SFR 117: Change Story, Change Audience, Or Both?

My message to market to offer match...

Hey, what's up everyone? This is Steve Larsen, and you're listening to Sale's Funnel Radio. I've spent the last four years learning from the most brilliant marketers today, and now I've left my 9:00-5:00 to take the plunge and build my million dollar business. The real questions 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 marketing strategies to grow my online business, using only today's best internet sales funnels.

My name is Steve Larsen, and welcome to Sale's Funnel Radio...

What's up, new intro! Hey, first off, just celebrating 100 thousand downloads. We've actually be past that for quite a while, just have not had the chance to create the new intro. I wrote this script while I was in the airport, I think two days ago, and I was like let's go do this, let's get it done. Anyways, hopefully you like that. I wanted to be more forward, and open, and purposeful about what this podcast is really all about, and why I do what I do.

The first about 100 episodes were me just documenting the journey and lessons as I sat next to the man Russell Brunson, of course, right? After that though, I wanted to make a really strong point of this is what I did, when I did it, this is my adjustments as I saw what market was telling me to switch. This is the part of the business and part of the funnel I'm building here and there, but not until this point because of this and that. Do you know know what I mean? I'm trying to help you guys see what I'm doing and why I'm ding it.

We certainly had a chance to build a lot of those kind of things for other entrepreneurs and such along the way, and finally I was like man, I see this pattern, it's the same pattern, regardless of the industry, I'm just going to go do it, and it's been working great. Anyway, it's been a ton of fun. Here's to 100 thousand downloads, and moving along, and me kind of documenting the journey as I keep going forward.

It's been off to a great start, we're officially in the month of March, which is crazy. That's nuts...

Anyway, hey, so this last week I was, I've traveling like a beast, guys. About two weeks ago I was in Vegas, last week I was in Dallas, and then I hope those of you that are coming to Funnel Hacking Live I'll get a chance to actually meet you. I got something cool. Stay tuned, I think next episode I'm going to drop something cool for you guys, for those of you who are actually coming to Funnel Hacking Live.

Anyways, I was speaking last week, and I don't know what the deal is with when events get created, but I feel like they get the speakers in by saying there's going to be this many people, and getting people in events is like the hardest thing on planet earth. To get someone to buy something on the internet, that's a lot easier, because, I mean, you're either having to ship something to their house, they don't have to change anything in their plans, or it's literally an info product, and you're just giving access to them, or some coaching, but an event?

They got to take time out of their life. They're going to plan a flight, they're going to plan hotel rooms, they're going to plan how to get from the airport to the hotel, they're going to plan, does this make sense? What are they going to eat, what are they going to wear? They got to pack a bag? They got to make arrangements.
Besides the fact you're going to sell them the actual ticket, like it's pretty incredible to watch how people, but you can really see who the amazing, amazing individual marketers are based on the events that they're putting, on which is Russell Brunson's No Different, it's freaking huge.

It's amazing, it's bar none the best marketing event that is in there, that is out there. In my very humble, but straight forward opinion, and correct opinion.
Anyway, this last event I was speaking at was awesome.

There was supposed to be 2000 people, there was only 1000 people, which is still a lot of people, and that was a lot, which is great. I had a lot of fun, but I was expecting more. Anyway, a lot of fun though. In the evening time I went and I spoke, and I got to go to dinner with some friends that were there, and one of the people asked me a question. They said, "Steven, how do you really come up with all this podcast material? Where do you see yourself in five years? What are you going to be saying?"

This is one of the major concerns that I feel like people get when they start considering publishing regularly, right? I had the same concern. The concern was what the heck do you say? Especially after I can come up with a few different episode ideas, but after a while I don't know what to be saying anymore. You know what I mean? I totally get it. I went through the exact same predicament. Whereas I don't even know, what am I going to say in episode 97? What about episode 140? What am I going to say when I'm at episode 1000? Oh, my gosh, right?

