Building a Story Brand Notes

 Building a Story Brand 2017

Donald Miller

My notes from this book. I downloaded it from the free public library on my iPhone' Kindle app. 

Clarify your message so customers will listen. 

Marketing too complicated

The simpler and more predictable the communication, the easier it is for the brain to digest.

 

All great stories (marketing stories) are about survival, either physical, emotional, relational, or spiritual

2nd mistake they cause their customers to burn too many calories to understand their offer.

 

The key is to make your company's message about something that helps the customer survive and to do so in such a way that they can understand it without burning too many calories. 

The formula for clear communication

1. What do you offer?
2. How will it make my life better?
3. What do I need to do to buy it?

Shultzphotoschool.com

Show people the cost of not doing business with us.

Never assume people understand how your brand can change them, tell them. 

Conserving financial resources

To survive and thrive, your customers may need to converse resources, which means they can help save them money. 

** Mystorybrand.com – and either create a storyboard brandscription or log into your existing brandscript

** Brainstorm what potential desires your customers might have that you can fulfill. 

** Fill in the “Character” module

Start talking about the problems your customers face. 

The hook of the story 

The more we talk about the problems our customers experience, the more interest they will have in our brand. 

Every story needs a villain.

If we want our customers' ears to perk up when we talk about our services, we should position those services as weapons they can use to defeat a villain and the villain should be dastardly.

1. The villain should be a root service.
2. The Villain should be relatable, when people hear us talk about the villain, they should immediately recognize it as something they disdain. 
3. The story should be singular, one villain is enough.
4. The villain should be real. Talk about this villain. The more you talk about the villain the more people will want a tool to help them defeat the villain. 

3 levels of problems that customers face. 

1. External problems
2. Internal problems
3. Philosophical problems

External Problems

The external problems work like a prized chess piece set between the hero and the villain, and each is trying to control the piece so they can win the game.

 

Internal Problems

Companies tend to sell solutions to external problems, but people buy solutions to internal problems. The external problems we solve are causing frustrations in our lives and just like in a story, it's those frustrations that are motivating them to call you. 

The only reason our customers buy from us is because the external problem we solve is frustrating them in some way. 

If we can identify that frustration, put it into words, and offer to resolve it along with the origin of external problems, something special happens. We bond with our customers because we've positioned ourselves more deeply into their narrative. 

Philosophical problems

People want to be involved in a story that is bigger than themselves.

If we want to satisfy our customers, we can offer much more than services, we can offer to resolve external, internal, and philosophical problems whenever they engage our business. 

They aren't just looking for a resolution to one level of problems, they are hoping for a resolution to all three. 

If we want our business to grow, we should position our services as the resolution to an external, internal, and philosophical problem and frame the “Buy now” button as the action a customer must take to create closure in their story. 

Ideas

Edward Jones Financial Planning

Villain: Financial firms don't listen to their customers

External: I need investment help

Internal: I'm confused about how to do this. 

Philosophical: If I'm going to invest my money, I deserve an adviser who will thoughtfully explain things in person.

 

Brainstorm the external problems (frustration or doubt) your customers are feeling as it relates to your brand. Is there one that stands out as a universal experience for your customers?

Is your brand part of a larger, more important story? Is there a philosophical wrong your brand stands against?

Always position your customers as the hero and your brand as the guide. 

The day we stop losing sleep over the success of our business and start losing sleep over the success of our customers is the day our business will start growing again. 

The guide, however, has already “been there and done that”, and has conquered the hero's challenge in their backstory. 

The guide, not the hero, is the one with the most authority. People are looking for a guide to help them, not another hero. 

Two characteristics of a guide. 

1. Empathy
2. Authority 

The guide must have this precise one-two punch of empathy and authority to move the hero and the story along.

When we empathize with our customers' dilemmas, we create a bond of trust.

Empathetic statements start with words like “We understand how it feels to “, and” Nobody should have to experience.”

Scan your marketing material and make sure you've told your customers that you care. Customers won't know you care until you tell them. 

Demonstrate Authority

When looking for a guide, a hero trusts somebody who knows what they're doing. 

Serious experience

4 Easy ways to add just the right amount of authority to our marketing.

1. Testimonials, keep testimonials brief.
2. Statistics, how many satisfied customers have you helped?
3. Awards – won a few awards. 
4. 4) Logos, place logos of known businesses you've worked with in your marketing collateral. 

How to make a great first impression. 

