#416: How To Turn a Case Study into a Case Story w/ the "Pitch Whisperer" John Livesay
INC magazine calls John Livesay The Pitch Whisperer. He is a sales keynote speaker where he shows companies’ sales teams how to turn mundane case studies into compelling case stories so they win more new business.
From John’s award-winning career at Conde Nast, he shares the lessons he learned that turn sales teams into revenue rockstars. His TEDx talk: "Be The Lifeguard of Your Own Life" has over 1,000,000 views.
#416: How To Turn a Case Study into a Case Story w/ the "Pitch Whisperer" John Livesay
What advice would you give yourself at 13 years old? 2:20
Listen to the sweat equity podcast.
Advice to yourself at 13 years old.
Worried about the future for several years.
Mushroom in the forest introspection.
You have to be the best in order to be loved. 7:07
Overcompensating for negative childhood experiences.
The best little boy in the world.
The fear of the unknown.
The importance of patience and asking questions.
Do you have any processes or anything you specifically do to help cope with anxiety? 10:40
How to cope with anxiety and fear.
The 555 method to help with anxiety.
How 555 helps in personal life, not just career stuff.
The irony of life.
When you’re running hot, try to break it down. 16:33
Breaking down stress with Eric.
Relationship advice, go crazy, but not at once.
Templating answers and conversations in story mode.
The four steps of a good story.
How to train your brain to think in story mode when you don’t have a formal answer. 20:33
Three kinds of stories to tell a story.
Sweat equity and case stories.
Journaling as a way to celebrate your progress. 23:29
Practicing in the mirror vs journaling.
Celebrating progress and being a perfectionist.
Taking cold showers to reduce depression and reduce inflammation.
The analogy of a bird.
How do you use storytelling to recruit top talent? 27:38
Birds don't like us. They're dinosaurs, they hate us.
Recruiting top talent and tech.
How to tell the right story to get the top 5% of your competitors to come work for you. 30:26
How to recruit the top 5% of real estate agents.
The three stories needed.
Storytelling, listening and empathy are the three soft skills.
The four steps to getting a job.
How to use storytelling to be more resilient in your career. 35:23
Jaguar's biggest challenge is emotional connection to the car.
How to use storytelling to be more resilient.
The secret to getting back up after a fall.
John livesay.com and pitchwhisperer.
Episode sponsored
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Transcription by Otter.ai - Otter referral link https://otter.ai/referrals/AVPIT85N
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 0:05
Yeah, that's pretty good.
Eric Readinger, Fractional CMO, Producer and Head Of Media 0:06
That was pretty bad
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 0:07
that's pretty good
what's i don't know I'm a voice or middle it's mad sweat equity by quest and streaming show the number one comedy business podcast in the world today. Pragmatic entrepreneurial advice with real blue humor is that what is that better than real raw dog talks? No. Listen to
Eric Readinger, Fractional CMO, Producer and Head Of Media 0:35
describe it at all. Just leaving
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 0:38
listen to us on iTunes Apple podcast, Spotify, Google podcasts, Amazon Music put us in a real I Heart Radio. All those all those who did you sir? Yeah, yeah, one Stitcher. All those audio apps that who knows who listens to them, but there are it's out there, man. All the audios out there. We're on YouTube. For video if you'd like that, if you're one of the Gen Z's that likes to listen to podcasts on YouTube. Watch them in Yeah, that's that's what the young young kids the young uns do. This episode, we're gonna roll through these sponsors real quick. All the links to get the hookup on all these will be in the description of this episode. Squarespace you're all in one ecommerce website builder drag and drop super easy Tao Get it, get it with our link in the episode description hooks you up, hooks us up Hey, you want to call track all the calls on your website, some call rail with some call swap numbers that don't record all the calls from people click to call on your site.
Eric Readinger 1:49
You know auto tag the conversations are
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 1:52
one of our favorites in house is basically sales for into the program a CRM with marketing outreach of email, SMS phone Pay As You Go marketing. And then the lastly is LinkedIn premium two months free. Two months free. It's like 60 bucks. That's just as expensive now but it the targeting so good. Just like we're targeting this episode with a lot of humor and wisdom. It's called sweat.
