Speaker 1:

Hi, and welcome to The Insiders by Durhamlane, where we get perspectives from industry thought leaders about strategies that are unifying marketing and sales cycles to help accelerate growth inside your world.

Richard Lane:

We were joined for this episode by Philipp Humm, founder at Power of Storytelling. It’s perhaps no surprise we had a great conversation. Simon and I are self-confessed fans of storytelling and sense making as a way to create valued relationships and success in sales. Philipp shared a number of hints and tips that will help you shift to a more story orientated approach. For example, make a great first connection, focus on success, and get personal, become more captivating by leveraging the inner and outer dialogue. And, if you’d really like to challenge yourself, have a go at Philip’s constructive embarrassment exercise. You’re going to have to listen on for that one. See you again soon and hope you enjoy the show.

Simon Hazeldine:

Hello and welcome to the The Insiders by Durhamlane, an industry podcast giving you the inside track on all things B2B sales and marketing. I’m your host Simon Hazeldine. I’m an author, sales expert and keynote speaker on all things sales and negotiation. I’m joined by my co-host the CCO and co-founder of Durhamlane, Richard Lane. Richard, great to be back with you for another Insiders episode. Do you want to tell us a little bit more about Durhamlane before you introduce our guest for this session?

Richard Lane:

Hi, Simon. And yes, gladly do that. It’s great to be back. Always good to be in The Insiders podcast studio. Just very briefly, Durhamlane, we’re an integrated sales and marketing agency. What do we do? Well, we help our customers create always on channels of meaningful and well qualified sales opportunities that business development teams love to close, so keeping the wheel of business development turning. As we’ve talked about on the podcast before, we’re the sense makers and the storytellers. So, absolutely thrilled to be joined by Philipp Humm. Philipp is the founder of Power of Storytelling, soon to be the author of a book, the Story Selling Method, which is due out in March. So, Philipp, welcome to The Insiders. Really looking forward to today’s discussion. I’m going to hand this back to Simon and we’ll get started.

Philipp Humm:

Thanks a lot, Richard.

Simon Hazeldine:

Wonderful. Thank you Richard. And, Philipp, welcome to The Insiders. What we normally do at the top of the show is ask people if they could just give us a little bit of a background so our listeners can get to know you, how you came to be in the role that you are in currently.

Philipp Humm:

So, my turn to the role started a little bit abruptly. I think about three years back, I still used to work as a product manager at Uber. And then, COVID hit, Uber decided to lay off 30% of the workforce. And, usually people go through all these different phases. Well, I went immediately online and looked for other jobs. And the same day I was laid off, I think I applied to 37 different roles. And two hours later I actually got already back notification about, hey, Philipp, you’ve been invited to an interview. And I looked at the role and I looked at the description and I realized it’s pretty much the same thing that I did at Uber before. And then, I asked myself, is that really what I want to do for the rest of my life? I haven’t been unhappy, but I haven’t been fulfilled.

I haven’t had, let’s say, the most fulfilled job. Is this really what I want to do for the rest of my life? And then, I thought, you know what? No, actually not. And so, I rejected that invite. I even withdrew all the other applications that were still open. And I said, you know what? I’m going to use that time right now to try out something that maybe I haven’t done so much before. And so, that day onward I went deeper into acting, into improv, into comedy, and into storytelling. And, particularly the part on storytelling I liked a lot. And after five courses, 30 books, I realized that, hey, actually Philipp, you’re not that bad at this.

Second, the courses that are out there, they very much focus on this big type of storytelling, TED type of storytelling. I love this type of storytelling, but it’s not really useful for business. So, I felt that I could do a better job actually teaching others storytelling of their works in business. So, I sat down and started crafting the content of my course. And fast-forward to today, I have given workshops for thousands of people at some of the leading organizations like Google, Oracle, Visa, and many more.

Richard Lane:

Excellent.

Simon Hazeldine:

Wonderful. Thank you. And as you might expect from the author of the Story Selling Method, starting off with telling us a story. So, absolutely on brand Philipp and on message. So, why are stories important in the world of business? How do you think they add value and help in a business hard bitten commercial context?

