Transform Your Business Through Proven Narrative Mastery
Every marketing director, business owner, and sales professional understands that the right story can transform how customers respond to their message.
What matters most is mastering the vital storytelling structures that have driven human engagement for millennia, especially when your business success depends on authentic connection with your audience.
But here’s the frustrating reality most professionals face: conventional brand storytelling advice offers generic tips and surface-level techniques instead of the primal storytelling principles that actually create lasting impact.
This happens because most business storytelling approaches focus on modern tactics without understanding the sacred narrative structures that have influenced human behavior for thousands of years.
That’s exactly where The Business of Story podcast transforms your approach to business communication.
Through Park Howell’s proprietary guidance, you gain access to primal storytelling amplified with cutting-edge technology, enabling you to excel through the stories you tell while accelerating your Return on Intelligence through remarkable storytelling mastery.
Your Guide to Storytelling Excellence
Park Howell brings over two decades of proven expertise in marketing storytelling, combining primal narrative wisdom with modern precision.
As the creator of the revolutionary Story Cycle System™, which has grown brands by 600 percent, propogator of the ABT (And, But, Therefore) narrative framework, and co-creator of the StoryCycle Genie™, Park has pioneered “Vibe Branding”.
Vibe Branding combines emotional intelligence with artificial intelligence, guided by proven storytelling structures, to accelerate ROI: Your Return on Intelligence.
His sacred mission: help you excel through the stories you tell, delivering measurable results through systematic application of primal storytelling principles.
Each episode delivers actionable insights you can implement immediately, combining proven primal storytelling frameworks with contemporary business applications for remarkable results.
Begin Your Storytelling Mastery Journey
Subscribe now and join thousands of professionals who’ve transformed their business communication through primal storytelling principles amplified with today’s technology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, and all major platforms.
Exclusive Subscriber Benefits:
Access to primal storytelling resource library
StoryCycle Genie™ early access updates
Monthly storytelling mastery workshops focused on Return on Intelligence
Direct connection with the storytelling excellence community
I recently produced a Business of Story training for the Board of Directors and team members of the Make-A-Wish Foundation, the global nonprofit founded in Arizona in 1980 that now has 59 chapters throughout the United States and operates in about 50 countries.
They do marvelous work granting wishes to critically ill children.
During a break, one of their board members jumped on a call with a prospect and closed a deal using the ABT story structure he had just learned.
Talking about immediate ROI!
Read about six-year-old Luis and his Nintendo wish.
But can the ABT really be that easy? Can it be that effective in such a short amount of time?
Today, Fran Mallace, the President and CEO of Make-A-Wish Arizona, joins us to share how she uses storytelling to build vibrant relationships, grow powerful teams, and build a winning company culture.
When I started working with Moving2Canada on their brand storytelling earlier this year, I realized that their business model can be clearly defined using the ABT (And, But, Therefore) narrative framework.
It goes something like:
As an immigrant, you are eager to start a new life in Canada and if you are confident in the information you need to emigrate, then your move will be fast and easy.
But you’re overwhelmed because the amount of hoops you have to jump through and the waterfall of paperwork you must navigate throughout makes you feel like a stranger in a strange land long before you’ve left your current country.
Therefore, to expedite your immigration and peace of mind, your first move is to Moving2Canada.com where you’ll join hundreds of thousands of immigrants who have relied on this invaluable resource to quickly create a new, prosperous life in Canada.
In fact, I created this GIF that demonstrates their ABT business model.
It’s based on the very simple conversational ABT that underscores the singular Moving2Canada’s problem/solution narrative for immigrants. It goes:
You’re excited about starting a new life in Canada.
But immigration is complicated.
Therefore, make it faster and easier with Moving2Canada.
As you’ll hear Hugo O’Doherty, Director of Partnerships of Moving2 Canada, say a lot, their #1 job is to build trust in the immigrant community by providing timely, accurate and FREE resources to help them make their move as quick and easy as possible.
It’s not surprising that boring rhymes with snoring.
If you, like me, believe that B2B selling shouldn’t mean boring to bored, then this episode is for you
If you’re a B2B sales and marketing pro, then you know how important it is to share your product or service offering in such a way that your prospects can’t wait to become customers.
But your sales aren’t where you want them to be because, well your pitch and your niche might be kind of boring.
Or you’re making it so by how you are trying to sell.
Remember this…
“Boring is in the eye of the beholder.”
You’ll learn today a simple three-step selling framework from master sales trainer, Will Barron of Salesman.com.
Will also wrote Selling Made Simple: Find and Close More Sales Using Proven Step-by-Step Frameworks, showing you how to turn any mediocre sales pitch into a magnificently memorable message as you thwart your arch nemesis of boredom.
I mean, when wast the last time you were bored into buying anything?
Imagine that you’re a smart, hard-working entrepreneur who can’t wait to start your own business.
But you’re disillusioned because you don’t have the start-up capital to launch a brand.
