This is one of the keys we used to grow our company initially that I totally overlooked and forgot to talk about. On this episode you’ll hear Russell talk about a strategy he used a lot when he was getting started in business. You’ll hear about:

-- Creating products for someone else and letting them keep 100% of the profit!

-- How he continues using this strategy today (with Tony Robbins!)

-- And how these products/services may seem like failures in the short term, they help build your online presence in the long run.

So listen in to find out how you can use this strategy in your business.

All right. So when I first got started in this whole game, right? And it was interesting because I didn't have, we talk about resources versus resourcefulness. I didn't have any resources. My wife at the time was making $9.50 an hour. I had no job as a wrestler and we were living in apartment that was like $475 a month. So between that and grocery money, like the $9.50 an hour she was making did not go far. So we didn't have any resources. Right? So I get it when people are like, "I don't have the money, I don't have the resource." I was there.

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What's up everybody? This is Russell Brunson. Welcome back to The Marketing Secrets Podcast. Today, I am streaming to you from an amazing cabin out on a lake with my family. And as I've been sitting here, just thinking away from my computer for a little while, I started having some realizations about one of the biggest keys that helped me get success initially, that I forgot about. And I've been watching some people who've been using this strategy and this concept strategically to grow their companies quickly. So I want to share with you some of my thoughts.

All right. So when I first got started in this whole game, right? And it was interesting because I didn't have, we talk about resources versus resourcefulness. I didn't have any resources. My wife at the time was making $9.50 an hour. I had no job as a wrestler and we were living in apartment that was like $475 a month. So between that and grocery money, like the $9.50 an hour she was making did not go far. So we didn't have any resources. Right? So I get it when people are like, "I don't have the money, I don't have the resource." I was there.

And so for me though, and this is before, even before Facebook ads, before all these things, it was like, how am I going be successful? And so what I started doing, and I didn't call it Dream 100 at the time, but literally we were going through and finding Dream 100 partners. Like I was looking at people. I was like following all the people in the market that I wanted to be in. And I was just so fascinated by them. I looked at what they were doing, how they were doing it, the products they create, what they were launching. I was on all their email lists. I read every email they sent out. This is before podcasting, even. If they would have had podcasts, I would have listened to them. But back then we did tele-seminars. I would get on all the tele-seminars.

I was watching what everyone was doing. And I was like immersing myself in this market trying to understand, trying to get my finger on the pulse of what was happening and why it was happening. And who were the players and what were they doing? And why were these guys products doing so well? And what were the different hooks and the angles they use? I don't know, just watching. And I was mesmerized. I remember I felt like I had like stepped into this world with all these producers, all these people making tons of money. And I was just like a little kid in a candy store, just watching and observing.

I remember looking at all these things and just thinking like, "Man, I don't know what to create. I don't what to do. I don't have any ideas. I'm not creative." But I was watching them and as I see people doing different things, I started getting ideas. And it's funny because I think so many of us nowadays, we have ideas for a product and so we go and we create this product and we create it. The thought is I'm going to create it, I'm going to go sell it, this is going to me by product.

But for whatever reason that wasn't my initial concept. My initial concept was always like, what can I create with that person? I think part of it is because I had like the hero factor, or I was idolizing, whatever you want to call it. It was just like; there were these gurus who were so cool. How cool would it be to work with them? And so as I started creating, especially started having ideas, my first few projects were all like I never thought of like, let me create a product and have this person promote it. It was like, "How do I create something with that person?"

And so I'd go back and I'd pitch them like, "Hey, you're really good at this thing. What if we create this thing together?" And like that became these things and I was trying to come to the table with something amazing. And I thought if I did all the work and I dealt with the heavy lifting and I gave it to them, they would promote it and it would be a win/win. And so I was in the role of like I'm going to do 100% of the work. They're going to do nothing, but I'm going to leverage their name and their credibility and their list.

