SFR 198: The SECOND Origin Story...

Boom, what's going on everyone?

It's Steve Larsen, and this is Sales Funnel Radio.

Today I'm gonna teach you guys about the origins of the offer.

I've spent the last four years learning from the most brilliant marketers today. And now I've left my nine to five to take the plunge and build my million dollar business.

The real question is, how will I do it without VC funding or debt, completely from scratch? This podcast is here to give you the answer.

Join me and follow along, as I learn, apply, and share in marketing strategies to grow my online business, using only today's best internet sales funnels.

My name is Steve Larsen and welcome to Sales Funnel Radio.
What's up, guys?

Hey, okay. So I was at the Traffic Secrets event. Traffic Secrets was an event run by Russell Brunson, just for the Two Comma Club X people.

If you don't know what that is, Two Comma Club X coaching is a program where we take people and we help them make their first million. Tons of fun, and it is successful. It's lots of fun. It's a fun group. There's a lot of events that come with it.

I'm a Two Comma Club X coach. I've now brought, at the time I'm recording this, about 2,000 people through this process now. There are patterns; and when people follow the pattern, they have success.

This event was called Traffic Secrets, it was over in Phoenix. Getting to Phoenix was pretty crazy. There was something messed up with the airplane, so they had to get us off and get a new plane. There was like, a bolt coming out of the side of the airplane, and no one could figure out what it was. It was really freaky.

We got off the plane to switch planes, and that is the moment, my friends, when adults become children and start whining and complaining.

Anyways,  I get over to Traffic Secrets, it's a bunch of fun. It's a lot of work.

I remember growing up, my dad traveled quite a bit as well. I always had this perception like, "Oh man, Dad, is it so cool going out?" Like, "You're traveling like a beast, do you have so much fun? What, did you see while you're there? Did you see this while you're there?"

It wasn't until I was a little bit older that I realized, it's pretty much straight work. I only see my hotel room, the event room, and the walk in between, that's it. And then the shuttle ride back to the airport. That's kind of all I see any event I go to.

Anyway, so, Russell got up. He talked for two days. I had a ton of fun. Right before that, I got a chance to go and hang out with him in his office just he and I, until about 2:00 am, to structure a lot of the content and things like that. It was just a ton of fun.

I'm going off script here real quick, okay? It's funny, 'cause my wife kinda laughs, she'll be like, "Hey, did you have fun with Russell tonight?"  

I'm not teasing her, I just think it's funny, and I get it, you know. She'll be like, "Why do you like hanging out so much?"  Well, besides the fact that it's Russell Brunson and we are good friends, the more you learn about the thing that you're doing, the less people you can relate with about what you're doing. You know what I mean?

And that's why the game can sometimes be a little bit lonely. So I always have a bunch of fun going and doing that. It was cool to be behind the scenes and be back structuring content and putting ideas and concepts together, and then go sit back and watch the audience as Russell executed that plan. Cool education right there.

Russell talked for two days. Lots of energy. "Rah, rah, rah," right? He's all over the place - lots of energy. At the end of two days, we go, and we're having dinner with the ClickFunnels crew, the staff and all the coaches were there. We were just shooting the breeze, just chatting for a little bit.

Most people left, and there's only five or six of us left, and we're like, "Hey, let's go see that movie, Venom." Which was super cool by the way, it was a good movie.

Just before we left to see the movie, Russell leaves for a second. He comes back, and he goes, "Dude. Do you know who Claude Hopkins is?" I'd heard the name, but I hadn't studied him yet.

I'm making the rounds on who I'm studying right now. I haven't gotten to Claude Hopkins yet. And I said, "No, heard the name though." And he goes, “Dude, you are going to love Claude Hopkins." I said, "Alright, cool." So he starts telling me a little about Claude Hopkins...and he said, "...basically, he's like the godfather of what you do." And I said, "Please tell me more."

This is a picture of Claude.  I went and printed out a picture of him.  It's gonna look really blurry. This is the man himself. What's up, man? Alright,  Claude Hopkins?

Claude Hopkins (1866–1932) was brought into companies to create the equivalent of an offer.  In 1907 he was paid a salary of $185,000 a year. That's like getting paid 1.3 million in today's dollars. This is a highly paid guy. And all he would do is go in and create offers. That's what he was known for.

Companies would hire him to come in and help construct the offer as part of the sales message. So he goes in and he would create the offer, but then also pieces of the sales message that would make it sexy.

I was like, "Russell, dude, that was like the greatest gift you could give me. Are you serious? You just taught me about how my market came to be."

I've been looking around trying to find the history of what I do? And it's not been an easy thing to go figure out. Not many people teach what I teach, which is one of the reasons why I'm stepping into that zone and being the category king of offer creation. That's my goal, that's what I'm going for.

You wanna see my second shot I'm calling? I'm calling it! My podcast introduction is all about, "Hey, I'm calling my shot!" Well, I'm doing that:

I'm on track I hope, for a million dollars this year. It's gonna be close; it's gonna be really, really, tight. But we're getting close. Some of you guys have reached out and asked, so I'm just telling you.

I'm trying to make my first million dollar business...