Stories that Sell: The marketing strategy algorithms can’t kill

Want a marketing edge that still works when algorithms shift and feeds overflow? We dive deep with publisher and ghostwriter Henry DeVries to show why story beats noise and how a single book, paired with the right stages, can turn your expertise into inbound demand and high‑value clients. 

Henry lays out his “Magnificent Seven” for converting pages into pipeline: run small online seminars, speak on other people’s stages, publish consistently, show up in target‑rich communities, volunteer to open doors, create short video assets, and host paid deep dives that often break even while surfacing serious buyers. Along the way, we talk generosity as a brand, why trust outlasts tactics, and how to market actively without sliding into hard sell.

If you’ve felt stuck at seven figures, spread thin across demos and content formats, this conversation makes a focused case to niche harder and be intensely useful to fewer people. 

View more SaaS Stories at Hat Media.

Transcript

What Makes Stories Work

SPEAKER_01 0:00

What separates a good storytellers from the bad storytellers?

SPEAKER_02 0:04

There are eight great stories. If you know which one of the stories you're telling, you're gonna have a lot more.

SPEAKER_01 0:09

From a business perspective, which one do you think works best for telling the story to the media?

SPEAKER_02 0:14

The media loves a comeback story.

SPEAKER_00 0:17

While others chase type that repels prospects, Henry DeBreach reveals a different path. Write the right book, deliver the right speech, and turn expertise into influence, impact, and high-paying clients.

SPEAKER_02 0:28

Why a book? The book is foundation feats. I spin them into weekly newsletters, or we turn them into expert articles that can go out. A book is the number one marketing tool. Speaking about book is the number one Biz Dev sales strategy. For the future, it's still going to be storytelling. That's been human beings for 6,000 recorded years. Carl Jung would say it's not that we want to hear the stories, we need to hear the stories.

SPEAKER_01 0:58

Welcome everyone to another episode of SAS Stories. Today I'm very excited to be joined all the way from California by Henry the Freeze, publisher of Indie Books International. Welcome, Henry.

SPEAKER_02 1:11

It's so great to be here to talk about storytelling.

SPEAKER_01 1:14

I'd love to learn a lot more about storytelling because I feel like we're drowning in content. And a lot of SaaS founders, marketers, anyone in business really is probably struggling to get awareness, to get recognition, engagement. And I know you've worked with hundreds of business owners. So in terms of storytelling, what separates um the good storytellers from the bad storytellers?

The Eight Great Story Types

SPEAKER_02 1:42

Two things. One, good storytellers know that there needs to be a hero or protagonist. There needs to be a nemesis or villain in the story. And then there needs to be a mentor character. And they know that they should not be the hero of their stories that they tell. Their clients are the heroes of the story. They're the Luke Skywalkers. And they're not the they're not the nemesis. They're not the villain. They're not the Darth Vader. But they're the Obi-Wanobi, or they're the Yoda. They're the voice of wisdom and experience. And the hero succeeds because they followed their advice. So when you know how to tell it that way, that's one. Second thing is they know what kind of story they're telling. There are eight great stories. There's the monster story, the underdog story, the comic solution, the tragic solution, the mystery, the quest, the the comeback story, and the escape, or as I call it a from crazy town story. So if you know which one of the stories you're telling, you're gonna have a lot more success.

SPEAKER_01 2:53

The comeback story. I think that would be my personal favorite. But I I guess from a business perspective, um, which one do you think works best and is it different for everyone? Is it as long as you have an element of any of those that you named, you can get your message out there and people will respond to that?

Media’s Love For Comebacks

SPEAKER_02 3:10

I know when you're dealing with the media, if you're telling the story to the media, the media loves a comeback story. They love a a redemption story, a rebirth story, the Phoenix Rising, uh, where in there's uh PR agency I work with in America, and they take some of the most distressed cities, and then they help them with economic revival. And one of the things is to tell the comeback story, where it uh uh you know, things used to be going great, and then they went to pot, and then the city is coming back, they're reinventing itself. So media loves those. Um, a quest story is good for a business. That is a journey, a path. Uh, there's a prize that the business has been going on. Um anything that's a real how-to story is is a quest, is a journey story. And then my personal favorite is the mystery, because sometimes it's just a mystery to people how things happen and what's done. And if you could help them crack the code or uh you know pick the lock or solve the riddle, um, it's very intriguing.

