Crafting Compelling Brand Stories: The Power of the StoryBrand Framework with Erin Fults

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:00:01

Welcome to another episode of Trust Builders. I have the pleasure and the honor of talking to Erin Fultz today. Erin is a certified story brand guide and she is a fellow, they ask, you answer, coach. Now, Erin has had a long history of marketing expertise helping smaller businesses really embrace clear messaging with the storybrand framework. She is now the director of marketing strategy at Heights Strategic Marketing. In today's discussion, Erin and I are really going to dive deep of what the storybrand framework is and what are these seven elements that make up that framework, how it helps you to really clarify your message and what you need to look out for if you really want to implement it. We're going to share a lot of practical tips of how you can take the story brand framework and help clarify your messaging. Because remember, a confused buyer doesn't buy.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:01:06

Are you ready to dive in? Let's get started. Erin, welcome to the show. I am super stoked that you're here today.

Erin Fults [: 00:01:16

Thank you, Hannah. It's my honor. Pleasure to be here.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:01:20

Now, Erin, in the quick intro I just did, I was telling everyone that you are a certified storybrand coach. You're also a certified, they ask, you answer coach. And what I really would love to focus on with this conversation today is about storybrand because it is so phenomenal in the way it changes how we build websites, how we bring our messaging about. And I would really love to share some insights with people who are listening today about how they can utilize the story brand framework. So in order to get us started, do you mind just explaining what I'm rambling on about? What is the story brand framework and what does it do?

Erin Fults [: 00:02:06

Yeah, so the story brand framework, it is a seven part framework. It was developed by a guy named Donald Miller. He wrote a book called building a story brand that goes through and teaches the framework. But essentially what Dodden did is he took story principles, narrative principles that have been used for centuries in stories. It's what Hollywood uses in movies to really capture our attention and draw us in to a story. And so what the story brand framework does is it takes those story principles that are used in movies and books and so forth, and it applies it to how to create a compelling brand story. So your ideal customers actually pay attention to and want to engage with your brand because you're speaking to them in a way where you're inviting them into a story where they're the hero of the story and they're compelled to listen, to pay attention to what you offer, to pay attention to the problem that you solve in your organization. And the goal, of course, being that they choose to do business with you if it's the, the right fit.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:03:19

Amazing. We're going to go into the actual elements of the story brand framework in a second, but I want to take a step back and really think about a lot of CEO's. When they look at their website, when they look at their messaging, they feel like my messaging is clear, it could use polishing. Most people would say they have a relatively clear messaging, but when you look in the buyer's side, that's a lot of times a very different story. It's not clear what's clear to us might not be clear to the buyer. So when you think about Storybrand, and you said it helps us to clarify our story or our brand messaging, why is that so important? And how can we test if our story or if our brand messaging is clear?

Erin Fults [: 00:04:12

Yeah. So the brilliance about storybrand and that framework is it does give us a path to follow to make sure that we have all the elements needed in our brand message, in our brand story so that it actually is clear to our customer. And like you said, we'll touch on the seven. There's seven parts of the framework and we can talk through those in a minute. But I find that often leaders who have been in a company, they have been inside the company for so long that there is so much inside language that they use, and they're the ones who are in the rooms making decisions about the products and services they're going to sell and they understand how it works and they understand how they're delivering it and all these elements, and they forget that their customer was not in the room when any of those decisions were made. And so it's almost like the messaging that ends up in marketing and on websites, there's unintentionally, I think, this sort of assuming that your customer knows what in the world you're talking about, when really we need to peel the layers back and just be really clear. Often companies in an attempt to be engaging in the marketplace or whatever, they try to be clever or funny or let's name this product or service or this process or something that feels clever, let's use alliteration or whatever the thing is, and in the attempt to be engaging or stand out, they actually have muddied the waters so much that no one actually knows what they're talking about. And they've sacrificed clarity in the name of being clever or unique or engaging or whatever it is.

Erin Fults [: 00:05:57

And often I will look at websites, we were talking about this before we hit record. I have a friend who I was just in a conversation with her yesterday, and she was looking at a firm trying to do some recruiting for the nonprofit she runs. And this recruiting firm had been recommended to her by a friend. She gets on the website and she searches and searches, and nowhere on the site was their contact information. There was no phone number, there was no email address. There was no form to fill out. Literally nothing. And so she had to go back to the friend and say, do you have a contact for the people there? Like, I really cannot get in touch with.