Listening to the sweat equity podcast that should show how effective your last time on here was. Because I think Eric and I have kind of talked about your interview. I don't know at least a dozen times.
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 2:59
Oh, that's nice. I was very honored when you invited me back.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 3:03
Yeah. I mean, we're into it. We're going yeah, we just started. Yeah. And so I think I think we didn't realize you know how impactful storytelling is until you kind of got it in her ear. Before we get into it, we got to ask an intimate question like we usually do with our new guests. But since you're returning, I'll let you revise your answer if you want any changes to what advice you would give yourself at 13 years old,
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 3:35
at 13 years old.
Gosh, I remember 13 Actually, because I felt like I was really officially arrived at being a teenager. And I think the biggest advice I would give myself was you don't know nearly as much as you think you do. So calm down. We may not have asked you that the first time. Yeah. The way you answered it was like, Oh, that's a great question. I never heard that before.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 4:03
Yeah, so okay, we didn't ask you the first time. I think we got right into it. When you got on half a year ago, but you don't know as much as you think you do. Which, you know, you can kind of say that at any age. Really. I feel like
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 4:20
real calm down part is really the advice I think of you know, I was very anxious about what's going to happen to my life. Am I going to make it? I had a lot of I was just not happy in the moment. I was always worried about the future for several years. In that timeframe. Did you ever nice to Yeah, go ahead. No, my advice would be to just relax a little bit and enjoy where I am as opposed to always I had a very much of a mindset as soon as this happens then I'll be happy. Whether it was a car or a job or getting into the right university or all the
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 5:00
He's other things I thought I needed, that I was not happy where I was at that stage. I believe I believe that's the hedonistic treadmill. Right? Get to the Stairmaster. I can't remember the phrase, but you get to that ladder. Yeah, this is why like a lot of celebrities pop stars. Like they get up to that level. And you're like, why are you miserable? You're rich. You're famous athletes want to be rappers, right? You want to be athletes? Every every Yeah, everybody doesn't seem comfortable in the position. They're crushing it in, you know, talking entertainment or sports or whatever. But
what do you think? Did you ever kind of do that? Deep Dive that kind of mushroom in the forest? Introspection to kind of figure out why you may have been anxious or do you Was it very
Eric Readinger 5:52
means eating mushrooms? Magic? Like I wasn't sure. You weren't,
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 5:58
like you weren't gonna go in the forest was portabello. Right? And really treat yourself.
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 6:06
I think part of my awareness at this stage of my life was
at 13, I thought I was gay. I wasn't 100% sure even knew what that meant. And I had a lot of trepidation around that. And fear of not being enough. So I overcompensated, so I'll be the best son, I'll be the best student, I'll be the best employee just to try to get to a baseline of MI, okay, enough to compensate for this thing that a lot of people have problems with. So I think that's where it stemmed from.
Eric Readinger 6:39
That's a whole different ballgame. Yeah, that that side of it is just man. I can't imagine dealing with that as a 13 year old.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 6:47
Yeah, and that's interesting. I've had I've had, we don't know if you're gay or not? Yes. The answer, but it was like, not gay. We don't. I don't know. I like, the time in my life. I talked to a lot of stand up comedians that thought they were for like, a couple of years of their life and never told anybody. And then they're not. Or yeah, maybe they are. They don't want to talk about it as an adult. But, you know, like, I would say, we don't really ask what you're into on the show to the guests. But I that's interesting, because I definitely have friends in my life that are gay that did the Overcompensation because they felt like it was a it was negative on the on the balance sheet for them growing up. And so to deflect it in, in a weird way, like you overcompensate. And everything else does that. So that's, that's kind of how I did.
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 7:44
There's a book out called the best little boy in the world, which goes into that whole premise of you have to be the best in order to be loved or accepted, and to just be good enough. And it's frickin exhausting. I can tell you that.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 7:58
Yeah, I'm sure and it sounds like you've you've, you've honed that anxiety and made it a positive is that fair to say?