Picture a purpose-driven franchise holding company whose mission is to help create franchise opportunities for the disenfranchised.
That’s what today’s guest is all about.
Dave Keil, CEO of Franworth and Beloved Brands and founder of Franchise for Good, shares his journey from working in Fortune 500 companies to the franchise world.
Growing up and moving 15 times taught him the importance of finding his own purpose and being true to himself.
In his career, he learned the power of purpose in driving decision-making that makes a positive impact.
He shares examples of how purpose transformed businesses, such as Ecolab’s focus on saving lives through hand hygiene and Honey Baked Ham’s emphasis on making occasions more special.
Dave also discusses his role at Franworth and the diverse range of purpose-driven brands they work with.
To reflect Franworth’s commitment to helping make franchise opportunities available to the disenfranchised, they are rebranding the company to Beloved Brands.
I bet you love what you do and you’ve probably invested tons of time, money and energy to become your customers’ go-to resource.
But you have those dark days too when you question the career track you’re on.
For instance, I recently learned that small animal veterinarians and practitioners are leaving the profession at a startling rate because the pressures of providing healthcare to pets and their human owners have them questioning their stressful career choices.
So I was invited by the American Animal Hospital Association to inspire these critical caregivers to share their stories underscoring the importance of their contributions to society.
We first taught our storytellers how to use the ABT (And, But, Therefore) narrative framework as the foundation for their story.
I’ve been working with artificial intelligence (AI) to develop an app. for the Story Cycle System™ that will help you reduce weeks of discovery, research and development of your brand narrative down to a couple of hours.
But my first forays into AI seemed super impersonal. It was like Spock trying to tell a story that Captain Kirk should be running with.
Then the more I dialed in my prompts, the more interestingly human the output became.
Now, most of our beta testers (mostly marketers and branders) tell me that our process is one of the best uses of AI they’ve seen.
I was surprised because I didn’t think you could get AI in its current pre-pubescent state to deliver personalized brand storytelling.
But I was wrong. You can!
That’s why I was excited to host David Edelman, co-author of the new book PersonAlIzed: Customer Strategy in the Age of AI, to be released in October.
He shares how companies investing in artificial intelligence for greater customer personalization will outperform organizations merely trying to cut costs with AI.
Any legitimate storytelling consultant or coach works from proven story structures.
We, of course, train the three-word And, But, Therefore, or ABT framework to make your messages land right the first time, every time.
The ABT leads to the second story structure we teach, the five primal elements of a short story for big impact. These are the elements of compelling anecdotes that make your business points for you.
These two frameworks are used in the 10-step Story Cycle System™ to help transform your presentations and long-form communications into experiences that transport your audience.
Today, you’ll learn the S.O.A.R. story framework developed by our guest, Paul Morton, to craft effective leadership narratives.
He authored the new book, Hidden Tradecraft of Elite Managers: Unveiling Second-Nature Skills for Remarkable Performance.
Summer is ebbing. Hints of Fall sprinkle through the air.
And it’s the kickoff to NCAA College football.
That was one of my favorite parts until the PAC-12 conference imploded as colleges prostituted themselves for media money.
I’m particularly bitter because my WSU Cougs were left in the dust along with the Oregon State Beavers.
But our guest this week has a different take. As one locker room door closes another one opens.
Yogi Roth, a football analyst who I followed for the past decade on the PAC-12 Network calling games and who is now with the Big-10 Network, joined me to talk about his take on NCAA football.
But more importantly, he details how he has used his talents both on and off the football field to become an EMMY-winning filmmaker and best-selling author including his latest book, 5-STAR QB: It’s Not About the Stars, It’s About the Journey.
I mean, what do you bring to the world through your curiosity, passion, and talent that no one else can?
And how do you express it through your personal and professional brand stories?
But you might be thinking, “I don’t know. I’m not sure I have a particular ability that people care about.”
Well, you’re not alone because in my experience lots of people tumble through life stumbling over their unique god-given gifts without realizing the impact they could have if they just embraced them.
Our guest today, Joy Spencer, founder of Reframe to Create shares her C.R.E.A.T.E. process. It will help you identify your gifts and share them with the world.
Transform Your Business Through Proven Narrative Mastery
We were talking on the phone when he mentioned that he’d taken Mom to the Barking Frog for dinner.
Will also wrote Selling Made Simple: Find and Close More Sales Using Proven Step-by-Step Frameworks, showing you how to turn any mediocre sales pitch into a magnificently memorable message as you thwart your arch nemesis of boredom.
Now, most of our beta testers (mostly marketers and branders) tell me that our process is one of the best uses of AI they’ve seen.
These two frameworks are used in the 10-step Story Cycle System™ to help transform your presentations and long-form communications into experiences that transport your audience.
Yogi Roth, a football analyst who I followed for the past decade on the PAC-12 Network calling games and who is now with the Big-10 Network, joined me to talk about his take on NCAA football.
