Podcast

Bob Burg

#445: How to Activate Your “Know, Like & Trust” Storytelling Flywheel

If you’re a business storytelling practitioner, then you know how a singular compelling story will move your audience to action.

But storytellers aren’t always as effective as they could be because they lack a story-connecting strategy that leads your prospects on a journey to quickly becoming life-long customers.

Have you heard of the Flywheel Effect popularized by Jim Collins in his book Good to Great and then detailed in his monograph called Turning the Flywheel?

The idea behind the Flywheel Effect is to create a virtuous cycle of connecting with strangers who turn into prospects that lead to customers who become promoters of your product or service.

Those promoters in turn share their experiences with people who have not heard of you but need your offering (strangers) to become prospects, customers and promoters…

…and your Flywheel builds momentum taking on a life of its own to help build your business faster and easier.

The Business of Story Storytelling Flywheel

It occurred to me that business storytellers could achieve the same effect with a storytelling flywheel strategy that helps them become better known, liked and trusted.

You activate your Business of Story Flywheel by using the ABT (And, But, Therefore) agile narrative framework to make your brand value proposition crystal clear to your ideal customer. This is what helps you become better known for why you do what you do to help you stand out in our crowded, noisy world.
Then you build your likability as you use real-world stories that illustrate the impact you make for your customers. This builds momentum for your Business of Story Flywheel as you apply the Five Primal Elements of a Short Story for Big Impact and the 10-step Story Cycle System™ to focus and humanize your presentations and long-form communications.
You become immensely trusted when your customers return as repeat buyers and maybe more importantly share your brand story with their worlds, which, of course, makes you even better known, more likable and trusted.

To test my hypothesis on the potency of the Business of Story Flywheel, I invited legendary sales guru, Bob Burg, on this week’s show. After all, Bob coined the popular sales sentiment of…

“All things being equal, people will do business with, and refer business to, those people they know, like, and trust.”

For over 30 years Bob Burg has successfully shown entrepreneurs, leaders, and sales professionals how to communicate their value and accelerate their business growth.

Although for years he was best known for his sales classic, Endless Referrals, it’s his business parable, The Go-Giver, coauthored with John David Mann, that has created a worldwide movement.

While part of a four-book series, The Go-Giver itself has sold more than one million copies and been translated into 30 languages. It was rated #10 on Inc. Magazine’s list of The Most Motivational Books Ever Written and was on HubSpot’s 20 Most Highly Rated Sales Books of All Time.

Bob is the founder of The Go-Giver Success Alliance, an online Mentorship Community for successful entrepreneurs, leaders, and sales professionals, and he publishes the very popular Daily Impact email.

He is an advocate, supporter, and defender of the Free Enterprise system, believing that the amount of money one makes is directly proportional to how many people they serve.

So let’s test my know, like and trust Business of Story flywheel on this special edition of the Business of Story.

Discussed in this episode:

Being known, liked, and trusted is essential for successful business relationships.
Storytelling plays a crucial role in the flywheel of being known, liked, and trusted.
How to activate your storytelling flywheel.
Authenticity and congruence with values are important for building trust.