Philipp Humm:

Now, on brand I’ll tell another story. After that I’ll move more into smaller, into shorter answers, but here I just have another answer where I just discovered the power of storytelling. All right, let me share that as well. So, the first time that I really saw the power of storytelling was back when I started my role as a consultant at Bain & Company in Germany. And within the first few months, my manager came up to me and he asked me, Philipp, hey, we have this big proposal coming up for this pharma company. Can you craft that proposal? And back then I was still a little bit anxious about everything. I was still pretty fresh out of college. So, I said, yes, this is my chance to prove myself. And I just went all in, every single night until, I don’t know, two in the morning. I worked on the weekend. I thought, this is my chance to prove myself.

Well, two weeks later, I’d put together this proposal. It was 17 main slides and I think 37, again, backup slides. But, I thought the most beautiful proposal that anyone has ever seen. Well, next day we had the proposal side. I walk into the office, I shake his hands and I connect my computer, stand there with the clicker ready to start. But, before we start, to my manager and the prospect, they start chatting, and I’m saying, well, probably they’ll get there eventually. Five minutes, and I still stand there with my clicker. 10 minutes in, start to lower my clicker. 20 minutes in, I just put the clicker aside and I’m like, what the heck? Why did I prepare? Now, these two weeks, why did I go so hard on that proposal if no one is even looking at that?

And as I was getting more and more upset, something struck me. I realized, Philipp, hey, no one is going to look at your proposal either way. You might as well right now pay attention to what they’re saying. And so, I tuned in. What I now saw is, my manager, he was just sharing examples of how he helped other customers, examples of how he helped them. And to my surprise, the prospect was glued to every word he said. And at the end of the meeting, the prospect got up, shook my manager’s hand and said, wow, I love hearing your stories. I can really see the value that you’re creating. When can your team start?

My manager had just closed that meeting by sharing stories. And as I see this I have two reactions. One, what a jerk, right? First, I thought I prepared two weeks for this presentation, no one is looking at that. But then, second reaction was, wow, this is powerful stuff. I need to learn this. Storytelling can help you close any deal. Now, that just as an example where I discovered the power of stories. Now, concretely, where does it help? It helps you become more memorable. So, your stories are up to 20 times more likely to remember than a fact. Second, your buyer, your prospect is more amenable to your ideas when you tell a story. And third, it increases the value of your product.

Simon Hazeldine:

So, I’m a big fan of storytelling in business and in sales, Philip. And if you introduce the topic to people, you’ve mentioned doing improv, stand up comedy, acting, or people think of stories as kids, things that kids listen to. And if somebody was really skeptical, they’re more of a 17 slides than a 36 backup slide kind of person for a sales pitch, as you said. How do you convince them that they should try stories as a method of influence or communication?

Philipp Humm:

On that one I’d say, hey, think about, let’s say the last meeting that you had with a buyer. And let’s say, usually in this pitch type of situations, it goes like that. We say something like, we are the market leader in X, Y, Z. We operate in Y markets. We spend 10% on R&D. We use all these facts to really distinguish ourself. In every single pitch you will find that, and I still think that you should continue doing that. But, just ask yourself, do you really think that your competitor says anything differently? Probably not, because we’re all market leader at the end in something.

And also, do you think that your buyer remembers your facts that you just mentioned the next day, a week later, a month later? Probably not. We all know how great we are forgetting facts. So, if you truly want someone to remember you, you got to appeal to their emotions. And the easiest way to appeal to the emotions is by telling a story. So, I’d say there, what do you have to lose if you have a 30-minute meeting? We’re not talking about here, hey, don’t spend 10 minutes on a story, but rather invest one or two minutes in a short story to build that emotional connection, that’s it. There’s really nothing that you can lose. You’ll become immediately more memorable.

Simon Hazeldine:

So, it’s kind of an embed, isn’t it? Rather than necessarily an overall replacement. So, Richard, from a Durhamlane perspective, your principle that you mentioned at the start of this episode with the storytellers and sense makers, what’s your kind of take on this?