Erin Fults [: 00:06:29

And so that's not so much tied to a brand message as it is just clarity. But that's a small example of we think that we're being clear and we overlook the most obvious things in our messaging and not communicating. Is it really clear what we offer if somebody lands on our website and sees that top above the fold part of our website, do they actually know the products and services that we are selling? Is that clear to them before they even click to another page or start scrolling? We often think it is, but if we actually go read the words that are there, it becomes obvious pretty quickly that we miss the mark on that and we miss being really clear, assuming that people know what we do. And we can't assume that we need to be overtly clear and straightforward in our language, in concrete, in our language, so that our message is not getting muddled and that gets missed too often in marketing.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:07:39

A lot of times that's like a. You alluded to that a little bit. The customer wasn't in the room. It's that curse of knowledge, right? We're the experts in the thing we do, but a lot of times we forget that our buyers maybe are doing this for the first time.

Erin Fults [: 00:07:53

Right?

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:07:54

And they haven't gone through this process as many times as we have, and we just forget that. They might even use very amateurish language to dumb it down a bit, but a very different language than we do, and they might not know all the things that we do, and it's actually not their job.

Erin Fults [: 00:08:09

Yeah, and I'm glad you said that. Inside language, what are the industry terms, the acronyms, the things that we know? We have to think about who is our ideal customer. Some industries, there is some level of inside language that is appropriate to use in your marketing because your target buyer, they speak that language and they understand that. But if you're in an industry where someone is, let's say you offer a service that someone does not engage in with regularity, trying to think of a good example, let's just say real estate. For an example, you say you're in real estate and you think, okay, most people are not buying a home every year, right? Most people are not going through real estate transactions on a yearly basis or definitely not more frequently than that, right? But we can assume that, oh, they must. We're in it all the time. We know how this works. It doesn't feel like a big deal, but we have to put ourselves in the shoes of the buyer and go, actually, how often do they go through a process of engaging in a service that we offer or the type of product that we sell? Where can we be exhaustively clear? So that one, we build trust through the clarity, right? And that we're not missing the mark because they're so confused.

Erin Fults [: 00:09:29

That is the other piece with when we're unclear in our messaging and it's not clear what we offer, it's not clear how we make our help our customers lives be better. It's not clear about the problem that our products and service solve. It's not clear the steps they need to go through to get it or to engage and do business with us. When we're unclear in any of those categories, our prospects are having to burn more mental calories to try to figure out what it is we offer. And our brain is actually designed to help us conserve calories. And if we're making it too complicated and people are having to work too hard to figure it out, eventually they're going to tap out. And we all know how over stimulated we are as humans in this day and age with the number of messages that are coming at us constantly. And so if our customers are having to work hard in the midst of all the other messages that they have and all the other things hitting their inbox and social feeds and all of those things, if we don't stand out and are really clear and make it easy for them to understand how we make their life better and how the problem we solve, they're not going to stick around long enough to figure it out.

Erin Fults [: 00:10:41

If they have to work too hard to get it. There needs to be a very quick get it factor when it comes to clearly communicating in our marketing, in our brand message.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:10:53

The first time I read the book, and I read that section about burning calories, it sounds a bit silly to read about calorie burning and marketing messaging because how much calories could we possibly talk about? But looking at your friend's example, she was very invested. If she would have not been recommended by a friend to really check this out. And her problem wasn't as acute. She wouldn't have wasted that many calories to go and try to find that contact information. So it's a real thing. Which brings me actually to the next question that I was going to ask you. Donald Miller also talks about framing our messaging in a way that it talks about primitive desires. It just already mentioned, a lot of people try to be clever and they try to have acronyms and they, they use big terms, but what we actually need to do is just to really pull back and to express how we can help them address certain primitive desires.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:11:53

Can you talk us through what that means and what an example of that would look like?

Erin Fults [: 00:11:58

Sure. So if you're familiar with Maslow's hierarchy of needs, there's the baseline of we just need our physical needs cared for, right? Food, shelter, clothing, that sort of thing. Then as you move up the pyramid, we get into other things, like making money, saving money, saving time, like avoiding. How can we avoid making a mistake? How can we make our lives easier? How can we gain standing and status in the world? Like all of those things fall into the Maslow's part, that pyramid and Maslow's hierarchy of needs. When we think about our products and services and we think about what is the problem that we're solving. It's easy as companies to get into the weeds of all the details of the problems that our product services solve. And they do solve those problems, not that it's irrelevant. The question becomes is what do we lead with in terms of the problem that we're solving that connects to those core desires of our customer? And how do we talk about that? In the first 1st kind of exposure and engagement, the initial level of somebody being introduced to our company.

