Podcasts about why brent

In this episode, the Gleason Bros. welcome OG co-host Phil Jacques back for the second week in a row and discuss: Why Brent looked like a drunken idiot at Stafford, we go really in depth on local racing, and how short tracks should be operating. Follow us on Instagram @makinglapspodcast and on Facebook at facebook.com/makinglapspodcast Find the show on every major podcast platform!

Sandy and Dr. Brent Jackson discuss:- How a physician’s career can feel like a game of Pachinko- The power of forming relationships with other physicians- Why a “steady paycheck” can mean less autonomy- Brent’s go-to tips for relieving stress- Why emotional literacy is important and why it’s overlooked (plus the “5 Whys” mental exercise)- Why Brent pursued an MBA, and what came out of itBrent Jackson is the VP/Chief Medical Officer at Dignity Health, Mercy General Hospital. He is a Physician executive experienced with inpatient/outpatient Utilization Management, physician leadership, quality/process improvement, and organizational change.

EPISODE 6 Cash buyer update from Jamil… how their buying criteria has changed, and how you must adapt 3 things you need to be negotiating into your deals How to use Pace’s “I’m not a buyer for your home” script to get deals iBuyers are OUT!!! Why this is a HUGE opportunity for wholesalers Brent’s 5 steps you need to take now to survive and THRIVE in the next 90 days (and come out stronger than ever!) Which call centers are still open for business Why Brent’s quality leads have QUADRUPLED in the last week, and why now is the best time to get into wholesaling and start Talking To People The pros and cons of getting a real estate license How Pace is using videos in his text message marketing to stand out from the competition and get more deals Hard money update: are lenders still lending? The new formula for how you should be evaluating land deals, and why developers are still HOT

Brent is a Vice President of Wealth Management with GCG Financial, having been a member of the firm since 1995. He has been serving clients, their families and their businesses since 1989 with a particular knowledge and focus on the accumulation and preservation of assets along with risk management. Brent meets his clients' financial needs through the use of the extensive resources and professionals at GCG, as well as through trusted outside advisor offices. Brent received his Bachelor of Science degree in Economics from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. He graduated with honors with a concentration in entrepreneurial management. He received his Chartered Financial Consultant® (ChFC®) designation in 1999. Brent played seven seasons in the NFL. He was with the Chicago Bears in 1988 and the Minnesota Vikings from 1989-1994. In a career that included over 100 special teams tackles, Brent retired after a serious neck injury. He is a member of the Chicago Jewish Sports Hall of Fame. Active in many charities and organizations, Brent serves as the President for the NFL Players Association Former Players Chicago Chapter. He is also the Treasurer of B'nai B'rith Sports Lodge and the Chair for their scholarship program. Brent and his wife Andrea live in the northwest suburbs with their three children, Alec, Zachary, and Mackenzie. Brent is a brown belt in Taekwondo, enjoys softball and family time, and is an avid, bad golfer. What you'll learn about in this episode: Brent shares his career journey and how he came to work at GCG Financial, and how his career took an unexpected turn thanks to an injury and chance encounter How Brent's time with the Minnesota Vikings came to an end after a career-ending neck injury, and how he discovered a new purpose after his NFL career How Brent transitioned from professional football to a career in the business world by using internships to learn what he didn't want to do How the competitive lessons Brent learned on the football field helped him approach the business world with the right mindset Why Brent believes the most important skill he has picked up is networking and the ability to connect people with others who can help them with their needs How Brent's mindset and attitude allowed him to succeed in football, and how he worked to make himself valuable enough that the coaches couldn't cut him How GCG Financial works to bring in the right people who fit the culture, and how it helps to add companies who already have a strong culture How Brent has found LinkedIn to be a powerful and useful networking tool, and why personalizing your outreach is the key to successful interactions on LinkedIn Why Brent believes that the important thing people need to do to find success in business is to take action and keep doing the things that work for them Additional resources: Website: https://gcgfinancial.com/team/brent-novoselsky-chfc/ LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/brentnovoselsky/

Brent Beshore is the CEO of Adventur.es, a private equity firm. Adventur.es has a totally different approach to private equity that makes them stand out in the industry. Brent and his team have even written a book to help business owners navigate the tricky and messy world of Mergers and Acquisitions. We discuss the book and why Brent thought it was important to write it. He explains why he prefers employees who don’t have previous experience in the private equity space, and how it makes Adventur.es different from the traditional private equity firm. What you will learn: How Brent stumbled into private equity. How Adventur.es raises money. The lessons Brent learned in the early days of his business. Why Brent and his team wrote The Messy Marketplace. What makes Adventur.es unique in the market. The benefits of over-communicating with your clients. How Brent treats his clients. What normally goes wrong in a private equity firm’s approach. The 4 key elements Adventur.es keeps in every deal. You shouldn’t need a Ph.D. to understand your deal structure. Why Adventur.es doesn’t use traditional financing. The broken private equity system what it means for the market. Why lower markets can’t get traction in this culture. Brent’s “do no harm” rule. Takeaways: M&A is a messy world and Brent’s book is a great resource to help business owners get a grip on the complicated ins and outs of private equity. Do your due diligence and take the time to really research your prospects before you jump into anything. If you are interested in the accelerator program, then you can reach out to me at ryan@gexpcollaborative.com or LinkedIn. We also have a page on the website with more information. Links and Resources: GEXP Collaborative GEXP Accelerator Program Brent on Twitter Adventur.es The Messy Marketplace: Selling Your Business in a World of Imperfect Buyers by Brent Beshore How To Acquire Your First Small(er) Company by Brent Beshore Buy Then Build: How Acquisition Entrepreneurs Outsmart the Startup Game by Walker Deibel Conscious Capitalism by John Mackey About Brent: Brent leads the Adventur.es firm, and more specifically the acquisition and diligence teams while supporting portfolio company oper