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 8:09
Oh, gosh, I still have my moments. It's not around that. But I am constantly having to work on staying in the present moment, I tend to be someone who's fairly impatient. I remember when my first book was coming out, I was like, What do you mean, it takes a year for the book to come out? Why can it come out sooner? Or I'm waiting for a job offer or a sale or something? What Why is it taking so long, and that creates a lot of anxiety is that of just accepting of this is what it is. They're just not life doesn't work on my timeline. And in the meantime, I'm not enjoying being in the moment because I'm so anxious about when something is going to happen that I think needs to happen in order for me to be happy in the future, because I'm not happy in the present. So it's, it's a different kind of anxiety. But have you, but that's where it started was the whole I'm not good enough thing, which is now just getting to the point, hopefully, where I am a little more patient with myself and with whatever else is going on in the world. Even the pandemic, I was like, Are you kidding me? 18 months, there's no way I can tolerate that for 18 months. So that all that is just an ongoing journey and the lesson of Yeah, that's what's gonna take or it's going to be like this for the next 18 months, whether you like it or not, and maybe not maybe longer. The unknown part of that really drove me crazy of the all the things that I look back on. It was how long is this going to be like this was the most anxiety provoking thing for me.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 9:39
Well, I was listening to your TEDx talk, be the lifeguard of your own life. And you brought up a theme that we've talked about on the show for easily seven years is the fear of the unknown and you just kind of brought it up. Ya know, that impatience. I don't know if that's always bad if you're asking questions because you're new to it. It sounds like this is your first book, you have you have the ability to ask those questions because you're new to it. So you might be able to have people on the other side tolerate it. But you're like there. Simon Schuster, whoever did your books. Like, this is how it wrote one
Eric Readinger 10:17
other publisher name was penguin dammit. I was I knew that was the name one other name one very well read.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 10:24
I used to read books. And then I have kids. But every time they see me on my computer, or crack a book open, it's like, I might as well not I might as well just be sitting there doing nothing. Because they're like, what's up? What's up? Hey, hey, hey, hey. Um,
Eric Readinger 10:44
so when you have these moments of anxiety and fear, do you have any processes or anything that you specifically do to help cope with that? Yes.
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 10:54
And what brings me a lot of joy is when I've shared this with other people, and they're going through a stressful time, I have a friend who's an entrepreneur, and she didn't sleep for three days, something was crashing, and she was so stressed out, and she was like, I'm trying to use your 555 method, while I'm in it, which is zoom out, and you think of yourself as the movie director of your own life, and you ask yourself, will this matter in five minutes, about five hours? How about five days from now. And that also really helps me zoom out and get some perspective on things. Like somebody cuts you off in traffic, you can let that bog you. Or if you're spared, if you're still thinking about that five days later, you there's something wrong. But if you lose the sale, or you don't get a job, or whatever else, you're funding for your startup, whatever your thing is, I work with teams on that a lot saying how can we be more resilient? How can we get back up fast when we get knocked down, because life is gonna knock us down in a variety of ways. And so this 555 is easy to remember, it's easy to use, it's easy to share, people start incorporating in their conversations, okay, we're gonna complain about this for five hours, and then we're never going to talk about it again.
Eric Readinger 12:04
Man, I didn't think you'd actually have like a numbered system, like with all kinds of stuff. I just thought you might have like a tip count to 10 Whatever. Of course, you got a number system.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 12:13
Well, you told me you had the the Wim Hof breathing that'll help I've done that. Yep. Just even even in like very short. Even if it's something like, what's the Louie CK joke? My vacation is when I get my kids in the car seat and then walk around the car
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 12:31
that five seconds. Eight seconds
Eric Readinger 12:33
is because
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 12:34
that's what I would do and sometimes are just stressed out.
Eric Readinger 12:37
Yeah, it's more about just focusing on something that's not what you're stressed about, I think focusing on your breathing focus on whatever, some some small task.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 12:48
Yeah, it'll take me out of it. Really whatever I was thinking about, because I'm now now I have to focus on this breathing method that I can't remember the rhythm to and have to.
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 12:59
Oh, my God, I'm doing something else wrong. Yeah, another reason to beat myself up
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 13:02
when I take your presence for granted because I'm like, oh, I'll just see her. And he'll remind me, but it's one of those things like I, you know, everybody has anxiety, I wish we had kind of a, a kind of terror level color system or something. Because actually, that's probably bad, because that didn't work either. But something where it's like, it can tell you kind of how some people have anxiety that's so crippling, it's so elastic, I'd say like in the the anxiety, or depression to me, or any addiction, and they all really come to fruition when they impede you from doing what you know, like normal tasks, or normal thought processes. Is that fair to say?
