#39: The 3-Phase Marketing Formula That Works Every Time

Summary

Podcast Summary: The StoryBrand Podcast

Episode #39: The 3-Phase Marketing Formula That Works Every Time
Host: Donald Miller
Co-host: Kyle Reed
Date: September 29, 2025

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Overview

In this episode, Donald Miller unveils his indispensable "3-Phase Marketing Formula"—a messaging framework that helps businesses gain clarity, captivate customers, and drive real results. Building on the StoryBrand method, the episode offers actionable strategies for creating sound bites that cut through the noise and generate revenue. Through vivid analogies, client case studies, and engaging banter, Donald and Kyle reveal why “curiosity sound bites” are at the heart of effective marketing and how to implement the full formula using examples from brands like “You Need a Budget” and Oswald’s Mill Audio.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Problem with Most Marketing: Talking Over People’s Heads

• Many companies fail by using complex, “over the head” messaging that customers don’t grasp.
  • “You are talking over people's heads. CEO after CEO will come to me, and I say, your product is so good and you're so close to it, you no longer know how to talk about it simply. And that's what's costing you money.”
    — Donald Miller [00:00]
• Nuance is not your friend for first impressions; clarity and simplicity win.

2. The Messaging and Marketing Campaign Framework

• Messaging Campaign: Focuses on the precise words you use across all marketing channels (e.g., websites, emails, social). The idea: A handful of sound bites, repeated, can directly grow your business—if you find the right ones.
  • “I just have this one belief that you can find a few words that if you repeat them, will grow your business and you can come up with those words. And if you repeat them and they don’t grow your business, those aren’t your words.”
    — Donald Miller [06:05]

The 3-Phase Formula:

1. Curiosity
2. Enlightenment
3. Commitment

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3. Phase One: Curiosity

What It Is:

• The initial sound bites that stop potential customers in their tracks—focused on survival or core problems.
  • “Curiosity is the most simple part of the campaign. But it's the most important part… The only thing I argue that piques a person's curiosity is survival.”
    — Donald Miller [06:49]
• Good curiosity sound bites call out the precise problem people face before ever mentioning your product.

How to Craft Them:

• Picture someone “in a hole” (problem state); your message should address the hole, not yet the solution.
  • “The only thing that is interesting is a problem. That's it… the problem actually posits a story question, will the hero get out of the hole?”
    — Donald Miller [09:19]
• Example: Instead of “We sell a gym,” say, “If you’re a busy executive who doesn’t have time to strength train, but feel like you’re slowly losing muscle…”

Real-World Example – “You Need a Budget” App:

• Five curiosity sound bites created for them:
  1. “Have you ever worried about money?”
  2. “If you have ever worried about money, it is probably because you are bad with money.”
     • “Now, we really kicked this around because are people going to identify as being bad with money?... But it also, you know, it necessitates. In order to download this app and use their system, you do need to admit that something's wrong.”
       — Donald Miller [25:06]
  3. “Download the You Need a Budget app.”
  4. “And we will help you get good with money.” (Became their new tagline)
  5. “So you never have to worry about money again.”

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4. Phase Two: Enlightenment

What It Is:

• Once you have attention, provide all the information needed to help prospects feel informed: how it works, how much it costs, why it works.
  • “They are in enlightenment mode. And so you actually need...enlightenment material or enlightenment collateral.”
    — Donald Miller [12:47]
• Examples: white papers, videos, webinars, FAQs, etc.

Why Most Businesses Fail Here:

• Most brands skip Curiosity and start at Enlightenment, overwhelming customers who aren’t yet attentive or invested.
  • “When I look at most businesses...they’re always missing the front steps. So I want you to just imagine a house that has a giant front porch…with no front steps...that's how most businesses look to me.”
    — Donald Miller [19:26]

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5. Phase Three: Commitment

What It Is:

• The ask: clear, direct messaging that tells the customer what to do next—“If you’re struggling with X, buying Y is the right decision.”
  • “If you're struggling with X, buying Y is the right decision.”
    — Donald Miller [14:10]
• This sound bite reassures buyers that taking action is the right move, closing the “story loop” you opened.

The Psychology:

• People delay buying when they aren’t sure if it’s the “right” decision—your job is to give them that assurance explicitly and simply.

Actionable Tactic:

• Donald suggests pausing the episode and sending an email to on-the-fence buyers explicitly stating that buying is the right decision per their problem.
  • “Pause the podcast and write that email and then come back and listen...because you can close that deal today.”
    — Donald Miller [15:01]

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6. Visualizing the Framework: The House Analogy & Communication Triangle

• Five Front Steps: Curiosity (problem-focused sound bites)

• Front Porch: Enlightenment (explanatory collateral)

• Front Door: Commitment (the ask)

  • “Curiosity are those five front steps, enlightenment is the front porch, and then the front door is commitment.”
    — Donald Miller [17:38]

• Most businesses have no front steps—potential customers skip them, and the “house” looks uninviting.

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7. Case Studies & Practical Creation of Sound Bites

You Need a Budget (YNAB):

• CEO admitted reluctance to use the word “budget”—wanted aspirational messaging.
• Donald demonstrated why the product should lead with clarity about the problem (“worried about money”), not aspirational lifestyle language (which is “inside the house/cult collateral”).
• Workshop method: Teams split to brainstorm problems solved, how solutions work, and arrived at a set of high-impact curiosity sound bites.