SPEAKER_01 4:14

And so taking a step back, the reason why we're talking about storytelling today, you yourself have written 20 books as uh as Henry DeVries. You've also ghostwritten 200 um for various businesses and personalities. Can you give us a little bit about your background and how you got into this in the first place and why you got into this? Where where did that all start from? Yeah.

Henry’s Path To Ghostwriting

SPEAKER_02 4:40

So, and in addition, I've written 350 articles for Forbes Digital, and now I write for California Business Journal. I've always had a journalism side hustle throughout my career because I love telling the stories. I love telling other people's stories. It's it's why I became a ghostwriter. Um so I had a career in marketing, um, marketing agencies, was even president of a large agency in San Diego, and then went on my on my own to create an agency. And um, I know I needed a a hook, something special about us. Uh otherwise we'd be just another commodity, just another marketing communications firm. And as I was looking for that, people kept coming up to me and saying, Henry, you're a writer, you've written books. Could you ghostwrite a book for me? And then uh so ghostwriters stay secret, you know, people don't know. So it's word of mouth that promotes you. And about 10 books into it, I thought, I think maybe I found the niche. And what happens if we started promoting this? Uh so I did that, and that's how we took uh that number up to 200 in the last decade.

SPEAKER_01 5:52

And so also having worked with a lot of marketing agencies, a lot of businesses, what do you think separates the ones that plateau at seven figures versus the ones that scale past it?

Scaling Through Story And Books

SPEAKER_02 6:03

Well, one of the things is the storytelling. Um, I gave a speech once, and it was uh to groups of like vice presidents. And when I was introducing myself, one said, Well, I know who you are. You're the reason we had to completely rewrite our website. Every every article on the website now has to tell a story, an engaging story to pull people in. I said, Oh, I must have spoken to your president a few months back. They said you did. Um, so I've talked to people who've made the uh Inc. 500, the fastest growing private firms, and uh they're storytellers, they they tell stories and um publish books. Um I think if you're in a high-end services business, not having a book is like being a movie theater without a marquee. People don't really know what's going on inside, or a restaurant without a menu. Uh they don't really know what's going on. Uh so it you don't want it to be a mystery what you do and who you are and your point of view. You want to be an authority, and the authorities are the people who are experts who attract people. I like to say you can't spell the word authority without the word author. That's true.

SPEAKER_01 7:21

And so I I mean, obviously, we we, you know, with smaller businesses, with startups, it makes sense for the founder to be the person to write this book. But what do you think in uh enterprise and mid-sized businesses, who who should be this authority? Who should write the book?

Who Should Author In Enterprise

Book As Authority And Leverage

SPEAKER_02 7:40

Well, I a funny story about that. I once had a client called Hart Hanks International, and Hart Hanks is uh New York Stock Exchange billion-dollar company, and they're horizontally integrated with all different media channels and and uh direct marketing services and marketing databases and all this. And um, they asked me to do a series of booklets for them that they would use to put on uh events and to uh give away at trade shows and all this. So they would just come up with the title. That's all they gave me a title, and then I would write the book, and then when they published them, it said from the marketing experts at Hart Hanks, which I thought was kind of funny because yeah, that was me in a little room. I was the marketing experts at Hart Hanks. But what I learned from it was they didn't want anybody's ego to get involved with it or to um, you know, uh just think that this is marketing information you're giving away, but a book is something special. It's it's not just uh more content that we're uh putting up on a website or something. A book shows thought and diligence and it sets the people apart. I say it's the number one marketing strategy. Talking about the book is the number one sales strategy. So when we gave it away, we did workshops, we did, you know, private executive briefings, and we handed these uh books out to people. Um, we measured the ROI and it was 400 to 2,000 percent we were getting back on this project. And we had a meeting with the the CEO, and the marketing said, you know, well, we deserve some of the credit for that. And and sales said, we deserve some of the credit for that. And and um my client who was uh uh you know, special marketing project, said, Well, we deserve some of the credit. And the president said, I don't care who gets the credit, I just want to keep the 400 to 2000 percent return on investment coming for marketing dollars. So that's why I think it's sometimes good to spread the credit. I've done books where uh one company had four authors on the book. Now I wrote the book, I interviewed them, but each of them would go out speaking, and also when they met with clients that well, let me leave you a copy of my book. Now I interviewed them, they they had a hand in it. But when you spread the glory like that, when you spread the credit, um, it's really the the content that's helping people that comes through.