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 13:53
Yes. Well, I what I love about 555 is, it can also help you in your personal life, not just career stuff. So when my dad died eight years ago, I wish I had this tool. Because I could go back to my younger self and say, Yeah, five days from now, you're still going to be pretty upset and grieving. So let's do it another five, five, and how about five weeks, five months, five years from now? Yeah, five years from now, you're still going to miss them. But I promise you, you won't be this sad. So that is another way to allow yourself to not let these monumental things happen. bringing you down for long periods of time, again, zooming out and saying I'm the movie director. Let me visualize myself five years from now functioning. Like my mom also recently passed away. And I was talking to my godson who's 10. And I said, you know, the irony of life and I tried to explain him what the circle of life is, and he hadn't heard that concept before. And I said, Well, ironically, two friends of mine had twins on the same day my mom died who And he said, oh, and I said, Can you imagine how crowded the planet would be if nobody died? And you could see his brain starting to process that. And, you know, that was sort of an it helped me with my grief.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 15:16
Do you think because it minimized it a bit.
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 15:19
Um, it didn't minimize it. It's just again, it goes back to an acceptance of what is nobody lives forever. And it's not meant to be that way. And we may want them to live forever. But realistically, that wouldn't be the right thing either. So it didn't minimize my grief so much as it helps. As you know, you teach your child something you're learning relearning it yourself. Sometimes I'm sure you guys have experienced that as dad. So me, as a godfather, it was, it was just a reminder of this is the circle of life. And, you know, the irony is I was, you know, dealing with my mom's hospice stuff. My friends were out of the country and had all their baby gifts sent to my house. So I had a garage full of, you know, baby stuff, which is preparing for new life at the same time, I was dealing with my mom and the hospice. So
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 16:09
that's a crazy duality. Yeah,
Eric Readinger 16:11
I think it's about perspective, you know, when you're explaining it to somebody else. If it were me, I'd sort of remove myself from the scenario as though I'm, you know, an observer of myself, and then explaining it and it kind of helps put, for me putting things in perspective.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 16:29
Yeah, sometimes a way I'll deal with it. If I'm, if I'm running hot, like I like to call it. I will almost say out loud, like, what am I stressed about? And really trying to like, break it down, like I would if Eric was in the rooms, because he used to see me go manic in our office back in the day and be like, You need to chill. And I was like, yeah.
Eric Readinger 16:52
Well, I mean, in those times, you know, we both had a lot going on. It was Thank God, we were together, we were going through the same thing, because like, you know, we were each other's guardians, whenever you want to call it, but we kept each other in check. Thank God.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 17:06
Right. We complement each other. Thank God, it didn't happen the same exact time because then we bond and be like, all emo all the time. I just watched the Batman again that you know, Batman?
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 17:18
I just heard that relationship advice. You have an agreement with your spouse or partner. We can both go crazy, but just not at the same time. Yeah, somebody's got to stay sane. Yeah. So if you want to go crazy for the next hour, go ahead. And then there'll be my turn, you know, if your car got stolen, or whatever you want to flip out about, right? Are you done? Because I got a lot to say.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 17:40
One thing we used to have in our household, and this is my ex wife, my then wife would kind of bring it up. It's like, you can't, you can go can't go to bed mad. You know, like, try to or if you do tomorrow is different day. Like you're allowed to kind of get it out. But tomorrow, you know, try to shake it off kind of thing. Your bye bye, bye. Yep. Yeah, I think all of those techniques are hovering around yours is more formal and better. But they're hovering around, like, take yourself out of it. And try to look at yourself as a grown shrooms? Yes, I've been getting out there. So it's all
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 18:20
about what the story is. We're telling ourselves
Eric Readinger 18:23
ah, Ooh, very nice. You at
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 18:25
right birth, death act one in three. If you're in the middle, act two, nice, you everything's in a story form for you. It is, do you find yourself kind of templating a lot of answers or conversations and story mode, because you've, you've seemed like you've kind of mastered this as a natural framework the way you speak. After watching a few videos,
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 18:50