Oswald’s Mill Audio:

• One core curiosity sound bite: “Made without compromise.”
  • “How do you say these are the best speakers in the world without saying it? You say 'made without compromise.'”
    — Donald Miller [23:42]
• Enlightenment content: Founder breaks down “12 ways they’re made without compromise” through videos.

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8. Guiding Principles & Common Mistakes

• Don’t change the story loop mid-message: Start and end with the same theme—if you open with “worried about money,” close with the resolution to that worry.
  • “Never show a gun in Act 1 that you don’t fire in Act 3…”
    — Donald Miller [27:08]
• Nuance is for later: Early messaging should be as simple as possible, at a third-grade reading level.
  • “Nuance is not your friend... This has to be third grade level messaging. That's what's going to grow your business.”
    — Donald Miller [31:25]
• You’re too close to your product: Most founders/teams lose the ability to explain it simply, assuming customers care about nuance.
  • “You're so smart, your product is so good and you're so close to it...you no longer know how to talk about it simply. And that's what's costing you.”
    — Donald Miller [31:42]

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9. Implementation: Tools and Next Steps

• StoryBrand AI: $49/month self-service tool for small businesses to develop sound bites.
• Marketing Made Simple: Hire a trained StoryBrand guide for collaborative workshops.
• Certification Program: For marketers who want to help others, get certified at StoryBrand.com.

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Key Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “These sound bites, they're worth tens of millions of dollars and they're just words.” — Donald Miller [00:13]
• “If you’re struggling with X, buying Y is the right decision.” — Donald Miller [14:10]
• “When you're coming up with your survival sound bites, nuance is not your friend.” — Donald Miller [31:25]
• “If you have ever worried about money, it is probably because you are bad with money.” — Donald Miller [25:06]
• “There's nothing more important [than curiosity sound bites].” — Donald Miller [34:59]
• “The five sound bites for You Need a Budget are so good that you can grow that business without any enlightenment collateral.” — Donald Miller [33:47]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:00 – Importance of clear messaging; common CEO blindspots
• 06:49 – Introduction to the three-phase messaging framework
• 08:27 – The power of problem-based curiosity sound bites
• 14:10 – The commitment phase: “If you’re struggling with X, buying Y is the right decision”
• 17:38 – The “house” analogy and visualizing the StoryBrand triangle
• 20:12 – Case study: Creating curiosity sound bites for “You Need a Budget”
• 23:42 – “Made without compromise”: Oswald’s Mill Audio example
• 31:25 – Why nuance kills curiosity; oversimplify for success
• 33:47 – Five sound bites—sometimes enough to sell, even without “enlightenment” collateral

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Practical Takeaways

• Audit your messaging: Does it genuinely call out your customer’s “hole,” or do you skip straight to features and explanations?
• Build and test 3–5 curiosity sound bites for your brand—repeat them everywhere.
• Don’t be afraid to provoke or challenge—curiosity bites should be simple and tap into real pain or need.
• Use enlightenment content only after you’ve sparked curiosity.
• When in doubt, ask: Are we building front steps, or just redecorating the porch?

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Further Resources Mentioned

• YouTube: How Storytelling Can Change Your Business Fast
  (Video referenced as a visual companion to this episode; search YouTube for exact title)
• Marketing Made Simple
• StoryBrand AI
• StoryBrand Certification

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Final Thoughts

This foundational episode breaks down exactly how and why businesses should focus on messaging that is brutally simple, sharply targeted at customer problems, and repeated consistently. The Curiosity – Enlightenment – Commitment structure is a roadmap for any organization seeking to attract, inform, and convert customers with the right words, in the right order.

Transcript

[A]

You are talking over people's heads. CEO after CEO will come to me and I say, your product is so good and you're so close to it, you no longer know how to talk about it simply. And that's what's costing you money. When you're coming up with your survival sound bites, nuance is not your friend. These sound bites, they're worth tens of millions of dollars and they're just words. Your customer, their life has been disrupted by the problem you solve. And when you actually call that problem out, they pay attention. There couldn't be anything more important than getting that right.

[B]

Hey, it's podcast producer Bobby Richards and I've got a quick question for you. When it comes to your marketing, is it actually cutting through all the noise or is it just adding to it? I ask this because if it's not clearly telling your customers how you can solve their problem, they will not buy from you. But don't worry, because this is exactly why we created StoryBrand your business. It's a brand new hands on live marketing workshop taught by Donald Miller himself, happening January 28th and 29th here in Nashville, Tennessee. At the event, Don will personally teach you the proven storybrand framework that's helped thousands of businesses clarify their message. Plus his brand new messaging campaign framework that's designed to help you compete in today's AI driven market. And you won't just learn the frameworks, you'll learn how to implement them into your business right away. You'll craft a controlling idea that drives every piece of your marketing, create survival sound bites your customers actually remember, and build a complete messaging campaign that works. And throughout it all, you won't be doing it alone. You'll be part of a small group of business owners just like you and receive live coaching from Story Brand certified guides who are in the room with you. But tickets are limited, so Register [e-mail] you don't have to stay stuck trying to figure out how to make your marketing and messaging work for your business. Join us at the Story Brand your Business live event with Donald Miller and walk away with a clear message and a plan you can immediately implement to grow your business. We can't wait to see See you there. So go register right [e-mail].