Building Confidence In Your Self Can Have A Huge Boost To Your Business My guest today, on the Steve Jobs inspired Join Up Dots free podcast interview is a man who first appeared on Join Up Dots back on episode 103. When the show was just a baby compared to what it is today. Back then we discussed the unusual concept that sales is in fact a honorable profession. Wait I hear you say…surely I didn't hear the words Sales and honourable in the same sentence? But our guest waxed lyrical about why he felt that it was in fact true, and why since 2000 he had focused his time, passions and energy's in the world of Insurance Brokerage, coming out the other end hardened by the work that he was performing. As he said he was bloodied, bruised, kicked in the teeth, chewed-up, and spit-out. But instead of becoming cynical to this work, he instead developed a passion for helping others learn from his successes, mistakes and backstory. Focusing on four main areas, Sales training, Attitude, Connections and Loyalty he worked tirelessly to create success in his life. And now he has managed to take these concepts and turn them into a personal branding encompassing coaching, training, and keynote presentations across America. He is a man on fire, and certainly from my perspective seems to be in control of what he is doing, where perhaps the last time he was on the show wasn't quite the case. So how has he done this and still juggled the issues that comes with being a family man. And is he where he wants to be in his life, or now is he aiming for bigger and bigger things that he just couldn't have dreamt possible back in the early days. Well let's find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Mr Brent Kelly. Show Highlights During the show we discussed such weighty topics with Brent Kelly such as: Why there is a comfort level across the world, which has led to so many people to simply follow what everyone else is doing, which is a huge mistake. Follow the crowd and see your prospects diminish massively. Go your own way and get the rewards. Why Brent realises that their was a confidence issue in his life, which lead him to not fully grasp the value he could bring to the world. When this came together for him then everything became so much easier. Why the world is more and more looking for the "how long it is going to take" answer, whilst they should actually be looking at "How can I become good?" and lastly…. Why you shouldn't be worried about the comparisons that you see online today even though there are so many. Just get your head down and do the work.

Be a fly on the wall during the ClickFunnels partner meeting and hear the #1 thing each of us learned on our journey so far. On this episode we get to hear from the entire Clickfunnels partnership team. They all share the big takeaways they have received as they have watched the company soar to over a hundred million dollars a year in revenue. Here are some of the cool things you will hear. How Russell learned that having a great partnership and team was better than being on his own. Why Todd thinks it’s important to have someone who is obsessed with the product you’re selling. Why Dave thinks the Dream 100 is so important. How John prioritizes and delegates to make sure everything is done by the appropriate people. Why Brent thinks it’s important to stay small and nimble as long as possible and why you shouldn’t sweat the small stuff. And why Ryan believes that constraints are not a limiting factor, but what helps you focus and succeed. So listen here to find out what the Clickfunnels partnership team members have learned that have lead the company to surpass their goal of a hundred million dollars in revenue a year. ---Transcript--- What’s up everybody, this is Russell Brunson. Welcome to the Marketing Secrets podcast. Today is a special episode, we’re here above the ice right here, there’s hockey happening down there. But we’re in our partner planning meeting, here are all the cofounding partners of Clickfunnels, hanging out and plotting world domination. The theme of today’s event and the theme of this podcast is this: It comes from social network, millions of dollars isn’t cool. You know what is cool? A billion dollars. Alright everybody, so welcome back. We’re excited to have you guys here. We’ve been here locked up in this awesome office for the last day and a half planning world domination and how to make Clickfunnels better for you as a user, how to get more of you as users, so we can serve more people, more audiences and more entrepreneurs. It’s been really, really fun. We’ve been going around plotting and scheming and planning and creating and doing and a whole bunch of really fun stuff. So I thought we’d take a quick ten minute break here and I thought it’d be fun because we actually had a call yesterday with, I guess they’re not really competitors, a cool company that we like what they do. We’re potentially interesting in maybe buying them or whatever. It’s funny because they’ve been watching what we’re doing, obviously and he’s like, “You guys are what, 10 million dollars a year in revenue?” and we’re like, “No.” So in case you guys are wondering, we passed $10 million in revenue year one. We’re year three. So I thought it would be kind of fun to maybe look at this, a little bit ago, like 2 months ago we passed a hundred million in revenue. So we went from zero to a hundred million dollars in about 3 years. And I wanted to say what was the biggest aha that each of us individually got, that we’ve learned in that process. So you guys get ideas from everybody inside the team here. So just a really quick intro with everybody, then I’ll share my aha