Learn How To Tell Legendary Stories Like Steve Jobs

A few wise words courtesy of Dave Gerhardt at Drift.

  1. Tell A Story
  2. Pose A Problem
  3. State the Solution
  4. how some proof/examples/facts
  5. Call to Action

Tell A Story

If you’ve ever seen a speaker get up on stage and immediately dive right into their “thing”? You immediately lose the audience. People love stories. Storytelling has been a part of our lives forever. Start with a story to hook the audience and build some credibility and relationship.

Pose A Problem

Now you have people hooked via the story, you now need to create some tension. Pose the problem. What is the problem you are eventually going to solve in the deck/presentation?

State the Solution

Now you’ve told people there is a problem you now have to present the solution as you are going to solve them how to solve it.

Proof

Back up with some facts or real-life examples or data. Show some examples of how others have solved this. Social proof great here if you can show other people that have done this. People don’t just want the solution they want to know how to do it.

CTA

What is the call to action at the end of this? All great marketing has a call-to-action at the end e.g. Share this. Email me. Go to this web page.

Bonus

In every presentation Steve Jobs gives he uses the rule of 3s. People are wired to remember things in 3s.

  • Three Blind Mice
  • Three Little Pigs
  • Goldilocks and the Three Bears
  • The Three Musketeers
  • Three Wise Men
  • Father, Son, and Holy Spirit
  • Location, Location, Location
  • 999

Try to always provide 3 things to remember.

Today we are introducing 3 revolutionary products ….. a widescreen iPod with touch controls, a revolutionary mobile phone and a breakthrough Internet communications device”

Steve Jobs