Ron Sciarro and Paul Preston

#325: How a Story Propelled Their Brand to Market Dominance

#325: How a Story Propelled Their Brand to Market Dominance

Most executives now embrace storytelling as a powerful business tool and if you use story to communicate your authentic purpose then you will raise the perceived value of your brand.

But most brand stories fall flat because they talk about what companies make versus what they make happen in the lives of their customers, colleagues and communities they serve.

Therefore, tell your story on purpose; what you stand for that makes you stand out.  A clearly defined brand story highlights the impact and real-life transformations your business achieves for your customers. 

Two people who know a ton about creating brand attributes and narrowing your focus to key messaging are Paul Preston and Ron Sciarro, co-founders of Aqua-Tots Swim Schools. They have found huge success in propelling their brand to an international level, becoming the world’s largest swim school franchise.

Ron oversees leadership development, training and operations strategy, helping franchise owners and their senior leadership teams with the execution of franchise systems within the Aqua-Tots core values.

Paul is the president of Aqua-Tots Swim Schools Franchise Holdings, and oversees strategic planning, growth and franchise development of all Aqua-Tots openings worldwide. 

Together, they have worked alongside leaders in other industries partnering with multiple brands to create franchise opportunities, and are passionate about offering people a safe place to live out their dreams in business and in the community. (more…)

Greg Head

#324: The Sales Power of a Focused Brand Story

#324: The Sales Power of a Focused Brand Story

We are now living in a golden age of entrepreneurship where pursuing a start-up consultancy or business has never been easier. And you want to make sure you can grow your startup in a way that creates a valuable experience for your customers and prospects so you can gain consistent sustainable growth.

But you’re hindering the success to your startups exponential growth because you’re not tackling the biggest roadblock – getting crystal clear in defining exactly who you serve and what exactly your thing is for your audience so that you can make aligned decisions and actions that will accelerate your business the fastest.

Today, I’m bringing in one of the biggest champions of Arizona’s tech scene and has spent decades in the startup world, Greg Head. Greg is a 30-year software industry veteran who was part of the startup-to-scale journeys of three different software companies in the CRM industry, including one IPO. 

He is now an active mentor, advisor, consultant, podcast host of Dallas Software Podcast, and a speaker helping founders of early-stage software startups all over the world.

Greg is also the founder of Gregslist.com, the up-to-date list of local software companies and SaaS jobs used by thousands of founders, tech leaders, investors, and job seekers each month. He runs his own consulting company, Scaling Point, where he works with startup tech founders on marketing strategy, messaging, and scalable marketing execution.  (more…)

David Pullan and Sarah Jane McKechnie

#323: Why the Most Skilled Storytellers Start With the ABT

#323: Why the Most Skilled Storytellers Start With the ABT

For many businesses, the most challenging part of telling their brand story is unlocking the complexity of their messaging. And you want to be able to communicate your story clearly to your audience so that it connects, resonates, and inspires them to take action. But your stories aren’t converting because you’re overcomplicating it instead of simplifying to a structure and language your audience can actually understand.

That’s why today’s episode is all about how you can use the immense power of the And, But, Therefore (ABT) framework to build authentic and memorable connections with your audience. That way, you can win them over and start putting the power of your story at the heart of your business success.

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Pete Walsh

#322: How to Craft a Better Family Business Story

#322: How to Craft a Better Family Business Story

The two most important assets in your life are your family and business. And you want to make sure your family business can survive the next generation so you can build a sustainable future and stay on the winning track to long-term success.

But, you can only create a high-performing winning team if you can step into the true power of a visionary leader. You need to start implementing the right systems for building a resilient and solid team and family so you can avoid the path to family conflict and business failure.

In this episode, I’m bringing in my very good friend, Pete Walsh. Pete knows a ton about what it’s like to be born into a family business and how to sustain a successful family business story. He is a Master Coach and a trusted advisor who brings real-life lessons to his family business and executive clients. He uses humor, compassion, tough love and 30 years of family business experience from his own family’s 90-year-old business to guide a business through thick and thin.