right? Well, it is my specialty and my level of expertise. And I love sharing it and giving it to other people because unlike sports or performing, you know, you don't have to be born with Lady Gaga as talent to be you. We all can become good storytellers. And one of my favorite examples of this impacting a client was he's an orthopedic surgeon who had me helping him craft his story about his product. And I taught him the four steps of what a good story is. And then he said he was putting his eight year old daughter to bed. And she said, Daddy, tell me a story. And he ignored the tell me part and just said, Okay, I'm gonna read you goodnight, Moon. No, no, don't read me a story. Tell me one. And he said, I had a moment of panic. And then I remembered you taught me how to tell this tell the story. And so I asked them to tell a really good story. You tell a story that somebody sees themselves in. So I said, Oh, once upon a time, there's this little girl she's about your age. She had the same hair colors. You say my color, but her name was this and then He's off and running. And so that made me feel great because I made him hero to his daughter that night.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 20:00
Yeah, you definitely inspired me to do that with my kids since the interview we had the first time around, because I used to do that improv story. And yep, they basically multiverse versions of the kids in the story. And
Eric Readinger 20:16
it really started picking it apart. Putting out potholes,
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 20:20
I made it to Germanic in, in dark. Yeah. Yeah, to see if I could get them off. And that was a bad idea.
Eric Readinger 20:27
And since a monster eats them, right, all
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 20:31
fairy tales are horrible. When you look at the real versions,
Eric Readinger 20:34
there are German rooted, I think,
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 20:37
Zalman Yeah, it's one of those things where it's very valuable, though, if you can kind of, I don't know how you would do this, like, if you were, I want to get back into kind of boxing a little bit to to kind of get in shape. But my motor memories, it's there, but it's not all there. And to get back into it, I gotta ease into it. Right? I feel like, I'd have to figure out 10 minutes a day to kind of train my brain to think in story mode, when I have to have a formal answer. For a lot of things. Is that fair to say? Is that something? Is there exercises you did?
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 21:11
To get? No, yes. It's the more you practice anything, the better you get at it easier it becomes. So if you just start, I teach people three kinds of stories to tell your own story of origin. How'd you get into being a podcast host or lawyer architect, or whatever it is you do? And then the second story is your company story. How'd you come up with the name for your podcast? are the names? What does sweat equity mean to you? Is it just simply working hard? For no money? Or is it is there something else in it that you relate to from your sports background? You know, I, we have a company story, that we're the values of this company. And then the third one is turning a case study into a case story, where you paint a picture that people see themselves and if they see themselves wanting to go on the journey with you as their Sherpa. So I tell people don't get overwhelmed with Oh, my God, I have to have so many different stories, just say this week, I'm working on my story of origin, how I got into what I'm doing, I'm going to practice it with my friends and co workers and maybe even a couple of strangers and see see how it lands. And I use that lens of is it clear? Is it concise? And is it compelling? As a checklist that I asked people after I've told him a story? Was it clear? Did I confuse you? Was it concise enough for you to remember and repeat it? And did it make you feel anything? Yeah, I feel like I know you a little bit better knowing that. That's how you got into this. So and then you do the same thing for the company story and the case story. And once you've got those, you know, that's one a week, you know, you're just focusing on one kind of story every week. And by the end of that month, you're like, I feel like I'm a little bit better storyteller. I want to practice the story at least three times during the week. And it's not overwhelming and mad if you keep doing that, like anything. You'll go from 10 Push ups to 20 ticks on and on and on. So
Eric Readinger 23:11
little bit. Yeah. A little bit. I thought. I mean, I think Dad burping so no, no. I can see trying to do this and then just being like, Are you for real trying to tell the story to the Walmart cashier again or whatever. Really not getting a lot of practice in?
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 23:31
Well, I had as I was thinking about it, you know, I guess I was thinking about it our way you just have to, like, prepare, you're like someone who's very introverted is trying to work on that not be so, so introverted. When people were talking to them, they might do practice stuff in the mirror, they might do that kind of thing. i What about journaling? You know, just doing a kind of journaling? Kind of Yes, to get that framework is that big is that are you big on? Yeah,
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 24:00
I'm big on anything that helps you celebrate becoming what I call a progression, just not a perfectionist. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Perfectionist, right. So if you journal today, it was just a little bit better. Who did?
