Tips to Write Compelling Marketing

habits. What actions are you taking every single day? Are you moving toward your goals, or away from them? It boils down to that simple formula. Dennis: What changed for you when you realized you were helping others? Brad: I didn’t realize it until later in life, but the shift was when I helped somebody go from earning minimum wage to earning $15,000 a month. I saw the impact that had on his family and his life, and I thought, “Man, that feels cool, I want to do that again,” so I quit my job to go help people make money by training them in sales, influence, persuasion, closing and other skills.

Until I was thirty, I only looked out for myself. I wanted to figure out how to get rich for myself. It was always for me. I didn’t really care too much about other people. When that shift happened, that’s when the real success started coming. Before thirty, I didn’t bust $500,000 in a year. But after thirty, I started busting $500,000 per week. I think if you focus on helping other people, money will come. We get up every day asking, “How do I make money?” You make money by solving problems, fool! You’ve got to solve problems for somebody. Solve your own problems while you’re helping people solve their problems. The world would be a better place if everyone woke up every day looking to help people, for money or not.

I’ve dedicated the rest of my life to focusing on helping other people, and in turn, I’m helping myself. I’m not a pure angel, but at the end of the day, I recognize the formula.

It’s fun making an impact on other people’s lives. A lot of people message me and tell me that I’ve changed their life and I’ve kept them inspired when they were ready to give up. It feels good knowing you’ve made an impact. Dennis: When did you start your training platform, Lightspeed VT?

Brad: In 1999. Lightspeed is a technology I developed to help people deliver, track and measure information so they can develop their human assets. I thought a website would suffice, but our team built technology instead. I started the online learning space. It’s easy to share knowledge. The mission of Lightspeed is to deliver knowledge from the people who have it to the people who need it.

Dennis: How did you come up with the idea for Lightspeed VT? Brad: When I went to train other people, I knew how to take the average person and turn them into a pretty badass salesperson. If you’re able to sell, persuade and close, you’re able to make money. I was very successful in showing people how to do it all these years, so I thought, “I’ll just run out and do it for myself and charge

people to train their team.”

When I started, I realized that training wasn’t just about good content. For several months, I couldn’t figure out why there wasn’t a lasting impact on my trainees. I analyzed how my methods had changed, and there was a difference. When I worked at a company and trained people, I gave them good content and repetition. I let them practice and held them accountable. Whether it’s a customer or an employee, it doesn’t matter—if you want to deliver training to an individual, those four ingredients have to be there.

After starting my business, I delivered good content, but there was no practice, there was no repetition, and there was no accountability. I couldn’t see if they were learning. I thought, “There has to be a better way of doing this where I can deliver repetition, practice and accountability. Maybe if I went online and I popped up on the screen and trained people, it’d be the same content, but then I could track them, measure them, monitor them, test them, role-play with them, practice with them and so on.”

I had quit my job, my training program wasn’t working, and I needed a way to emulate what I did before, which usually requires working at a company, so I invented the technology that now has put me on the map. Most people think they’re training their employees, when in reality, they’re just exposing their employees. They’re exposing them to good information, and I don’t know about you, but out here in Nevada, exposure can get you arrested. Dennis: As an entrepreneur, how important is building a personal brand online, and how did you build your brand? Brad: It took me about 10 years to reach $1 million in income with a company when I had no brand. Then I built a personal brand that you see all over the internet, and that personal brand will probably make me $200 million in two years. Anyone can build a personal brand, but not many people do, which is foolish, because it brings opportunities you would not believe. Deal flow. Invites. Access to rooms that you wouldn’t normally have access to. People reaching out to you. All because of a personal brand. Make an account on social media. Boom. Now you’ve got a brand. Question is: Is it good or bad?

What I recommend people do, instead of trying to figure out how to sound smart or what cool-looking photo of you can go next to a quote that you stole from somebody else—instead of doing all that, how about you grab a camera and film yourself? You go to lunch, you talk to employees, to customers, to spouses, to friends. You take phone calls. You’re doing business all day, right? And if you’re not, well then, what are you doing all day? Go to work, come home. Film that shit,

then edit it and put it on the internet. Most people won’t do that because they’re afraid of what other people might think. They’ll say, “Nobody wants to see this,” but that’s limiting self-talk.