SPEAKER_01 10:21

That makes sense. That makes sense. And so uh I I guess that's okay, so that I think mid-to-enterprise level clients, you you know, that makes sense to to position some of their people, maybe multiple of the people as the authors, and then that gives them incentive to promote the book. I guess for a lot of SaaS companies out there, they're probably stuck in a bit of a content crisis that they just don't know, you know, they're between running demos, uh webinars, short form videos, um, blogs for SEO, all sorts of content. What is really the argument for them to maybe stop that and focus on writing a book instead? Why a book?

Generosity As A Brand

SPEAKER_02 11:05

Why a book? Because, again, that authority position. And in these days, you don't want to be chasing clients, you want to attract them, you want them to seek you out. And the book is foundation piece. And then I take the books and I spin them into weekly newsletters, say on LinkedIn, or uh we turn them into uh excerpt articles that can go out, or we make the chapter a basis for an industry speech. Uh so there's all these ways you can leverage the book. And and I was a meeting planner uh with magazines and at the University of California, San Diego. I'd put on conferences, and we would have uh speakers that we were deciding who we were going to go with. And this person's interesting, this person's interesting and has written a book. You book the author every time, yeah. Because uh that says that they're a cut above. Uh, they've done some analysis, they put it out there, they've put their point of view out there. And as I was studying this, I was looking at uh leaders in the tech field and you know, Bill Gates book. Uh you look at uh other other people, um uh uh, you know, at Cis Cisco and and all these places, and they're writing books. Well, they're actually having someone write a book for them, uh, either as a ghostwriter or it would be with this person. So they were realizing the power of the book to do spread the message.

SPEAKER_01 12:46

It's um yeah, it's such a tangible asset when you think about it, because I I feel like everything we read online now, we kind of question how much is AI involved in this. Whereas a book, you know, even if the author has used AI, you kind of do feel like, but they've done a lot of work into it, they've put a lot of research and time into it. It just feels like a tangible asset that you you just trust.

Authority Vs Performance Marketing

SPEAKER_02 13:12

Well, you gotta know that AI is a good research tool for writing a book, but AI isn't like your drunk uncle. Uh sometimes it says good things, but other times it says crazy things. Um and I I also think uh it might suggest strategy, but it takes human beings really to develop strategy and position strategy, and that's something that can be done in a book.

SPEAKER_01 13:42

And so, EOV, what do you think is broken um with service businesses and the way they approach marketing today?

SPEAKER_02 13:52

Well, one of the things that is broken is a lack of generosity. Um, you need to make generosity your brand. You need to be very generous in giving information away uh through books, uh, through workshops, through small scale seminars that are helpful, that help solve a problem for people in general. And then they come hire you for the specifics. And and that's what I think is broken. Some people are playing too tight to the vest, like like in you know, in poker when you hold the cards like that. You know, they don't want to, they're afraid they're gonna give away their secret sauce or something. There is no secret sauce. Um it's it's not the strategies that win, it's the execution of the tactics that win. And that's what they hire these companies for.

The Magnificent Seven Promotion Plays

SPEAKER_01 14:51

Yeah. Yeah, it makes sense. Um and so I guess the difference between authority marketing and performance marketing, um, what can you tell me about your experience there? Like companies.

SPEAKER_02 15:06

You don't mean like when you say performance marketing, what exactly do you mean?

SPEAKER_01 15:11

I guess it's more around the the heavy sales tactics, the, you know, the outreach, um, the sales acceleration campaigns, and whereas authority is all about what you just said, it's you know, educating your market, um, giving them value, giving away the secret source.