Erin Fults [: 00:13:05

So think about website is a great example. If somebody lands on our website, it needs to be clear pretty quickly the problem that we're helping our customers solve that really connects to those more primitive desires that are we helping them make money, save money, save time, gain standing in the world, grow your business? All of these pieces, where does our product service and the problem we solve, where does it fall on that level? We need to identify that, and then we can expand into all the other more specific ways that what we offer and what we sell, the other specific problems that it solves. But we need to connect to that kind of gut desire of our customer. And our messaging needs to communicate that really quickly so we don't lose people when they land on our website or they encounter our marketing material.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:14:04

Do you have an example. I know it's a bit difficult to think of examples on the spot, but do you have an example of what that could look like in terms of what that could sound like?

Erin Fults [: 00:14:16

Yeah, let me think of a good example. I'm trying to think of all the messages that I've written recently and go, what's a good one that would pop out? So here's an example. So at Hyte strategic marketing, the agency that I'm with, we have a client that does their consultants to nonprofits. They're fundraising consultants since they come in when nonprofits are trying to do large capital campaigns and they come alongside and help them develop those campaigns. Well, as we were developing their messaging, trying to connect these dots using the story brain framework, really where we landed with, what is the problem that they solve, which they solve a lot of problems and the different service lines that they offer. But at core, the problem that they're solving for their ideal client is fundraising is really complex, and it can take a lot of time and it can take a lot of effort. But we are here to make it simple and we do it, help simplify it in such a way that it does not cannibalize your annual fund, which is a big deal when you have regular budgets that are trying to be, you've got to meet those budgets and keep that fundraising engine going while you're also trying to raise over and above for a large capital campaign. So that was a pain point that their clients often deal with.

Erin Fults [: 00:15:34

With. So we're doing it and making fundraising simple without cannibalizing your annual fund and without taking up so much time that it disrupts your daily operations. So it was really a, we are here to help simplify in the, on the way to solving this much larger problem. That was the problem that we were identified. That really was their sweet spot of helping their clients in when it comes to the kind of consulting that they're doing.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:16:06

Yeah, I can see how that ties nicely back to the survival story, because you really, you can't afford to cannibalize your annual budget, and you have to keep moving and keep the engine turning.

Erin Fults [: 00:16:17

Identifying the clear problems that your customer is feeling like, what is the thing that they're really feeling? That is a challenge and an issue for them that you can identify in your marketing, and for them, that's what their people are feeling. And so we had to speak to that. And when you can identify what that is, it really speaks to the heart of your ideal client customer in a way that they go, oh, they get me, they understand what I'm up against. They understand the problem, and they're much more likely to engage.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:16:50

We talked about the customer and the buyer and the person coming. Reading this message a lot. That is actually the first part of the so called brand script, the thing you create to build a story brand website. And it starts with a character, but the ultimate goal is to make that character the hero of the story. Right? The Luke Skywalker of the story. Why is that so important?

Erin Fults [: 00:17:20

Yeah. So the mistake that many companies make in their messaging is making the story all about them. And this is actually a mistake that people who still read the story brand book and learn the framework, a mistake they often make is they think that they're telling their story, the company story, but that's not the story that you're telling. The story that you're telling is the story of your customer, where you are inviting them, the character, the hero of the story. You're identifying. The very first part of the framework is identifying, what is it that your character, your customer, what do they want specifically as it relates to what you sell? What is it that they want? And we're speaking to that so that it agitates a sense of desire in your ideal customer and your prospect. And they go, oh, I want that. They've defined something that I want clearly enough that I can at least pay attention a little bit longer to see.

Erin Fults [: 00:18:18

Do I want to keep paying attention? I want that. Are they the company I want to work with or do business with to get that thing that I want? And so making them the hero of the story by making the story about your customer makes them pay attention, because you think about it, all of us wake up every day, and we are the hero in our stories. Right. It's not that we're not interested in other people's stories. It's not that we're not interested in what they have going on or that we don't want them to experience success and all of those things. But really, you and I both woke up today, Hannah, right? And we said, we have things to do. We have a plan for what we're trying to accomplish today. We wake up on a mission to do the things that we are setting out to do.