and then move on. So I’m Russell, I’m the nerd who is the dancing monkey who’s talking about Clickfunnels all day long. That’s what I do here. This is Todd Dickerson, he is the genius that built all of the original Clickfunnels and look at that beard, so manly. Over here, this is Dave, he’s all the business development stuff, he’s got the retro Clickfunnels shirt on. Then over here is John, he does all of our ads, and if you see us every day on every platform it’s because of that guy, so blame him. Over here we have Brent Coppieters, he does all our operations stuff and he’s going to be transitioning to a bunch of our new, something we can’t talk about live or publically yet. It’s going to be cool. And this is Ryan, what’s up Ryan. Ryan is the genius who is always coding. So I thought it would be fun to give you different people’s perspective, because obviously we’re all in different parts of the company, lifting different parts, doing different things, so I thought it’d be interesting to hear everybody’s ideas. So I’ll start with mine. So I think the biggest takeaway, I shared this last night with these guys, is as I was growing my business initially, the first 8 or 9 years I was very, I don’t know what the right word is, scarcity mindset or whatever. Where it’s like, I am Russell. I am the leader. I own the company, and all these things. And I think I had one or two deals with partners that went sour because I was like, I will never have a partner, I will only be me. It’s funny, with that mindset and that attitude, we were able to get to this level and we kind of camped out there. And I’m lucky for me, Todd came in. Trojan horsed his way in, where he basically worked for free for an entire year, which was awesome. And then we worked together for a couple of years. I don’t even know how many years it was ahead of time, a couple of years before that, and then we had the idea for Clickfunnels. We were sitting in an office in Boise, we bought the domain, we were going to call it something different and then we finally found Clickfunnels, we bought the domain, then for a whole week we were mapping out on the whiteboard everything. At the end of the week, and this is to kind of take you back, this is on the backend, we had 100 employees, the whole thing collapsed, we had to fire 80 people. I had to go from a 20 thousand square foot building to a 2 thousand and we could barely afford the rent. It was the most humbling, painful time of my life. I think that the Lord or whoever, whatever you want to call it, humbled me to a spot where I was willing to say yes to this. And I am so eternally grateful that I did. But at the end of that week Todd was like, “Okay, I’m going to go back to Atlanta. I’m going to build this thing, the Clickfunnels thing. But I don’t want to do it as an employee, I want to do it as a partner.” And the Russell two or three years earlier than that would have been like, “Um nope. This is the Russell show.” And I would have done something stupid like that. But luckily I was at a point where I was sufficiently humble. I was like, you know what I’m going to do that. And I’m so grateful that I did because then Todd built Clickfunnels. Holy crap, seriously. It’s insane. And then after that, that’s when we brought in these other guys as partners as well. They’re all rockstar people. It wasn’t just like, “I’m going to give you a base salary.” Or whatever. It was like, “Okay, come in and become a partner in this thing.” For me it’s like, as you find the right people and incentivize them….If I were to ever build a company again, I would never build a company where Russell’s the thing. We went and watched Justice League last night, so maybe this is because it’s in my head. Justice League, Avengers, Batman, whatever. I would literally, if I ever build a company again, the initial thought will be, I’m going to build my Avengers team, my Justice League. I’m Batman, there’s Iron Man, everyone’s got their spot. Ryan’s Wonder Woman, I just want to look like Aqua Man, that dude is ripped. But if I ever start a company again, the first thought will not be, what product should I sell? It will be what team should we assemble? And then I would carve out where everyone’s roles were going to be. I’m not going to be CEO next time, so any of you guys can pick that, I’m done after this. But we each pick our different roles and then from there, collectively, be like, “What should we create? What should we build? Who should we serve?” And then we’d go from that. So my biggest takeaway from going from zero to a hundred million dollars is definitely give up control, build your Avenger team ahead of time, because Russell Brunson could have never gotten here. It took these guys and the team we built to create that. Anyway, there’s my number one. So I’m handing it off to Todd now to share the biggest thing he’s learned from going from zero to a hundred million dollars. Todd: What’s funny is that I was actually thinking about saying very similar things. One of the biggest things is the team. Seeing how to build a team around you and actually do things as a team as opposed to by yourself independently. That’s how I’ve always done things in the past, on my own more or less, same type of scenario. But I think something else that stands out to me is having someone who is obsessive about the product itself. We always talk about how marketing is the big thing, and it is. But if you’re focused on the marketing, you still need someone on your team that is obsessed with the actual product. Making sure you’re delivering the best possible thing to people. So when you sell it to them, they actually like it and they come back and want more. So that’s my other big epiphany I think that I’ve had over the past… Russell: Especially in our world. Our world, everybody’s obsessed with marketing, rightfully so. A lot of times if you’re in the marketing and product, if you do them both, it’s really, really hard. I tried to build software companies in the past where I was like the marketing guy, plus trying to convince the developers how to do it. Whereas with this, you were able to run with the product and I could just sell. Todd: Absolutely. That’s why I think that’s worked as a great partnership. Russell focuses on the marketing and I focus on the product. And I think having that really makes a difference. Pass it on to Dave here. Dave: Hey there. So we talk