It's only after trust is established that a person begins to consider getting to know us further. 

The plan creates clarity.

Procession 

1. Schedule an appointment
2. Allow us to create a customized plan.
3. Let's execute the plan together.

Post-purchase process plan

When a customer is looking at the wide span between themselves and the integration of a complicated service, they're less likely to make a purchase.

 But when they read your plan, they think to themselves, 

“Oh, I can do that?”

Alleviate confusion for our customers.

 What steps do they need to take to do business with you? Spell out those steps. 3 steps, no more than 6 steps. 

But studies show when you bombard customers with information, buying decreases. Remember, the whole point of creating a plan is to alleviate customer's confusion. 

The key is to simplify their journey, so they are more likely to do business with you.

 

Agreement plans

Alleviating fears

An agreement plan is best understood as a list of agreements you make with your customers to help them overcome their fear of doing business with you.

The best way to arrive at an agreement plan is to list all the things your customer might be concerned about as they relate to your service and then counter that list with agreements that will alleviate their fears. 

What's the plan called?

For instance, your process plan might be called “world's best night's sleep plan”, your agreement plan might be titled “Customer satisfaction agreement”, or “our quality guarantee.”

Customers do not take action unless they are challenged to take action. Are you challenging your customers to place orders? 

Create stronger calls to action to grow your company. 

Buy now button. 

Be bold about inviting them to do business with us. 

2 kinds of calls to action

1. Direct calls to action
2. Transitional calls to action 

We ask a customer to buy but they don't.

The way to deepen that relationship is through transitional calls to action. Transitional calls to action, however, contain less risk and usually offer a customer something for free. 

Invite people to watch the webinar. 

As a brand, it's our job to pursue our customers. We want to get to know them and for them to get to know us, but we are the ones who need to take initiative. 

Those who ask again and again shall finally receive. 

Direct calls to action.

1. Order now.
2. Call today. 
3. Schedule an appointment
4. Register today. 
5. Buy now.

Consider in every email signature, on all business cards. 

Transitional calls to action. 

Release PDF

1. State a claim to your territory. Renown as a leader in a certain territory, staking a claim to the territory, creating a PDF, video series positions you as an expert is a great way to establish authority.
2. Create reciprocity, never worried about giving away free information. The more generous a brand is the more reciprocity they create. 
3. All relationships are give and take, and the more you give to your customers, the more likely they will be to give something back in the future. Give freely. 
4. Position yourself as a guide. When you help your customers solve a problem, even for free, you position yourself as a guide. 

Transition calls to action.

1. Free information, create a white paper or free PDF educating customers about your field of expertise. Educational videos, podcasts, webinars.
2. Testimonies, creating a video or PDF including testimonies from happy customers. 
3. Samples, free samples, few pages of your book. 
4. Free trial 

What's at stake for the hero?

Brands that don't warn their customers about what could happen if they don't buy their products fail to answer the “so what?” question every customer is secretly asking. 

Blog subjects, email content, and bullet points on our website can all include elements of potential failure to give our customers a sense of urgency when it comes to our services.

 

People are motivated by loss aversion emphasizing potential loss is more than just good storytelling, it's good behavioral economics. 

At certain times, people are two to three times more motivated to make a change to avoid a loss than they are to achieve a gain. 

1. We must make the reader (or listener) know that they are vulnerable to a threat, for example, “Nearly 30% of all homes have evidence of termite infestation.”
2. We should let the reader or listener know that since they're vulnerable, they should take action to reduce their vulnerability. “Since nobody wants termites, you should do something about it to protect your home.”
3. Should let them know about a specific call to action that protects them from risk. 
4. “We offer a complete home treatment that will ensure your house is free of termites.”
5. Challenge people to take this specific action, “Call us today and schedule your home treatment.”

Fear is the salt in the recipe. Just a pinch of salt in the recipe will do. Too many warnings about imminent doom will turn customers off of fear.

Rousing content is most effective in producing attitudinal and/or behavior change. 

What are you helping your customers avoid? What's the cost of not doing business with you? You only need a few terrible, dastardly, awful things to warn your customers about to get the point across.

Once we've defined the stakes, your customer will be motivated to resist failure. Next, we'll dramatically increase their motivation by helping them imagine what life can look like when they buy your services. 

Never assume people understand how your brand can change their lives. Tell them, “Always remember, people want to be taken somewhere.”

Successful brands, like successful leaders, make it clear what life will look like if somebody engages their product or services once you know how your customer's lives will change after they engage your brand, you will have plenty of copy to use in your marketing collateral.

