I was spending the week out in Scottsdale…

And one afternoon we took a day trip to Sedona for Laura’s cousin’s wedding.

It was a really nice trip overall…

I finished some work during a good chunk of the day…

Spent time in the pool with my daughter Eden…

And met up with various entrepreneurs as well.

So one thing I’m thinking about this morning is how lucky I am…

Both in general, but also in regards to the industry I’ve found myself in.

There are just so many cool people in the world of internet marketing/direct response/eComm.

On Tuesday afternoon I went over to Joe Polish’s office and spent over an hour just chatting and shooting the breeze (thank you Amber Spears for that intro!!)…

Later that night, I went to a local marketers dinner and hung out with Nick Verge, Carlos Redlich, and a few other entrepreneurs…

And then last night Laura and I met up with Sean Kemp and his girlfriend Christa at Top Golf.

I also met up with a wealth management guy who Joe recommended before heading back to Vegas in the afternoon.

So it’s been a busy but fun few days…

And one thought I have while reflecting on all of this…

Is to not be afraid of the future.

You see, I had this thought when hanging out with Nick Verge and some of those other marketers on Tuesday night…

If you don’t know Nick, he’s 21 years old, and a super sharp dude…

And one really interesting thing I thought about while we were all chatting…

Is how there are so many “young guns” who are coming up in the world of IM/eComm/DR/Copywriting right now.

This is hardly a new phenomenon…

I was once a young gun as well…

And probably still am if you ask some of the real legends of direct response.

So it’s a tale as old as time…

But when I thought about this…

It made me really excited.

I love the fact that there’s a whole new generation of marketers and entrepreneurs on the rise…

Young men and women who are doing really interesting things…

Both in terms of their marketing and funnels…

But even the technologies they are leveraging (ie. Tik Tok + 1,000 other things I’ve probably never heard of).

I mean heck, one really simple example of how this generation approaches things differently…

Is that some of them don’t even use sales funnels or designers when selling stuff sometimes…

Instead, they just send traffic to a Google Doc that has a checkout link.

At first, I thought that was a bad decision (and it’s still not for me)…

But then, I had to challenge my assumption a bit.

The truth is: this can be a really effective tactic, depending on your market.

If you don’t know Ed Reay, he recently did it for his FB compliance course…

Anyways, I mentioned that to Nick and some of the other people at that dinner…

And they were like, “Oh yeah, _______, _______, and ______ all do it that way too.”

I was shocked…

But thinking about it more, it’s kind of cool.

I mean, look at it this way:

What’s one of the biggest reasons why we don’t pursue stuff?

Usually, there’s some B.S. block or challenge that we say is too difficult to overcome.

For a lot of first-time offer owners…

It can be setting up, designing, and doing dev on a new funnel…

So some of these younger entrepreneurs are just saying “screw it”…

And removing the block.

That’s pretty cool.

Of course, there’s also a caveat…

Which is that the effectiveness of this strategy does depend on your market.

For Ed’s course, as an example, I actually still do think he should build a “real” funnel

And the reason why is because his network involves a LOT of accomplished business owners and entrepreneurs who are in their 30s, 40s, and beyond.

As such, I think his marketing should be reflective of what “we’re” used to…

Because otherwise, it may not connect with us.

So, you still need to think about your market…

But when it comes to 21 year-olds selling to other 21 year-olds…

I feel like the Google Doc strategy can work super well.

Anyways, I hope this is making sense…

And before I wrap up here…

I do want to mention that someone who is really good at not fearing the future…

Is my friend Brian Kurtz.

If you don’t know Brian, he’s an absolute legend in direct response…

He owns the rights to Breakthrough Advertising (the DR bible)…

He’s helped generate over a billion dollars in sales…

He’s broken bread with virtually every legendary marketer you can think of…

The guy is incredible.

A month or so Brian and I had an hour-long zoom call where we caught up…

And I remember him telling me that he’s motivated by a fear of the times passing him by.

I love that…

I think it’s super healthy…

Because nobody wants to be the old dinosaur on a stage, trying to tell the young whippersnappers how it “used to be”…

While they’re rolling their eyes and secretly laughing to themselves…

Because they know how it actually is, today.

I don’t think Brian is any danger of experiencing this…

He’s way too smart for that…

And more importantly, his Titan’s Mastermind brings together an incredible blend of the newer generations and the “old guard”…

Giving him a front-row seat to the ever-evolving nature of marketing and direct response.

It’s really cool…

And if you want to watch the recording of my podcast The Road to a Billion, where Brian came as a guest…

Here’s the link to the video on YouTube.

– SPG

P.S. This post originally came from an email I sent to my private list. If you want to see more stuff like this from me, you can apply to join my list using this link.