Create Bite-Sized Stories for Talks, Networking, Your Website + Sales Pages

“Soundbites are the lightening flashes of who you are and the message you want to get across. To say what you mean and mean what you say, develop your soundbites word for word.”–Susan Harrow, Sell Yourself Without Selling Your Soul.

The prompts + formulas on this post are from Susan Harrow’s book, Sell Yourself Without Selling Your Soul and Alex Franzen’s blog.

Part of enchanting our audiences, and attracting the made-for-us, fun to work with clients, begins with telling GOOD stories. Working with soundbites is key to creating some buzz around your brand.

Have fun and allow your wild creativity to emerge.  (Along with your flair for the dramatic. Come on. We know it’s in you!)

Part 1. Knowing Your Essence + Owning It.

Ask yourself three questions.

1.  What are the most important things for my audience to know? (Hint: use your centering messages from last week’s missive)

2.  How or what do I want my audience to feel?  

3.  What do I want my audience to do?

For Kris Oster, Ph.D., Mythic Rhythm:

1. Most important things for my audience to know: Marketing is a golden opportunity for healing self and the world. Marketing is about telling your authentic story, Branding is about personal clarity and Business Development is about fulfilling your destiny.

2. I want my audience to feel confident about their business and messaging. I help my clients know their story and show them how to tell it in the most effective way. People want to be seen, heard and even more so, felt. I want them to feel understood, and then teach them how to do the same for their own audience.

3. I want my audience to develop powerful messaging that speaks to their tribe by signing up for my Fun in the Sun Summer Plunge in July and August.

Part 2: Telling Your Story. Succinctly.

Now, move this into a story soundbite you can use in an interview, talk, networking event, website page:

1. State the problem:

Research proves that many entrepreneurs have a powerful fear of failure holding them back from embracing their progression and growth (reported in the 2012 GEM Report). The only way to truly be successful on your own terms is to feel that way despite the numbers in your bank account and on your newsletter list. You must have unwavering faith in your own potential. And stop comparing your numbers to someone else’s.

2. Propose a resolution:

With even less than an hour a day of reflecting on and writing about your favorite stories and characters, you can discover what work you were really put on the planet to do and why you are drawn to particular people and projects. You’ll feel more engaged and enthusiastic about your livelihood instead of disconnected and weary.

3. Outline your talking points (or point, or technique, or tip, or teachable moment):

Today I’m going to talk about 3 easy exercises to help even the most drained entrepreneur feel exhilarated about doing their day-to-day work. Your Favorite Things List, Your Mythological Superpowers, and The Plunge.

4. Deliver your talking points. Casually sneak in mentions of your current and upcoming workshops, projects, products or services:

The first exercise is called Your Favorite Things List and I do it with every mentoring client who comes to me for coaching. Simply sit down for 15 minutes and write down your favorite stories and characters from film, TV, mythology, fiction, comics. You can go as far back as you remember. You’ll begin to see where you are living out these stories in your real-world, everyday life.

The second one is a favorite at my marketing workshops, called Your Mythological Superpowers. You can figure them out by looking at “Your Favorite Things” list and seeing the major archetypal themes that are associated with your fave stories and characters. For example, if you’re an avid Lost Girl fan perhaps you are drawn to adventure, mystery and dangerous men. OOOO lala. And, maybe in your early life you loved Mary Poppins because she was able to make boring things fun and easy with a snap of her fingers.

The third, The Plunge is both an exercise and the title of my only one-on-one offering for July and August. For this final step, you take a few key phrases and simply fill in the blanks with the answers from the first two exercises…

5. Sum it all up (the epiphany):

You will be more successful and energized in your business when you feel confident that your divine message is reaching the people who most need your flavor of work. And, by engaging in your stories and using your mythological superpowers in your day-to-day livelihood, you will draw a lot more of the customers you are craving and build a loyal fan-base ready to invest their precious time and money in you.

Ok, it’s your turn.

And, after you write your soundbite, practice saying it aloud.

Share your insights and sound-bite stories in the comments below.

Have a beautiful Friday. And don’t forget to celebrate you.

Be well,

Kris