SPEAKER_02 15:33

Well, I I don't like to say authority marketing is passive and and the other one is active, because I think you need to be active marketing. So with authority marketing, you're also actively inviting people to your workshops, to your seminars, or to do a briefing. Um, one of my clients, uh, one of the things we discovered is that IBM was the biggest customer they had. But IBM three letters, but it's this huge organization. So we had to market to individual branches and divisions and come out and actually educate them on the software that they bought uh that they didn't know. Um I know of other people who've made their living uh teaching people how to use software that they've purchased from a vendor. I won't use names, uh, but they've come in and and they were confused uh by what they've bought. You know, somebody bought it on high, you know, a VP, and then uh the managers and supervisors uh at first it's like, oh, this is more of a hassle to use this than uh than we the way we did it the old way, because they're not willing to get over that hump to where the real productivity is unless somebody is out there generously giving information, helping. That's that's even after the sale.

SPEAKER_01 16:59

Okay. And so let's say we all go through the trouble of writing a book. I know I have, I I wrote one that I published earlier this year. You'll be very proud of me.

SPEAKER_02 17:10

Um, I'm already very proud of you, but I want to show you you hold the book up like this. Okay. In case somebody uh does a screen snap, you get the book and you in the picture. But anyway, uh, so what was the title of the book?

SPEAKER_01 17:25

Uh all about account-based marketing and just how the the B2B consumer has changed, uh, especially you know, through the pandemic and um the digital transformation and acceleration that that caused. Uh, it was a very interesting research for me to dive into the psyche of of consumers in in this world now and just the way they, you know, just buying has changed so much uh significantly. But say a lot of SaaS uh founders and marketers that they go through all that trouble, they write a book, they publish it. I have to say it's not an experience without its pain. Um, what next? How can they then promote that book to make sure that they get to where they need to to get that scale and growth?

One Profile, Many Markets

Teams, VCs, And The Pivot

SPEAKER_02 18:18

Right. I I say there's the magnificent seven, like the old Hollywood movie, The Western. I don't know if you like the old uh Steve McQueen Yule Brenner version or the Chris Pat Chris Pratt Denzel Washington version, but it's uh I liken it to there's seven things to do. Uh number one is uh small scale seminars on the internet on a regular basis on the book. And and inviting people to it to have a discussion. It's not a lecture, you get an interaction and a discussion going. Um and just the fact that you're doing that on a regular basis. I know people who get business, people don't even attend the event, but they know that they're doing it, so therefore they investigate. Um, number two is to get on other people's stages and give how-to information away uh about this problem that that you help solve. So it's not direct promotion of the product, of the service, uh, but it's it's how-to and helpful information, that authority type information. And that can be on podcasts. Hey, we're doing it right now. Uh, but it also can be at conferences. Uh I was at uh university this week. Uh I'll be at the University of Michigan next month. So I speak at a lot of conferences and doing that. Uh the third thing is, and we say get published. Published is a book, but also um, I mentioned I write for the California Business Journal. Um, it's not for the money, uh though that they do pay me, but it's for the exposure. Yeah. And then also uh I have my own LinkedIn newsletter, and I've got 2,500 subscribers every week, you know, read what I have to say on the subject. So you get published, uh, and there's a whole spectrum of that. Um, you know, all the way to uh sure you'd love to be in the Wall Street Journal or Forbes. I put a lot of people in Forbes, made them real happy. Uh so it can be that. Then uh the fourth thing to do is find target rich environments. Uh and what I mean by that is uh a conference or a trade show where your target audience, uh, we say niche in America, they say niche in Canada. What do they say in Australia?

SPEAKER_01 20:44

We say niche as well.

