The Russell Brunson Show - The History And Math That Will Actually Grow Your Company

Episode Date: May 21, 2018

Most entrepreneurs don't love history or math, but when they understand this principle, it'll make it really, really fun. On this episode Russell talks about knowing the history and math of your industry to be able to grow your business. Here are some awesome things he discusses in today's episode: Why knowing the history of your industry will make it easier for you to market and grow your business. What it means to know the math of your business and why that helps it magically grow. And Why it's important to remember that you are not entitled to success just because you worked hard. So listen here to find out why if you know the history and math of your industry, you are more likely to have success within it. Transcript - https://marketingsecrets.com/blog/the-history-and-math-that-will-actually-grow-your-company Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Air Transat presents two friends traveling in Europe for the first time and feeling some pretty big emotions. This coffee is so good. How do they make it so rich and tasty? Those paintings we saw today weren't prints. They were the actual paintings. I have never seen tomatoes like this. How are they so red? With flight deals starting at just $589, it's time for you to see what Europe has to offer. Don't worry, you can handle it. Visit airTransat.com for details. Conditions apply. AirTransat. Travel moves us. Good morning, everybody. This is Russell Brunson.

I want to welcome you to the Marketing Secrets Podcast. Today, we're going to be talking about marketing history and marketing math. 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 answer. My name is Russell Brunson and welcome to Marketing Secrets. as I was studying, I was listening to Mr. Dan Kennedy, who's still one of my favorite

people to study in this marketing world. And it was kind of fun. I was listening the last like 48 hours or so. And last time I listened to one of his courses and in the middle of the course, he was talking about me. I was like, how cool that Dan Kennedy is talking about me at one of his events and seminars. So anyway, that made my whole night and got me more set to listen to him. And this morning he started talking about, uh, what his criteria are to do, to do a deal with somebody to, to like be in business with them or to work with them. And, uh, there was a couple of fascinating things. One of them obviously was like, can you find three other people that have done at least

one deal with that person that would do a second deal? And, uh, and I think that was a good one he was talking about. He's like, some of them have divorced once or twice, so maybe there's a reason. But they've been divorced nine times, and there's probably something wrong. It's probably them. It's probably not the other person at that point. And it's kind of funny he was talking about that. But then he's talked about three criteria. So I'll walk through those. So the number one criteria was he doesn't want, he would never work with somebody who

is entitled. And so when he was talking about entitlement, he was talking about, he has watched Shark Tank. And he said he started tracking this over the last like two or three years. And in Shark Tank, they always have the little video before the person comes and presents their package, kind of telling, presents their package kind of telling, or their product kind of telling about their business, right? And he said that entitlement is when they're like, oh, you know, we spent our whole life savings.

I quit my job. I did all this kind of stuff. And so like, I just have to get a deal. Like the sharks have to give me money. Where it's like out of a point of desperation or entitlement, like, oh, because I sacrificed everything, I should get this thing. And he said, if you look at the Shark Tank, the 48 people that he counted, since he started counting, that their little package before their pitch happened, he said only four of those 48 ever got a deal. Whereas the average, if you look at Shark Tank as a whole, one out of three get a deal.

So coming at something where you think you should be successful because you worked hard and because you put forth the time is not, it's not like a good reason. Like it has nothing to do with it. Um, and so like entitlement of like, well, I should be successful. I've been killing myself on this. I've been studying, I've been reading, I've been learning. And it's like, that is not entitled to success. Like that's, that's, that's not the right thing. So that was number one. Uh, number two, he said that you have to understand intimately the history of the industry that you're going in. He said, for example, if you were going to go and you wanted to be in the personal development success space, he's like, if the only thing you know about

personal development going back was like, was thinking grow rich. And that was like this far back in history of that, of your industry, you'd gone. He says he would never do deal with you. So there's so much stuff that happened pre thinking grow rich. There's so many, um, people and like stuff that happened that if you hadn't studied back that far in history, he would not actually work with you. I think that's, and that, that one's actually when I completely agree with, it blows my mind. Have people come into an industry. I had someone who joined one of our coaching programs who was, uh, wanted to be a real

estate guru. And I was like, cool. And I'm not a real estate guru, but I happen to do my homework in every market that I'm in or that I'm interested in. And, uh, and I know who all, you know, I know a lot of the real estate gurus are. And, um, and I asked this person, I was like, I was like, so do you know, so-and-so and so-and-so and so-and-so that I can never heard of, never heard of, never heard of them. And I was like, you are doomed. Then if you don't know the history of your market, how are you supposed to come in and compete in that market? You don't know what other people's offers have been throughout time. You don't know

what's worked, what hasn't worked. Like you don't know these things, you are going to struggle. You have to know the history of the industry that you're going in. Okay. Um, I mean, it kind of leads back to my point today. I've spent the last two days binging out on Dan Kennedy, um, uh, who, uh, for all intents and purposes is, you know, he's, he's the history of this industry. Like, and I go back further than that. Like I study like Robert Collier. I study, um, um, I'm going to blink out and all the top of my head, but like, I study all the old time marketing sales books, Gary Halbert, like even prior to that, like I study a geek out, a nerd out, all those kinds of things. If you look at my library in here, you would never, you would look at it and you'd be

like, I've never heard of any of these book trusts. And I'm like, I know these are the history books of my industry. There's a reason why I'm successful now. Cause I studied direct mail. I studied clear back to the pony express when people were delivering stuff through, uh, by horse, right? Um, like I know this market inside and out. That's why I'm able to compete because I know the history of it.