about this all the time and I cannot express the importance of it, and that’s the Dream 100. So I took a look back on everything that’s happened as far as first of all having an amazing product and then amazing leaders, and then Todd and Russell, the two of them are amazing together. I think the part for me, is I look at everything we’ve built over the last three years now, is the importance of the Dream 100. Originally Dream 100, as far as affiliates, and even most recently when we did the book launch, what I really learned a lot from that was the importance of understanding it’s a Dream 100 per platform as well. So as far as your influencers, where are they at? Are they on YouTube, are they on Facebook, are they on Twitter, or are they in Instagram? Wherever they might be. And then as recently, as far as, a new Dream 100, as far as hiring partners that you really want to end up working with long term. So for me, I think the most important thing is when you start looking at building something, is really identifying your Dream 100 and then being very, very consistent in continuing to mail out every single month to them. Establishes and builds that relationship with them, they get used to seeing you. It’s been fascinating as we’ve gone out and traveled and go to these different places and people remember the boxes and things that have been sent. And they’re like, “Oh, how do I get on that list?” And if they’re asking to be on the list, I don’t need them on the list, I don’t need them basically. But the reality basically says that it actually works. So I would say, in building a hundred million dollar company, and any size company I would definitely say Dream 100 is one of the most important things. John, up to you. John: Alright, so a really interesting journey we’ve been on. It’s been so much fun. One of the things that I’ve learned which is just huge, is prioritizing your time and your tasks. I mean, especially when we’re all internet entrepreneurs, we’re on the computer, it’s so easy. The computer is a gateway to anything. So a huge thing for me is to, before even opening the computer, physically write down or use your phone or use something else that’s not your computer, to structure out. We all do this, Russell does this, I do this. We structure out what we’re going to do.What are the next things I need to do? Because if you can get that basically spiritually created, if you can get that thought through before you actually begin, then it changes everything. Then you’re actually getting through stuff instead of just fumbling along. It’s so easy because we’re all bombarded with a million different things, we could be paying attention to a million different things. Only some of which are really going to move the needle. And the other thing is, especially as you grow your team, as you get more people working with you, it’s about….So I build out that list and then the next thing I ask myself as I go through that list is, “Okay, who can do this? Who can I get to do this? Who can I get to do this?” And that specific question, as I go through the list, as who can I get to do this, that allows me to go through and delegate as much as possible to team members, so then I become more of a leader. Because it’s so easy to just be like, I could just do it all. Yeah, you can probably. But maybe you shouldn’t be doing it all. You know, that’s something to think through. So build out that list, really think through it before you start to take action in the day, prioritize it and then go through and glean through the list and be like, “Who can get to do these things.” Assuming you’ll be doing none of them. Of course there will be a handful that you end up doing, but that way it’s just a mindset that will help you get things delegated properly. Here you go Brent. Brent: Awesome. Hey everybody, it’s good to connect with you. I just want to express how much we appreciate you. Everybody who follows us, who’s obviously dedicated listeners of Russell’s program. It’s funny, more and more as we travel with Russell, even locally here in the Boise area, he’s getting like, people recognize him all over the place. They see the jeep, or they see him in the hallway of the hotel and they’re like, “Hey, I’m your neighbor.” Just these random……Albertsons…..it’s just funny. Anyway, a couple of things. I’ve had the privilege of working with Russell for over 11 years and the one thing I think that you just cannot replace, or that’s absolutely needed is hard work. You have to be dedicated in getting this business and be willing to sacrifice what you need to sacrifice to get going. Another thing that I think we’ve learned through this journey is stay nimble and small as much as you can. Don’t go out and try to lease some big office space until you’ve got sales coming in, consistent sales, your business is in good shape that way. Another thing that we’ve kind of followed here in our company is we’ve been slow to hire and quick to fire. Building a team, and Russell’s done a tremendous job of this, obviously we’ve got great partners here. And then that has extended to our team members. Again, we love all our team members. We are essentially a great family of likeminded individuals who are focused on a goal. And the leadership in this company has helped us all work to achieve that goal. So that’s been awesome as well. So stay small as long as you can, be nimble, be humble, but you gotta work hard. Once you do those things, don’t sweat over the small things. We’ve had different variations of an employee handbook, and I’m just finally getting it out here in the next few weeks. And we’ve been in business three years. So don’t stress about the mistakes. We were somewhere, we were at an event in Denver a few weeks ago, it was related to customer support, and that’s very normal. For small startups, that’s very normal. Those things just come, but don’t worry about those little details. They work themselves out. But work hard and you’ll achieve that success. So I will hand this over to my buddy, Ryan. Ryan: So I love talking about this topic, and I think it’s best summarized as, “Worse is better.” You can do a lot more than you think. Gary V told us that when we met with him on the social media side. We’re like, “We already do everything, we already do a ton, we’re on everything.” He’s like, “You can do more.” And I think this is true on everything we do in