[A]

Welcome to the Story Brand Podcast based on my best selling book, Building a story brand 2.0. If you are looking for a podcast that helps you clarify your message, we've got you covered. My name is Donald Miller. I'm here with my co host, Kyle Reed. Kyle, how are you today?

[C]

I'm doing great, Don. How about yourself?

[A]

I'm doing really, really good.

[C]

Did you get a cold plunge?

[A]

I did not get a cold plunge in this morning because my daughter had us up all freaking head cold.

[C]

Been there. Oh, not fun.

[A]

Four years old.

[C]

You think it's because school's starting back up and all the fun things, all the germs are getting spread around.

[A]

Well, no, she. She would be the guilty parter. Who. Who brought those germs? This was. These are cousin germs.

[C]

Ah.

[A]

And she. We. We debated whether or not to let her go to school. It was a mild sniff. We normally pull her back, but we sent her, so she probably got all those kids sick.

[C]

So that's never fun.

[A]

Yeah. Send your lawsu. 331 Smith Avenue. Email Donald L. Miller, StoryBrand won't [e-mail].

[C]

And you know, I'm thinking about a good transition here because the transition that, that I come up with is what do you do when you're awake all night? Let me tell you what I do.

[A]

Go record a podcast or I watch YouTube. Well, I couldn't because I'm stuck in my daughter's room. I didn't even have that called AirPods. Well, I was trying. I was committed to trying to get some sleep.

[C]

That's true. You're a better dad than me because.

[A]

I was doing all the things like the stress is just in your head. It's not in your head, it's all over your body.

[C]

Yeah. No. Well, transitioning us to YouTube. Recently, there was a YouTube video that we put up that is kind of a new framework you've been discussing lately. A lot of people who listen to this podcast or familiar with your work, especially with. With building A Story Brand 2.0, are very familiar with the story brand framework.

[A]

Yes.

[C]

There's kind of a new framework you've been introducing called the messaging and marketing campaign.

[A]

Yeah, Story brand messaging campaign.

[C]

Yeah. And I'd love to discuss about. Discuss that with you today, kind of. First off, where did you come up with that? And then, because it's a newer thought, but there's some principles inside of this campaign that you've been sharing with a lot of people. I think it'd be good today if we talked about your meeting you had a couple of weeks ago with you need a budget. You kind of introduce them to this.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

But take me back to kind of this, this print. Like, where did you come up with this?

[A]

You know, the story brand framework that's in building a story brand is it basically helps you come up with seven categories of sound bites that you repeat verbatim over and over and over that invite customers into a story. The next question then is, what do you do with those sound bites? Where do you put them? Yeah, and I always kind of thought this was sort of boring, right? I mean, you put them on your landing page, put them in lead generators, that sort of thing. But I explained it once in a keynote because they kind of asked me to. And every phone in the audience goes up.

[C]

It's a good sign.

[A]

It's a good sign. And then we took a keynote and delivered it. I just delivered it here in the studio and put it up on YouTube. And I think 2 to 3,000 people a day are watching.

[C]

Yeah, it's doing really well.

[A]

It's by far the most popular. We've never had anything go really viral on YouTube. The book is went viral, but YouTube hasn't. And so I think we're just realizing, oh, this is something that customers want.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

Now, I'll start by saying a messaging campaign and a marketing campaign are very, very similar. A messaging campaign is a marketing campaign, but a messaging campaign focuses on the words that you're using. So the primary thing you got to get right are the words where you put those words. It matters, but it doesn't matter that much. We all do the same things, right? Social media, YouTube scripts, lead generators, websites, emails, text message campaigns. These sorts of things are where these messaging campaigns end up. But the difference with storybrand is you're really actively thinking about those words and the words that you use. I am not a conspiracy theorist. I don't believe in magic. But I just have this one belief that you can find a few words that if you repeat them, will grow your business and you can come up with those words. And if you repeat them, they don't grow your business. Those aren't your words that they're out there somewhere. Abracadabra is out there for your business. It's not going to be abracadabra unless you're selling a magic kit. But that's out there somewhere. That's the spine of your messaging campaign.

[C]

So does this messaging and marketing campaign, this kind of new framework you're talking about, does it help you find those words? Is that kind of the goal of it? Or what's the primary source of using this?

[A]

So there are three phases of a messaging campaign. The first phase is curiosity.

[C]

Okay?

[A]

And curiosity is the most simple part of the campaign. But it's the most important part of the campaign. So curiosity is you need sound bites that pique a potential customer's curiosity. That if you're in a crowded mall and you yell these sound bites, the right people who need your product would stop and come up to you and say, hey, what were you just talking about? And so the only thing I argue that piques a person's curiosity is survival. When you hear something that you think could help you survive, you stop. You know, let's say you go to the doctor and the doctor says, hey, you've got some like mildly high blood pressure, nothing to really worry about, but you want to watch this over time and you want to do some things that lower your blood pressure, like exercise and a thousand push ups a day and 50 pull ups a day. And then you're walking through the mall and you overhear somebody say, actually lowering your blood pressure is pretty easy. Right. That's lowering your blood pressure is pretty easy. Serves as a survival sound bite to that specific person.

[C]

I think that's important though, to call out because let's say you don't go to the doctor and you don't hear that news, you would just pass right by.