The next step to clear up.

We must tell our customers what their lives will look like after they buy our services, or they will have no motivation to do so.

We have to talk about the end vision we have for their lives in our keynotes, in our email blasts, on our websites, and everywhere else.

Whatever you sell, show us people happily engaging with our service.

How to end a story for your customer, 3 dominant ways storytellers end a story is by allowing the hero to.

1. Win some sort of power or position.
2. Be unified with somebody or something that makes them whole. 
3. Experience some kind of self-realization that makes them whole. 

Winning power and position (the need for status). If our brand can participate in making our customers more esteemed, respected, and appealing in social content, we're offering something they want. 

How to offer status.
a) Offer access 
b) Create scarcity 
c) Offer a premium 

Union that makes the hero whole (the need for something external to create completeness)
a) Reduced anxiety
b) Reduced workload
c) More time 

The important idea in this section is that we need to show repeatedly how service can make somebody's life better. 

People want your brand to participate in their transformation. Human desire to transform your brand is helping people become better versions of themselves. 

Brands that participate in the identity transformation of their customers create passionate brand evangelists. 

Smart brands define an aspirational identity. 

Identify aspirational identity that customers may be attracted to is consider how they want their friends to talk about them. 

Once we know who our customers want to be, we will have language to use in email, blog posts, and all manner of marketing. 

A guide offers more than a product/service and a plan. 

Playing the guide is more than a marketing strategy; it's a position of the heart. When a brand commits itself to their customer's journey; to helping resolve their external, internal, and philosophical problems, and then inspires them with an aspirational identity, they do more than sell services, they change lives. 

Leaders who care more about changing lives than they do about selling services tend to do a good it of both. 

The hero needs somebody else to step into the story to tell them they're different, they're better. That somebody is the guide. That somebody is you. 

Brands that realize their customers are human, filled with emotion, driven to transform, and in need of help truly do more than sell services; they change people.

 

Participating in your customer's transformation can give new life and meaning to your business. When your team realizes that they sell more than services, they guide people toward a stronger relationship.

The brand script you've put into our marketing and messaging material. Has to show up on websites, email campaigns, elevator pitches, and sales scripts website. 

You need a website that passes the grunt test and converts browsers into buyers. The website should be the equivalent of an elevator pitch. 

5 things your website should include.

1) An offer above the field and a short sentence would have helped me understand what they offered. Squarespace, “We help you make beautiful websites.” 

a) They promise an aspirational identity. Can we help our customers become competent in something?

b) They promise to solve a problem, if you can fix a problem, tell us. 

They state exactly what they do.

2) Obvious calls to action 
Buy now button, let's not hide it. The top right of your website, 2nd is the center of your screen, top left is the logo.

People have more eyes in a Z pattern across your website. The buy now button should be a different color from any other button. 

People don't read websites, they scan them. You want that button to keep showing up like a recurring theme. 

The transition button should be next to the buy button. 

Buy now download PDF 

1. Images of Success
2. Need to communicate a sense of well-being and satisfaction with our brand. 
3. A bite-size breakdown of your revenue streams. 
4. Very few words, People don't read websites anymore, they scan them. Use ten sentences on the entire website. 

Long section, read more. Cut half the words out of your website replace your text with images and reduce whole paragraphs into 3 or 4 bullet points.

There shouldn't be a single word, image, or idea shared on your website that doesn't come from the thoughts generated by your storyboard Brandscript. 

Getting the organization back on mission. When customers are invited into a magnificent story, it creates customer engagement. 

Could the same be true for employees? 

Exude a sense of competence within their industry as well as across the community in general.

Their leaders are respected. 

The employee enters the story. It's about who he will become if he's allowed to enter the story.

 

He senses that working for this company will transform him. He spends quality time with a facilitator who takes a small, new team through a curriculum and how the company positions itself as the guide in their customer's story.

 

The onboarding is more about the company's customers than it is about the company itself. 

These people are here to serve a customer they love. Is your thoughtmosphere on script?

Thoughtmosphere is an invisible mixture of beliefs and ideas that drives employee behavior and performance.

Video curriculum: When your culture tells a great story, everyone wins. 

1. Create a Brandscript with your leadership team.
2. Audit the existing thoughtmosphere.
3. Create a customer storybrand culture implementation plan. 
4. Optimize internal communications to support the plan. 
5. Install a self-sustained team to enhance the culture.

