Embracing the storytelling edge with Joe Lazauskas

Speaker 1:

If you’re going to take the risk of running an agency, shouldn’t you get the benefits too? Welcome to Agency Management Institute’s Build a Better Agency podcast presented by HubSpot. We’ll show you how to build an agency that can scale and grow with better clients, invested employees, and best of all, more money to the bottom line. Bringing his 25 plus years of experience as both an agency owner and agency consultant, please welcome your host, Drew McLellan.

Drew McLellan:

Hey, everybody. Drew McLellan here with another episode of Build a Better Agency. Today’s topic is storytelling, but before I get into that, I want to remind you of a couple things that I think are super important, that I think are of benefit to you. So, the first one is please make sure if you haven’t done it already that you go over to agencymanagementinstitute/podcastgiveaway, and that you sign up for the drawings that we do. A lot of our guests are super generous. They give us signed books. They give us courses. We’re giving away workshop seats. So, we just gave away a seat to our advanced AE Bootcamp in March a few weeks ago. So, somebody got to go to that workshop for free. So, we’re giving away some pretty cool stuff and some very valuable stuff, and I’m a little baffled that all of you have not gone and put your name in the hat. I don’t care where you live. I don’t care if you are on an outer island in some foreign country. I don’t care if you are my next-door neighbor, we will get the gift to you. So, again, agencymanagementinstitute.com/podcastgiveaway. Please go and make sure that you take advantage of getting even more of the smarts that our guests offer and some of the things that we offer at AMI.

So, with that, let’s talk a little bit about storytelling. So, when I think about my own career, my own path through marketing, and advertising, and agency life, the truth of the matter is I’ve been a storyteller and a writer my whole life. That’s sort of how I self-identify in terms of my skill set. I’ve done other things. Obviously, I’ve owned my own shop for the last 20, almost 25 years. So, obviously, I’ve had to learn a lot of other things about agency life, but at the core of my skillset is storytelling, and I do believe that stories are the way that we change minds, the way that we change behavior.

And by the way, I think this is equally important. We don’t talk about it a lot in the interview, but I want you to listen from two perspectives to my conversation with my guest today. I want you to listen to it in terms of I’m an agency that is producing content, and by the way, content is pablum compared to storytelling. So, I want to elevate my content to really telling stories that engage someone. But also, I want you to listen from the perspective of an agency owner or an agency leader who is trying to create culture inside your organization. And I believe one of the most powerful ways for you to create culture inside your organization is to be mindful of the stories that you tell about the agency, and the agency’s history, and the founding, and the mission of the agency, and why you exist, and the good fight that you fight on behalf of clients, and we don’t do enough of that. We don’t share sort of that tribal knowledge and that tribal pride inside of our organization. So, as you’re listening to this episode, I’d really love it if you would listen from sort of both perspectives.

So, let me tell you a little bit about our guest. So, Joe Lazauskas is now one of the owners and drivers of Contently. So, if you’re not familiar with Contently, it is a content strategy practice. It is a software as a service. It’s a dashboard. But they also help clients, big brand clients create stories and content for those brands. So, Joe started a new site called The Faster Times with one of the first branded content studios back in 2010, and then he was one of the founding editors of The New York Egotist. So, he then became a tech and marketing journalist for Fast Company, Digiday, Forbes, and some others. He joined Contently in their early days of their formation, and in the beginning, he served as editor in chief. And so now, he is really driving the storytelling for that organization.

And Joe just wrote a book with his co-author, Shane Snow, and the book is called The Storytelling Edge. It is a great book. So, the first part of the book sort of explains how and why stories work, why they’re effective, and the second half of the book talks about how to build stories, very much from a brand and an agency perspective. So, what I love about the book is it really does help us understand the elements that make up a good story and gives us sort of a mental checklist, or if you want to you can create a checklist, but a mental checklist of what we need to make sure exist in the stories we’re telling on behalf of our agency when we’re trying to get prospects or recruiting a new employee, and the stories that we’re telling on behalf of our clients in terms of trying to attract prospects to their business and/or make them even stickier to people who already love their brand.