And so one example, one of the guys who I studied a lot at the very beginning was a guy named Alex Mandossian. And Alex is a genius and I remember at the time he had this course called, he had a bunch of courses. He had Teleseminar Secrets, he had a postcard. I think it's called PostcardMarketing.com or something like that. I don't know. It was a postcard course. About the same time, there was a network marketing program coming out called Send Out Cards and I was like, "Oh my gosh, Alex needs to send out cards. He's teaching people postcard marketing, this is a tool that works that way." And so I was like, "I want to create something with Alex that'll get people into this thing." And so I went through and created an idea for it. And I was like, "Here's the project. Here's the idea." And I mapped it all out. It took me a while to get a hold of him, get through all his gatekeepers. And finally I pitched it to him. I was like, "Here it is."

And at the end he was like, "Well, what's in it for you?" And I'm like, "Dude, I just want to do this project with you. You can keep all the money. I don't even care. I just want you to promote it. And if we can get my name next yours." And luckily he eventually said yes and I killed myself on this project. Probably not the best example because that project didn't end up going anywhere, but that's how it worked. And I do that over and over and over again. Like all my early projects, they were co-branded. I found someone who was already successful, who had something. I brought something else to the table. I did all the work and they just promoted it.

And that was kind of the thing and I was able to leverage their credibility and their things and it was awesome. And for a long time, that's how I started growing my company. I was piggybacking on the backs of all these other people. And I was co-branding products together. I do all the work, slap their name on it, and it was amazing. I remember I came out with a product called RSS Generator. And at the time Armand Morin had like 20 different generator products. I remember I created this whole product, spent a ton of money, energy, really expensive. And I remember designing the site and all of Armand's sites at the time had his head up at the top. So then I had the site designed with his head and my head on the top. I remember bringing it to him like, "Hey, do you want to add another product to your product line?" He's like, "What do you mean?" I'm like, "Well you have all these E-cover generator, header generator, blah, blah, blah. How would you like to own RSS Generator?"

And I said, "Go check out the site." And he went to the site and there's the site done, it's finished, his brand, it's got his head on it and my head on and everything. And he's like, "Dude, that's amazing." I'm like, "You want to partner?" And he's like, "Sure." And I remember the next big seminar he promoted from stage this new project that me and Russell have been working on called RSS Autoresponder. It's crazy.

Right now, we are about a week away from launching a big project with Tony Robbins and it's this new software we created that's insanely cool. And it was kind of the same thing. We build the whole thing and then came to Tony like, "Hey, this thing's done. You want to be part of it?" And he's like, "Yes." And so now it's Russell, Dean and Tony's software and Tony didn't do anything right, but he needs to show up, he put his name on it and we leveraged his credibility, his list and it'll be arguably the greatest launch in the history of the world, right?

Again, to this day, I'm still doing it. And I start looking at like some of the people who've come into the click funnels world who are really, really smart, right? Jim Edwards is a good example of it. Jim came and he could have easily came to me and said, "Hey Russell, I have this software that writes scripts for people. You should sell it to your list." And I would have said, "No," but instead he came to me and said, "Hey, I have an idea. I have all this cool software. What if we made a new version for you? And I'm going to use your scripts from your books and we're going to build this thing and we'll call it Funnel Scripts." And then he pitched me on this idea. And I was like, "What do I need to do?" He's like, "Nothing. I will do all the work. I'll do all the effort. I'll do everything. All you got to do is you got to put your name on it and sell it with me." And I was like, "Done."

And so we did that. You look at it now, it's been what? Three or four years since Funnel Scripts first came out and that one product alone has hit Two Comma Club X. Jim makes a lot of money every single month. And he did all the work for it, but he came and co-branded it with me. And it's this thing now that we sell every single day, like consistently. It in and of itself is a huge business, just this one thing. But he was able to come to us and kind of leverage our credibility.

I think you got to start thinking about things that way, especially if you're just getting started. Instead of like just I'm going to create a product, I'm going to go drive Facebook ads and stuff like that, how do you latch on people who already have the credibility, already have these things? How do you co-brand something together? There's no rules. You can make anything you want.

Another good example, inside of Two Comma Club X Coaching Program we're building out, having everybody do these summit funnels. And so we're launching a new company with the students to show them like in real time, this whole thing happening. And so we're doing a summit just like them. And we're asking people and we got somebody who we approached to be part of the summit who has a million person list. And they're like, "Oh, we can be part of the summit, but we're not going to promote." I'm like, "What would it take for you to promote?" They're like, "I don't know, what do you have?" And so we came back and said, "Well, instead of paying you 50% commission, what if we paid you 100% commission? And instead of this, what if we do this?" We just gave them everything and they were like, "Done." And now we've got somebody who's got a million person list who's going to be promoting our summit, which is insane. Right?