Richard Lane:

I think the three of us are probably very well aligned in the power of stories. When I think about how we deliver our work for our customers, Simon, then onboarding is such a critical element for us. Usually takes about four weeks to complete. And a large part of that is getting under the skin of our customer, but really understanding why someone should be interested and why should they be interested in them. And how do you do that? Well, you learn the stories. You learn the stories of how you’ve helped other people. You learn the stories of how this product or service came to be in existence. And when you are at the front end of the sales process prospecting, you need to be able to convey that information in a way that gets someone’s attention and draws them in to be interested. So, I think we’ve built our business really on the maybe vignettes, the storytelling vignette. It’s the little small stories, isn’t it? Just to try and link it back. But, so that onboarding piece is absolutely critical for us.

Simon Hazeldine:

So, that’s kind of an early stage, and you obviously work at an earlier stage of the sales process at Durhamlane. Typically, a lot of your time is focused there. And we’ll probably come onto stories as part of a sales pitch in a little bit more detail in a moment, Philipp. But, I’m interested, we were having a conversation before we came on air to record where you were saying, stories can be used at different stages of the sales process. What about right at the start when you are developing that initial connection, seeing, or meeting, or talking to the person for the first time? Do stories have a role there?

Philipp Humm:

Absolutely. Because, that’s always funny. Everyone also who’s listening right now, think about, let’s say the first few minutes that you have on any meeting. What is the conversation about? Usually goes like that, right? It’s like, hey, how are you? Good, how are you? The weather is today, luckily a little bit better if the sun has come out after a few days of rain. Now, that’s 99% of the people. I know that the listeners right now, they’re doing a much better job at small talk than what I just described there.

But, overall, what we see that most of the small talk that we do, it’s really bad. Most of the times, 99% of the time we focus on weather, we focus on traffic. COVID is now also popular. Again, there’s nothing wrong with that, but like that we’re just staying at the same level of relationship. And if you truly want to stand out, and if you want to bring your relationship to the next level, you might as well share something that is a little bit different. So, share a short connection story. Connection story is something, a short story about yourself that reveals a little bit more about you as a human. Should I give you an example?

Simon Hazeldine:

Yeah, please. Bring it to life.

Philipp Humm:

Do you want to ask me how are you, so that it’s less awkward?

Simon Hazeldine:

Yeah, I got you. So, hey, Philipp, nice to meet you. How are you?

Philipp Humm:

Hey, Simon, I’m really good. Well, yesterday I had a little upsetting disappointment. I got into my new Airbnb here in Seville in south of Spain. And as I got inside, the owner showed me around a little bit. And he was showing, here’s the kitchen, and there’s the bathroom, there’s the closet. And at one point I ask, so where’s the bedroom? And he looks at me, bedroom, and he goes to the wall and he lowers this bed from the wall. And I’m like, oh, shoot. It doesn’t have an extra bedroom. Anyway, when was the last time that, I know you were disappointed in some hotel, Airbnb or apartment, and how was that for you? And then, bring it back to you, right? I ask now about your experience. Now, that just as an example. And these connection stories, they change every day, but every day there is actually something that is a little bit more interesting, a little bit more unusual than how we respond all the other days. So, just think, is there anything that is more interesting than weather, weekend?

Richard Lane:

So, Philipp, let me bring this in, because I think this has been a really interesting change with work from home. So, you get a lot of people that use corporate backdrops. I actually like, see you’ve got Simon’s bookshelf behind Simon there. I like to just see what people have got in their rooms, and I think that’s a really neat way of getting a conversation started. So, I had a really big enterprise call on Friday last week. I was in Edinburgh, I was on holiday, so I was just doing it from the street. So, there was a talking point there. But, the guy I was speaking to had a guitar hanging on the wall. So, first thing was I play a guitar, he plays a guitar, talk about different guitars, you talk about where you are. So, I think the whole work from home piece has brought in some really interesting ways of talking about things other than the weather, because the British are very good at talking about the weather. So, it’d be interesting your views on that.

Philipp Humm:

My experience, you cannot rely too much on that. If I look on the backgrounds of most people, a lot of people have them blurred. A lot of people you can’t recognize it. So, if there’s something, please yes, go for it. How you can avoid that and how you can prepare a little bit in advance say, go on their LinkedIn. And, now not only look through the professional stuff, but you’ll see what are the interests, what other pages do they like? And then you see, ah, he liked Tim Ferriss, so maybe he’s into self development. Maybe right now the short story that I tell is a little bit more about a skill that I learned, and then I ask him about him. So, I’d say I prefer to plan a little bit in advance so that I don’t rely on, oh, is there an object in the room? If there’s an object, that’s great.