[A]

That's exactly it. Yeah. Only qualified buyers are going to hear that. Like, you know, we're bombarded with messages all day long. And so you're looking for the message that the person who needs your product when you say this, they stop.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

And that is almost always going to be talking about a problem that your product solves. It's not talking about the product. That's where most companies make mistakes. They start talking about the product. You want to talk about your product. Actually second or third, and I'll get there in a second. But the first thing that you want to lead with is if you struggle with X or a lot of people feel the pain of Y, that is the thing that triggers the brain to wake up and pay attention. If you watch a movie. So much of our stuff is based on ancient narrative structures. If you watch a movie, the movie actually is not interesting until. Or the story itself. If it's a novel, the story is not interesting until the hero falls into a hole.

[C]

Okay.

[A]

You know, proverbially so if once the hero meets the love of his life but discovers that the love of his life is already engaged to his jerk brother. Now we have a story. If he meets the love of his life and they date and they have a lot of fun, they make great memories and then they get married and they have a kid, the Audience is sitting there going, I don't understand everything. And what they really are saying is, this isn't interesting, because the only thing that is interesting is a problem. That's it. And the reason is the problem actually posits a story question, will the hero get out of the hole? And so when I'm walking through a mall and I say, there's actually this great medicine that lowers blood pressure easily. And without exercise, whatever, by the way, I have great blood pressure probably because I take medicine. But then the hero who's in that hole is going to hear that message. And there couldn't be anything more important in terms of your messaging campaign than getting that right.

[C]

So a business should start trying to find out where their customer is in that hole or the problem that they're.

[A]

What hole are they in?

[C]

That's how they get their curiosity solved.

[A]

Exactly. It you want to analyze, what hole are they in? What does it feel like? What are they worried about? You know, it's. It's a negative sound bite in the sense that it identifies a problem which is a. Which would be considered a downbeat in a screenplay. So good screenplays, they usually start with a stable character, so kind of an upbeat. And immediately they have to go to a downbeat. The stable character's life is disrupted. Your hero customer, their life has been disrupted by the problem you solve. And when you actually call that problem out, they pay attention. When you actually say, we sell new roofs or we sell a gym, there's a guy, Jeff, in my Mastermind, who has a gym. He has a franchise of gyms that are very, very successful. And Jeff promises that you can go to his gym twice a week for 20 minutes without changing your clothes or breaking a sweat.

[C]

And so that's his curiosity sound bite.

[A]

That's his curiosity. That would be his solution. That is also a curiosity sound bite. But before that curiosity sound bite might be if you're a busy executive and don't have time to go to the gym, or if you're a busy executive and you feel like you're slowly losing muscle, or if you're in your 50s and you feel like you're slowly. That's it.

[C]

Yeah, it's just playing off that.

[A]

But don't have time to strength train like the guys you follow on YouTube. Yes, now we're there.

[C]

Now you're interested.

[A]

That's exactly.

[C]

You're talking directly to me. And that piques my curiosity because I identify with that.

[A]

That's exactly it.

[C]

Yeah. Okay. So if I have my curiosity sound bites, I Know, you know, knowing this framework a little bit.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

There's a next step.

[A]

There is. And I want to come back to the Curiosity sound bites, but there is a next step. Let's. Let's move ahead. First, the Curiosity sound bites, as far as this podcast, are the most important thing, the most value.

[C]

Yeah, let's definitely.

[A]

But let's say why they exist. The reason that the Curiosity sound bites exist is because they trigger somebody to pay attention. And when people are paying attention, they want to be enlightened. They want to be enlightened about how much that product costs. Are there any side effects? How do I find it? Do I have to have my doctor prescribe it? Is there a gym in my area? You see all that information they're now curious about.

[C]

Got it.

[A]

They're not ready to place an order. They are in enlightenment mode. And so you actually need. In your messaging campaign, you need what I call enlightenment material or enlightenment collateral.

[C]

Got it.

[A]

That would be white papers, lead generators, YouTube videos, podcast episodes, keynote presentations, anything that you could use. Webinars, anything that you could use to say, okay, you're curious. Here's how it works, here's why it works, here's the science behind it. Here's how you would adopt it into your life. Here's how much it costs. Here's what you need to do to buy it. All of that stuff is enlightenment material, and you need quite a bit of it, probably from multiple angles. You would need it from, for instance, every demographic. So men with high blood pressure might want to read something that's different than women with high blood pressure or. Or whatever. So you're creating as much enlightenment collateral as you can. And then the third phase, and the final phase is commitment. And commitment is, I'm going to buy the medicine or I'm going to sign up to work with this trainer at this gym. That's a very, very simple message, and I'll give it to you right now. The storybrand formula for asking people for the money is this. If you are struggling with X, buying Y is the right decision.

[C]

And it follows that.

[A]

That's exactly it.

[C]

Curiosity, enlightenment, commitment.

[A]

Yeah. And the commitment is just. It's literally one sound bite that you just put everywhere.

[C]

Ask for the money.

