven't seen the greatest showman like the book or the movie is amazing

but um if you studied pt barnum's life he's like the king of publicity and shows like in fact he um uh two days before he died he wrote his own obituary and he published it to the newspapers and and that he had died and they told this whole story and people mess you know came afterwards like why, like, you're still alive. Why did you publish your obituary? He was like, oh, I thought that the death of, uh, that my death would help sell tickets or the news of my death would help sell tickets to the circus or something like that.

Like he's always about creating the buzz and the story and the excitement and the, the whatever to be able to, you know, to sell more tickets or to be able to deliver the message or whatever the, whatever the, the thing to be able to sell more tickets or to be able to deliver the message or whatever the thing might be. And so for us, we were thinking, how do we cause some noise? How do we get some excitement? Let's make this not just like, hey, Russell's doing an announcement. You should show up because then no one's going to show up. We needed to get people excited.

And what's happened has been like a show. We could write a whole book on what happens. What happened is initially we're like, well, what if we got people to start rumors? Like we got people to go post on their Facebooks, you know, like, oh, did you hear the rumors that ClickFunnels is selling or that these things are happening? And so we were thinking about that, right? That's not really as good. And so instead what we did is when I was in Fiji, I recorded a video.

And the video, if you haven't seen it yet, it's on, it's on Facebook and on YouTube, but it was me kind of like talking about some of these changes and, and I'm obviously nervous about them. And so I, I didn't try to hide that. And, and, um, and I made this very vague, very cryptic announcement. I talked about what some of the rumors are. You know, some people have rumors that we're acquiring a company. Some people, some rumors are that we were selling, I'm going, we're in public or I'm retiring or all these things. And, you know, and, um, and, um, I haven't been able to tell anyone, but I'm going to tell everybody on Monday. And so that's been kind of, um, the thing is that, in fact, I think this podcast would

probably go live today. So, um, that's the case and you know about it now it's happening on Monday. So Monday the announcement will happen and I'll, I'll tell you guys about kind of what it is afterwards. And if you've been listening to the podcast, you have some, some hints and some updates. One of the big ones is that this is just one part of a three part announcement. Uh, one part announcing, um, right now, one part announcing Fun Locking Live and one part announcing on my birthday, March 8th.

And so these are, these are three big, fun, exciting things that are happening. And so anyway, the reason why I'm telling you this is because what's been happening has been crazy. I've been watching people online meltdown. I've been watching people post on their own page, what's happening? People taking bets. Like, I think ClickFunnels is selling. I think this is happening.

I think Russell's doing this. I think this. And like, everybody's's speculating like crazy. And it's causing all this buzz. And it's been insane to me, because I've been getting text messages from all my friends. People I haven't heard from in a long time. People texting me like, oh, good luck on the news.

Good luck on this. We're nervous for you. We're praying for you. All these things. Today, I got in the car to take my kids to school. And I pick up these kids in the neighborhood. And when the kids jumped into the car, again, these are kids that go to school. And, um, and I pick up these other kids in the neighborhood. And when the kids jumped in into the car, again, these are kids that go to school with my, with my kids. And, uh, and the

first thing he asked is like, what's your now it's happening on Monday. I'm like, wait, what, what? And my kid's like, what dad, what's happening? I'm like, Oh my gosh, this has gotten all the way to like the neighborhood kids. And, uh, they were like, yeah, my parents were talking about last night for like 30 minutes, trying to speculate what they thought was going to happen. And, and it's like, Oh my gosh, this is so cool. Um, so I hope you guys are watching this because, um, there is a real announcements happening. There are multiple announcements happening over the next couple of months, but, um, we could have easily just gone in and told people, Hey, we're making announcement about blah.

But instead we talked about, we're making announcement and it's not these things. And by talking about what it's not, um, or we're making announcement and it's not these things. And by talking about what it's not, um, or we didn't say it's not about these things. We said that people are speculating that it's about these things. Um, and I'll tell you exactly what it is. And by, by, by saying that and, uh, and saying what people were speculating, then it caused people to really speculate. And it's caused all this this all of this controversy and all these these people talking about it and it's just been like one of the most organic fun cool promotions we've ever done and so it's got my mind thinking like man i don't want to ever speak or do facebook

live or do an announcement without this kind of buzz behind like how do we how do we craft this how do we choreograph this how do we how do we create this when we have a new webinar coming out we have a new thing like how do we make it so that we get this kind of buzz behind it. Like, how do we, how do we craft this? How do we choreograph this? How do we, how do we create this? And when we have new webinar coming out, we have a new thing, like, how do we make it so that we get this kind of buzz behind it? Cause it causes it, you know, when you get people talking about your business and creating speculation and all these things, um, it's really, really fascinating. It's been crazy. And I'm excited to see on the Facebook live Monday, how many people actually show up. Um, I don't think it's going to be a few. I think there's going to be insane amounts of people. Um, just for, just from the amount of people that have texted me personally, people who haven't heard from in years, um, who are all in the middle of this,

my neighbor kids and their parents talking about it, you know, like online, seeing people posting on their own social profiles and people, um, you know, just, just causing this controversy. And it's, um, it's been really fun to watch and a really interesting marketing lesson. So, um, for you, I'd start looking at your business, like what's, what's an announcement you could make or you should make? Um, and then how do you cause the buzz and behind that, you know? Um, it also makes you think about that for any new webinar idea or any new announcement or any new product or any new whatever, how do you, how do you craft that, that much engagement? engagement you know steven larson i was his offer mind event he talked a lot about how like a lot of people think it's just the offer i think it's just the funnel it's like no like those those are parts of you have to have an amazing offer it's an amazing funnel but then it's like the

