DotCom Secrets: The Underground Playbook for Growing Your Company Online

by Russell Brunson

Look through your life, and I promise that you’ll start finding these little parables that can help illustrate important points. You can also draw parables from the lives of others. Just know that when you stop teaching facts and start teaching through parables, your messages will stay with an audience longer.

3. Attractive Characters Share Their Character Flaws. This next element is one that most people really struggle with sharing, but it’s one of the most important ones to share because it makes you relatable and real. You need to understand that every believable, three-dimensional Attractive Character has flaws. Think about your favorite characters in movies, books, or TV shows. Every character that you bond with emotionally has flaws, right? One of my favorite examples is Superman. He’s the Man of Steel. He’s invincible. Nobody can kill him. As a storyline, it’s not very exciting. But when you introduce Kryptonite and his concern for the welfare of his family, suddenly he has vulnerabilities and flaws—he becomes an interesting character that people care about.

4. Attractive Characters Harness the Power of Polarity. Another challenge people face when communicating with an audience is trying not to offend anyone. So, instead of being a relatable person, speakers become bland and stay neutral on many topics, only sharing safe things everyone will love.

Instead, Attractive Characters are typically very polarizing. They share their opinions on hard matters, and they stick to their guns—no matter how many people disagree with them. They draw a line in the sand. And when they take a stand for what they believe in, they split the audience into three camps: those who agree with them, those who are neutral, and those who will disagree with them. As you start to create that polarization, it will change your “fair weather fans” into diehard fans who will follow what you say, share your message, and buy from you over and over again.

It’s very interesting that we will spend as much time listening to, talking about, and sharing things from people that we despise as we do treasuring the wisdom from our favorite people. Yet, if any of those characters weren’t so polarizing, chances are you wouldn’t even know who they were.

If you’re neutral, no one will hate you, but no one will know who you are either. As soon as you start taking sides on important issues, you’ll develop haters, but you’ll also develop a group of raving fans. Those raving fans are the people who will buy your products and services.

The Leader: The identity of the leader is usually assumed by people whose goal is to lead their audiences from one place to another. Most leaders have a similar backstory to that of their audiences and, therefore, know the hurdles and pitfalls the audience members will likely face on the journey to get ultimate results. Usually the desired result has already been achieved by the leader, and his audience has come looking for help along that same path.

The Adventurer or Crusader: The adventurer is usually someone who is very curious, but he doesn’t always have all of the answers. So he sets out on a journey to discover the ultimate truth. He brings back treasures from his journey and shares them with his audience. This identity is very similar to the leader, but instead of leading his audience on a journey to find the result, he is more likely to bring back the answers to give them.

The Reporter or Evangelist: This identity is often one that people use when they have not yet blazed a trail to share with an audience, but have a desire to. So they put on the hat of the reporter or evangelist and go out to discover the truth. Typically, people who use this identity interview dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of people and share those interviews, and all they’ve learned along the way, with their audience.

Because I started interviewing all these cool people and sharing their stories and lessons, I started building an audience of my own. People kept seeing me with these other high-profile people, and over time, I became associated with them. My status went up because I was constantly in the company of high-status people.

The Reluctant Hero: This is my personal identity now, and typically the one that I try to share with my audiences. This is the humble hero who doesn’t really want the spotlight or any fuss made over his discoveries. But he knows the information or the secrets he has are so important that he must overcome his shyness and share them with the world. There’s a moral duty that compels him to share all he knows. Many of you may feel this way naturally. The spotlight is uncomfortable, but you know you need to be there. If that’s you, the reluctant hero is the perfect identity for you. Play the part.

Stories are a great way to communicate with your audience. And there are six basic storylines that businesses use over and over again in emails, sales letters, landing pages, and other communications.

Loss and Redemption: “I had everything. I was on top of the world. Life was great. Then ___________ happened. I had to figure my way out of ________________. But it turned out to be a blessing in disguise because I went through __________, and I learned/received ___________. Now I ___________.”

Us vs. Them: You want to use us vs. them stories to polarize your audience. Remember the power of polarity? Using these types of stories will draw your raving fans even closer and give them a rallying cry against the outsiders. I often call out the “talkers vs. the do-ers” on my list. I want people to make a choice about who they are, because if they’re with me, then they will be do-ers, continuing to ascend with me.

Before and After: “First I was ______________. Now I’m ___________.” These are stories of transformation, and they work great in any market. For example, in the weight-loss market, you might say, “First I was fat. Then I tried Program X. Now I’m skinny.”

Amazing Discovery: “Oh my gosh, you guys . . . wait til you hear about this amazing new thing I just discovered! You’re not going to believe it, but I hit it out of the park on my first try! I wasn’t sure it would work, but it’s amazing. You’ve got to try it!” These stories are huge for selling webinars and teleseminars because they help people believe that the answer they have been searching for is finally available to them.

Secret Telling: “I’ve got a secret . . . if you want to find out what it is, you need to do ___________.” This is my favorite type of storyline. My whole company, DotComSecrets, is built around “secret” storylines. The lure of secrets draws the reader into your funnel and up your Value Ladder.

Third-Person Testimonial: Sharing other people’s successes with your products and programs provides powerful social proof. Get as many third-person testimonials from your customers, clients, and students as you can. Then sprinkle them liberally throughou...

If you’ve never watched a soap opera before, the stories rely on open-ended, high-drama episodes that hook the viewers in and keep them coming back every single day to find out what happens next. The programs are continuous narratives that never conclude.

The key to making this sequence work (just like a soap opera) is you have to open and close loops that will drag your reader from one email to the next.

effects . . . but instead of telling them all the details, I merely open that loop and tell them I’ll give them the secret tomorrow.

Then, in the second email, I will give them the secret, but then I open a new loop that pulls them into email number three.

Email #1: Set the Stage. This is the first email, a thank you note, that people receive the minute they sign up for your list. It sets the stage for the emails to come and lets people know what to expect.

For this first sequence, I recommend once a day for the best results.

I learned from Daegan Smith that you ALWAYS start any good story at the point of high drama. Most people mistakenly start their stories at the beginning, but usually stories don’t get good until the middle, so it’s better to start at the good part, and then you can go back and fill in the backstory after readers are hooked.

The emails themselves should be easy to read and fast to scan. So, use one or two sentences per line. Add in lots of white space. Do not use long paragraphs that slow people down. I like to write out the basic structure elements first. Then I fill in the juicy details and emotional hooks.