[A]

Yeah, it's. It's how you ask for the money. You position your product as the solution to a problem. If you are struggling with X, buying Y is the right decision. The reason is that if you say, would you like to buy why today? They are not exactly clear why they. They should. They're worried that this might be a black box investment. They don't know how it's going to work. The enlightened material was helpful, but they aren't willing to make a decision. There's only one reason there aren't. They aren't willing to make a decision. They are wondering the answer to one question, is this the right decision? That's all they're wondering. And so they're going to say to you, well, give me a week. What they're hoping to do is go home and spend a week and it will be affirmed that this is the right decision. However, you don't go home with them and you don't explain to them that this is the right decision. So you need to do it right there, right on your website. It needs to be on your sales reps, talking boys. If you're listening to this, I want you to try something. It's gonna be amazing. If you're listening to this podcast and you own a company or you're a sales rep for a company and there is somebody sitting the fence out there, somebody has not decided on whether or not they should buy your product. They're, they're thinking about it. Email them and say, hey, loved the conversations that we've had. I hope you had some time to think it over. I want to be really clear. Colon, colon. The two dots on a colon are like a double barrel shotgun. You're about to shoot something. It's punctuation, but it's a very, very important piece of punctuation. Colon. If you're struggling with X or I understand that you have this problem, whatever it is, start with a problem. Detail that problem. I mean, really agitated. It's a painful, ridiculous problem. If I've heard you correctly, and this is true, signing the contract today is the right move because it's going to solve this problem. You're going to close that deal. And you've wondered why couldn't you close the deal? You couldn't close the deal because you didn't affirm that this is the actual solution to the problem. So thing number one, if you're listening to this podcast, pause the podcast and write that email and then come back and listen to the rest of this podcast because you can close that deal today. You can close that deal today. Not, you know, what percentage of people are gonna, that that's gonna happen, I don't know. But there's no question we're gonna get emails saying, I can't believe I actually just paused the podcast and did that. And we closed the deal. I do this in workshops. I'll have people raise their hand. If somebody's sitting on the fence, we will write the email in the room. And if it's a two day workshop, within 48 hours, that deal is closed. It's never failed.

[C]

And that's how powerful that sound bites.

[A]

That's how powerful that sound bites. Because it's really about understanding where the customer is. And the customer is. They don't know that they're confused, but they're confused about whether or not this is the right move. And they don't even know what they're confused about. But what they are confused about is wondering whether or not this is the right move. They don't want to take a risk.

[C]

Now, for the visual learners out there, like myself, you have kind of a breakdown of like visualizing this entire process.

[A]

That's right.

[C]

Of curiosity, enlightenment.

[A]

Yeah. It's called the story brand communication triangle or the messaging triangle.

[C]

How do you break that down? You talk about a house.

[A]

Well, yeah. One of the things that you can do while you're asking Kyle is go to YouTube. What's the name of the video? Do you remember it?

[C]

Yeah, it is. I got it pulled up here. It is how storytelling can change your business fast.

[A]

So how storytelling can change your business fast is the video that's doing well on YouTube right now.

[C]

And we'll put it in the description of this show.

[A]

Yeah. And you can visually see the communication triangle. The analogy that I use with those three phases of messaging, curiosity, enlightenment and commitment is a house. And let's say you're walking through a neighborhood and you see a house. My house here in Nashville has five front steps, goes up to a front porch, and then a front door. And those represent curiosity, enlightenment and commitment. So curiosity are those five front steps, enlightenment is the front porch, and then the front door is commitment. So basically the way it works is you take these easy steps up to a porch where you stand and talk for a while. And then somebody says, by the way, if you are struggling with high blood pressure but you don't want to exercise, there's a medicine that will fix that. And if that's you, then this is the right decision. You should get your doctor to prescribe it today. That's how you get somebody into the house.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

So we know the message that gets somebody into the house. We also know the message on the front porch, which is, here's how it works, here's how much it costs, here's the science behind it. You know, whatever you need to do to enlighten people about how this is, in fact, the solution to the problem. When I look at most businesses that I personally work with, I'll work with a business Thursday of this week. When I look at a business, they're always missing the front steps. So I want you to just imagine a house that has a giant front porch that's about 8ft off the ground, that has no front steps, and ask yourself, is that an inviting house? It's not. I mean, if you. If you got your kids and you're. You're trick or treating through the neighborhood, we're skipping that house.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

You know what I mean?

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

It's weird.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

And that is the way most businesses look to me when I look at their website or I talk to the CEO. That's how it looks. And, you know, I've worked with the National Security Administration. I've worked with, you know, you need a budget was this week. Nextiva, a software company, Oswald's Mill Audio, makes the greatest hi fi audio speakers in the world. None of these people had front steps. They didn't have those sound bites. That made me curious and want to be in life. They just started enlightening me.

[C]

Let's talk about that. Practically. You mentioned someone you've worked with, you need a budget. You just finished that meeting off, and that was the big. You kind of mentioned to me. That was the big takeaway for them, was when you walked them through this exercise. You helped them create those sound bites. Could you just talk about that?

[A]

Yeah. There happened to be five sound bites that we created for you need a budget now. You need a budget is an app. You download the app and it helps you get good with money. When we talked on the phone, Todd, the CEO, said, we want to come up with sound bites that increase our business. They have been growing every year. They are very, very successful. They've never not grown in the years that this app has been out there. $50 million company only making money off an app brought 15 people to town. We met in the carriage house at Goose Hill. It was a wonderful, wonderful day. And they basically said to me, though, before we got there, we don't like the word budget. We don't want to use the word budget. I'm like, well, the name of the company is you need a budget. And the reason is that they felt like it's so much more than that. This is a lifestyle brand. This is this and that. And Todd tried to explain that this is really about health and wellness. It's about getting a great Night's sleep. It's about keeping couples together. It's about all this kind of stuff. We just are so much more interesting than a budget. And we shouldn't even be in the finance section of the App Store. To which I turned around and said, you will never not be in the finance section of the App Store. Nobody is ever going to think of you as anything other than. So let's not even try to do that. But they're right. What that is, that's brand evangelist collateral. That's after somebody downloads the app. That sort of language is what you use to create a collateral.