Post‑Pandemic Renaissance Mindset

SPEAKER_02 20:46

Yeah. So get re get your your reaches or in your niches. Uh okay. So uh go there and um volunteer for the group. And I always found that the membership committee was the easiest thing to join. And they love you if you bring in new members. But I loved it because it gave me permission to call uh potential prospects, not as my business, but representing the trade association, saying uh we'd really like you to consider membership and we'd like you to uh do this. I was doing this uh at my agency in San Diego. We did a lot in the hospitality industry, so I joined the Hotel Motel Association. And the woman who was in charge of membership at the Hotel Motel Association said, I'm confused, Mr. DeVries. I said, Why are you confused? She said, You're the only um advertising and marketing agency that has joined the Hotel Motel Association. And I thought, excellent. And in a year I had three hotel clients, but because I represented them, and then they'd say, Oh, well, uh, you are you a hotelier? You know, do you have a hotel? I said, Oh no, no, I'm a marketing advertising agency. Oh, well, we're thinking of uh getting a new agency. I said, Oh, that's interesting. Now Let's talk about membership in the Hotel Motel Association. I I I I like I was like if you want to feed, well, we would say a deer. I don't know what every animal you have is so dangerous. I don't know if I'd feed them. But uh you put the the food like the carrot in your palm and you let them come up to you. So when you're in a target-rich environment and you're helping, they come up to you. Uh five is just to attend those events, and you know, it's a target-rich environment, so it's still about networking. I wrote a book during um the pandemic about all the ways you still needed to do that, but now we all had to do it online and we had to reinvent doing that. Oh, those were good. That's fun. Yeah, and then um six is to do things that are on YouTube and and video and short things. Yep. And then seven is unfortunately. Yeah. Well, we're seven is a pain event where it would be a workshop that people would find the content so valuable, they'd pay hundreds of dollars and a day to spend with you on that.

SPEAKER_01 23:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:10

So and um that is that's you think, well, that's a revenue generator. Usually you break even what you spend on marketing, you get back on people paying to get in and lunch. But uh the business that can come out of that because you're seen as the expert.

AI Floods Content, Bold Wins

SPEAKER_01 23:28

Yeah, that's fantastic advice. Thank you. I'm just gonna summarize. So, one small-scale seminars, uh, these could be online, say LinkedIn live events is an example, YouTube Live as well. Number two, get on the stage, get on podcasts, get on webinars, spread the message on other people's stages. Number three, write for platforms. This could be your mediums, this could be LinkedIn newsletter, this could be hopefully Forbes and all the other wonderful. Or Substack.

SPEAKER_02 24:01

It could be Substack. I know people who do well with that.

SPEAKER_01 24:04

Yeah. Number four, trade rich environments. If you speak at them, volunteer. And then number five, even if you just attend and network. Number six, YouTube and short form content. I know that's really where we're headed, you know, with our attention spans these days, which is really unfortunate, but it is what it is. And number seven, paid events. Now, you mentioned niching or niching, in as it's said in the US. Um, how important do you think it is to niche when scaling?

Books Beat Business Cards

Trust, Story, And The Next Five Years

SPEAKER_02 24:40

I think it's extraordinarily important. Um now uh I've also run businesses where I'll have three different uh niches and I organize things in different ways. Um, this is not in your world, but I once um had a pest control company as a client. And they uh uh they were struggling, you know, half of their business wanted termites killed, and the other half of their business uh wanted rodents killed, and uh and I said, Well, what where do they, you know, is oh if it's inland, it's rodents, if it's on the coast, it's termites. And I said, Well, why don't we create two company names? One would be you know, termite pest control, and the other would be rodent pest control. They said, Well, how would we do that? I said, Well, uh, we would get two kinds of t-shirts, and when you're you know, you're wearing the different ones. They said, Well, what about when people call? I said, You have two phone lines, you know. So they didn't two websites. I said they said, Well, but about the trucks, and I said, magnetic signs, slap the right one on when you go out there. Uh, I think their heads exploded when I said all that, but I just really believe in the power of niche, uh, niche, excuse me. Um, so I believe in the power of that because I want you to be interesting to fewer people, but I want you to be more intensely interesting to them. So get rid of the ands. We we held blank and blank. It's like, no, choose one or market in two different directions. Um, now I market to advertising, marketing, digital marketing agencies, but many high-end management consultants and executive coaches find me uh because my material works for them. And I don't ever say, no, I'm not gonna help you. Um, if their problems interesting, I will sell to them, but I won't spend a dollar marketing to them. Every marketing dollar goes in that other direction.

Advice To Younger Self

SPEAKER_01 27:00

I think there's a saying on that. It's uh you don't always target who you market. I kind of it rhymes, I think I butchered it. But essentially, I mean it's the same here. Uh we I work mainly with SAS and tech companies, but if if I look at all my clients, that only makes 80% of them. Um if they have a very similar problem that I can help with, then it doesn't really matter the industry. But I do I do agree with you. I think niching is very important. You don't want to be everything to everyone because then you essentially can't really tell a good story. You want to pick your people and solve their problems, right? The biggest challenge I see with that one, I've had this people say this to me in the past is well, I've only got one LinkedIn profile. What do I write in my LinkedIn profile if I have two different markets that I want to target? Would you say create two LinkedIn profiles?