But we had to renegotiate, figure it out. It wasn't so much it was co-branded, but same kind of thing where you're leveraging their credibility and giving them whatever it takes. Okay?

I have friends in the past who have gone to affiliates and said, "Promote my product. We'll co-brand it and I'll give you 100% of the commission." Oh, in fact. Okay. Here's another funny, sorry. This story is kind of funny. Some of you guys know who Logan Paul is. I'm not going to give you my opinion on him or anything, but he posted on Twitter the other day that he'd give $10,000 to any influencer who could beat him in a wrestling match. And so obviously I was like, "Dude," so I wrote him back, I said, "I'll give a hundred grand if you win. And if I win, I'll give a hundred grand to charity, to OUR." And so I put it out there and it's been funny, I've been texting back and forth. I'm trying to set up this huge wrestling match with Logan Paul. And it's funny because if you don't know Logan, he's got like 20 million followers on YouTube. He's got 18 million on Instagram and all these things.

It was funny because we're kind of negotiating this thing, which I'm hoping happens. Cross your fingers it happens. But we've gone back and forth. And he was asking me, he was like, "Well, what's in it for you?" Because I was like, "Literally I'll pay you a hundred grand win, lose, or draw. Just let's do this thing. I'll pay a hundred grand. I'll donate money to charity. I don't even care." And he's like, "Well, what's in it for you?" I'm like, "Dude, what's in it for me is I get to wrestle Logan Paul. That's going to be on a YouTube channel in front of your 20 million people. You're going to Instagram it. I'm just leveraging for the credibility." I was like, "You can sell tickets to this thing and keep 100% of the money. I don't want $0 from it. I'm just leveraging you and your credibility and your personality to bring more people into my world, right?"

I don't know, I just want you guys to start thinking that way. I think so many of us think about the short-term, like how are we going to be making an immediate ROI? It's like, no, no, don't worry about that. I'm not going to make any money off my Logan Paul wrestling match, right? I'll lose money. I'll give money away. But it gives me publicity. It attaches my name to this thing. It does all these things now, if I'm able to pull it off, that will in the long-term, make me insane amounts of money. And that's what I'm looking for. I'm looking for these partnerships.

So think about that as you're building your businesses. Think about the projects you have, think about the ecosystem you're in. Who are the influencers, who are the people that have the lists, who are the people that have power, that have money, that have connections, that have these things? What can you create? Instead of getting them to promote as an affiliate, what can you create, you can co-brand and let them be part of it, right? Where you do all the work, they slap their name on it. They promote it to their list and you split the money. Maybe you'll split it 50/50. Maybe it's 90/10, whatever. Take less money, but then you're building your list, your credibility, your reputation, all of those things.

In the short term, if you looked at most of those early projects I did, the co-branded projects, most of them from the outside look like failures, right? But if you look at the compounding over a decade, it's like this one lead to this, this lead to this, this lead to this, every single time it introduces me and my personality and my brand to a new segment of the market, a new segment until eventually it's like man, I see this guy everywhere. Right? I see Russell everywhere. How many of you guys felt that before? Now I see Russell everywhere. I open up my phone and wherever I go, he's there. It's because I am. I'm there on podcast interviews, on ads, and they're on as many things I can. Hopefully I'll be there on a wrestling match, like all the things, and that's kind of the goal.

So I hope that helps, just put that thought in your guys' head as you're starting to think through this and your business and trying to put them all together. That said, we're about to go and jump on some boats and some jet skis so I'm going to bounce. Thanks you guys for listening today. If you got any value from this, please take a snapshot of it and post it on Instagram or Facebook and tag me on it. I'd love to see it. And let me know your biggest thoughts, your biggest takeaways and drop some ideas about it, like how you think you could co-brand your next project or take your existing product and co-brand it with somebody. If you do that, I want to know about it because it's going to be a shortcut to your success. Thanks so much you guys. And I'll talk to y'all soon.