[C]

Yeah. You're already in the house.

[A]

Yeah. It creates a cult like following. And that's what Todd is getting at. Because that kind of messaging is actually very important. But it's not first date messaging. This is like we're married now messaging. So the very first thing, I divided their team up into three small groups. Product creation, content creation, leadership, I think. And basically gave one of them the task, what problems do you solve? The other task, how do you solve that problem? And another, the task.

[C]

Did you break that down by team? Did you give.

[A]

Yeah, I gave each team an assignment because I knew we were going to come back together and try to put it all together. What I was looking for going in. And I didn't have any clue walking into the room what these would be. But I was looking for basically four or five set in stone concrete sound bites that they could use and focus.

[C]

Primarily on curiosity or enlightenment.

[A]

Only on curiosity.

[C]

Only on curiosity.

[A]

Yeah. And the curiosity sound bites, by the way, will inform all the enlightenment.

[C]

Yeah, that makes sense.

[A]

And it will even inform the commitment part.

[C]

You gotta nail those.

[A]

Everything is on the foundation. It doesn't have to be five, it can be three. We won, honestly. But with Oswald's Mill Audio, the speaker company, we came up with one really, really good sound bite made without compromise. These are very expensive speakers. They're widely considered the greatest speakers in the world. At Oswald's Mill Audio, everything they do is made without compromise. Jonathan, I know Jonathan personally, the guy who started the company. He is obsessed with perfection. And he doesn't care what it costs. He just doesn't care. He'll pass it on to the consumer. If there's some horn speaker that there's only 40 of them in the entire world and they were used in theaters in Paris and that is the best sounding thing. He's going to sell 40 speakers and he's not going to sell any more than that. And that's just how he Is so if you think so. How do you say these are the best speakers in the world without saying these are the best speakers in the world? Even though I'm not against saying that, because they are. You say made without compromise. So now Jonathan is filming a bunch of videos where he goes through his speakers and he talks about the 12 ways they're made without compromise.

[C]

That is his enlightenment.

[A]

That's exactly it. Well, that's the curiosity sound bite that gets people for. You need a budget. We came up with five. The first one, and I'll explain why we came up with these and why I like them. The first is, have you ever worried about money? That's it.

[C]

Pretty universal.

[A]

Very universal. And by the way, are you worried about money is not the sound bite? Have you ever. Because it's a broader net.

[C]

Yes.

[A]

Like, if you're not currently worried about money, there was a time when you were. When you went off to college and you couldn't afford Taco Bell, there was a time when you worried about money. So what that does is it qualifies the customer. And the only people downloading you need a budget are people who are worried or have worried or don't want to worry about money. So that was it. We now know the customer for the you need a budget app is anybody who is ever worried about money, which is universally 100% of people on the planet. Right?

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

So that's a great one. Now this is where it gets a little bit provocative. I'm curious as to what you think of this, Kyle, because they haven't shipped it yet, but they're going to. The second sound bite is if you have ever worried about money, it is probably because you are bad with money. Now, we really kicked this around because are people going to identify as being bad with money, even if they are bad with money? And do you want to say to your customers, you're bad with money?

[C]

I like it. I think it's provocative, speaks to the internal struggle you're having. But also it gives me an identity of like, I'm bad with money, but this app will help me be better.

[A]

That's money. As we go through the sound bites, there's a way out here pretty quickly. The other thing that I think it gets attention, but it also, you know, it necessitates. In order to download this app and use their system, you do need to admit that something's wrong, that you're doing something wrong. Right. Do you eat a lot of junk food? Would be the equivalent. Right.

[C]

Have you ever eaten a lot of junk food.

[A]

Have you ever eaten a lot of junk food? So have you ever worried about money? If you have, it's likely because you were bad with money. That's Sound Bite one and two.

[C]

They're building on each other. I see it. Yep.

[A]

Download the. You need a budget app. That's Soundbite three. Okay, so sound by three is literally just download the. You need a budget. Telling them exactly what to do. Soundbite four is, and we will help you get good with money. So get good with money. Those four words are now their tagline.

[C]

Got it.

[A]

So that fourth soundbite happens to be good enough and appropriate for the actual tagline. That's the foundation. That's the offer you need. A budget is going to make you good with money. And then the happily ever after sound bite is the fifth sound bite. And that sound bite is so you never have to worry about money again.

[C]

Yeah, Makes total sense, right?

[A]

So there's so much going on in those five sound bites. One is, we open a story loop. Have you ever worried about money? Closes with the fifth sound bite. You'll never worry about money again. So that's a complete story right there. A lot of people would make the mistake of saying, did nobody ever teach you about money? And then close with, you'll never worry about money again. It's not as clear if we open with, did nobody ever teach you about money? The closing sound bite. The fifth step needs to be, you'll learn more than you ever thought you need to know about money or you'll become a master of money. Because we taught you. In other words, we opened the story loop of, you need this. So we need to close with the same story loop. There's an old saying in screenwriting. Never show a gun in Act 1 that you don't fire in Act 3. So let's say I'm writing a movie, and my daughter comes home from college, and she brings a guy that she's dating, and he's kind of a jerk. He's clearly not somebody that I want to marry my daughter. So during the meal, I go into the kitchen and I open the junk drawer, and I just make sure that 9 millimeter is loaded. And then I close the drawer, and then the movie goes on, and we never show the gun again. That is a problem in a screenplay because you literally showed a gun in Act 1 that you never fired. So you opened a story loop that you never closed. This happens all the time with small businesses. They open a story loop and close a different story loop in Their messaging makes sense.