Okay. So all history in school is useless. History in your marketplace is essential. Um, and so if you don't know your market, now it's time to start like geeking out and figuring out the history. So while history in school is useless, history in your marketplace is essential. So if you don't know your market, now it's time to start geeking out and figuring out the history. For me, I spent $400 or $500 a month on eBay buying old marketing and sales books. Go to your industry and go search on eBay for old stuff that's been published in the past and buy it and read it and study it and learn it. Because if you understand the history of where you are at, you're going to be more successful in the future of where you're trying to go.

So study the history of your market. And then number three is understand the math of your business. So really, it was kind of interesting. Don't be entitled. Have a deep understanding of the history of your industry and then understand the math of your business. And the math is the numbers, right? How much does it cost to acquire a customer? How much do you make from your customers on average?

You know, how much would your average car value? What's your stick rate? Like all those kinds of things are vitally, vitally important. And if you don't know the math, then you're in trouble as well. If you go watch Shark Tank, you notice like the one question that all the sharks always ask is how much does it cost to acquire a customer? And like half the time the people like blankly stare over and they're like, uh, I don't know. I don't know the answer to that. Like they, they have no idea. It's like, how are you supposed to compete if you don't know that?

Like you need to come in and know like, Hey, this is about what it costs me to acquire a customer. When you know that, then you can work on a funnel that's going to give you more than the cost to acquire a customer so that you can be profitable or break even and that you acquire customers. Now you can go and you can sell them other things in the future. That's how we grow and scale companies. So anyway, I thought it was interesting today because most of us internet nerds and entrepreneurs aren't obsessed with history or math,

but history and math in the confines of what we're talking about is actually really exciting. My grandpa was a history professor at Brigham Young University. He's written like 10 books on history. Man, and I love him and I go talk to him and I ask him questions about history and he tells me and my eyes glaze over. Like, I like 10 books on history, man. And I love him. And I go talk to him and I ask him questions about history. And he tells me in my eyes glaze over, like, I'm not interested

in history. I love Christopher Columbus. Gratefully came here, but I don't really care about all that stuff. Right. But, and so if I can think about history, typically I'm like, I don't want to do that. But history of my market. Oh, I'm obsessed with it. I love it. I love finding out about the old school guys who were licking stamps and gluing them on envelopes and shipping them out. Like, what do they know? What do they understand that I didn't understand? Like, what are the things I can learn from them that I can then come back and apply in my market? Okay. And if you look at, it's interesting, the marketing, like the ninja secret stuff that I come out with that people are like, Whoa, Russell, how did you think of that? And I'm like, Oh,

cause Ogilvy did it. Like who's Ogilvy? I'm like some dude who's been dead for a long, long, long time. Okay. Like I study the greats. I understand where this market came from. And because of that, I'm able to compete at a different level in this market because I know history. It's interesting. I even, even not like the long history. Like I look at 15 years ago, the things that I was doing to grow a list and build a company,

like I'm bringing a lot of those things back. And it's interesting because those were the, because I know the history, I'm able to bring these things back that are dead, lost arts. I talked about this before, like, like selling from stage is a perfect webinar. Like I don't think I'm the best stage presenter in the world. Um, but I do think that it's a dead art. I think that when I got started as a business, there were some amazing stage presenters who were a million times better than me. Um, so I studied and I learned the art of it. Okay. I studied history. And then when these guys all retired, there's no one else doing it. And I came back and started doing it with the stuff I learned from back in the day. And the history lesson

gave me the ability where I was able to stand on stage two months ago and do $3 million, 90 minutes, which is a world record. So imagine if one of the greats came to that, they would have crushed me. Okay. Um, but I understand history and therefore I'm able to use in the present. Um, and then the math, um, I hate math more than anyone. I hate Excel. I hate all those kinds of things, but I do know the numbers that drive my company. We have a big TV screen in our office. When you walk in, I can look at it. I can see the numbers and the metrics. And, and, um, I have this weird thing that I know is when you look at numbers, what you track grows. So I look at it, I see it, and then I can figure out how to grow it. Um, it's a magical, amazing thing. In fact, today, I woke up this morning a little

heavier than I like to be. So I downloaded my fit pal or whatever that app is. And, and I told Melanie and told my wife, I told her this week, like any food that crosses my lips have to go to my, my fit pal. So I can track it. So I can see what I'm actually eating. And soon you're aware of what you're actually putting in your mouth and what actually equals out in calories, then you're like, oh crap, I should eat differently or change some things. It's like this morning I did my supplements and usually I think supplements are zero calories because it's just like they're supplements, but I actually put them all in there and it's

like 200 calories in supplements. I'm like, oh crap, I just put 200 calories in that I wasn't accounting for. Maybe that's the thing that's putting me over the edge right now on top of all the other stuff I'm eating. So you got to know the numbers. Even if you don't love math, find someone who loves math but give you the core numbers that drive your company and your business and then look at them. And just by looking at them, they'll grow.

It's this weird thing. When I start tracking how big is my list, I look at that number and it would grow because it's like your brain starts trying to figure out ways like how do I make this bigger? How do I make it bigger? And it's weird. You look at that number and your, your body, your brain, your mind, you will automatically find the answers to it. It's kind of cool how that works. So there you go, guys. First off,

you're not entitled to nothing. Number two, master the history, understand the history of your industry. And number three, learn the math of your business. Now you got history, math, and now you can actually have a business. Know your numbers, know your business, no numbers, no business. Okay. Now I probably can't see me spelling it out, but know your numbers. K-N-O-W, know your business. K-N-O-W, your business, no numbers, N-O, no numbers, no business, no business. Okay. Someone told me that one time. I don't remember who, but it was amazing. So know your numbers, know your business. If you have no numbers, then you have no business. So that's why the math's important as well.

All right, guys, that said, appreciate you all. Have an amazing day. Go dominate the world. Go find some history of the market that you are in. Understand it, study it, learn it. It's part of your homework assignment for this week. Appreciate you all, and we'll talk to you soon. Bye, everybody.

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