 

A story brand culture turns their entire team into a sales force. 

A story brand culture honors the story of its team members. Increasing compensation is one way,

Also raise value by improving the employee experience, advancement opportunities, recognition, meaningful work, and camaraderie.

The leader of a company becomes a guide, respected, loved, listened to, understood, and followed loyalty.

 

Build your company around a compelling story. 

The story brand marketing roadmap, 5 things.

Edit your website.

1. Create a one-liner, on your website, email signatures, back of your business cards.
2. Create a lead generator and collect email addresses. You need a PDF, e-course, video series, webinar, live event, or just about anything else that will allow you to collect email addresses. A lead generator will help you find qualified buyers so you can let them know, directly and authoritatively. How you can help them resolve their problems. 
3. Create an automated email drip campaign, beginning with the nurturing campaign.
4. Collect and tell stories of transformation. Transformation of the hero. Collect stories of transformation, teaching you what questions to specifically ask your customers and where to use those stories to get the greatest response from potential customers. 
5. Create a system that generates referrals and invites happy customers to become evangelists for your brand. 

Certified story-brand guides are independent contractors who act as marketing coaches and consultants and are each certified through an immersive live training program. 

Clarifyyourmessages.com

Create a one-liner for your company.

What do you do?

A logline is simply a movie's one-sentence description. A strong logline sells the screenplay and contrives to be used through a movie's opening weekend. 

“Example”

“An incompetent, immature, and dimwitted heir to an auto parts factory must save the business to keep it out of the hands of his new con artist relatives and big business” Tommy Boy.

What makes them complete and effective?

2 things: imagination and intrigue.

You'll craft a powerful one-liner. 

1. The character
2. The problem
3. The plan
4. The success 

What is their problem?

What is your plan to help them?

What will their life look like after you do?

1. The characters—understand your characters and what it is they want. Soccer moms, “We help busy mothers get a weekly, meaningful workout so they feel healthy and full of energy.”
2. The Problem, Will your brand be able to help me overcome it?
3. The Plan, you won't be able to spell out your entire plan in your one-liner, but you must hint at it. 
4. Success, Paint a picture of what life could look like after customers use your service.

 

** The characters –Moms. 

** The problems-- Bust schedules

** The Plan --------Short meaningful workouts

** The success ----Health and renew energy

** We provide busy moms with moms with a short, meaningful workout they can use to stay healthy and have renewed energy. 

Again, a one-liner is simply a clear, repeatable statement that allows potential customers to find themselves in the story a company is telling. 

Keep editing your one-liner until it works. Write it down and test it repeatedly. Do they completely understand what you offer? 

How to use your one-liner. 

1. Memorize your one-liner and repeat it over and over. Read and repeat it until you can recite it as fast as your name.
2. Have your team memorize the one-liner.
3. Include it on your website. Make it bold and legible so it becomes one of the obvious statements you want viewed to read. 
4. Including your one-liner almost guarantees your site invites potential customers into a story they find interesting. 
5. Repeat your one-liner in every piece of marketing collateral possible. Print your one-liners on your business cards and in your social media bios. Include in the email signature.

 

Create a lead generator and collect email addresses.

Email Marketing

How do we get people to join our email list?

We offer them something in return, something more valuable them the vague offer of a newsletter. Transitional call to action. 

How to create an irresistible lead generator

1. Provide enormous value for your customers.
2. Establish yourself as an authority in the field. 

Downloadable document (PDF Format) called “5 things your website should include.”

40,000 people downloaded, allowing me to email reminders about our upcoming story brand marketing workshops. 

Free video marketing makeover. 

5 types of lead generators for all types of businesses

1. Downloadable guide, inexpensive way to generate leads.
2. Online course or webinar, creating a brief online course or webinar is involved. Offer free training online in exchange for an email. 
3. Software demos or a free trial. 
4. Free samples 
5. Live events, and hosting a quarterly class is a terrific way to build a small database of qualified customers. 

5 mistakes People Make with Their First Million Dollars 

Downloadable PDF file, building your dream home: 10 things to get right before you build, free eBook offered by an Architect who wanted to establish herself as a guide to families looking to build a custom home. 

How much value should I give away for free?

Be as generous as possible and keep it at 3 pages of content among marketers, it's been said you give away the “why” as in why a potential customer would need to be addressed or be aware of a certain issue. 

And sell the “How” which is where you offer a tool or teach customers how to follow through step by step. Be very generous. It never cost me to be generous with my customers. 