engineering, everything we do when it comes to product. You’ve heard it in every single answer from everybody to some degree. But I think the killer, underlining subtext to all that, is that constraints are not a limiting factor. They force you to focus, the focus forces you to prioritize, that forces you to do the one thing everyday that’s most valuable so that you can compete with somebody who’s got 40 million dollars in funding and you’ve got three guys in an office trying to figure it out because it makes you laser focus on the thing you have to do every single day. That’s what enables you to compete at a higher level, that’s what enables, and I believe the most important thing we’ve done in our culture is force everybody, from hiring decisions, to business processes, don’t worry about the handbook, don’t over complicate this, simplify this. Because those constraints are what make us as powerful as we are and what enable to be a hundred million dollar company with a hundred people. To grow to a billion dollars with fewer resources and a fraction of the budget and everything else. Everyone else who’s competing with us, they have no idea how we do it. They’re all like, “Wait, how many engineers do you have? How do you do this? How big are you?” it blows their mind and I think that’s the thing they miss. Those constraints are what enable us to do it. Our weaknesses are our strengths and people see them backwards. And we see it the opposite. That’s why everyone’s so blown away and why nobody gets it. I think that’s our secret sauce in many ways. So I love that. That’s our thing. That’s what I learned, that blew my mind. Russell: That’s awesome. Well, I hope you guys enjoyed this episode. Its fun hanging out and we just want to thank you guys so much for allowing us to serve you and serve your audience. We love what we do. We’re obsessed, we’re passionate, we’ve been up for the last two days going crazy trying to figure out ways to do it better. You know, for us, a lot of people say, “You guys made it to a hundred million. That’s crazy.” That’s step number one for us. We’re just getting started, wait until you see what’s going to be coming out over the next twelve months and beyond. We love you guys, we appreciate you, we’re so grateful for the ability and the right and the gift we have to be able serve you guys in what you guys do. So thanks again so much for everything and we’ll talk to you guys soon, bye everybody.

Be a fly on the wall during the ClickFunnels partner meeting and hear the #1 thing each of us learned on our journey so far. On this episode we get to hear from the entire Clickfunnels partnership team. They all share the big takeaways they have received as they have watched the company soar to over a hundred million dollars a year in revenue. Here are some of the cool things you will hear. How Russell learned that having a great partnership and team was better than being on his own. Why Todd thinks it’s important to have someone who is obsessed with the product you’re selling. Why Dave thinks the Dream 100 is so important. How John prioritizes and delegates to make sure everything is done by the appropriate people. Why Brent thinks it’s important to stay small and nimble as long as possible and why you shouldn’t sweat the small stuff. And why Ryan believes that constraints are not a limiting factor, but what helps you focus and succeed. So listen here to find out what the Clickfunnels partnership team members have learned that have lead the company to surpass their goal of a hundred million dollars in revenue a year.

Be a fly on the wall during the ClickFunnels partner meeting and hear the #1 thing each of us learned on our journey so far. On this episode we get to hear from the entire Clickfunnels partnership team. They all share the big takeaways they have received as they have watched the company soar to over a hundred million dollars a year in revenue. Here are some of the cool things you will hear. How Russell learned that having a great partnership and team was better than being on his own. Why Todd thinks it’s important to have someone who is obsessed with the product you’re selling. Why Dave thinks the Dream 100 is so important. How John prioritizes and delegates to make sure everything is done by the appropriate people. Why Brent thinks it’s important to stay small and nimble as long as possible and why you shouldn’t sweat the small stuff. And why Ryan believes that constraints are not a limiting factor, but what helps you focus and succeed. So listen here to find out what the Clickfunnels partnership team members have learned that have lead the company to surpass their goal of a hundred million dollars in revenue a year. ---Transcript--- What’s up everybody, this is Russell Brunson. Welcome to the Marketing Secrets podcast. Today is a special episode, we’re here above the ice right here, there’s hockey happening down there. But we’re in our partner planning meeting, here are all the cofounding partners of Clickfunnels, hanging out and plotting world domination. The theme of today’s event and the theme of this podcast is this: It comes from social network, millions of dollars isn’t cool. You know what is cool? A billion dollars. Alright everybody, so welcome back. We’re excited to have you guys here. We’ve been here locked up in this awesome office for the last day and a half planning world domination and how to make Clickfunnels better for you as a user, how to get more of you as users, so we can serve more people, more audiences and more entrepreneurs. It’s been really, really fun. We’ve been going around plotting and scheming and planning and creating and doing and a whole bunch of really fun stuff. So I thought we’d take a quick ten minute break here and I thought it’d be fun because we actually had a call yesterday with, I guess they’re not really competitors, a cool company that we like what they do. We’re potentially interesting in maybe buying them or whatever. It’s funny because they’ve been watching what we’re doing, obviously and he’s like, “You guys are what, 10 million dollars a year in revenue?” and we’re like, “No.” So in case you guys are wondering, we passed $10 million in revenue year one. We’re year three. So I thought it would be kind of fun to maybe look at this, a little bit ago, like 2 months ago we passed a hundred million in revenue. So we went from zero to a hundred million