Erin Fults [: 00:19:03

And yes, there's other people in our stories and in our lives that come along, and it's not that we don't care about them, but we're still focused on the thing we're trying to accomplish. The same is true of our customer. They don't wake up and go, I wonder what the history of this company is, and I wonder why they do the work that they do and why it's not. Not that they don't care about those things, but it's secondary to them caring about, can they help me get what I want? Because when we communicate that we can help our customers get what they want and we lead with that, they go, oh, I think they might be. I may want to engage. I want to find out more because it's helping them move along further in whatever the thing is that they're trying to accomplish in their own life and in their own world, instead of being so focused on your company's story and all the things that you want. So that's how we get them to engage and to care is by caring about them and what they want.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:20:03

That's really very cool explanation. And for me, as a european reading this story brand framework for the first time, it sounds very voodoo and very. Yeah, great. It's a neat idea, but if you actually take what you just said and think about it, if you make a movie where you focus on Yoda instead of Luke Skywalker and the guide guiding the hero is now all of a sudden the hero, it's half as interesting.

Erin Fults [: 00:20:37

Oh, sure.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:20:37

Because you want to see that hero meet at the end. You want them to go through that journey and struggle, and you come out the other end and. But the guide is really the one who just is a side character leading them along.

Erin Fults [: 00:20:51

Yeah, yeah. The interesting thing is, so we think the hero is the strongest character in the story. It's actually the guide that is the strongest character in the story. And the guide is how we want to position as a company. Right. Our customer is the hero of the story. We are positioning as the guide. In any story.

Erin Fults [: 00:21:11

It's the yoda. It's the one who comes alongside to help the main character win the day. They've actually already, already undergone transformation that is in their past, and they're on the other side of that, which puts them in the position to be able to walk alongside the main character. Right. And so when our company as companies, if we position as the guide, we're saying, we understand what you're going through, we get it, and we are competent to come alongside you. We've got a plan. We can help you get to the other side. We can help you get what you want and overcome the problem that's in the way of you getting what you want.

Erin Fults [: 00:21:50

We can come alongside and help you do that. And when we position that way, it's a much stronger role. That we're playing in the story by being guide instead of. Instead of reverting to the hero, the hero role.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:22:04

So we've alluded a little bit of what the other parts of the framework are, but let's actually walk through it so it makes a sense in a chronological order. So we talked about the hero, the character. Now take us through the rest of the framework, if you will. So it makes sense what we're actually talking about.

Erin Fults [: 00:22:25

Sure. Yeah, yeah. So we first start with identifying our character and what they want. That's our customer, right. What is it they want as it relates to our product or service? Then we need to identify there is something getting in the way right now of them getting what they want. And that's the problem. So we need to identify the problem getting in the way. And there's actually three layers problem.

Erin Fults [: 00:22:47

There's the external problem that's in the way of them getting what they want. That external problem is making them feel something internally, and that's our internal problem. And then we have the philosophical problem, which is that is really like a statement we make as a brand in a company. It's the you shouldn't have to deal with. It is a philosophical statement or stance we're making on why we believe they should not have to deal with the problem that they're dealing with. And it begins to position us as the guide. So once we've identified the problem that they're dealing with, then this is when we position as the guide and we do that by showing empathy, we get it. And also authority.

Erin Fults [: 00:23:27

We're competent. We can, we've done this before. Look at our testimonials, look at our case studies, look at our stats, whatever the relevant information is. Then from there, once we come alongside as the guide, we want to give them a clear plan for how to do business with us. Typically, this looks like a three step plan that's very high level and there's a couple of types of plans. So go read the book. If you want to get into the details of the types of plans, a common one is just how to do business with us. What are the steps you need to go through to move forward in doing business with us? We often think that's clear because we're inside, like we've talked about before.

Erin Fults [: 00:24:04

It's like we're inside the company and it feels very obvious how to do business with us, especially if you're in an obvious, like, common industry. This is a mistake that people make, but we do. We want to be really clear. Step one, step two, step three, how do they move forward and do business with us? And then the next part of the framework is we want to call our character our hero. We want to call them to action, and we need to do that very clearly. So this translates into our calls to action on our website. Learn more get started are not clear primary calls to action. They need to be our version of a buy now button.