I will tell you that I don't care at all until I'm at episode 96 is over. Until 139 is over, until 9999 is over. Okay? There are times, though, I've don't that six part series where I went through and deep dived with other experts in their funnels. There is times where there is a lot of planning involved with it, but I started just talking very openly about how I do my shows, and I just wanted to drop this little tiny thing onto you, and help you understand how.

I feel like this is one talent and skill that has served in many areas, and I know is one of the major reasons why I've been speaking more. I know is one of the reasons why I've been able to go out and even do Russell's fad events, it's because of podcasting. I was talking to them, and I was like, "Well, here's the thing that a lot of people don't realize, is that you're learning with me. Okay, we're learning at the same time, I'm just telling you what I'm learning."

How many of you guys are learning something new probably every day? Right, everybody. Everybody is. Are you telling anyone about it?

One of the major things that I did in college, I know one of the major reasons why I started getting straight A's, I do believe ... You guys know that I am very religious, I believe in God, and I don't live perfectly, but I try to live the best I can. I know that for me I did really, really, really well in school.

A lot of that was divine intervention, there is not a doubt in my mind. But a lot of it had to do with my own action, obviously, all of it. None of it happens without my own action, and one of the habits that I started creating for myself is that every time I came back from a class in college, this is very key, listen to this, this is, it's the same pattern for how I come up with stuff in my podcast.

Every time, most times I should say, as often as I could, one of the things I actively did was whatever I learned in class that day that was exciting, that was interesting, that was prolific, that was amazing, that was something I wanted to remember, I made it a point to teach it to somebody else as quickly as I could.

The moment I was done learning whatever, whether it was stuff I was studying on my own, or stuff that was in a class, or something I was building a funnel for another business, in college, that's where I developed that pattern, I developed that habit.

When I learned something that is incredible, when I learned something that is like, oh, my gosh, like that really helped me here, here, and here. Right? I teach it to somebody as fast as I can. I find somebody. I have even taught random people. I know that sounds stupid and weird, but I have literally, I've done it before, or I'll send a message to somebody and be like, "I know you're thinking about this at all, I just learned something cool, I just wanted to share," because frankly it's to be selfish. I want to share it with you, but I also want to make sure I remember it, and I will teach them what I just learned.

I do over and over and over and over and over...

What's cool about it is it's almost like you guys have seen The Five Minute Journal? I can't remember who it's by, but it's the five minute journal, and who is by actually? I can't remember ... Anyway. The five minute journal goes through and it makes you look at your day, it makes you go back and look, and kind of debrief. I can't think of the other word for it. Assess, take accountability for the things that you did in your day, and the things that you learned, and what was amazing, what was bad, how you're going to change it, how you're going to react. I try and treat this show like that. Does that make sense?

When something amazing it going on in my life and I'm like oh, my gosh, that's crazy cool. I got to share that. Right? Then it becomes very, very easy for me to continually have podcast material. I don't know what two episodes from now is going to be, but I know it will be amazing, because I thought it was amazing, and because I get excited about it, because I'm obsessed about funnels and marketing it's going to be easy for me to talk about it, and it's going to be easy for me to tell a story around it. Does that make sense? You've got to develop this talent, this habit, okay?

What was super cool was I was able to use very, very heavily when I was speaking this last weekend. I've shared with a few other people as well, so if you've heard this, I'm sorry, but I went through and I was on stage and I could tell very, very quickly that the stories that I was telling, I wasn't allowed to pitch, but I took the first half of my webinar script and I just took out the pitch and I pretty much did the exact same script. I still broke and rebuilt their belief patterns, and I know it worked because a ton of people came up afterwards.

Actually, it's kind of funny, for the first 24 hours not a lot of people came up. For the second 24 hours I feel like it all hit their brains and they're like, wait a second, I get it. The next day it was like floods of people. I've never had that happened before, it was funny. I was like awe, cool.