So, as you know, great stories, they stick with us. They change our mind, and they drive us to action, and the book is packed with stories about, no pun intended, of how stories have influenced people, both on a… You can tell these guys are sort of geeky nerds. A lot of the stories they tell are Star Wars stories. They look at the Star Wars story arc and use that to teach us. So, whether it’s how it moves me in a movie theater or how it moves me in a grocery store, the stories are at the core of that. And so, I really am excited to introduce you to Joe and his thinking around stories so that you can very quickly absorb it and weave it into the way that you tell stories for both your shop and for your clients. So, let’s get to it.

And so, with that, I just want to welcome Joe to the show. Before I actually welcome Joe to the show, I want to warn you that I have a great cold and Joe has a sinus infection. So, we were laughing before we hit the record button that we sound a little bit like a commercial for DayQuil. So, if you hear us coughing a bit or sniffling, we apologize in advance, but we wanted to make sure we got this conversation in no matter whether we were sick or not. So, Joe, welcome to you and your sinus infection to the show.

Joe Lazauskas:

Thank you. Yeah, it’s about the 12th podcast for me about the book, but the first for my sinus infection. So, it’s a little bit nervous right now. Hopefully, it won’t act up too much, but I appreciate everyone bearing with us today as we power through.

Drew McLellan:

So, as I said, I’ve been anxious for this conversation because I read the book and I love the book. And I know, as you know, the listeners of the show are agency owners and leaders in small to mid-sized agencies, and there’s so much pressure for them to help their clients define actually what good content is and what storytelling is in relation to content that I just knew we could not wait until you and I were healthy to get this recorded. So, I appreciate you jumping in, even though you’re not feeling a hundred percent.

Joe Lazauskas:

And I’m super happy to be here.

Drew McLellan:

So, let’s start with that. So, storytelling is like our industry has a million of, but storytelling and content marketing, all of those buzzwords swirl around. How do you define the difference between content and storytelling, and talk to us a little bit about the critical indifference of our ability to help our clients tell stories? Later on, I want to talk to you about what do you do when a client doesn’t want to tell their story because they’re afraid, but for now, let’s just define storytelling, how is it different than content marketing.

Joe Lazauskas:

Yeah. So, I think right now, if you look at the industry, there’s a lot of brands creating content, maybe not a lot of brands telling great stories. There’s this study back in last year that found that 5% of all branded content is getting 90% of all engagement branded content. So, there’s basically a few brands out there that are doing a really good job of telling their story, and then there’s a lot that are pumping content out there. They’re putting out white papers and blogs, but it’s not actually having an effect. It’s not building a relationship with people which should ultimately be the goal of putting content out there. Right? It’s to deepen your relationship with your target audience, your prospective customers, your current customers. And as our head of content strategy at Contently, this is something I see a lot, and a lot of it I think is because we have a lot of business people. We have a lot of marketers that have sort of been tasked as content marketing has come up in this tidal wave, right, over the last seven years with you have to go start a blog, you have to do content now, but they never got a chance to actually understand what makes for good stories, what makes for good content.

A lot of folks who especially come from a more technical SEO or digital marketing background didn’t necessarily go to school to learn how to tell stories. And so, much of what we wanted to do in this book is really explore the art and science of storytelling. How do stories actually impact us in our brains on a neurological level? What are some of the key tactics that have made for great stories throughout history, and how do you actually apply that to your own business? So, that’s a roundabout-

Drew McLellan:

So, define for me what a story is that content is not.

Joe Lazauskas:

Yeah. So, that’s a roundabout way of saying is that I think that all good content tells a story. If you have content without a story, it’s probably that it’s something lacking, right, or it’s something that’s very solution-oriented or tactical or just a product one sheet, or just say an ROI calculator. But I think the vast majority of the content we create, even if it’s not top of the funnel should have elements of story in it. Your case studies should actually be really provocative and intriguing stories about your customers that have tension between where they are and where they could be. Your story about your brand, about who you are should include a story about what your mission is and what your brand cares about. It shouldn’t all just be a dry memo one sheet. In fact, a study that your brands put out should not just be a lot of dry statistics and findings on a page, but tell a story about where your industry is and where it’s going on.

So, in my mind, the vast majority of content when done well is a story. Certainly, there are some tactical, pure utility pieces of content that there’s not as much of an opportunity to tell a story in. But I encourage us with our team internally with the clients that I work with to search for the story whenever possible because as human beings, it just helps us absorb information in such a deeper way. When we hear a good story, our brain lights up at five times the capacity. Neurons fire at five times the capacity of when we don’t, and stories trigger the release of this empathy drug called oxytocin where we feel closer to the protagonist or the brand or person that’s telling us the story. And when you get those two things fire together, you’re going to have information recall and a connection that’s much deeper than when you don’t. So, there’s just such an advantage to finding the story whenever you can.