Or they’ll say, “I don’t want to look stupid,” and that’s valuing someone else’s opinion over yours. You’re doing everything we’re raised to do, and in reality, you shouldn’t be doing those things. Dennis: How often do you have a camera on you? Brad: I always say bathrooms and bedrooms are where the cameras don’t go. Other than that, I really don’t care. I forget that there’s a camera on me all day long, so the clips you see on social media are those moments that I’m walking around my office, smoking a cigar, talking to a customer, doing a podcast. Whatever it is I’m doing, there’s a camera on me.

That footage goes to a creative team, and they chop it up and drop it out there with the right headlines and everything. Dennis: How do you deal with haters online?

Brad: I don’t usually acknowledge them. Occasionally, I’ll make a smart-ass comment, but most of the time, I keep scrolling. I don’t even delete the comments.

Dennis: Many successful people on social media say that repetition and frequency are vital. What is your take? Brad: I closed Grant Cardone on using Lightspeed because he trains car salesmen. Nobody outside of the car business knew who he was. I built him a VT system, and we started selling car dealerships. Social media started coming out around this time. He jumped online and posted constantly, telling people to buy every five seconds. I was following his accounts, and I called him and said, “Grant, you have to stop posting so much. It’s going to hurt your brand,” and if it hurts his brand, it hurts me, because I make money when he makes money. I take a piece of the revenue that he generates, so all those millions that he’s generating, I get a little tad for Brad, a little sliver to deliver, a little fraction of the action, for using my software and showing him how to do it.

He told me not to worry about it.

I said, “Trust me, I need to worry about it. You’re going to cost us both a lot of money.” A week or two went by, and he didn’t stop at all. In fact, I think he posted more frequently after our conversation. I called him again and said, “I don’t know why you’re doing this. I’m going to have to unfollow you. Every time I look down, there you are, talking shit or telling me to buy something.” He said, “Go ahead, you ain’t buying nothing.” That was true. So right there on the spot, I was wrong, and he was right. Why? Because look at him now. And all that came from building his brand on social media.

your face, whether they like or dislike you, the better off you are. If you’re a well-known individual, you’ll have a deal flow coming, there will always be people that love you to death, and there will always be people that don’t like you. The ones that don’t like you will keep walking, but the ones that do like you will bring you massive opportunities. People will offer to pay you to do the easiest things. People pay me $50,000 to come speak on their stage for an hour. Dennis: How important is it to have confidence as an entrepreneur? Brad: It’s important to have confidence as a human being. We’re raised to believe that we’re supposed to remain humble and fly under the radar. That’s bad information. If you look up the definition of “humble,” it says, “To have a low opinion of one’s own importance.” Why would you want to have a low opinion of your own importance? I believe in the opposite. I think you should raise your self-worth. Raise your self-value. If you want to raise your net worth, you have to raise your self-worth, because let me tell you something—you’re not going to outperform your own self-image. You have to have a bigger self-image to grow bigger as an individual. OK, how do you value yourself more? You make what you think you deserve. So people walk around—and I’m not talking about arrogance and conceit, I’m talking about true confidence— true confidence, to me, is something every human being should acquire. It’s sad when you see someone with low confidence, because quite frankly, they’re worried about everybody else’s opinions and everybody else has the same problems they do, they’re just not aware of them. But you are aware of yours, so you sit there and focus on your problems all day and your shortcomings and you think, “I’m not rich.” You’re looking on the internet and everybody’s driving Rolls Royce and flying private and everybody’s badass, right? When those cameras aren’t on, their lives are normal, their problems are normal, their stuff is normal, just like everybody else. People always act like I’m somebody, and I say, “I put my pants on just like everybody else.” Everyone should have confidence, not just entrepreneurs, but it’s very important for an entrepreneur, because you have to go out and sell yourself. You have to go out and sell your vision, get other people to do business with you. If you don’t have confidence in yourself, who else is supposed to? How do I have more confidence in you than you? How stupid does that sound? That’s a problem. If that resonates with you and you’re thinking, “Yeah, I’m not very confident,” folks, you need to get some confidence.

To learn more about Brad Lea, visit bradlea.com or bradlea.tv.