Simon Hazeldine:

And, I guess, you could potentially, to Richard’s example, you can get the other person to tell a story, can’t you? I guess, and say, so how did you get into playing guitar? Or is that your guitar first? I guess. And I must apologize as a British person, Richard and I are British and causing great trauma to suggest to Brits that they might want to talk about anything other than the weather, Philipp. So, think we need to put a health warning on this episode for the Brits. But, in all seriousness, so I like the thinking about moving from the same level of relationship to a different deeper level of relationship and starting off really positively. And then, you mentioned that we’re not replacing, for example, necessarily the entire sales pitch, but we might embed or use customer success stories, for example. So, how do you construct and use stories as part of the overall sales pitch or sales approach?

Philipp Humm:

That’s an excellent question. Often people think like, ah, now I need to tell stories all the time. No, that’s not the case. If you have, let’s say half an hour call, well, maybe we have one max, two stories, that’s it. It’s not that you need to change your entire way of communication. You’re just sprinkling in one or two stories once in a while in these strategic turning points of the conversation. And often, one is the first one, second one is a little bit more in the discovery at the beginning. These are industry stories. And the third one is customer stories. So, specifically when you pitch your product, once you have a clear understanding of what the pain points are that the prospect is going through, well, you can chip in with a customer story, and that is a success story about another customer. Now, how do you craft that?

It’s about thinking that happy customer that you want to use in the story, in what situation was that customer before meeting you? What problems did that customer have? How did you then help overcome that problem? And what was the result at the end? What is the transformation that that customer saw because of you? And when you follow these few steps, you’ll have a short success story that you can use in your next conversation. Now, for these stories to work well, a few things that you want to keep in mind. One is, make it about a specific person. Because, we all know these case studies, right? Everyone has them in marketing, they’re beautiful on all the websites. Marketing spends hours and hours crafting them, but at the end, think again, how memorable are these?

Why are they not memorable? Because, they’re about companies and not humans. So, when you share your success story, share it about a specific person that you have helped at the customer side, that’s one. And the second is, make it relevant. You only want to share a success story that is actually relevant to your buyer. If you pick someone that is in a completely different industry with a completely different profile, with another challenge, well, you might as well not share a story because it can have the opposite effect. So, always think, how can I share something that is relevant to my buyer?

Simon Hazeldine:

So, these are things that are helping to make the stories more interesting and maybe even captivating. I’m just thinking about those of us who’ve been unfortunate enough to be on the receiving end of somebody telling us one of those stories and your eyes close over and you think, oh my goodness, not again. So, what do you do to really make sure those stories that we tell are captivating, grab the attention of people, on top of the things you’ve mentioned a few moments ago?

Philipp Humm:

So, I’ll share with you two specific techniques that you can use to make it more captivating, my favorite ones. Technique number one is to add emotions. Any story that is emotional will be immediately more interesting. Now, how do you add emotions? If it’s your own story, bring out some of the thoughts that are going on in your head. So, let’s say you have a certain challenge, and instead of saying, ah, this was a really bad problem, blah, blah, blah. You go in there and you say, oh man, that was really bad. I think now everyone will think that I’m a failure. I’ll probably have to leave the country right now and move somewhere else. What are the thoughts that are going on in your head? Share any of these thoughts and your story will immediately become more emotional, more captivating, that’s one.

The second is, try to focus on the visual moments of the story. A lot of times people share their story in very generalistic terms. They say, so I went there, I did this, then they respond that. That’s all very general. Now, bring us into a specific moment, how you stand there. You stand there, your boss walks up to you, does something, you respond. So, bring us into the specific physical moment in this visual moment. One technique that you can do to do that is by sharing dialogue, the outer dialogue. So, if it’s with another character, let’s say with a customer, what are the words that were used in that specific moment of the story?