Drew McLellan:

That gets to what you refer to in the book as sort of the witchery of story which is sort of the science of how we react to the stories. So, what I heard you just say was, A, our brain reacts, our brain chemicals react differently to stories, and, B, that it actually engages more parts of our brain. So, if I’m reading a fact sheet versus a story, my brain actually reacts in a different way and connects me to the story, and if I just heard what you said correctly, it actually releases a chemical in my body that creates an emotional connection. Yes?

Joe Lazauskas:

Yeah. This is sort of the new science of storytelling that’s come out over the last 10 years is we always knew that oxytocin was a thing. Right?

Drew McLellan:

Right.

Joe Lazauskas:

We knew that mothers release it in their brains when they’re near their babies. We knew that hugging or being near a loved one can do it. Dr. Zak Hawkins is this neurologist we’ve worked with a lot on this. My co-author Shane’s actually had himself strapped up to measure his oxytocin levels when he watches or engages with different stories. They had an awesome study come out, all the Superbowl commercials that are going to be ready in about this week where they measured oxytocin levels, and we actually see that oxytocin spikes when we hear a story. And this is the way that we always built connections with each other as human beings.

When we were ancient human beings, we were sitting around campfires in prehistoric times. Before we had written language, the way we passed our lessons of where to go to get food, or what berries to avoid, or how to stay safe was to tell each other stories to pass on that information. And that feeling of oxytocin in the brain is how we built connections with people, how we knew someone was part of our tribe. And when we hear someone’s story, we come to associate them as part of our tribe. It’s how we feel closer to someone. It’s why you might feel a connection with your favorite celebrity that you hear their story over and over again, right, or when you watch a documentary about someone that you never knew before, you feel close to them after hearing their story. The same thing can be true of a brand like Dollar Shave Club that tells their story of why they started their business in a funny and provocative and interesting way. There’s just so much opportunity to build those stronger connections through stories.

Drew McLellan:

And for you, storytelling is really made up of four key elements that make up a great story. Can you walk us through what those elements are and how we as marketers can think about those elements? Because when you’re writing a children’s story or a fiction story, you can sort of see how it would be easy to bake all of these elements in. It’s a little harder when you’re writing about an auto repair place. Right?

Joe Lazauskas:

Yeah.

Drew McLellan:

So, can you tell us what those elements are and how as marketers we can look for ways to bake those into our content?

Joe Lazauskas:

Sure. So, there are four main elements of storytelling. Relatability, novelty, tension, and fluency. So, the first and the key one is relatability. Our brains will reject any story or scenario that seems too out there. We come really grounded in a story when we can relate to the narrator or the protagonist in some way. So, if you think about this in fiction, it’s when we see part of ourselves in the main characters, the protagonist, or the situation we’re in. But even if say you’re writing about content marketing or about an auto repair shop, it’s about bringing in the reader or the viewer with a lead that makes them see themselves in you. So, for me with say Contently and everything I write for our blog, it’s about talking about my own experience as a content marketer to bring people in challenges I face, scenarios I found myself in, and that creates that connection with the person that is reading or watching something.

But the next thing is novelty because if something’s relatable, but it’s boring, it’s not new, it’s the same story we’ve heard over and over again, it’s not going to capture our attention. But when we hear or see something new, once we’re locked in via the relatability factor, our brains actually light up. Our brain is naturally attuned to pay more attention when we’re seeing something that’s new or novel or learning something new or novel. So, there’s sort of this Venn diagram, right, between relatability and novelty where something can’t be too unfamiliar, but if you bring and lock someone in through the relatability factor, you then can make things a little bit different and more novel and more new because they’re already locked in. This is why say like something like the first Episodes Four through Six of Star Wars work really well because although it was a far-off planet, it conjured a lot of 1950s Americana. Right?

Drew McLellan:

Right.

Joe Lazauskas:

The spaceship looked like cars of the 1950s, a lot of the fashion evoked nostalgia of the late fifties, early sixties, whereas something like the first three Star Wars movies were just so out there and weird that our brains didn’t get locked in in the same way. This is the same case that if you’re not… As if you’re telling a story that isn’t really related to the challenges or needs of your brand, if you’re not bringing them in in a way where your reader can see themselves in the piece that you’re writing, you’re going to have a hard time locking them in. But then you need to tell them something new.