dollars in about 3 years. And I wanted to say what was the biggest aha that each of us individually got, that we’ve learned in that process. So you guys get ideas from everybody inside the team here. So just a really quick intro with everybody, then I’ll share my aha and then move on. So I’m Russell, I’m the nerd who is the dancing monkey who’s talking about Clickfunnels all day long. That’s what I do here. This is Todd Dickerson, he is the genius that built all of the original Clickfunnels and look at that beard, so manly. Over here, this is Dave, he’s all the business development stuff, he’s got the retro Clickfunnels shirt on. Then over here is John, he does all of our ads, and if you see us every day on every platform it’s because of that guy, so blame him. Over here we have Brent Coppieters, he does all our operations stuff and he’s going to be transitioning to a bunch of our new, something we can’t talk about live or publically yet. It’s going to be cool. And this is Ryan, what’s up Ryan. Ryan is the genius who is always coding. So I thought it would be fun to give you different people’s perspective, because obviously we’re all in different parts of the company, lifting different parts, doing different things, so I thought it’d be interesting to hear everybody’s ideas. So I’ll start with mine. So I think the biggest takeaway, I shared this last night with these guys, is as I was growing my business initially, the first 8 or 9 years I was very, I don’t know what the right word is, scarcity mindset or whatever. Where it’s like, I am Russell. I am the leader. I own the company, and all these things. And I think I had one or two deals with partners that went sour because I was like, I will never have a partner, I will only be me. It’s funny, with that mindset and that attitude, we were able to get to this level and we kind of camped out there. And I’m lucky for me, Todd came in. Trojan horsed his way in, where he basically worked for free for an entire year, which was awesome. And then we worked together for a couple of years. I don’t even know how many years it was ahead of time, a couple of years before that, and then we had the idea for Clickfunnels. We were sitting in an office in Boise, we bought the domain, we were going to call it something different and then we finally found Clickfunnels, we bought the domain, then for a whole week we were mapping out on the whiteboard everything. At the end of the week, and this is to kind of take you back, this is on the backend, we had 100 employees, the whole thing collapsed, we had to fire 80 people. I had to go from a 20 thousand square foot building to a 2 thousand and we could barely afford the rent. It was the most humbling, painful time of my life. I think that the Lord or whoever, whatever you want to call it, humbled me to a spot where I was willing to say yes to this. And I am so eternally grateful that I did. But at the end of that week Todd was like, “Okay, I’m going to go back to Atlanta. I’m going to build this thing, the Clickfunnels thing. But I don’t want to do it as an employee, I want to do it as a partner.” And the Russell two or three years earlier than that would have been like, “Um nope. This is the Russell show.” And I would have done something stupid like that. But luckily I was at a point where I was sufficiently humble. I was like, you know what I’m going to do that. And I’m so grateful that I did because then Todd built Clickfunnels. Holy crap, seriously. It’s insane. And then after that, that’s when we brought in these other guys as partners as well. They’re all rockstar people. It wasn’t just like, “I’m going to give you a base salary.” Or whatever. It was like, “Okay, come in and become a partner in this thing.” For me it’s like, as you find the right people and incentivize them….If I were to ever build a company again, I would never build a company where Russell’s the thing. We went and watched Justice League last night, so maybe this is because it’s in my head. Justice League, Avengers, Batman, whatever. I would literally, if I ever build a company again, the initial thought will be, I’m going to build my Avengers team, my Justice League. I’m Batman, there’s Iron Man, everyone’s got their spot. Ryan’s Wonder Woman, I just want to look like Aqua Man, that dude is ripped. But if I ever start a company again, the first thought will not be, what product should I sell? It will be what team should we assemble? And then I would carve out where everyone’s roles were going to be. I’m not going to be CEO next time, so any of you guys can pick that, I’m done after this. But we each pick our different roles and then from there, collectively, be like, “What should we create? What should we build? Who should we serve?” And then we’d go from that. So my biggest takeaway from going from zero to a hundred million dollars is definitely give up control, build your Avenger team ahead of time, because Russell Brunson could have never gotten here. It took these guys and the team we built to create that. Anyway, there’s my number one. So I’m handing it off to Todd now to share the biggest thing he’s learned from going from zero to a hundred million dollars. Todd: What’s funny is that I was actually thinking about saying very similar things. One of the biggest things is the team. Seeing how to build a team around you and actually do things as a team as opposed to by yourself independently. That’s how I’ve always done things in the past, on my own more or less, same type of scenario. But I think something else that stands out to me is having someone who is obsessive about the product itself. We always talk about how marketing is the big thing, and it is. But if you’re focused on the marketing, you still need someone on your team that is obsessed with the actual product. Making sure you’re delivering the best possible thing to people. So when you sell it to them, they actually like it and they come back and want more. So that’s my other big epiphany I think that I’ve had over the past… Russell: Especially in our world. Our world, everybody’s obsessed with marketing, rightfully so. A lot of times if you’re in the marketing and product, if you do them both, it’s really, really hard. I tried to build software companies in the past where I was like the marketing guy, plus trying to convince the developers how to do it. Whereas with this, you were able to run with the