Say, if it’s a customer success story, it could be at the end, right at the end of the story. The customer coming to you saying, wow, Simon, I’m so thankful we worked with you guys. Right now sales is through the roof, 10X right now, this year so far, thank you. It’s a tiny change. But, use the words that were used in this specific moment of the story. That’s my second technique. So, one, share the inner inner dialogue, which is thoughts to make it more emotional. And second, share the outer dialogue to make it more visual.

Simon Hazeldine:

I got you. So, that’s kind of making both of the characters in the story become more alive, I guess, in the customer’s mind is what strikes me. And obviously, Philipp, you’re very adept at telling stories, but how should people, let’s say we’ve convinced the cautious skeptic that maybe a story should feature in their next sales pitch, but they may be used to doing the slides, they’re okay with those. What do they need to do to rehearse a story so that they can deliver it with confidence and with competence?

Philipp Humm:

On this one, let’s say on the short connection stories that we just talked about. Well, you can try them out any day, and in non-work environments as well. Someone ask you, how are you? You just respond with the tiny story. That way you’re getting used to using stories in your day-to-day. Now, if we’re talking more about these bigger stories that you will use with a customer, I’d suggest speak them out loud. First, write down a few bullets, the key scenes of the story, and then speak it out loud. What I usually do is, I find a few objects in my room I say, hey, here’s the water bottle, there is the microphone, there is my backpack. And then, I just move deliberately speaking out loud, finishing one thought, and going to the next item, and then going to the next item. So, speak it out loud while having deliberate eye contact with random objects in my room.

Simon Hazeldine:

So, are you using that kind of like a pegging system to remind you of various parts of the story? Like a memory peg, Philipp? Is that the reason for using the objects?

Philipp Humm:

It’s mostly to have deliberate eye contact. Because, even though you share your story often in a one-on-one setting, people look all over the place. That way you train yourself to stay with one person, with one object for until you finish your thought, and then you only move to the next one. So, it just helps you become much more deliberate in eye contact, as eye contact is absolutely crucial to deliver a story in a captivating way.

Simon Hazeldine:

Absolutely. And, thank you for clarifying. And, of course, just remind people, if you are on webcam to look at the webcam, not the video image of the person that’s on the screen, if you want to make eye contact with people. I still have to remember that myself. And Philipp, I’ve been doing my homework for this episode. I was watching your very enjoyable TEDx talk, the secret to building lasting confidence. So, check that one out folks, and you reference what you call, constructive embarrassment. What on earth is constructive embarrassment? And you recommend that people try this, don’t you? So, tell us more.

Philipp Humm:

For those of you who don’t know, constructive embarrassment is that thing where you put yourself on purpose in an embarrassing situation. Now, example, you go outside into the street, the next person, next stranger comes close and you say, excuse me, could I give you a hug? Or you walk into your next coffee place and you sit down on the floor. Now, I know you’re freaking out and you’re thinking, why on earth would I do that? We already, we’ve been through enough embarrassing things in our lives. Why would we do that?

Well, by putting yourself on purpose in this embarrassing situation, you learn how to deal with feelings of judgment. You notice how everyone is judging you, and instead of jumping up and moving somewhere else, you stay with that feeling. You feel the sensation, and you learn how to deal with judgment. By learning how to deal with the judgment in these moments, all the other moments, whether at work or outside of work, they’ll become easier to be with. If you have this big presentation coming up after that, you’re like, hey, it’s the same feelings that came up when I sat down on the Starbucks floor. And so, there is no different. You learn how to deal with the judgment, and by learning how to deal with these feelings of judgment, you can be more present, more in the moment and less worried about what other people think.

Simon Hazeldine:

I’ve got visions of, we know that a lot of Richard’s team from Durhamlane obviously listen to the various episodes of the podcast. I can just imagine them at this moment, Richard, going oh, oh, I wonder what Richard’s got lined up for us in terms of constructive embarrassment.

Richard Lane:

I will look forward to people saying, can I give you a hug?

Simon Hazeldine:

So, this is kind of like the you go outside your comfort zone as this often called to expose yourself to that Philipp, and then it makes, for example, telling a story in a meeting or something like that. So, much less daunting for people, I guess.