[C]

Total.

[A]

Yeah. So it's like, you know, you're. You're in your 50s, and you realize that you've gained five pounds a year for the last 10 years. Use our product so you can get a great night's sleep. I mean, as absurd as that is, I see it over and over and over. It's like, guys, you're opening a story loop and closing. You open a story loop about a fat tire around your belly, and you close the story loop about sleep.

[C]

Sleep. Yeah.

[A]

So you can't do that. It's got to be. So those five sound bites again, three, four, or five, it's probably all you need to get somebody to the front porch are the absolute most important things that you can come up with to grow your business. And by the way, you need a budget. Came to Goose Hill, came to my house all day long with 15 people and paid a lot of money, and we left with five sound bites. Now, I guarantee those five sound bites are going to give them a 10x return on their investment. There's no way. They're not.

[C]

What I love about that, too, is you actually follow that here on whole scripting as well. Right. Because you started out with, again, I am stuck. I'm bad. You had to use the words, you are bad with money.

[A]

Right.

[C]

Because it set that up.

[A]

Well, let me tell you why we did that contrast. We knew that the tagline was going to be get good with money, so we needed to say bad with money. And we needed a transformative journey inside of those curiosity sound bites of, you were bad with money, but we're going to make you good with money. And that journey is really what the app takes you on. Let's go up to the porch. Now, there's all sorts of opportunity using these sound bites to create enlightenment collateral. For instance, one that I really liked was five signs. The man you're dating is bad with money. Do you think anybody's going to download that? Yes, absolutely.

[C]

As a man, I would download it not just as a female, but.

[A]

Yeah, Yeah. I mean, yeah, because women are just like, women don't want a guy who's bad with money. That's terrifying, right? What if you get pregnant, you have a baby, and now you got this guy who's like, he's bad with money. So that's going to get. And then what do you do with your boyfriend who's bad with money? How do you help him tell them to download that you need a budget app, or you get on the same page. So you could write those PDFs, those lead generators, all day long. But you want to use the words bad with money, good with money. Download the Ynab app, you know, whatever. You need to use those messages inside of the Curiosity Summits, those Front Step messages. Survival sound bites are the foundation. Those are the repeatable sound bites that you use over and over and over again to get people to pay attention to your brand.

[C]

And I think we see it all the time. You know, people skip those steps so often and go straight to the porch and they just make a bunch of content.

[A]

That's right. And here's why they're doing that. They think enlightenment content is our survival soundmates. That is front porch content. It's not. You are talking over people's heads. And CEO after CEO will come to me and say, but we're so much more than that. And I say, I know that you're so much more than that. You can explain that in two places, on the front porch or inside the house. You cannot explain. When you're coming up with your survival sound bites, nuance is not your friend.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

This has to be third grade level messaging. That's what's going to grow your business. And it's what you're missing because. And look, I mean, this is a compliment. You're so smart, your product is so good and you're so close to it. You have such a robust understanding of it. You no longer know how to talk about it simply.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

And that's what's costing you.

[C]

That's what's costing you money. You're losing a lot because of it. Okay, so if I'm listening to this and I'm tracking with you and I'm going, man, I love this. What, what are a couple options? What are some ways I can respond to what you just taught and like, walk through?

[A]

@Marketingmadesimple.Com there's close to 500 marketers who have come to me personally and been trained in this. You need to hire one of them and spend a day coming up with these survival sound bites and brainstorming where to put them. Because one of the things we did, we just looked at their website and said, cross this out. Put that survival sound bite here. There's not even a website redesign fee at this point. You're literally just changing the words on the website. That's the best thing that you can do if you can afford it. 49 bucks a month is Storybrand AI. So you go to Storybrand AI and you create your brand script and you work on survival Script. That's right.

[C]

You work on the survival. What if I'm someone listening to this as a marketer, a messenger, and I'm resonating and I want to help people do this?

[A]

You threw me a softball. Thank you for doing that. Sign up to be one of our Storybrand certified guys. So go to storybrand.com, click get certified and we'll walk you through the training.

[C]

And what's awesome about that is the training in that is what you just said. It's trained by you. Walking through this.

[A]

It's trained by you. And listen, AI can do this, but AI can do this only if you use the right prompts. And if you know whether or not it got it right, AI is not going to spit out a magical solution for you. You basically. It's like a human using a calculator. You're going to have to punch some numbers in to get where you want.

[C]

To go, but there's still some input.

[A]

That's right. Yeah. But these sound bites, they're worth, depending on the size of your company, tens of millions of dollars. And they're just words. It's just words. You get them in the right place and people start responding.

[C]

I love the unlock. It does too, because you start kind of infinitely where you could go with curiosity. But if you nail those right, it gives you the. The guardrails to then go to the front porch and then you can create so much collateral. It's honestly endless.