Erin Fults [: 00:24:39

What's the next thing they need to do? If you're in a more of a consultive sort of business, it might be schedule a call, request a consultation, something along those lines. But it needs to be very clear what they need to do next to move forward to do business with us. And then finally the last two pieces of the framework are we want to paint a picture of success. What does their life look like if they choose to work with us and to do business with us? Short term, what are the, what does it look like? What is that look like? And even long term, what does success look like when they have chosen to work with our company? And then alternatively, we also need to show the failure we're helping them avoid. Now, we want to be careful. We don't need to camp out too long in failure. We don't need to have too much failure in our message because we're not fear mongers and we don't. That crosses a line.

Erin Fults [: 00:25:30

But there needs to be enough that people see that there is actually something at stake if they don't make a decision and move, whether it's making a decision at all. Some of our companies, our biggest competitor, is in action. It's not another company. It is just having our customers actually make a decision to move forward and solve the problem. And then we just want to be clear about what could go wrong. Are they going to continue to experience that is already not great, that will continue happening if they don't choose to work with us or they don't choose to do something about solving the problem that we can help them solve. So we have a character that wants something, they encounter a problem. We want to be clear about the problem our companies help them solve.

Erin Fults [: 00:26:11

We position as the guide to our main character. We give them a plan for how to move forward to solve their problem and do business with us. We have clear calls to action. And then we want to paint a picture of success and also show the failure that we're helping them avoid. And that comprises the seven part framework of the story brand framework that really takes someone through a narrative story structure, invites them in and helps them see themselves in our company, in our brand, in our message, in such a way that they go, I think this company, they're reading my mail. They know the problem I'm dealing with. They understand, and I think that they can come alongside and they can actually help me solve it. That makes for a really clear and compelling brand message that moves people to action.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:27:00

See, and I think that's where the genius of the story brand framework comes in. Because now you have this awesome messaging framework, and there's a lot of messaging frameworks out there that get you to that point. Right. But the genius, I feel, is you can immediately apply it using that brand script and translate it into a wireframe, and it's immediately like flowing into it and it's crystal clear. I love it, but it's not all puppies and rainbows. Where do people struggle the most in given that framework? Where are the points where people consistently go wrong or struggle with, or that are really just the most difficult ones to figure out?

Erin Fults [: 00:27:45

Yeah, I would say the two most difficult parts of the framework where you really want to nail it, is getting clear on defining what your character wants, making sure you're clear in that, and also being clear about the problem that they're experiencing, especially the external problem. We talked about the three layers of problem. The problem external is the one that's the hardest, can be the hardest to define the internal problem and the philosophical problem, those are just a natural outpouring of wherever you land with the external problem. So they're very easy once you've nailed the external problem. But the challenge in that one is because we spoke about this before, because most companies actually solve a lot of problems, is how do you distill down for your overall brand message? The problem that you're solving, where it's specific enough that it actually connects with your customer, but it's broad enough that it encapsulates the different product and service lines you have underneath your whole brand. That can be a challenge sometimes, and is often where, when we're developing messaging at heights for our clients is that's where we spend the most time making sure that, are we getting this right? Is it connecting? Is it really landing with your, with your prospect? That's the one that can be tricky to do. One of the things, though, that is helpful to note about the story brand framework is we almost always start with an overall brand message. How do we use the framework to develop an overarching brand message for a, for our clients and their companies? Then you can go back and use the exact same framework and develop messaging for every single one of your products or service lines where you get more specific, and that's where it's helpful to go.

Erin Fults [: 00:29:33

We have an overarching brand that follows this framework, and then we can use that same framework for every one of our product and service lines so that we can get as specific as we want to get. That can, depending on what you sell and what so forth, your overall brand can sometimes feel like, are we being specific enough? There can be a challenge and a little bit of a rub there. But when you take it and you apply the framework to your product service lines as well, you have this very nice overarching brand that's very clear. And all the sub messages for every one of your product service lines is also really clear. And then they work together very nicely to really engage and capture your prospect and their attention and capture their, help them move and make a decision to do business with you.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:30:21

That would have been actually my next question because my initial inclination would have been to say, okay, we do the more detailed ones first, right, the product ones. And then when we have an understanding of what the product ones are, we can move up to the broader brand one. Why do you do it the other way around?

Erin Fults [: 00:30:40

Yeah, we don't always do it the other way around. It really does depend on every client and what we're trying to accomplish. What's the problem we're solving right now? Is it starting with a particular product service line or are we working with the whole company? There are cases for both. If we're doing the whole company first, though, that tends to be because as an overall organization. So a lot of the companies that we work with at heights, they tend to be expert service professionals. And so they have a number of product service lines, but they're often very consultive, it's very custom engagements. And even though we can develop messaging for different service lines, we really do start with the overall, because generally they're internally having challenges in how do they talk about what they offer clearly amongst their team, like their whole internal team among themselves, as well as forward facing to their clients and prospects, they're struggling with consistent language. And so when we start with overall brand, it gives everybody clear, consistent language for how to talk about what they offer.