SPEAKER_02 27:58

I well, what I did was um my partner, uh Devon, she is the health authority expert on LinkedIn, and she has a health authority TV show, and she's the editor-in-chief of our health authority books imprint. So it's a different person goes deep because I go very deep on agencies on my LinkedIn. So everything I put in there, you you I mean, if you don't get that I'm the agency book guy when you go to LinkedIn, then uh something's really wrong with you because it is on everything I do. I would love to have you on my agency Rainmaker TV show, by the way. I'll love to be on. I think uh I find you delightful and I think you've got some wisdom and you're the author of a book. So you're my kind of people.

SPEAKER_01 28:52

Thank you very much. Thank you very much. I think yeah, it certainly does help help to have a co-founder uh that can go into that different area whilst you focus on your sweet spot. Um I think a lot of SaaS companies do. In fact, um, you know, I've heard a few statistics around SaaS companies that have multiple founders in the business are more likely to get VC capital and investments, and it there's just really a lot of research around them lasting a lot longer um in the world.

SPEAKER_02 29:27

Well, the VCs are betting on the team, not the idea. Right. Because ideas cannot work and things can change, and but but the team is gonna figure out a way. I had my own team come in, they go, Oh, you know, there's chaos in America and things are changing, and what happened, tariffs, and what happens? And I said, What's happened is we're gonna figure it out, we're gonna pivot and figure it out because that's what we always do, it's what we've always done. Um, nothing static. It's what we did during COVID, the pandemic. Yeah, um, my business was built on out there on seminars that I was delivering around the country. And overnight that dried up. And we had to reinvent on Zoom. Yeah, it was say Zoom, I don't mean Microsoft Teams. Sorry, Microsoft. I know I own a teeny amount of stock in you, but uh I just Zoom's just so much easier for me to deal with.

SPEAKER_01 30:28

It's only built for that. Um this podcast is recorded on Zoom, so yeah. Now, you've let's let's talk a little bit about the pivot, actually. You mentioned having to pivot the power of the pivot. I think this is really important. And obviously, the earlier you figure out that you need to pivot, the better, rather than really just trying to grind and do things the same way you've always done them. Um, I think if there's only one thing guaranteed in life, it's change. Um, so tell us a little bit about your experience with pivoting and um, you know, what advice do you have for other businesses out there if they need to do that?

SPEAKER_02 31:11

Well, the story starts in 2023, and we built the company on um management consultants. We were publishing books for management consultants mostly, and other people were finding us, and I wanted to do some more speaking. So uh a coach of mine said, Well, analyze all the you know, the hundred people you've worked for, and and there were two big groups, one was technology companies, and the other was advertising and marketing agencies. And I said, and then I said, Well, what are the major uh places to speak? And I had the venue of all the technology places. I hadn't spoken at any of those places, they never invited me. Oh, the marketing one, many of the top ones. I was already a speaker at those events. Uh I said, you know, the marketing people, some of these people asked me to go on vacation with them. You know, they like us that much. Uh so I said, Well, oh, but there's one group there that uh I haven't been to. So I I used my Forbes contact to get a credential to attend this event, and it was for advertising uh executives, advertising agencies. And within five minutes, I knew I was home. I knew these were my people, and went all in and grew the business 40% as a result of that. Now we didn't tell the technology people no, you know, if they came for a book or anything like that. Uh we didn't we didn't tell them no. Again, but everything we went in. And there was a speaker at the conference, and uh he said, we just made it through the pandemic. It's like being in Antarctica and you make it through an ice storm and you're alive, so you go into this little snug harbor. He says, You can't stay in the snug harbor. Uh we've come out of something bad. There's a renaissance that's gonna happen, it always has. After World War II, there was a renaissance, after the you know, the plague in Europe, there was a renaissance. Uh, there's gonna be a renaissance, and if you try to play it stay safe and do what you used to do, um, you're probably gonna get passed by. But the people who embrace and look for the new opportunity, the new problem to solve, that's all we are. We're in the business of solving a problem. The there's a there's a book from 1909, The Science of Getting Rich, and I'll sum it up for you. Uh it's find a group of people that have a problem. A problem that you can solve at a price that they would find to be a value, and at a price that you can make a profit. And then it didn't say what the shampoo bottle says, but it implied it. Lather, rinse, repeat. Lather, rinse, repeat, you know, and and keep doing that. Um, so then, but you have to watch when okay, when when does it move? Like that book, um Who Moves My Cheese by Spencer Johnson, and you know, so that the metaphor of the mice and the maze, and and somebody moves the cheese. So, you know, you don't sit and cry and walk long for the old days when there used to be cheese here. You go out and find where the cheese is now. Uh, so it's the same thing with the with the pivot.

