Park Howell

The easiest, most effective marketing strategy is the “Know, Like & Trust” Storytelling Flywheel. What remarkable product or service are you known for? Use the ABT (And, But, Therefore) agile narrative framework to craft your UVP that makes your ideal customer believe in your offering. That gets your storytelling flywheel moving. Then use the Five Primal Elements of a short story to illustrate the impact you make. Your stories are not about what you make but what you make happen. This makes you likable and accelerates your flywheel and your marketing momentum. When you deliver on the promises you make in the anecdotes you tell you become the trusted brand that your customers talk about. And the virtuous cycle continues. It’s that easy.

What problem do you solve for what customer? Is that problem still relevant to your customer regardless of the changes *innovation* is making in your market? How are you currently messaging about the problem you solve? Are you using the ABT (And, But, Therefore) Agile Narrative Framework to focus your message from your audience's point-of-view? That's all you have to do to refine your message and keep it relevant.

Put your personal brand story to the ABT test to see if the one thing you stand for is truly being communicated in a clear and compelling way, because confusion will stifle your impact. Name your #1 audience, define what they want relative to your personal brand offering AND describe why it’s important to them. BUT why don’t they have what they want because of what problem? THEREFORE articulate why you are uniquely equipped to help them get. Now compare your ABT statement with your homepage and see if you are being clear or confusing with your personal brand story. When you confuse you lose.

Sure, I acknowledge it. Then I don’t let that person be a client. I mean, I had six siblings always questioning my personal brand growing up. What do they know?

You know what? B2B communications should not mean Boring2Bored. Business leaders bore when they communicate in a non-narrative way meaning and, and, anding their audiences to death. Instead, narrative-proof your communications by using the ABT (And, But, Therefore) framework that is the set-up/problem/resolution structure that our narrative mind rejoices in. For instance: You communicate AND care, BUT bore. THERFORE, tell a story. There, I just used three-act story structure in 10 words to pique the interest of your pattern-seeking, problem-solving, decision-making limbic buying brain. Aristotle would say the ABT is a simpler way of saying that every story has a beginning, a middle, and an end.

Stories deliver the truth that creates trust. But only if you share your stories from your audience's perspective. What's in it for *them*. Even when you are telling a story about yourself, you must make sure your audience lives vicariously through the telling so they make your story their story. Ask this question to help you select the proper story or stories to tell in a presentation: "What doe I want my audience to think, feel and do when I'm done telling them this story?" That will help you select the right story from your audience's perspective. Always place them at the heart of your story. #StoryOn!