Brad shares what he calls his “structure” for posting brand-building content on social media:

Step one: You are the source of the content. Too many people are trying to create content when they need to be the content. Then you don’t need time to make it, because you’re being you all day long, so you might as well film it.

Step two: The content needs to be edited down to either just the funny parts or down to whatever point you’re trying to make. You need to create a hook and a headline. You need to type the subtitles and any necessary text. Write a little caption on what the video is about. Make something that catches people’s attention. Add on a couple of trending hashtags, and it’s ready.

Step three: Now you need to figure out where you want to post it. Put it on YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn, at minimum. All six of those platforms should have an account with your face on it, and you should be posting content on those accounts every single day.

How frequently should you post? It depends on the platform. On LinkedIn, I recommend posting once, maybe twice, per day. On YouTube, post as often as possible, at a minimum of three to five times a week. Instagram, three to four posts per day. For TikTok, three to five videos per day. On Twitter, tweet a couple of times per day.

That’s why it’s valuable to film yourself all day, because now you have hours of content to use. You can make one video and create different formats with different start and finish dates and post it on every platform.

Should you want certain people to unfollow you on social media? Yes, you should! Brad tells us why:

Don’t worry about who thinks you look stupid and who thinks you’re going to ruin your business. Put If I’m following your account and you’re saying things I don’t like, I’m going to unfollow you. Most people are worried about others unfollowing them.

I’m not worried about people unfollowing me. In fact, I wish they would unfollow me if I say something they don’t resonate with. I’m talking about the shit-talkers. You should want the haters to go away. You want people around you that like you, that encourage you, that support you. You don’t want a bunch of haters around you. You don’t want a bunch of negativity in your ears all day long.

What goes in your head grows. It’s just like soil: You plant corn seeds, you get corn. Well, if you plant shit, you’re gonna get shit, too, so you have to get rid of all the negative nonsense and block it out. One way to do that is to remember that you don’t want people like that following you, so let them go. Let the universe filter out all those people and move on.

Keep posting you and be authentically you. Over time, you’re going to look down, and the people that

are following you are the ones that should be. Those are the people that you can eventually monetize or do business with.

If you hate my guts, you’re never doing business with me. And nine times out of 10, even if you hate my guts, you’re still following me. Why? Because it’s undeniably good content.

Brad tells us his sixstep procedure for building lasting selfconfidence.

Step one: Forgive yourself for all the mistakes you’ve ever made, all the procrastinating you’ve done, all the time you’ve literally screwed yourself and others.

Step two: Commit to doing exactly what you say you’re going to do and follow through with doing it.

Step three: Start racking up the wins by lowering your targets. People are out there trying to make $1 million, and they’re coming in lower than a million dollars and rationalizing, “Eh, I did pretty good.”

No. Lower your goal. Can you make $1,000? Can you make $100? Can you make one more phone call? Can you brush your teeth? Can you make your bed? Can you exercise? Can you drink enough water? Can you send out five thank-you emails?

You want to consciously set small goals that you can do throughout the day, so that all day long you’re winning. I wake up and I have ten wins before 7:00 a.m.

Step four: Get rid of the idiots. Block out the nonsense, the headlines, the hate, the idiots. If you let it in your head, it will grow. If you plant negativity, then you will get more negativity. You can’t harvest wheat from corn seeds.

This step is where most people slide back into low confidence, because they’ll start to feel more confident doing the first three steps. They’re winning all the time and they’re starting to feel better about themselves and they’re starting to walk around saying, “Man, I’m going to buy a nicer car.”

Then someone says, “Dude, you didn’t even graduate.”

Those are the people that pull you back down. Get rid of all the negativity and all the negative people around you. You want only good shit going in your head. Step five: Map out and visualize exactly what you think success looks like. Too many people go after success, and they never find it because they didn’t figure out what it looks like.

Visualize your idea of success every single day.

Step six: Start reading and absorbing new information on a regular basis. You’ll get smarter, your opinions will change, your thoughts will change, you will change.

If you want to change what you’re getting, you have to change what you’re doing. In order to change what you’re doing, you have to change your belief system, because your beliefs are why you do what you do. In order to change what you believe, you have to learn new information.

If you don’t receive any new information, your beliefs will remain the same, which means your actions and choices will remain the same, which means your results will remain the same.

A little information makes a little change. A lot of information could make a big change.