product and I could just sell. Todd: Absolutely. That’s why I think that’s worked as a great partnership. Russell focuses on the marketing and I focus on the product. And I think having that really makes a difference. Pass it on to Dave here. Dave: Hey there. So we talk about this all the time and I cannot express the importance of it, and that’s the Dream 100. So I took a look back on everything that’s happened as far as first of all having an amazing product and then amazing leaders, and then Todd and Russell, the two of them are amazing together. I think the part for me, is I look at everything we’ve built over the last three years now, is the importance of the Dream 100. Originally Dream 100, as far as affiliates, and even most recently when we did the book launch, what I really learned a lot from that was the importance of understanding it’s a Dream 100 per platform as well. So as far as your influencers, where are they at? Are they on YouTube, are they on Facebook, are they on Twitter, or are they in Instagram? Wherever they might be. And then as recently, as far as, a new Dream 100, as far as hiring partners that you really want to end up working with long term. So for me, I think the most important thing is when you start looking at building something, is really identifying your Dream 100 and then being very, very consistent in continuing to mail out every single month to them. Establishes and builds that relationship with them, they get used to seeing you. It’s been fascinating as we’ve gone out and traveled and go to these different places and people remember the boxes and things that have been sent. And they’re like, “Oh, how do I get on that list?” And if they’re asking to be on the list, I don’t need them on the list, I don’t need them basically. But the reality basically says that it actually works. So I would say, in building a hundred million dollar company, and any size company I would definitely say Dream 100 is one of the most important things. John, up to you. John: Alright, so a really interesting journey we’ve been on. It’s been so much fun. One of the things that I’ve learned which is just huge, is prioritizing your time and your tasks. I mean, especially when we’re all internet entrepreneurs, we’re on the computer, it’s so easy. The computer is a gateway to anything. So a huge thing for me is to, before even opening the computer, physically write down or use your phone or use something else that’s not your computer, to structure out. We all do this, Russell does this, I do this. We structure out what we’re going to do.What are the next things I need to do? Because if you can get that basically spiritually created, if you can get that thought through before you actually begin, then it changes everything. Then you’re actually getting through stuff instead of just fumbling along. It’s so easy because we’re all bombarded with a million different things, we could be paying attention to a million different things. Only some of which are really going to move the needle. And the other thing is, especially as you grow your team, as you get more people working with you, it’s about….So I build out that list and then the next thing I ask myself as I go through that list is, “Okay, who can do this? Who can I get to do this? Who can I get to do this?” And that specific question, as I go through the list, as who can I get to do this, that allows me to go through and delegate as much as possible to team members, so then I become more of a leader. Because it’s so easy to just be like, I could just do it all. Yeah, you can probably. But maybe you shouldn’t be doing it all. You know, that’s something to think through. So build out that list, really think through it before you start to take action in the day, prioritize it and then go through and glean through the list and be like, “Who can get to do these things.” Assuming you’ll be doing none of them. Of course there will be a handful that you end up doing, but that way it’s just a mindset that will help you get things delegated properly. Here you go Brent. Brent: Awesome. Hey everybody, it’s good to connect with you. I just want to express how much we appreciate you. Everybody who follows us, who’s obviously dedicated listeners of Russell’s program. It’s funny, more and more as we travel with Russell, even locally here in the Boise area, he’s getting like, people recognize him all over the place. They see the jeep, or they see him in the hallway of the hotel and they’re like, “Hey, I’m your neighbor.” Just these random……Albertsons…..it’s just funny. Anyway, a couple of things. I’ve had the privilege of working with Russell for over 11 years and the one thing I think that you just cannot replace, or that’s absolutely needed is hard work. You have to be dedicated in getting this business and be willing to sacrifice what you need to sacrifice to get going. Another thing that I think we’ve learned through this journey is stay nimble and small as much as you can. Don’t go out and try to lease some big office space until you’ve got sales coming in, consistent sales, your business is in good shape that way. Another thing that we’ve kind of followed here in our company is we’ve been slow to hire and quick to fire. Building a team, and Russell’s done a tremendous job of this, obviously we’ve got great partners here. And then that has extended to our team members. Again, we love all our team members. We are essentially a great family of likeminded individuals who are focused on a goal. And the leadership in this company has helped us all work to achieve that goal. So that’s been awesome as well. So stay small as long as you can, be nimble, be humble, but you gotta work hard. Once you do those things, don’t sweat over the small things. We’ve had different variations of an employee handbook, and I’m just finally getting it out here in the next few weeks. And we’ve been in business three years. So don’t stress about the mistakes. We were somewhere, we were at an event in Denver a few weeks ago, it was related to customer support, and that’s very normal. For small startups, that’s very normal. Those things just come, but don’t worry about those little details. They work themselves out. But work hard and you’ll achieve that success. So I will hand this over to my buddy, Ryan. Ryan: So I love talking about this topic, and I think it’s best summarized as, “Worse is better.” You