Dotcom Secrets: The Underground Playbook for Growing Your Company Online with Sales Funnels

by Russell Brunson

The Adventurer:

they don’t always have all the answers, so they set out on a journey to discover the ultimate truth.

The Reporter:

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.

This is the identity I used when I got started. I didn’t know a lot about marketing online myself, so I started interviewing people. I became a reporter, just like Larry King or Oprah.

The Reluctant Hero:

This is the humble hero who doesn’t really want the spotlight or any fuss made over their discoveries, but they know the information or the secrets they have are so important that they must overcome their shyness and share them with the world.

ATTRACTIVE CHARACTER STORYLINES

Loss and redemption: Loss and redemption stories are very powerful because they show the upside of going through hardship or meeting challenges. You start by telling about some level of success that you had accomplished, but then because of some trial, you lost it all. This storyline will relate to any of your fans or followers who are currently in a time of loss in their lives. As you tell your redemption journey, they will receive faith and hope that by following you they can experience something similar in their lives.

Us versus them: You want to use us-versus-them stories to polarize your audience. Who do you define as the “us” in your audience (people that do the types of things they need to be successful with what you are selling) versus the “them” (those who don’t comply with what you need them to do)? Using these types of stories will draw your raving fans even closer and give them a rallying cry against what they don’t want to become.

Before and after: These are stories of transformation, and they work great in any market. For example, in the weight-loss market, you may show your before and after pictures and tell the story of your journey. In financial markets, you could show your home before your success and then after. Every product or service promises a result, so the question is, “What was life like for you before you applied the result, and what does it look like now?”

Amazing discovery: Every day on your journey to help serve your dream customer, you should be discovering new things that can help them on their journey. Tell the stories about what you’re discovering, how it’s helped you, and how it can help them as well.

Secret-telling: You’ve probably noticed from the titles of my first three books that this is the one I go to a lot. What secrets do you know or have heard from other people that you can share with your audience? Even as a kid, when someone told me they had a secret, it would drive me crazy until I found out exactly what it was. The same is true online...

Third-person testimonial: Sharing other people’s successes with your products and services provides powerful social proof. Get as many third-person testimonials from your customers, clients, and stude...

EXERCISE: THE ATTRACTIVE...

SECRET #5 FUNNEL HACKING

It always amazes me that they don’t look at what we’re doing now and just model it.”

They have thousands of arrows in their backs. Why would you start down that same path and get the same arrows when you could just look at where Agora is now and start building your funnels modeling what they had proven was successful?

Before I build out any new sales funnel, the first thing I want to do is find other people who already have a successful funnel and are selling to my target market.

“If you want to achieve success, all you need to do is find a way to model those who have already succeeded.”

watch the moves that the winners used,

The first person I modeled was a guy named Armand Morin. He was selling software products online, so I decided to create my own software products. When I went to launch my sales funnel, I looked at what his looked like, and I modeled it.

Copying is illegal and is not what I am talking about here. Funnel hacking is modeling a proven process or framework and then putting your product, your words, and your art into that framework.

After I’ve identified 10 or more funnels that I want to model, I act like a customer so I can see every part of their sales process. That means I actually go to each funnel and purchase their products so I can see everything that is working in real time.

I start by pretending I am a normal customer, and I go to Google and type in the keywords that I’d search for if I was looking for that product. I then start looking for paid ads that I can click on that will lead me to a funnel. I go to Facebook and start searching as well. I will “like” pages that are related, hoping that Facebook will start showing me ads with similar products. As soon as I start seeing ads, I make a note of what the hook, story, and offer are for that ad. Then I click on that ad and see where it takes me.

SECRET #6 SEVEN PHASES OF A FUNNEL

IT’S ALL ABOUT THE PRE-FRAME

In the book Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior by Ori and Rom Brafman,

A pre-frame is simply the state you place someone in as they enter the next step in your sales funnel.

the number one thing that would affect his sales after his presentation was tied directly into how the event promoters introduced him before he came on stage.

I now use this lesson of pre-framing on every step of my funnel. Each page has its own hook, story, and offer, but it’s also serving as the pre-frame for the next step.

Phase #1—Determine traffic temperature:

There are three levels of traffic that come to your website: hot, warm, and cold. Each group needs special treatment

“If your prospect is aware of your product and has realized it can satisfy his desire, your headline starts with the product. “If he is not aware of your product, but only of the desire itself, your headline starts with the desire. “If he is not yet aware of what he really seeks, but is concerned with the general problem, your headline starts with the problem and crystallizes it into a specific need.”11

Phase #2—Set up the pre-frame bridge:

This could be an ad, a video, an email, or an article. It’s a bridge that pre-frames people before they get to your landing page. Different types of traffic need different bridges.

A hot traffic bridge is typically very short. You already have a relationship with these people, so you don’t have to do a lot of...

A warm traffic bridge is a little longer than a hot traffic bridge, but not much. If you are targeting your warm traffic on any of the social platforms, you can often use a video to bridge the gap between where they are (on someone else’s fan page or watching a YouTube video) and where you want to take them.

A cold traffic bridge is the longest type of bridge.

I’m creating a customer out of thin air.

you often need a whole separate page that they go through (we call this a bridge page) before they hit the landing page. As I just explained, this separate pre-frame page educates people, enabling them to better appreciate the offer and making them more likely to convert.

Phase #3—Qualify subscribers:

The whole goal here is to take all the traffic—hot, warm, and cold—and find out who is willing to give us an email address in exchange for more information. (This is known as subscribing to a list.)

Qualifying subscribers is done through an opt-in or squeeze page that offers something of value in return for contact information.

This is typically the very front end of your value ladder. For my companies, it’s usually a free report or a free video showing the visitor one thing they would really want to know.

Phase #4—Qualify buyers:

you must find your potential buyers immediately after you qualify subscribers.

So as soon as someone fills out their name and email address and clicks the Submit button, they should land on a sales page that offers them your first premium offer.

I typically sell very low-ticket products here that range from being free (they just cover the shipping and handling costs) to somewhere in the $7–$10 range. I like the offer to be extremely inexpensive so I can find out who all my buyers are.

two lists: subscribers and buyers. Each list is unique and gets treated differently.