Anyway, I could tell I was speaking, I wasn't pitching, but I was definitely selling, I'm always selling. I'm selling through stories, very crafted stories to help break and rebuild the way they see the world and whats actually possible, you know what I mean? You obviously can use that for very bad things, but anyway.
I was speaking though, and I was I could feel that the room, like a third to a half of the room was not with me.

Because I've been practicing this as frequently as I have, right? I have an entire separate podcast show. We're at episode 60-something now, right? I'm about to cross 200 episodes of doing this, let alone the different events, let alone the different places I've spoken or taught, let alone the different coaching sessions. Pretty much all of Friday for me is coaching. My entire Friday, every week, I just coach 100s of people. I mean, it's the entire day. I've been doing for that over a year now, and I've had a lot of practice at it.

When I was up there and I could feel that part of the room was not with me, because their eyes went down. They got distracted by what was on the table in front of them. I wasn't getting any more like oh, ah, like you would at Fourth of July, you know what I mean? I was able to see, I was a able to sense it. I don't know what it is guys, it's a sixth sense. You will develop it if you do what I'm telling and just start publishing, you will develop it. It will not happen for awhile, but you will develop it. I could feel that part of the room wasn't with me.

One of the challenges that you have as an entrepreneur, one of the challenges that I run into, that everyone runs into. I'm no exception on the rule in this, when you've got a product that kicks butt, I know that the webinar that I'm selling, that the product that I'm selling right now, it's amazing. I know it's the best one that's out there right now. I know that there is nothing out there that it like it. I know that I am the only one that delivers it how I do with the most value.

I am confident in that, but that's not what sells stuff, the message is what sells it.
The sales message is a different thing than the actual product. It's the reason you can start selling without the product actually being done. I've been obsessing over the sales message. I've just barely finished the product that I've been selling, which is awesome. It's such a good feeling ...

Anyway, what I've been doing is I've been going and I've been selling, selling, selling, selling. Selling like crazy, and when you have a product that's, follow with me. I know I'm kind of stumbling, but follow with me, I've got 15 billion thoughts all over the place. I'm trying to follow it and grab it. When you've got all these different ...

Sorry, when you've got this amazing product, okay, I'm sure all of you guys have an amazing product, so why isn't literally everyone on the planet running out to buy it? I know we've already talked about sales message is what sells the product, however, there comes a point when you don't need to be tweaking as much of the sales message anymore as much as you need to be tweaking who's hearing it. Does that make sense? I know we've all heard the phrase, "Message to market match." 100%, totally with that, totally agree with that, obviously.

I think one of the dangers we will fall into through as funnel hackers is we will continue to change, after awhile, I'm not saying not to, but change your product, change the sales message, tweak, tweak, tweak, tweak, tweak. I'm getting it to a point now with the level of obsession that I've been at, where I feel like it's not going to be so much tweaking the sales message anymore that's going to be doing it, I think I could shorten the sales message for my webinar right now. I think I could shorten it.

I think it's a little long, but the actual message, I think it's spot on. I think my offer, there is a few things I could add to it to turn up the sexy just a little bit, and I think I know what they're going to be, but the next piece if really changing who is hearing it, right? Who I'm dropping it front of.

Steven, why are you on this random rabbit, squirrel that's over on the side? You're talking about being on stage. Okay, here's why. I was on stage, and I was telling you that about half through I could tell they were with me, they were getting it, they were like, oh, my gosh.

Remember I was pitching to MLM-ers. If you're not in MLM, that's fine. I'm just telling who I was speaking with, and I was speaking with them, there's 1000 people there, I show them the funnel stuff, and a lot of them have never seen this before, and they're like, "Holy crap." About half of them were freaking out, they were like, "Good grief, that's what you just did?" I was like, "Yeah, what's up? I don't know any of you guys, you all know each other though."