How many email addresses do we need to get started?

Under $5 you should see results with as little as 250 qualified email addresses. 

Where should I feature my lead generator? On your website. Create a pop-up feature on your site after 10 seconds or so of the browser. 

Create an automatic drip campaign. 

Realized in hindsight, was that every month our top customers were being reminded that we existed. Logo flashed across their eyes, content is important, but the point is there is great power in simply reminding our customers we exist. 

Our customers may not need our services today, and they might not need them tomorrow, but on the day, they do need them, we want to make sure they remember who we are, what we have, and where they can reach us. 

Send potential customers regular, valuable emails. 

Create an automated email campaign pre-written sequence of email messages that trigger once a person is added to your list.

Some people call this an 'Autoresponder series” or funnel, but the idea is that you'll be inviting people into a narrative that leads to a sale even while you sleep. 

Does anybody read this thing?

20% open rate is industry standard. Even if they delete, you're “branding”. If someone unsubscribes from your list, that person probably never would buy from you anyway. 

Emails

Nurturing campaign

Regular email that offers your subscribers valuable information as it relates to your services. We want these emails to continue positioning us as the guide and to create a bond of trust and reciprocity with potential customers. 

Email #1 –nurturing email.

Email #2 – nurturing email.

Email #3 – Nurturing email.

Email #4- Sales email with a call to action.

The pattern repeated month after month. Create a few months' worth of material and let it ride. 

Add something of great value and then occasionally ask for an order and remind people you have services that can make their lives better. 

Pretty soon you'll have hundreds of potential customers being introduced to your business. When they need help in your area of expertise, they will remember you and place an order. 

The nurturing email.

1. Talk about a problem.
2. Explain a plan to solve the problem.
3. Describe how life can look for the reader once the problem is solved. 

Add postscripts P.S.

Often, the P.S. Is the only thing somebody who opens a mass email will read. 

Write out an email at the bottom, containing the client logo, their one-liner, and phone number.

 

The primary concern was to offer something of value, position the business as the guide, and create reciprocity. 

The offer and call to action email. Every third or 4th email in a nurturing campaign should offer a service to the customer. Be direct, don't be passive. 

1. Talk about the problem.
2. Describe a service you offer that solves this problem.
3. Describe what life can look like for the reader once the problem is solved. 
4. Call the customer to a direct action leading to a sale. 

What software should we use?

Mailchimp – automated email campaigns that are simple and reliable. 

Infusionsoft – storybrand.com/infusionsoft

Start small-- use a Word document and then paste it into the email application. 

Collect and tell stories of transformation. 

One of the best ways we can illustrate how we help our customers transform us is through customer testimonies. 

Great testimonials give future customers the gift of going second. Get the right type of testimonial, one that showcases your value. 

The results you get for customers and the experience people had working with you. If you're asking customers to write testimonials. 

Questions or format lead the satisfied customer down a specific train of thought and fill out a form. These same questions can also be used to create video testimonials.

Simply invite customers to be interviewed and ask them the following questions. Feature on your website or in a nurturing or sales email campaign. 

4 questions most likely 

1. What was the problem you were having before you discovered our services?
2. What was different about our service?
3. Take us to the moment when you realized our service was working to solve your problem. 
4. Tell us what life looks like now that your problem is solved or being solved. 

Once you capture a testimonial, feature it everywhere. 

Create a system that generates referrals. Invite happy customers to become evangelists for your brand. 

Create a system that invites and incentivizes people to spread the word.

What it takes to create an effective referral system

1. Identify your existing, ideal customers.
2. Give your customers a reason to spread the word. 

Consider creating a PDF or video that you automatically send to existing clients along with an email that goes.

Dear Friend.

Thanks for doing business with us, A number of my clients have wanted to tell their friends about how we help customers, but they aren't sure how to do so.

We've put together a little video that will help your friends with XX problem, feel free to send it along. We'd be happy to follow up with any of them, and we'll be sure to let you know whether we can help. 

We know you value your relationships and so do we. If your friends are experiencing a problem, we've helped you solve, we'd love to help them too. If there's anything else we can do, please let us know. 

Sincerely.

P.S. XX's problem can be frustrating. If you'd rather introduce us to your friend in person, just let me know. We are more than happy to meet with them in their place of business or at our office.

Shettig Construction Management provides Professional Construction Management services from the inception of your project through completion. www.shettig.com

mshettig@gmail.com