Philipp Humm:

Exactly. Then any moment that matters, you’re like, hey, if I can do that, if I can do that random thing in the street right now, I can do anything in life. Just as a sample, when I gave my TED talk, the same day before giving my TED talk, I had to drive down all the way by train from Amsterdam to south of Netherlands. And that day I stood up and the entire train compartment ask, excuse me, can I sing a song for you? And they’re like, huh, what does he want?

And I’m a terrible singer, I’m not a good singer. And I say, I want to sing a song for you. And I started singing a song for them, or I don’t know, a minute or so, I stood there and sang a song for them. And yes, it felt super awkward. I hated, I would still hate it today. This is still very awkward to me. But, after doing that, I went on the stage of TEDx and like, man, this is easy stuff. This is easier than actually right now being in this train and singing and making a complete fool of myself.

Simon Hazeldine:

I love the, it’s the comparison. I’ve done quite a lot of speaking in my time, but when I took a decision to do little five minute standup comedy routines to raise money for charity, that was a whole different level of challenge and stretch, I’ve got to say. Because, if nobody laughs, it’s not going well. Luckily they did. So, I’ve had a bit of potential constructive embarrassment, Philipp, so wonderful. Richard, you normally give us your pithy summary of the key points from the conversation. What do you think is most important from what Philipp’s been sharing about stories?

Richard Lane:

Thanks, Simon. I’ve got lots of notes here. We’ve really only touched on one topic, which was storytelling. So, it’s been very focused, which is great. Just first off though, I love in life the moments of change. So, you had a bit of an epiphany, it seems, Philipp, when you left your job at Uber and then started applying and then thought, I’m going to break this cycle. So, I love that, and thank you for sharing that. A story is 20 times more memorable than a fact. If you’re not using stories in your sales activity, then you should be. Once, I’ve said that. I also like the idea that it is a shift. So, it’s not a, I now only tell stories. It’s like, how do I use stories to help my sales journey and the conversations that I’m having? So, you’re not only telling stories, you are blending them into your conversation.

We looked at success stories, so about a person and being relevant to the prospect. So, at Durhamlane, when we prospect we talk about concise, relevant, topical, and action orientated, so that is nicely aligned to that. Two ideas to be more captivating. So, your inner dialogues, you add emotions, you focus on visual moments of the story, which is your outer dialogue. So, again, how do you really bring that relevance and make it captivating? And then, we talked finally about practicing. And unfortunately in life, practice tends to make perfect, doesn’t it? So, I remember as a kid realizing that actually when I practice something, I get better at it. And I was pleased, but also a bit frustrated, but it is the truth. So, Philipp has been talking to his backpack, and that’s all been about, how do I get my eye contact and keep that eye contact?

And, Simon, your point about when we are working from home or we’re on Zoom and Teams, then actually you look at the camera and not at your face or the face of the people because, and we all forget that from time to time. And then, finally, constructive embarrassment. And I realize now that I’m going to know how many Durhamlaners actually watch the podcast, because they need to come and say to me, hey, can I have a hug? And then, I’ll know that they’ve listened to this episode. So, I’ve really enjoyed it, Philipp. I think it’s, as I said at some point in the conversation, I feel like the three of us are very aligned in our thinking. So, it’s been knocking on an open door, but I think there are some really practical little hints and tips that you’ve given our listeners there, which will help them to have better business conversations, which is what this is all about.

Simon Hazeldine:

Absolutely. Wonderful. And Philipp, we have one last question for you. We are building The Insiders Spotify playlist, and we’re asking every guest to choose one song, which we will add to the playlist. It’s a very diverse, eclectic, and rich mix of musical genres. Philipp, what are you adding?

Philipp Humm:

Superstition by Stevie Wonder.

Simon Hazeldine:

Oh.

Richard Lane:

Class. Don’t think we’ve got that. That’s a cracker.

Simon Hazeldine:

No, we don’t have Stevie Wonder on the list. We do now. So, Superstition by Stevie Wonder going on The Insiders Spotify playlist. Wonderful. Philipp, thank you very much for joining us on this episode of The Insiders by Durhamlane. Thank you to my co-host, Richard, and thank you for listening in folks. Please subscribe to The Insiders podcast on your preferred podcasting site, and you’ll be notified of new episodes, and visit durhamlane.com to learn more about selling at a higher level. In the meantime, we’d like to wish you good luck and good story selling folks.

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