Anyways, it was really cool. About the other half, though, weren't with me. From that I had two options. This decision happened in my head very quickly while I was up there. They gave me a tight 45 minutes to be up there and be speaking. I had a very tight timeline, and ... That was really fast for what I did up there.
I had two options, through. Option number one was to just say, you know what? It's fine. If you don't resonate with what I'm saying you're not probably a good fit for this anyway. Does that makes sense? I wouldn't say that, but that would be my reasoning, but like you didn't resonate, that's fine. That's okay.

You didn't resonate with the stories, you didn't resonate with the sales message, even though I'm not pitching, I'm definitely selling, and you didn't resonate, that's fine...

Number two, though, the second option I have is the one I took, which was to grab another story that I have been practicing, because of all the publishing, because of the podcasts, because of all the stuff, I developed, right, that little sixth sense that I'm talking about and grab another story from my Quiver...

Grab another story, grab another arrow from my Quiver and launch that story out there that I think fits who I saw who was also in the room. I was like, "Man, I didn't realize there would be this many of this kinds of demographic. This kind of psychographic, this kind of belief pattern.

I didn't realize, I wish I would have known that before. Do you know what I mean? Your ability to adapt on the fly like that will very much depend on how much you've been publishing, how much you've been practicing telling the story. The first option I had was okay, that's fine. You didn't resonate with my message, that's cool. I think a lot to when I automate the webinar that that will be my reasoning, hey, look, you didn't resonate, that's fine, but I have a second option, which is the benefit of doing live webinars, which is the benefit of feeling like live is you get to feel that sixth sense, and you get to go out and you get to say, hey, look, let me launch this other story.

Let me grab another arrow from my Quiver, and shoot it out there, and go is that going to stick? And it did, and I was able to grab a hug other portion of the room and it resonated with them. Does that make sense?

I know I'm kind of all over the place with this, but I hope you understand what I'm saying. This is all very very connected. Your ability to tell story, do it repeatedly, have a lot of stories in your Quiver, and being able to sense when to grab. They're like weapons guys, you grab another story, boom, and you launch it out. You grab a different story, boom, you launch it out there, you're like oh, man, that one didn't hit. Boom, that one hit.

I can tell, I'm reading their body language, they're jumping all over the place, they're clapping, they're screaming, whatever. The equivalence of that online, during a webinar, whatever...

If you're not getting a lot of that feedback when you're selling your product it might be very well possible that they're not feeling that. You have two options, number one is to say, that's fine, and you just keep finding people that resonate with your current message. Number two, launch a second story and shoot it out there. Launch a second story, see if it sticks, and be like oh, that one didn't stick, boom, and you launch another one, and you launch another one, and you launch another one, and your ability to do it quickly will very much effect how well the rest of your funnel performs.

Anyway, does that make sense? That was kind of long, roundabout way of saying all this guys, but I hope that makes sense, what I'm saying here. This was a pretty powerful thing for me to go through. I've done it on very micro scales, where there's maybe up to 60 people in a room. I've done that many times, where I can sense it, I can feel it in the room and be like they're not getting it, or be like you know what? Let's come up with a brand new analogy on the fly, or let's use one of their business, okay, let me weave a story in between there to help break and rebuild beliefs there. Your ability to tell story is marketing, and it is selling. I'm sorry, is marketing, not selling, it's face-to-face.

Anyway, I hope that make sense, and I want you to, the takeaway from this episode ... I feel like I've been all over the place a little bit with these last few episodes, but I'm trying to distill down the things that I'm noticing. It's like I think we all have the bricks, what I'm trying to do is help you fill in the mortar, you know what I mean? The glue between them, and figure out how to do that stuff.

Anyways, I'm trying to help you understand that the takeaway from this is that you have got to write out storylines of what's happening inside your life. You've got to. If you've got the gumption, which I hope that, if you don't have it, learn it. Just start publishing. Start publishing those storylines, and as you do it, I don't know somewhere around episode 30-ish, I started finding my voice.

