Stories Sell: Storyworthy Strategies to Grow Your Business and Brand

The rest of the story is crafted to serve that singular moment in time and only that moment. Anything in the story that doesn’t help bring that moment to the greatest clarity possible is marginalized, shaded, or removed entirely. Anything that helps bring clarity to that moment is strengthened and highlighted.

Over the years, I have assigned Homework for Life to tens of thousands of people, but only a small percentage have actually done it. A tragically small percentage. This is because Homework for Life requires two things that are often lacking in the world today: commitment and faith.

By connecting the world of four decades ago with the world of today and demonstrating an understanding of the way the market has evolved over time, the storyteller demonstrates insight, wisdom, and mastery of the subject:

As desperate for stories as I was, even I couldn’t commit to writing a full story every day, especially if the story wasn’t especially compelling. Instead, I would write a snippet. A sentence or three that captured the essence of the moment from that day. Just enough for me to remember the moment and recall it clearly in my mind at a later date.

Lacking bricks, she used a Band-Aid. The last thing we want is to rely on the stories of other people. Telling our own story vastly increases our chances of connecting to our audience through relatability, authenticity, and most importantly, vulnerability. It’s easy to tell someone else’s story. It takes courage to tell our own. Audiences know this

A client recently said, “I wish I had a story about when I found my voice. It would work so well in this keynote.”

What Is Entertaining?

That’s my five-second moment said as simply as possible. It’s not a story on its own, but it’s what the story will be built around. Ideally, summarize your story in a single sentence, which I call the thesis statement:

Telling our own story vastly increases our chances of connecting to our audience through relatability, authenticity, and most importantly, vulnerability.