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 24:15
Who did that prep? Oh, sorry. We don't do
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 24:20
an extra minute. And today, I spent an extra minute in the cold ice bath, then longer than I did last week. And so you journal that your brain goes Ooh, endorphins lighting up like a video game, right? Because we are wired to celebrate progress. And if we journal it, and we're focusing on a skill, like storytelling or any other skill, then your brain goes, Okay, keep going. We like this celebration of progress. We don't have to, you know, hit the top of Mount Everest and be black belt in it on the first day. But we're celebrating because whatever we focus on, we get more out. So if we focus on celebrating our progress, then of course we're going to be incentivized to keep up practicing.
Eric Readinger 25:01
So you mentioned ice baths.
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 25:02
We talked about that last time, as well. But I know that's in your bio, and he referenced it earlier.
Eric Readinger 25:07
Okay, so are you? Is that something unique? I'm curious about routines. You know, yes. What time you're waking up? Are you working out every day? What do you what do you got going on?
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 25:18
Well, I take cold showers every morning. In fact, in fact, the opening to my talk is I start, I'm standing in a cold shower, shivering, it's my third Cold Shower of the day. And then I say, How in the world that I find myself taking cold showers. And while I did some research, and it turns out, it burns fat sites depression, and reduces inflammation. It had me it burns fat. In fact, I thought, well, maybe I don't even have to work out anymore. I'll just take cold showers. But that didn't really work. So that whole premise of getting yourself in a discomfort mode. And that from a stoic philosophy of how it fills up your tolerance for I don't have to be perfectly comfortable. Every single second of my life, I'm purposely putting myself in an uncomfortable situation, not only for the three things I just rattled off, but it does, but also for the mental. I can tolerate this. So when my plane gets canceled, or whatever else might happen in my life, my dad or mom dies. I'm not so devastated. Because I've never been uncomfortable before. I've built up a tolerance for if I lost everything, you know, those fear based future is thoughts that some people have, myself included, I'd still be okay. You know, the thing that's really helped me lately is this analogy of when a bird is on a branch. It never from second confuses the branch with its own security. Because the bird has wings, and it can fly away at any moment. And so I love that metaphor for all of us. So it's like if you decide to take a job, like, I might land here for a year, or five years, I'm in charge of deciding how long I land on this branch, or this project, or whatever it is, we're doing that we don't suddenly give all our power away to the job, the funding the relationship that we're in. But I'm the bird, I've got the wings. And that for me has really helped me lately.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 27:30
That's a great metaphor. What Bird did you think of?
Eric Readinger 27:34
I didn't think of a bird you didn't visualize. I was looking at the branch in my mind. Interesting.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 27:39
I went fetch and then I changed to a crow.
Eric Readinger 27:43
I was wondering.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 27:46
I know. I know you love birds. Bird people who have birds indoors. I think they're disgusting. Just by the way. I just wanted to throw it
Eric Readinger 27:55
out. You don't like a talking parrot. That's fun. Oh, you like
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 27:59
everywhere? That and then just like, I don't know. Is
Eric Readinger 28:02
that a thing? They do? dander. They have feathers?
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 28:05
It's yeah, they have. It's I bought for an air purifier company. And I had to go to a trade show. Yeah, ball in. And I was like the only normal person at this trade show. It was all weird. Yeah. But yeah, take tape took care of rabid air took care of pet dander from birds, because they have it too.
Eric Readinger 28:26
Okay. And learn something today.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 28:29
Birds don't fucking like us. Just by the way. They don't like us. They're dinosaurs. They hate us. Crows are the coolest because they they talk and they can trick people. And super smart. They use tools. Yep. They communicate with each other.
Eric Readinger 28:41
They have funerals.
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 28:42
I saw some stuff. And I was completely freaked out by how big they are. And how they hop.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 28:47
Yeah, well, plus, plus the crow. The movie. This Yes. is bad. Good. Good. Bad.