Then something else happened around episode 90. I don't know I've heard it from a lot of you guys, you felt it as well. There was this extra amount of, I don't know, glaze that my voice gained as I published. It was like this extra sizzle, and I think it was part of that sixth sense that started coming in...

As I would start to say stuff it was almost like I would hear the audience reply with something, with the false believe that they were hearing, that they were giving up as an excuse, and I'd have a chance to react back and forth, boom, boom, boom, boom, back and forth, back and forth, as if you were in the room with me while I was doing these podcasts. Does that make sense? I hope that you're understanding what I'm saying here with this.

This is super, super, super, super, powerful. I know I pound the story, I tell you guys get good at story, but the applications for it are all over the place. It's not just in publishing, not just in selling, but the ability to adapt on the fly.

The ability to get new markets in, when Russell tells the story about, "Hey, I couldn't figure out how to sell Click Phones for awhile." He had to change the story. That's the major thing. When he changed the story and the offer, and he's tweaking it back and forth, boom, boom, back and forth, back and forth, which offer matches the story that I'm telling, that matches the person that's hearing it. It's really this three part series, right? Who's hearing it, what's the story that they're hearing, and you got to craft that, and then what's the offer?

Then when you match those three together, that's where the magic happens. What I was feeling on the stage was the person who was in the room was not the person I was anticipating. Crap, my story's not right, which means my offer, even though I wasn't actually pitching, I was certainly selling though, I was still breaking and rebuilding the way they saw the world, wasn't correct. There was a mismatch. I felt the mismatch. It was like this three part mismatch. I got to come up with another way to say that. It's message to market match, yeah, but there is something, it's deeper than that.

It was the thing that I start knowing, and feeling, and sensing, and I hope that you understand what I'm dropping out there with this, and start feeling that. Start asking yourself, okay, who am I actually doing the selling to? What's the story I'm using to gain their attention and break and rebuild their beliefs? Then number three, what's the offer?

Where do I feel like that weak spot is? If you don't know what the weak spot is you are not pitching frequently enough.
I'm telling you around episode 85-90ish, okay, that was a long time, that's when I started feeling it. You have got to have frequency with this thing. Frequency is far more important, in my opinion, than perfection in every single thing you say. I say too many ums, I say too many ahhs, I'm practicing storytelling, I'm practicing is ...

Anyway hopefully this has been helpful to you guys. You know what? You might actually have an amazing offer, and my gut feeling is that you probably do, you probably know that it is amazing, and if you don't know that, get there. Okay? Oh, it's amazing! It's so cool! It's the best thing on the planet. I know I can defend it to death. You know what I mean? If you got that, boom, done, boom. My offer is there, there is a few more things I got to toss in there to make it extra sexy, in terms of my fast action bonus, but the offer, done. Okay, next piece. Message. What are my stories? My stories are set, my stories are freaking awesome. I know they're great, I feel it.

Then what's the next thing though? It's who is hearing it, and I think I'm speaking to about half the people that I'm supposed to. I think the other half that are coming in, they're not going to resonate with my story, so number one, whatever, or number two fire a different story. That's the next piece I'm trying to figure out when it comes to my webinar funnel.

That was a very long message, and hopefully it made sense, and hopefully you can see how it applies to what it is that you're doing, and think of it in these three stages, and as I've done that it's simplified, the entire process for me. It's all very much interconnected, it's all very much, and you will not do it without mat time. You will not do it without podcasting, or whatever it is. Publishing in general, you will not develop that kind of sixth sense without actively seeking to. It will just kind of happen one day you'll be like oh, crap. I felt, that was weird, you know? It's kind of cool when it happens though.

All right guys, thanks so much for listening, I appreciate it. I've developed a whole bunch of other cool outros, and maybe I'll talk about that in the next episode coming up and why I did that. Anyways, thanks so much. Talk to you later. Bye.

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