can do a lot more than you think. Gary V told us that when we met with him on the social media side. We’re like, “We already do everything, we already do a ton, we’re on everything.” He’s like, “You can do more.” And I think this is true on everything we do in engineering, everything we do when it comes to product. You’ve heard it in every single answer from everybody to some degree. But I think the killer, underlining subtext to all that, is that constraints are not a limiting factor. They force you to focus, the focus forces you to prioritize, that forces you to do the one thing everyday that’s most valuable so that you can compete with somebody who’s got 40 million dollars in funding and you’ve got three guys in an office trying to figure it out because it makes you laser focus on the thing you have to do every single day. That’s what enables you to compete at a higher level, that’s what enables, and I believe the most important thing we’ve done in our culture is force everybody, from hiring decisions, to business processes, don’t worry about the handbook, don’t over complicate this, simplify this. Because those constraints are what make us as powerful as we are and what enable to be a hundred million dollar company with a hundred people. To grow to a billion dollars with fewer resources and a fraction of the budget and everything else. Everyone else who’s competing with us, they have no idea how we do it. They’re all like, “Wait, how many engineers do you have? How do you do this? How big are you?” it blows their mind and I think that’s the thing they miss. Those constraints are what enable us to do it. Our weaknesses are our strengths and people see them backwards. And we see it the opposite. That’s why everyone’s so blown away and why nobody gets it. I think that’s our secret sauce in many ways. So I love that. That’s our thing. That’s what I learned, that blew my mind. Russell: That’s awesome. Well, I hope you guys enjoyed this episode. Its fun hanging out and we just want to thank you guys so much for allowing us to serve you and serve your audience. We love what we do. We’re obsessed, we’re passionate, we’ve been up for the last two days going crazy trying to figure out ways to do it better. You know, for us, a lot of people say, “You guys made it to a hundred million. That’s crazy.” That’s step number one for us. We’re just getting started, wait until you see what’s going to be coming out over the next twelve months and beyond. We love you guys, we appreciate you, we’re so grateful for the ability and the right and the gift we have to be able serve you guys in what you guys do. So thanks again so much for everything and we’ll talk to you guys soon, bye everybody.

This week we have our first ever international guest, author Brent Williams from New Zealand.  Brent wrote the graphic novel “Out Of The Woods” which is a stunning visual representation through his unexpected journey with depression and anxiety. While suffering from depression, Brent learned that journaling was one of the most powerful ways to get in touch with what he was feeling, and deconstruct some of his own thought and behavior patterns that were perhaps contributing to his condition. Being that he was unable to read due to exhaustion while he was depressed, he determined that the graphic novel medium would perhaps be the best method to share his story and connect with others who felt similarly. Tune in to hear the entire story from start to finish of how this incredible work came to be! Highlights of this episode include: — Why Brent was able to connect with the graphic novel medium versus more traditional self-help vehicles — How never thought he’d be afflicted with something like depression — How Brent eventually managed to heal himself — The power of journaling for Brent during the healing process — What Brent currently does when he feels anxiety starting to surface

My guest today, on the Steve Jobs inspired Join Up Dots free podcast interview is a man who first appeared on Join Up Dots back on episode 103. When the show was just a baby compared to what it is today. Back then we discussed the unusual concept that sales is in fact a honorable profession. Wait I hear you say…surely I didn't hear the words Sales and honourable in the same sentence? But our guest waxed lyrical about why he felt that it was in fact true, and why since 2000 he had focused his time, passions and energy's in the world of Insurance Brokerage, coming out the other end hardened by the work that he was performing. As he said he was bloodied, bruised, kicked in the teeth, chewed-up, and spit-out. But instead of becoming cynical to this work, he instead developed a passion for helping others learn from his successes, mistakes and backstory. Focusing on four main areas, Sales training, Attitude, Connections and Loyalty he worked tirelessly to create success in his life. And now he has managed to take these concepts and turn them into a personal branding encompassing coaching, training, and keynote presentations across America. He is a man on fire, and certainly from my perspective seems to be in control of what he is doing, where perhaps the last time he was on the show wasn't quite the case. So how has he done this and still juggled the issues that comes with being a family man. And is he where he wants to be in his life, or now is he aiming for bigger and bigger things that he just couldn't have dreamt possible back in the early days. Well let's find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Mr Brent Kelly. Show Highlights During the show we discussed such weighty topics with Brent Kelly such as: Why there is a comfort level across the world, which has led to so many people to simply follow what everyone else is doing, which is a huge mistake. Follow the crowd and see your prospects diminish massively. Go your own way and get the rewards. Why Brent realises that their was a confidence issue in his life, which lead him to not fully grasp the value he could bring to the world. When this came together for him then everything became so much easier. Why the world is more and more looking for the "how long it is going to take" answer, whilst they should actually be looking at "How can I become good?" and lastly…. Why you shouldn't be worried about the comparisons that you see online today even though there are so many. Just get your head down and do the work.