And the way you tell them that that story needs to be really fluent. So, a lot of times, especially in B2B and more technical industries, we conflate being smart and professional with being verbose and complex. We see these reading level scores and we think, “Oh, I want to reach a CMO. I better rate it at a 12th-grade level or a college level.” That is the wrong way to go. The best storytellers throughout history have always written almost always at an elementary school or middle school level. They break down that barrier to entry for you as a reader or a viewer as much as possible. They make it as easy as possible for you to get absorbed in the story.

Everyone from Hemingway to Fitzgerald to Stephen King to J.K. Rowling do this. The best storytellers, the storytellers we love do this. In Star Wars, George Lucas does this through quick, fast action shots. Right? Make it really easy to follow the story along. And this is the biggest thing that I think we need to fix a lot in our industry is that we conflate the two being dry and boring and jargony with actually telling information in a way that people are going to absorb it.

Drew McLellan:

This is a place where clients often insert themselves when you show them copy that is tighter and shorter and more in sort of common man language, and then the client’s like, “No, no. We have to add this or that or whatever.” So, being able to talk to them about these elements of story and that fluency, being able to move someone along in the story is critical to being effective, is a tool agencies can use to help combat a client’s need to want to word-stuff a piece of content.

Joe Lazauskas:

Yeah, absolutely. A good test is honestly to give it to someone who doesn’t know anything about your industry and see if they can understand it.

Drew McLellan:

Right.

Joe Lazauskas:

I think probably the greatest accomplishment of this book is that I was able to… We really strove to write in a really easy-to-read fluent way, and I was able to give it to my mom and dad, and they finally understand what I do after eight years.

Drew McLellan:

There you go.

Joe Lazauskas:

But the last element is I think also equally important and sometimes tough with clients is tension. So, Aristotle said that the key to a great story is establishing what is for the protagonist, and then what could be, and the job of the storyteller is to move you along by closing that gap. So, create that gap between what is and what could be, and close that gap, and then immediately open it up again, and close that gap, and open it up again until you hit the climax of the story.

And this applies, I think, to a lot of brand stories and is probably the biggest thing that I try and keep in mind. If you’re writing a case story, set up what the current state of existence that was dissatisfying was for your protagonist, the client you’re writing about, and what they saw could be, and then show how they tried to close that gap, hurdles they came into along the way, and try to close it again. If you’re trying to write a piece of thought leadership, think about that in terms of your industry what’s the current state, and where’s the place that we as the protagonists in this story can get to, and bring us along how we’re going to close that gap.

It’s a really simple formula, and it’s something that a lot of brands are afraid of. I won’t name names, but we once had a client who was an adventure outdoor clothing company, and they wanted to tell adventure stories, except they had a big rule in their brand style guide which is that no one could get wet.

Drew McLellan:

Yeah, that’s sort of a problem.

Joe Lazauskas:

Yeah, they were selling outdoor gear and they wanted exciting stories, except no one could ever get wet or be in any sort of danger. Kind of makes it hard to tell a story. And these are the hurdles that we really need to do a lot of education to get people through that if they want to actually make a difference with content and not just check a box of having a blog or posting things on social, they need to embrace these elements of storytelling.

Drew McLellan:

So, that’s a great example of we want to do what’s right for the client, and sometimes that client is their own worst enemy. Using that example, what did a conversation around the fact that you are asking us to get people… Your audience are people who are adventure seekers. Your audience are people who are taking risks outside, doing activities that where they need your kind of gear and clothes. But if we show them in perfectly calm, dry, perfect weather, the water is still sort of situations, we’re going to disconnect with them because that’s not actually what they’re interested in, nor is it what their life is like. What does that conversation look like with them?

Joe Lazauskas:

So, I found in general that the most effective tactic is to ask a client like, “What are some publishers that you really admire that’s reaching a similar audience, or who are some competitors you think are doing a really good job of reaching your audience?” Because usually if they’re at that state, they know that their content isn’t doing everything it could. Right?

Drew McLellan:

Right.