Erin Fults [: 00:31:49

And then we immediately take that. Homepage of website is almost always the first place that gets implemented as a starting place. But again, it depends on where you are. It does make sense sometimes to start with a particular product service line, especially if you're about to launch something new. Going through the process for the launch of a new product service line. That's a great place to start. And you can always go backwards, so there's no right way to do it in terms of order. It really is going to vary depending on your company's needs and what you're trying to accomplish.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:32:22

Awesome. Yeah, thanks for walking us through that. What are some other common mistakes that people make in terms of implementing storybrand or misunderstanding? Storybrand, for example, there's one sort of misconception that or negative thing that a lot of people bring always up and they say, yeah, Storybrand is just oversimplifying the brand narrative.

Erin Fults [: 00:32:50

Yeah. How to address that question? So story brand is intended to be simple. It is intended to really boil your messaging down to a really clear seven elements of your message using the framework. I think why people think that it's simplistic is they often think that if you're just starting with a brand script you mentioned earlier, that's the term that we use for that. Those seven parts of your message. If you stop there and don't take those seven core messages and really build them into more finished copy, that is compelling. On your website and in all the other places that you have your marketing messaging, it can feel vanilla. There is a place to bring in to the equation which is not addressed with the story brand framework, but a place to bring in your brand personality, brand archetypes, if you are familiar with that world, is going, okay, what is your brand personality and voice and all of those things? So it feels, feels engaging.

Erin Fults [: 00:33:53

But you think about once you've identified a clear problem that your brand solves as the core part of your messaging, you can talk about and illustrate that problem in a thousand ways. It's not that we're using the exact same sentence over and over again, it's that the core of our message is there's a common thread line that the story brand framework gives us to build our messaging on, but there's a lot of freedom to take that in, build it out in compelling and interesting ways. We just know that we need to account for those seven parts of our message, because if we're missing one of those parts, we're not being clear as we could be. And so we need to go, how do we make sure that we're accounting for those seven pieces of our brand message? Use the story brand framework to do that. And then it plays out in all of the areas of your business you just mentioned.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:34:53

You have to take those elements and you have to bring copy in and other, you have to move it to something to another level. Right. How does it fit into all the other marketing things I have going on?

Erin Fults [: 00:35:07

Sure. Yeah. So the way that I often think about story brand is we're developing our clear, underlying message. It becomes the foundation for how we talk about the problem we solve and what is it our character wants. We have a clear plan for how to do business with us that gets repeated in all the places, website, social, emails, all the things. That's the foundation. And it also really impacts our homepage of our website sales pages, core pages of our website, the messaging elements that come out in those pages. But then outside of that, we have articles we're writing.

Erin Fults [: 00:35:47

If we're following the they ask, you answer framework, you and I are both, they ask, you answer coaches. And so we bring that, those elements in with the work that we're doing with clients. So we still need to be answering our customers questions transparently, unbiasedly in creating content for that, whether it's video, written content and so forth. And so we can use the elements that we learn through story brand clarity. Are we giving clear calls to action? Are there clear next step plans and how do we even incorporate that? Even though it may be a little bit specific to the use case of an article or an email and all the other marketing collateral and content that we're creating, it may be specific to that particular use case and it may not fall under the exact, let's say, the three step plan we developed for how to do business with us. But how do we take that same principle of clarity and giving your reader a clear plan for what to do next after they engage with an article or after they read an email? We can use those same clarity story principles in these other places. Even though the actual topic we're talking about in the messaging may not be a match for exactly what we're identified with our brand message, the principles still apply. Are there clear calls to action? Is there a clear three step plan? Have we identified and agitated the problem? That article or that video or whatever piece of the content, have we identified what those are clearly? And we can use those same story principles in all of the other content that we're creating for specific use cases around specific topics that answer questions for sales enablement content and so forth.

Erin Fults [: 00:37:29

So awesome.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:37:31

Now I want to finish us off on this segment with a few stories. Do you have any stories that you can share? If someone's listening and they're like, that sounds interesting, but does it actually work? Take us through if you have a few examples of what initially the situation was and how storybrand helped them solve that challenge.

