When I started in this business 18 years ago, business was completely different.

We didn’t have Facebook and Google and YouTube, Instagram, TikTok.

None of it.

If we wanted traffic to our offers, we had to get creative.

It was different then.

It was WAY harder.

We couldn’t just go out and buy ads and start making sales.

So when one of my first mentors told me that I had to build an email list, I built it.

As I started, though, this thing called Google AdWords came out.

If you’ve been around long enough, you know what I mean.

I had friends making $50,000, $100,000, even $500,000 a month on AdWords.

When I saw that, I didn’t want to do this email thing over here.

I wanted to do what they were doing.

It looks like they’re making a ton of money without actually doing anything at all.

And while I wanted to jump on that shiny object, my mentor said NO.

Instead of letting me jump on the next new trend (which, in hindsight, survived every other trend), my mentor convinced me that the foundation of every business is having an email list.

As disappointed as I was, I took his advice and started building my list.

Then slowly, but surely, the list started growing each month.

Month 1 was 217 people on my list.

I think month 2 was 1,000 people.

Month 3 was 3,000 people.

It was this really, really slow process.

While my buddies are over there making a ton of money.

And I’m glad I listened to him.

Because while I was over here building my list, Google AdWords seemingly came and went overnight.

I watched it essentially disappear as it got more competitive, rules changed, and people’s offers quit working.

The friends that I had who were making insane amounts of money essentially lost it all as AdWords changed.

They never figured it out again.

They went back to the real world and got normal jobs and missed out on all the power of internet marketing because they were focused on the shiny object that works for a little while.

What didn’t disappear, though, was email.

After 18 years, it’s still the most evergreen source of traffic we’ve ever used.

And it’s still the backbone of every single business I build.

It doesn’t matter what trends come and go if you’re building your email list.

What you have to do, though, is FOCUS.

Follow. One. Course. Until. Successful.

And if you understand a few core principles when it comes to building your email list, it really isn’t that hard to grow a massive list you can email over and over again.

So if you see all the shiny objects right now?

But you want to build your business on a strong foundation?

Learn these List Building Secrets now.

Because you’ll be grateful as the trends come and go while you still have your email list to fall back on.

Instead of getting caught up in the shiny objects like so many of my friends did 18 years ago.

- Russell Brunson