Eric Readinger 28:55
I haven't watched it since it came out. All right, P Brandon
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 28:58
Lee. But it's one of those things. I think we'd be remiss if we didn't get to kind of the main storytelling topic. We have a lot of people that talk to us about lead gen and marketing funnels. And I go, well, it doesn't really just stop with lead gen, right. We're going to take this lead gen model of a big funnel marketing and sales funnel, which are really two funnels we were looking at. And then we need to apply it on town. And I know you're big. How do you use storytelling to recruit that kind of top talent? Because that would be the kind of the campaign message the brand message of the company. I that's how I would define it. I don't know how you would call
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 29:41
it I was hired to speak at a Coca Cola summit for the CMOS of all of their biggest clients. They call them quick service restaurants, by the way, QSR.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 29:53
You can sit down in right, that's the bad
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 29:55
guy. So Domino's Pizza was one. Yeah. And I talked to them. Ken director and I said, What's your biggest marketing challenge? And he said, recruiting top talent, tech people. And I was so surprised, because my brain is always oriented to marketing is about consumer focus. And I said, Oh, interesting. He said, Yeah, we used to say, you know, we're a pizza company who has this really cool app. It lets you know, who put the pizza in the oven and who's delivering it with different names and tracking all that? Would you like to come work here on that project? But now we say, we're an E commerce company that happens to sell pizza. And I said, Oh, that sounds like Amazon on purpose. Right? Yeah. As a tech person who is considering which kind of career you're going to go into. So how you tell that initial story, your hook of the culture has a big factor. And then recently, Berkshire Hathaway, the real estate division Home Services, asked me to speak to their team on how do we recruit the top 5%, from our competitors to come work here. The people who are managing our office are really good at selling homes, but they don't have a lot of training on how to get the top producers to come over here and bring their book of business. And I said, Well, we go back to the basics. What made you become a real estate agent that your own story of origin? What kind of leader? Are you? Do you have a story to tell about? Do you micromanage people? Or do you leave them alone, right? And then what is the company's culture, you need to tell that story. And then finally, you need a story of someone who did leave the competitive competitors and have has come here, and how much better their life is not only revenue wise, but personal life, maybe they have more work life balance, maybe they are using some new tools, or whatever it is. So again, it's three stories, through the lens of the person you're targeting, to come work there, sees himself in that story and goes, got that sounds like me, that I'd like to have more work life balance and more money,
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 31:59
which is marketing and one on one for campaigns, right? Any, any retail, you see, they're trying to put a version of you. That's, you know, the Dove soap kind of remember the Dove soap or they had just all different kinds of women of different shapes, sizes, ethnicities, because they were like, we're going to cover the whole market share, basically.
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 32:27
You know, it's disruptive because every other beauty brands so brand is targeting, you know, the classic model. And so if you're the brand that's going, we see you, we hear you, we appreciate you we celebrate you even well, then you're got that emotional tie. And that's what really storytelling is so great at is giving the emotional connection that causes people to change brands change jobs, hire you. There's some emotional reason that people make a decision to change their behavior or by and when you tell a story that you're tugging at heartstrings, and then it's really about storytelling, listening and empathy. If you learn to master those three soft skills, you'll have the magical emotional connection. And whether it's, you know, that's why really good marketers will listen to current clients. So in my particular case, I work with sales teams in tech and healthcare. And so I've listened to them say, Oh, we are so tired of coming in second place when we pitch against competitors. Guess what's on my landing page about hiring me as a speaker or the online course. Tired of coming in second place? So they got Oh, my God, are you in my head? So it's, that's an example of using storytelling and in telling when
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 33:47
you listened to the promise, and it happens multiple times over in different iterations, but the same problem, you know, they're losing the pitch. Yep. And so you're playing to that? And yeah, I mean, we're working on case stories, not case studies landing page. Okay, well, so this is a good reminder, this might be one of the only episodes I listened to. Right?
Eric Readinger 34:11
It was like, Oh, do you have a notebook? Can you take notes?
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 34:13
And on the other side, on the flip side of that, you know, a lot of resume, like experts will tell you, here's your resume, here's how we can technically make it professional. But when you're in the interview, make a story out of it. It has an IT needs just like any story, it needs it needs a you know, I was I was struck with this problem. There's an intro of struck with this problem, here's how I solved is usually how they kind of the position it is that how do you use storytelling to get a job?