Erin Fults [: 00:37:53

Sure. Yeah. So two come to mind. One is a client I worked with a couple of years ago, a residential landscape architect, and he was really struggling to fill his pipeline. But when I spoke with him and heard him talk about what he offered and his process and all those things, he was very self focused in his credentials and how great, how his process was different. And I do things different than the competitor. And it's the classic more better. Like, we just do it better, we do more of like, it's not really a differentiator.

Erin Fults [: 00:38:30

Right. Because everybody says that. And so we worked together, developed his brand message, so it was clear the problem he was solving that was compelling for his target client. But the biggest shift was is he was talking about and making his customer the hero, because before that he had been the hero of the story. It was all about him and all about his credentials and past accolades and all of those things. And so when we made that shift and then we made the story about his client one, but we were also clear about the problem he solved and painted a picture of success and helped the client, the prospect, see really how he was differentiated. His business transformed drastically. He went from struggling to fill a pipeline to being so full that he had to hire four new employees just to meet demand.

Erin Fults [: 00:39:23

And so that not every company has that kind of very quick transformation within six months that happened because everybody, the scenario is always different. But for him, it was this real shift in how he showed up in the marketplace. In a way where before people were just ignoring him. It was very hard to see how he stood out and it was making it all about himself. But because of that shift, it really began to connect with his ideal, ideal client. So that's one example, and that's really him making himself that shift from being hero to customer is the hero. The other example that comes to mind is a small tech company that I had worked with a couple of years ago, and they were really struggling to describe what they offered in a way that was clear to their prospect. They were just had to use so many words to help them understand what they offered.

Erin Fults [: 00:40:18

They just never could seem to connect. And the whole team was like, we all describe it different, how we, the product service we offer, it's like this and this sort of thing. They just did not have streamlined or clear language to talk about what they offered. And so took them through the story brand framework, took them through that process, developed a clear message, applied that to website, to a pitch deck and several other things, and they because of the clarity, all of a sudden their prospects, they go, oh, we see what problem you solve. We understand now what you offer. Because the message was clear. They ended up going on to sign a fortune 500 client, the first, the largest to date at the time. Very soon after we clarified that message and they applied it to their pitch deck and some other collateral, all because all of a sudden what was felt very muddy and you were having to run around the block to try to figure out what in the world they offered.

Erin Fults [: 00:41:18

It became clear much faster and they really connected and have continued to grow since. And so it really is interesting. If anything, not only is there clarity that comes with your external messaging and connecting with your customers, going through a messaging process and developing clear messaging is also fantastic for your internal team. So everybody in the company is using the same language to describe what you offer. So they become your salespeople out into the world, right? When they have language to that's clear and that you've given them as a company to. When their friends say, hey, what do you do? And they have a clear way to talk about your company, all of the sudden you've multiplied your salesforce because everybody's using clear and consistent language in the marketplace to describe your company and what you offer. And it really is remarkable the transformation that can happen because of that.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:42:18

Yeah, I am going to share my example because it's just you telling those stories, it's just awesome and inspiring. So one of my they ask you answer, coaching clients, we just started out doing the coaching together and the messaging needed to be clear. And what happened with them previously is they go to a lot of trade shows. A lot of people come to the booth and they say, so what do you do? And they start going into this. Let me show you. And people are like, okay, by, it didn't connect. And we started this coaching process and I said, we have to clear up this message like, it's not clear what you actually do. So we sat down and we read the story brand together and we built the brand script.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:43:03

And that night the CEO called the CEO and said, we have to say this from now on. He happened to be at a conference, started to use that messaging and it was instantly clear. People were like, oh, I have that problem too. Tell me more. It was like instant transformation of a company happening within 24 hours, seeing in front of your eyes, it was unbelievable. So we've now moved that into the website, into the messaging. Everyone in the company uses the same language and it just is clear.