campaign you create to cause the buzz that pushes people with that funnel like that's a whole other art and science is the is the art of creating campaigns and creating buzz and doing these kinds of things. And, um, it's interesting if you, if you watch the people that are great at this, um, you know, I've been, I've been watching as I've been writing the book and like, you know, editing the book and things like that. Every once in a while, like my brain has a lot of pain. So I'm like, I gotta, I gotta take a 20 minute break on something. And so I'll go and I'll, you know, watch different things or things that are short though. So like, for example, I was watching the Conor McGregor Khabib fight,

which, you know, all my UFC fighter friends and wrestlers would know this, but it was like this big fight that happened a couple months ago. And it's like, I watched that, but like I was watching all the pre stuff that built up to the fight, right? It wasn't just like two dudes stepped in the ring,

started fighting. It's like, no, there's this campaigning and there's this talk, trash talking, and there's the, the pre-weigh-ins and the stare down and the trash talking. And then after the matches, the, you know, Khabib jumping over the, the side of the cage and all these things that caused the drama. It's, it's, it's all the campaign buildup that makes us care about this fight, right? Um, because if two people just jumped in a ring and started fighting, nobody would care.

It's like, it's what's the campaign ahead of time that creates the buzz and makes people want to know what's happening, right? Because that's the one you guys are thinking about with your businesses. It's like, what are the things I can do? I have a really good book to read, probably the best book to read on this. Joe Vitale wrote this book. It's called There's a Customer Born Every Minute, and it's the life story of P.T. um, through the lens of how he did his marketing. And, um, I sent

this, uh, two years ago to all the two comic club X, um, students. I was like, read this book. You guys, it is so good. Um, but PT Barnum, um, like I said, he lived back in the early 1900s and this is before the internet and everything. So he had to go and create this buzz to get people to come to the show. And, and, um, again, if you watch the greatest showman, you saw a glimpse of it. But, um, if you, if you study his life and especially that book, that book is really good. There's a customer born every minute by Joe Vitale. Um, if you read that book, you'll see how he created all these things. He called them humbugs. Like, uh, we need to create a humbug, um, which is like a you know a a fake story to cause buzz and back then they didn't have the ftc and and you know they didn't have all the

legal regulations like most of the stuff that pt barnum did back then would probably be illegal nowadays but um you know he did these things to create buzz like he did uh stephen larson at offer minor showing he did this this campaign where it's like i can't remember what it was like a mermaid monkey or something and basically it was like a big fish and a monkey and he and he took the corpse of it like and like sewed them together so it looked like it was a monkey mermaid or something like that i can't remember and like put these ads in newspapers showing the picture of this monkey mermaid it literally was just like he took a dead monkey and a dead huge fish and he like sewed them together.

But you use that as his publicity to like get people to come to the circus and come to his, his, um, his museums and like all these crazy things. And so I just want you to just, I just, I hope you're watching this campaign.

I hope that you're paying attention. I hope that you're thinking about what can I do in my business to stimulate growth and controversy and people talking and like, um, because man, this is the best viral free organic exposure of anything we've ever done. It all started with a two minute video that I filmed in Fiji, um, telling the story about, about the rumors that people have been throwing around. And if I'm completely honest, um, there were no rumors. Um, I caused those rumors. So there you go. Just my marketing secrets, friends. You guys know behind the scenes, like I'm the one, there was nobody saying, I wonder if ClickFunnels is getting

bought or sold or going public or going, you know, if Russell's retiring or whatever, like none of those things people were saying, but I said, you know, my video, I said that there's, there's been whispers of this. And it was like, I was whispering about it with my team. And so, but by putting those things out there, it causes the whispers, it causes the thing. So anyway, it's fun. It's exciting. I think you guys are all going to enjoy it. So hopefully you're enjoying the show. Um, come on Monday. If you get in, depending when you get this, uh, Monday, we'll be making the first of three big announcements and they are big announcements. Um, each one progressively bigger. And then, um, and then there's, there's one, ah, there's one thing I can't tell you guys all yet.

Oh, even on these announcements that I'm excited for. But, um, I did buy just, you know, I bought bootstrap.com and my next book is gonna be called bootstrap.com. It's going to be telling the ClickFunnels story. And in that book, I will be able to tell you the full story. Um, anyway, there's, there's reasons I can't explain all right now that will make more sense when you read the book someday. But, um, yeah, that book I'm excited for. It's going to be the first non like how to book. It's going to be just the story, the story of ClickFunnels. Like how did this come to be? How do all the weird characters meet together to create this thing and the movement and the ups and the downs and the,

um, all this stuff. So how many of you guys are pumped for that book? I'm excited. So anyway, that's it. I'm going to bounce. I appreciate you guys all for listening. Hope you have a good day. And if you do get this before Monday, I'll see you on the Monday announcement. If you get this later, that's really cool.

My next podcast episode will probably be recorded. One of the near future ones will be talking about that and what came from it. So we'll go from there. Thanks, everybody, and we'll talk to you soon. Want more marketing secrets? If so, then go get your copies of my two best-selling books. Book number one is called Expert Secrets, and you can get a free copy at expertsecrets.com. And book number two is called Dot Com Secrets, and you can get your free copy at dotcomsecrets.com.

Inside these two books, you'll find my top 35 secrets that we've used to become the fastest growing non-VC backed SaaS startup company in the world.