Pete has a new workbook called the Family Business Playbook: Your Family’s Path to Long-Term Success, providing powerful tools and step-by-step guides on how to get your team into a “coaching mindset” to increase family engagement in new ways and through productive conversations. (more…)

John Jantsch

#321: How to Create Clients for Life With Their Story

#321: How to Create Clients for Life With Their Story

“A business is important to its customers when those customers realize that their lives would be diminished were the business to cease to exist.”

Your customers are distracted by the multitude of ways to buy. And as a business, you want to be able to cancel all the noise and confusion so you can start creating authentic relationships with your customers and convert them into life-long customers.

But, you can only turn them into customers for life by changing your view of them as a member instead of a transaction. The secret is to align your focus in helping them achieve the transformation they are seeking and focusing on their success rather than your own. Being able to guide them from where they are to where they want to go is where you will find consistent growth in your business.

Today, marketing guru, John Jantsch will teach us how. John is a marketing consultant, speaker, and author of Duct Tape Marketing, The Referral Engine, The Self-Reliant Entrepreneur, and The Ultimate Marketing Engine. He is also the founder of the Duct Tape Marketing Consultant Network, which trains and licenses independent consultants and agencies to use the Duct Tape Methodology.

Listen as John shares how you can use his innovative Marketing Hourglass that reimagines the typical customer funnel process. You’ll learn the seven prospect and customer behaviors of the marketing hourglass and how you can leverage the stories they’re telling themselves about you to attract and keep more ideal customers.

Discussed in this episode

• The seven stages of John’s hourglass metaphor & how you can use this framework to turn your customers into a referral machine.
• How to drive consistent growth by honing your focus to the top 20% of your ideal clients so you can clearly identify how to bring them to where they want to be 
• What is the Customer Success Track? The five stages of this framework and how you can use this potent tool to create customers for life
• The importance of understanding the different stages of your business growth and where you and your customers are in the journey to determine whether you need to standardize or customize your approach

Click here to grow your sales with the new The ABT’s of Selling™ online course.

Links

• https://theultimatemarketingengine.com/
• Join John’s free Ultimate Marketing Engine Companion Course
• Connect with John on LinkedIn
• Follow John on Twitter
• Follow John on Instagram
• Grab your copy of The Narrative Gym for Business
• Click here for your The ABT’s of Selling™ online quick course

Alice Heiman

#320: The Stories CEOs Are Telling That Prevent Sales

#320: The Stories CEOs Are Telling That Prevent Sales

Could you be the one preventing sales in your company?

As the CEO you hold many responsibilities for your company to succeed. And driving sales and being able to sustain your company’s growth is one of them.

But how do you grasp that opportunity for exponential growth potential? It’s all in redefining your sales strategy with these changing times so you can start having an effective sales approach that isn’t outdated and ensures you have the proper structure to get the tremendous growth you want.

Today, I’m bringing in our guest expert, Alice Heiman, who teaches companies all around the world how to elevate their sales to increase valuation for their companies with a B2B sale. Alice is a Chief Sales Energizer who spends her time strategizing with CEOs, company leaders and their sales leadership to build the strategies that find new business and grow existing accounts.

She is also the host of the popular podcast, Sales Talk for CEOs, and dedicates her time to local entrepreneurs by teaching at the University of Nevada in the entrepreneurship minor which she helped inspire. Alice also serves on the board of several growing companies to energize and elevate their sales. (more…)

Sam George

#319: Why We Tell Ourselves Horror Stories When We’re Ghosted

#319: Why We Tell Ourselves Horror Stories When We’re Ghosted

Digital communication has had a profound impact on the way we deliver our message to our prospects and it provides a solid foundation for communication that is critical to our relationships with them.

But how do you make sure your message is not left unreturned, delayed or answered ambiguously so you’re not left churning into a psychological loop of worst-case scenarios and catastrophizing? It’s being able to close the gap of the broken communication loop so your message can be fully understood and promptly returned.