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 34:51
Well, you the kinds of questions you're gonna get ask are, you know, tell me a story about a challenge you had bring your resume to life all those kinds of questions. And so we No, that's going to be asked, it's imperative that we prepare and not be a deer in headlights when someone asks you that question, because you can tell if you thought about it or never thought about it, like, you know, what would you say to your 13 year old self? You could tell? I had never heard that question before. So I tell people, it's the same four steps, you need exposition, you need to describe a problem. And then your solution. And then more importantly, what happens after that solution. has let me give you an example. When I was interviewing for a job, I said 10 years ago, Jaguar reached out to me when I was selling advertising for an upscale fashion magazine and said, our biggest challenge is we want people to have an emotional connection to the car and think of it as moving sculpture. But we don't know how to do that. So I said, All right, we came up with an event idea where we would target 10 couples that had cars whose leases were expiring and six months that were in the competitive set, they get picked up in a Jaguar taken to the magazines, golden glow party, in the car. And then from there to a private room and a dinner where the chef would be there as well as somebody from the Museum of Art, talking about art. And so you'd have a Jaguar representative, and a museum of art representative having a dinner conversation with people. And they saw Jaguar literally became part of the conversation. And in between courses, there was another Jaguar outside that people could take a test drive around the block. And that was resulted in 10 ad pages $500,000 worth of revenue, and Jaguar sold three cars that night. So instead of just saying, Oh, I'm someone who's creative, I show it in the story that I totally renovated revenue for me, but I generated revenue for the advertiser.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 36:50
That's some amazing psyops too, in a good way. That's because there you get you kind of got their Plaza pleasure centers, with the car with the event, the car takes you to all the events you have sculpture are around you the whole time, but it's never probably never really. They had to ask with intent, I'm sure to test drive, whatever car is out there and all that stuff. Yeah. Interesting. And then before we let you go, you know, how do you use storytelling to be more resilient? I'm guessing the better way to ask that is maybe in a professional kind of way, in a career. Right? If you have kind of non work resiliency?
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 37:36
Well, for me, it's about how fast you get back up after you get knocked down. So the number one way is what story? Am I telling myself? Am I telling myself? I am a loser? I'm an idiot. I should get fired for this. No one No one? I'm not enough. Or are you saying to yourself, everybody makes mistakes? I'm human. I don't have to be perfect to be loved or accepted. And what did I learn from this? And how fast can I shake this off? I have a quick story when I heard Bonnie St. John's speak at the TEDx event right before me. She'd lost the lower half of her left leg and as a child, but she went on to compete in the Paralympics, so she's standing on stage with a skirt showing her prosthetic leg and her Paralympic medals around her neck. And she said, in the downhill skiing, they would take the average of your two times in the first mountain. She was the fastest she was in first place. Then the second Mountain was much icier and everybody was falling. And she also fell. And then when they combined the two times, they said, Oh, you came in second place. While you were the fastest going down the first mountain, you were not the fastest one coming, getting back up after you fell. So that time you took to get back up after you fell is what caused you to come in second place. And so it's a great story about how fast do we get back up? We're all going to fall down. And that really is the secret to how fast can we let go of the nose and the negatives. And that's how you it's all goes back to what story? Am I telling myself and other people? Are you playing the victim? You can't believe that that client said to me how stupid they are to not buy from me whatever it is, or you know what, on to the next and letting it go.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 39:21
Well, John, the pitch whisperer. We appreciate you coming back on we'll have to have you on you know, maybe in
Eric Readinger 39:30
another six months, I guess geez, I just happen.
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 39:34
Well, we'll we'll figure out a time that works for you. And you know, if anybody's out there that wants to hire them. It's John live say.com and turn the mundane stories into cocaine stories. I don't know. I was trying to come up with a slogan.
John Livesay, The Pitch Whisperer 39:53
Use that if you want. Yeah, you can use thanks,
Law Smith, Fractional CMO, Stand Up Comedian, Sweat Equity Host, and President of Tocobaga Agency & Advisory 39:55
Trey. Look, I just take a little big on that every time to use Nope. big deal but a little I wish I liked it but you know we're not that kind of Florida here that's all that's Miami style but thank you for coming on appreciate it and so much wisdom thanks thanks guys thank you
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