SPEAKER_01 34:31

Yeah. Yeah. I just think we, you know, we with AI and with all the advancements coming out these days, that pivot probably has to happen a lot faster than than before. So you'll be probably looking for that cheese, you know, more often than not. Um, it really does um separate, I suppose, those that can can do that and kind of pick themselves up and keep going, and others, like you said, that just want to stay in that little hole and um feel safe.

SPEAKER_02 35:01

I'm real comfortable writing my newsletter, you know, it's like uh I I hire out and people do the newsletter, or but then like, oh well, AI can do that at a tenth of the price, and if a human looks it over to make sure it didn't do the crazy uncle uh thing in there, um you know that works. But the other thing is, you and I know it. You're not gonna win the AI race, it's not gonna be the most content is gonna win. No, and people are gonna be flooded with it. Um you're gonna have to be really bold on your group, the problem you solve, and how you solve it. So, you know, I'm I'm very bold that a book is the number one marketing tool. Speaking about the book is the number one biz dev sales strategy. If you're in high-ticket services, that's where you gotta be. Yeah, it's not oh, who can churn out the most blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, which is just a regurgitation of of what's said before. Um, one of my authors uh is talking about you need like this a slap, you need to slap them with the truth uh for to get their attention. So uh one uh technology company I work for, the CEO gave me a pep talk. It was he goes, I mean, I got I need you to stay bold. I want you to be bold and out there, and people are gonna ignore you, or they're gonna say this is too good to be true, your technology, or they're gonna say, Well, you're just a pipsqueak company. You know, what gives you the authority? It says, I need you to be bold and keep going because that's what's gonna win.

SPEAKER_01 36:47

Yeah. Absolutely. It's coming back to the sales strategy as well. I think that there's definitely more value in handing someone a book rather than a business card, right?

SPEAKER_02 36:59

Well, our fourth grade teacher, uh, either Mrs. Bandy or sister Mary Elizabeth, uh, they did a number on us that uh books are special things and you don't throw them away. Now I know and you know that they're ground-up trees and ink. Uh but what they represent, they represent knowledge and the work that went behind it. And um when I I moved out of one office and uh condensed in the space, and I had hundreds and hundreds of books. It was before I was doing the publishing, um, and I was gonna throw them away, and my wife wouldn't let me. She said, You'd please just for me find somebody to take those. So I found a library that would sell them like a used bookstore, and and she could sleep better at night than if I just took them to a dumpster uh or a recycling bin. Um, you know, it's uh because uh and it's funny, everybody works for me. There's we we've got a crew of about 10, and then another 10 you know, or freelancing, and they all love books. It's not an accident that they're working for us. Um we had a little discussion uh before a teammate was well, tell us about what you're reading in your favorite book. And I couldn't believe how deep everybody was uh into literature and books and and what they were doing, yeah. And um, so sometimes a career chooses you.

SPEAKER_01 38:27

Yeah, no, I I agree with that. There's definitely something to it. I mean, where I live, we chuck out a lot of stuff um in the neighborhood, and you see furniture, you see all sorts of stuff, you know, old toys from the kids. Rarely do you see books. And in fact, a lot of people are building what they call street libraries in front of their houses where they put in the books that other people could then come and and rent for free.

SPEAKER_02 38:56

I was, yeah, that's a wonderful thing. It just triggered something. I was up in a little mountain resort area, and I was in a boutique uh boutique, uh, you know, resell clothing and all that. And I had this thing where uh it was food. And it was just take it was like take what you need. If you need food, take it. And I thought like, yeah, we need more of that. You know, it was with books and fruit and other stuff. Um it's just it the generosity, make generosity your brand.