In today’s episode, Sam George will teach us exactly what we can do when we’ve been ghosted out. Sam is a media consultant for political campaigns, non-profit organizations and corporations who specializes in email marketing and also leads an entirely online yoga company, YMEDICA which educates yoga teachers on medical yoga.

He is the author of I’ll Get Back to You: The Dyscommunication Crisis – Why Unreturned Messages Drive Us Crazy and What to Do About It. He emphasizes the Dyscommunication crisis we’re facing is caused by delayed and ambiguous communication brought on by our reliance on impersonal digital tools like texts and emails. When we don’t get a response we have an open loop in our story that our subconscious brain absolutely can’t stand. It needs closure. So it makes up a negative story to close the loop.  (more…)

With Randy Olson, PhD

#318: The One Narrative Framework You Need for Effective Business Storytelling

#318: The One Narrative Framework You Need for Effective Business Storytelling

You have an important brand story to tell and you need to communicate it in a way that will quickly connect and convert your prospects into life-long customers. But you’re not connecting like you could because you’re overcomplicating your message confusing your audience.

Therefore, I’m excited to connect you with this extra-special edition of The Business Of Story that launches my second book, The Narrative Gym For Business. Co-authored with my good friend, Dr. Randy Olson who introduced me to the foundational narrative framework of the ABT (And, But, Therefore) in 2013, The Narrative Gym for Business is a short 75-page deep dive guide into how you can craft this messaging dynamo for all of your business communications. 

Legendary Silicon Valley marketer Christopher Locchead says, “This book provides an unfair advantage for anyone who cares about producing exponential results.”

Greg Head, Founder of ScalingPoint and Greg’s List, said, “The ABT is THE most powerful framework for communication that I have ever used. Thanks for your podcasts, blog posts, and workshops that led up to this book about the ABT.”

Communications consultant Ariella Label added, “The ABT is such a good framework it deserves verb status!”

Tune in as Randy and I share this secret selling technique and how you can use this fundamental narrative framework of the ABT to transform your business storytelling and win your customers over every time.

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Dov Baron

#317: How to Find Your Story of Personal Fulfillment

#317: How to Find Your Story of Personal Fulfillment

One of the biggest lies we’ve learned is that vulnerability is a form of weakness. Vulnerability is actually our greatest strength. And when you step up to reveal your truth and the message you’ve got to deliver, that’s what makes the impact.

But it’s all about living a purpose-driven life, one rich with meaning. Being courageous enough to strip away the layers and all the covers you hide behind so you can tell the right story to cultivate trust, bond and connection with your audience.

A master storyteller himself and a leading authority figure on actualized leadership, Dov Baron teaches us how we can get the results we set out to achieve in the most meaningful manner.

Dov, for over thirty years, has worked with committed elite-level leaders who have outward success but are dealing with internal turmoil from childhood imprinting that impacts their happiness and fulfillment. He shows them how to embrace those good and bad impressionable moments and use them to accelerate their careers and happiness.  (more…)

John O’Hagan

#316: How to Tell Your Brand Story by Just Being You

#316: How to Tell Your Brand Story by Just Being You

Your brand story is the essence of your business. People buy from people. People relate to other people. And allowing your customers to see the reason why you are the best person they know they can count on and help them make better decisions is what will create that trust and drive your business forward.

But what makes your brand completely unique? It’s all about being authentic! Being truly genuine and not being afraid to expose your reality to motivate your audience so you can grow your business. 

One guy who knows a thing or two about how to just be yourself is John O’Hagan. A former punk band member and co-owner of Restro Real Estate. John has been a Realtor for 14 years, a designated broker for the last 2 years and started Retro Real Estate 3 and a half years ago to go out on his own.

He was the former co-founder and owner of Golden Rule Tattoo which he started in 2010. One of the busiest tattoo shops in metropolitan Phoenix, winning more number one awards than any other tattoo shop in the Valley. And is now the co-founder and owner of Maxwell-O’Hagan Group, a real estate investment and design company that buys and does wild remodels of homes to either re-sell or keep for vacation rentals.  (more…)