[A]

You know what's interesting is, and this is a bit controversial, so don't tell anybody I told you this. The five sound bites for you need a budget are so good that you can grow that business without any enlightenment collateral. You can literally just take the front steps to the front door and everybody listening to me knows it. If I say if you've ever worried about money, it's probably because you were bad with money. Download the Ynab app and we will help you get good with money so you never worry about money again.

[C]

That's it. That's the app.

[A]

If you're worried about money, download the app. That's it. That's just writes itself. Or each of those sound bites can be used independently in a thousand different places on a coffee mug. Whatever you want to do. But do you really need a white paper at this point? No one could argue. No, not for whatever they're charging a month, which is a small fee. No, you don't need that. Now if you're trying to get a pothole and bridge deal for the state of Texas, Yeah. You're gonna need some white papers and some lead generators and some case studies and some pitch decks and some proposals and things like that. But for most products, that's how important those five steps are.

[C]

And it reinforces. What you said at the very beginning of this conversation is that the curiosity sound bites are the most important.

[A]

There's nothing more important.

[C]

Because at the end of the day, if you just get those right, if you don't do anything else, even if you're bad at asking for money, the curiosity sound bites still do the lifting for you.

[A]

Yeah. If we use another analogy, imagine like, in your dating years, you have terrible hygiene, terrible breath, you don't comb your hair, you dress straight out of the 1980s, whatever, but you would be the best husband in the world. Yeah, right. What we need is actually, we need a little bit of a makeover just so people. Just so women will actually talk to you. That's another way of looking at it. Speaking for myself personally, this is something I had to discover. But we want to make your brand extremely attractive so that people can find out you actually have character.

[C]

Yeah, that's good.

[A]

And can deliver results.

[C]

I'm going to put you on the spot. Do you have a messaging campaign you use for yourself?

[A]

For me as an individual, or for storybrand?

[C]

Yeah, for you as an individual. What's your curiosity enlightenment?

[A]

I do. And basically it's if I'm in an Uber or on an airplane or something and somebody says, what do you do? I don't say I have a company called storybrand. I say, do you know how a lot of people have products or ideas or a vision they want other people to understand? Often they don't know how to talk about it with short, simple sound bites that get people curious. When that person has that problem, I am the guy in the entire world that they call. Now, I don't say the entire world because that's a little dramatic, but I'm the guy they call. I have never said that to anybody without them turning down the radio or leaning in. Because when you position yourself as the solution to a problem, people assume you're very important. Because everything that is important in this world solves a problem. Every product that is important solves a problem. Every person that we elect to be president of the United States, we believe is the only reason we put them there is so they could solve a problem, on and on and on. And so what I did was articulate. I mean, that sounds like a real problem. Like, if you have a vision and you can't get people to pay attention. That's sad. That's a hero in a hole. So basically my sound bite is there's a hero and a hole. And this is the specific hole that I'm talking about. And I get people out of that specific hole and they, even if they don't have that problem, they want to know more because they're like, oh, that's a useful tool. And if I ever know anybody who has this. Yeah.

[C]

And that conversation leads to one. If you don't want to have a conversation with the person next to you on a plane or an Uber, you.

[A]

Just say, I tell them I'm in.

[C]

I own a marketing company.

[A]

Yeah, I own a marketing company.

[C]

And they will ask you a follow up. So that's the power of, of of nailing.

[A]

They'll say, yeah. When you say I own a marketing company, they say, oh, you married?

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

You have kids? They change the subject.

[C]

Yeah, exactly.

[A]

Not interesting.

[C]

Well, this has been a really enlightening conversation. And, and, and I think there's a lot of things people can take from this but also do some more work. We, we talked about it. Go, go to the YouTube channel and go and check that video out. There's, there's more.

[A]

What's it called again?

[C]

30 minutes long. It is how storytelling can change your business fast. Yeah, the video is 30 minutes. So again it's going to be, by.

[A]

The way, what a great sound bite.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

Now that's interesting. That's the use of a front porch sound bite. How storytelling can change your business fast. There's a transformation that's offered there through the tool of storytelling. Two things. There's no room for nuance. And it doesn't have to be completely true. And by completely true, I don't mean it can be a lie.

[C]

Yeah, gotta delay.

[A]

What I mean is it doesn't have to be this comprehensive explanation of what your business does. It's gotta be something that only job of those steps is to pique curiosity. That's it.

[C]

That's right. I love it. Well, it's great. I think go watch that. If you want help with this, go to Marketing Made Simple. If you want to do more of.

[A]

This to hire a guy, go to Marketing Made Simple. If you want to become a story brand certified guide and help other people do this, go to storybrand.com. if you're a small business and you don't have much of a budget storybrand, I will help you workshop those, those sound bites.

[C]

Well, Don, this has been super enlightening for myself. I know, there's some things that I want to go work on and just appreciate you sharing for your personal brand. Yeah, for sure.

[A]

Are you leaving us? Did you know?

[C]

I just.

[A]

Freudian slip. I just.

[C]

No.

[A]

I really like you around here.

[C]

Oh, my goodness. I want to be able to answer.

[A]

The question, why are you building a personal brand? That's what I want to know.

[C]

I want to be able to answer the question in the Uber like you did. That's all I'm trying to say. All right, I'm going to wrap this up. That's all for this episode of the Story Brand Podcast. Thanks so much for listening. And remember, when it comes to your messaging, once you know how to say it, people will listen. We'll see you next time.

[A]

Sam.