Erin Fults [: 00:43:39

Yeah, that's fantastic. And what's amazing is one of the challenges in developing your own message even go read the book. If you're listening, go read the book. You can go to mybrandscript.com and there's a free online interactive tool that you can use to develop your brand message. Go through the exercise and there is a lot of value in having someone outside of your company to come in and give you perspective, whether it's coaching, whether it's working with a certified story brain guide, because we have the curse of knowledge, because we are inside. The things that we think are clear are not always as clear to folks externally. And having an outside perspective is really valuable to make sure that the messaging you develop actually does connect and is as clear as you think it is whenever you start using it out into the, in the marketplace.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:44:36

Yeah, there's really definitely something to be said about trying it yourself, getting an understanding for it, playing around with it, but having someone come in and knows they've been through this so many times, like a certified story brand coach and really guiding you through that process and being your guardrails to say, okay, that sounds like we're going veering off that direction of talking about ourselves again. Let's go back to making the buyer the hero. Yeah. Awesome. Alright, it is time for a favorite segment of mine, which is the two minute rant. Yeah, I threw that left field for you there, but I would love for you to take two minutes and rant about a subject of your choice.

Erin Fults [: 00:45:22

Yeah, just thinking about several conversations that I've had, both with existing clients as well as prospects over the last handful of weeks. And one of the things that I think is tempting in the marketing world is folks call a marketing consultant or an agency and they're going, I know I need help with my marketing, can you help? And you start talking and really what they want is somebody to come in and just magically make it all better and take care of it for them without them having to do anything. And I think one of the things that increasingly, the longer I do this, one of the frustrations I have is this sense of leaders in a company and it's going to vary depending who that is, depending on the size of the company. They want to just go hands off and have somebody deal with it and handle their marketing and not realizing that you have got to take the time, you have to carve out time to do this work. You have to make yourself self available for feedback and providing your expertise. You cannot just hands off with your marketing. Somebody internally at your company has got to take responsibility. And whether you're working with a coach or you're working with an agency, there's all different models on how you can get marketing support, but somebody's got to own it.

Erin Fults [: 00:46:42

And especially with smaller companies, this tends to be where they just want to outsource all of it. You cannot do that and get the results that you're going after. You don't have to become a marketing expert. You can work with somebody to give you that advisory and support, but you cannot go hands off and expect to get great results. You just can't. And you have to be able to commit to putting the time in to do the work and to make it a priority. And it doesn't stop. We all wish that it was.

Erin Fults [: 00:47:12

You wish that it was a one and done. The marketing keeps going. You cannot stop it. And I think there's just a lot of misconceptions with leadership sometimes at companies where you think, we're going to do this initiative and project that's going to be the magic bullet. And it's no, like, this just needs to be part of the plan to account for this from now until forever. Like, it just is part of it. And it's. It can be a little maddening when companies want to have this, the magic bullet thing that's going to come in and save the day.

Erin Fults [: 00:47:46

And no, it's just consistently doing the work over time and the snowball effect of that. But you can't ever take your foot off the gas. And it just is the world that we live in. We have to keep going. So my brief rant for today.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:48:02

Awesome. Good. And just to finish us off, what is a book that you have read that really influenced you in your career or how you approach things in the last, I don't know, six to twelve months. But if it was longer ago, it's fine, too.

Erin Fults [: 00:48:19

Yeah. Yeah. I'm a big reader, so I have a long list of books I could pull from the one that comes to mind that I've really enjoyed. I really enjoy David C. Baker's work, but he wrote a book, one of his more recent, called Secret Tradecraft of Elite advisors, and he really just talks through kind of process, how to think about being an effective advisor, how to set great client expertise, expectation and relationship. And I've really taken a lot from that book. It's one of those books were highlighted and put sticky notes in and revisit because it is so applicable to the work that I do. And any of our clients that are consultant advisors, we have quite a few that fall in that category at heights.

Erin Fults [: 00:49:04

And there's just something to be said for not just our professional expertise in terms of subject matter and the things we're bringing to the table, but how we show up in those engagements, how we lead those engagements in such a way that it actually maximizes the value that we're delivering to clients. And that book has been a really great just piece that I've continued to revisit in terms of how I think about that.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:49:36

I've actually, just. Because it's not available in Europe, it's really hard to get in his books. So I've just got my hands on both of them, and I've listened to the audiobook of the business of expertise way before when, but I spent the weekend reading the business of expertise because I started reading the secret tradecraft, and I'm like, that feels like a second version of how to do this practical what he says in the business of expertise. So I'm definitely looking forward to reading that one. And I'm excited that you shared that one with us.

Erin Fults [: 00:50:10

Yeah.

Hannah Eisenberg [: 00:50:11

All right. Erin, I cannot say enough how I really enjoyed our conversation, and there were so many awesome nuggets in there. So thank you very much for coming on and sharing those with us today.

Erin Fults [: 00:50:23

Oh, thank you, Hannah. It is my pleasure. Always enjoy conversations like this.