SPEAKER_01 39:28

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 39:29

I wound up buying things that that uh I bought something I wouldn't have bought, but I thought like, okay, if these people are giving away food to people, uh I'm gonna buy something to support this place.

SPEAKER_01 39:39

Yeah, that's great. Looking ahead five years, what do you think will matter more? Um algorithm mastery, human trust, storytelling continuing? What what do you I know it's hard to kind of get a crystal ball with everything that's changing and look into the future, even five years is too much. Um, what are your thoughts?

SPEAKER_02 40:04

Well, as one American baseball player said, the future isn't what it used to be. So uh for me, for the future, it's still gonna be storytelling. That's been human beings for 6,000 recorded years. That's curious and human brains are hardwired for these stories I was talking about. We uh people like uh Pearl Jung would say it's not that we want to hear the stories, we need to hear the stories. They're reaffirming that that comeback story, um life's hard. People need comeback stories to hear, oh, you know what? Somebody rallied. Oh uh not everybody likes JK Rowling right now, but I'll take her as an author, and you know, where she's wounding up, you know, down and out, but but writing a uh children's book that uh turned into one of the most popular works of literature.

SPEAKER_01 41:01

Uh I can't think of which one you're referring to.

SPEAKER_02 41:05

Yeah, I don't know. Some magic thing, I don't know. So, uh but uh uh you know the the point just being uh the comeback story uh is a story people need to hear. The mystery story, you know, life's full of wonder. Technology companies are really positioned to tell the mystery story because they have cracked the code on a number of things. And um, if you embrace it, uh your life can be so much better.

SPEAKER_01 41:38

Yeah, for sure. Absolutely agree with all of that. I think storytelling, you're right, it's it's been around for thousands of years, it will continue to be around. It's essentially how we learn, how we retain information, how we share um and teach. It's yeah, it's a beautiful thing. Um, Henry, my last question for you tradition on this podcast is if you could go back in time and give yourself one bit of advice, how far back will you go? And what advice would that be?

SPEAKER_02 42:10

I thought about this, and it's I don't know if it's advice, but um I would go back to 18-year-old Henry and say, you know, uh it's all gonna work out. Uh don't be don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. It's gonna work out. You're gonna you're gonna find the love of your life, you're gonna be married uh, you know, for 50 years, you're you're gonna have great kids, you're gonna uh uh you're gonna travel the world. You're gonna be, you know, am I gonna finally write that book? No. You're gonna write 20 books. And you're gonna help 200 other people write books. I said, so it's all gonna be perfect. Well, no, you're gonna, it's gonna be a struggle, you know, you're gonna fight, you're gonna, you're gonna, you're gonna have to diet and exercise a lot, you know, to keep the pounds off. You're uh uh yeah, there'll be there'll be cash flow issues, there'll be all these things. But overall, it's gonna be great.

SPEAKER_01 43:13

I love that. I think that's great advice. I think that's where we'll probably get to um later in life when we kind of in hindsight look back and go, why was I so worried all the time? It all worked out in the end, and everything was a learning and a and uh like where where one door closes, another one opens, right? Right.

SPEAKER_02 43:33

I it it's hard emotionally, uh, because when something bad happens or what you perceive as bad, every bad thing in my career has led to something greater. And when I finally realize that, I go, like, oh, it still sucks while it's happening. Uh but there's something, there's something ahead here that's gonna be better. Um if certain things Worked out. Uh I would be running a little advertising agency in San Diego advertising uh homes for people to buy. And I'd be talking about vaulted ceilings and low-flow toilets my entire life. Uh, you know, I wouldn't have gotten the life I wanted. When you get moved out of that and something else happens, um, you just have to look at it. That is this a stepping stone? Is this a stepping stone to something better? Let's let's stay attuned to that.

SPEAKER_01 44:28

I love that. Henry, thank you so much for being on the show.

SPEAKER_02 44:33

Uh it was my pleasure. And uh, I would love to have you on my show. I'll invite you.

SPEAKER_01 44:39

Absolutely. Looking forward to it.