Joe Lazauskas:

And then you get that from them and just do some analysis. Use tools like Similarweb, BuzzSumo, et cetera. Do some analysis on which are the top-performing stories that these brands have had, and then analyze those stories. Pinpoint out what those stories have in common they’re doing really effectively. Usually, you’ll find these elements of storytelling in those stories, and then walk the client through… We walk the client through them and we say, “Here’s what’s working. Here are the topics what’s working, but more or less, if we really dig into these stories, here’s the voice that’s working. Here’s how they’re using first-person narration. Here’s how they’re using quick, short-form animation or cuts on social. Here’s how they’re setting up actual tension in the story. And let’s compare that to what we want to do and the performance of your stories currently, and let’s look at what this gap is and how can we find that middle ground where we can get a little bit closer to this ideal.”

And I think you can also position it that way to make it feel like it was the client’s idea that they wanted to look at these publishers and you’re just doing the analysis for them and then you’re like, “Yeah, you were totally right to look at these guys. I think there’s a lot we can learn from them here.” That’s a good way to spin it because as we all know we have sensitive clients who don’t just want to hear that they’re screwing up in some way. They want to hear that they’re a big part of finding the solutions to the problem.

Drew McLellan:

So, you talking about that reminds me of the whole notion of discernment that our brain also sort of rejects when something doesn’t feel accurate or true, which I think sometimes clients want to paint such a rosy picture that I think the reader or the listener, however they’re consuming the content, sort of their BS meter goes off a little bit. Can you talk about how the brain does that?

Joe Lazauskas:

Yeah. So, it ties in almost fairly closely with the relatability factor. I mean, I think you can see both as sort of an… And I hate this term, but like an authenticity meter for stories. So, if something doesn’t seem real, if it doesn’t actually feel like a real relatable challenge or protagonist or problem that we’re reading about, if it’s just the equivalent of walking through a trade floor and just a bunch of rosy jargon about the real-time, 360-degree technology that’ll help us leverage our customer insights to transform the way that we do business in the digital age, we’re going to turn off because that is just meaningless words, or if it’s just writing about things were great, and then things got better. If that’s the arc of your story, it doesn’t feel relatable to us as what we experienced as human beings. It doesn’t feel like a real story. And our brains are built to discern. We’re built to know when we’re being deceived, when a story doesn’t actually feel relatable to the core of our own human experience and who we are.

I think what’s great for someone like me building our audience for a few thousand people to hundreds of thousands and building subscriber-based or print audiences, the biggest key was just talking about what we were going through. You know, a lot of times the people you’re trying to reach are going through similar challenges, and if you can just write and speak really honestly about how you kind of messed up or what challenges you faced and what worked for you, that can just be the easiest thing to build that connection with an audience and tell the stories that are real.

Drew McLellan:

Yeah. You know, that whole idea of being willing to sort of share your foibles and the challenges that you have and the problems, I want to dig into that a little bit more, but let’s first take a quick break, and then we’ll come right back.

I get that sometimes you just can’t get on a plane and spend a couple of days in a live workshop. And so, hopefully, our online courses are a solution to that. Lots of video, hours and hours of video, a very dense, detailed participants’ guide, and all kinds of help along the way to make sure that you get the learning that you need and apply it immediately to your agency. Right now, we’ve got two courses that are available. We have the Agency New Business Blueprint, and we have the AE Bootcamp. So, feel free to check those out at agencymanagementinstitute.com\ondemandcourses. Okay, let’s get back to the show.

All right, we are back and we are talking about storytelling, and before the break, we were just talking about how our brain sort of has a BS meter when the story’s too perfect, when there are no problems, which made me think about, Joe, the whole idea of building out content on like a story arc. And I know probably a story arc that most people are familiar with, even if they don’t know the phrase, is the Hero’s Journey story arc. And in the book, you talk about how that can be a really great framework for brands to tell their story, but it requires, I think, a brand to be brave enough to admit that they don’t know all the answers, they aren’t perfect. They make mistakes. They have fears, whatever that is. So, I’m curious, walk us through sort of what that Hero’s Journey arc looks like. But also, I want to talk about how do we help clients get comfortable talking about the fact that they’re not perfect and they don’t have all the answers.

Joe Lazauskas:

Yeah. So, I think you need to embrace more than anything… The Hero’s Journey in its full arc is kind of hard to walk through without the full diagram in front of it. So, I’ll talk about a few key elements from it which is first really embracing that sense of conflict in a story, and this is the hardest thing to do. Right? Our instinct, our brand safe instinct is for no one to ever really feel that or they’re not to be a real challenge that’s f