289. The Art of Behavioral Storytelling: How David Paull Captivates Audiences

Welcome to episode 289 of the Brainy Business Understanding the Psychology of why People Buy. In today's episode, I'm excited to introduce you to David Paul, CEO of Dialsmith. Ready?

Let's get started.

You are listening to the Brainy Business podcast, where we dig into the psychology of why people buy and help you incorporate behavioral economics into your business, making it more brain friendly. Now, here's your host, Melina Palmer.

Hello. Hello, everyone. My name is Melina Palmer and I want to welcome you to the Brainy Business Podcast. In today's conversation, I'm joined by David Paul, founder of Insights technology company Dialsmith and the research and messaging agency called Lillian Labs. His Superpower is helping B2B marketers use storytelling to build their brand. His behavioral storytelling framework, which you're going to hear all about today, is rooted in emotional intelligence and principles. Pulls from behavioral and narrative economics. In other words, understanding how people feel, how they make decisions, and how they're influenced by others in order to craft engaging stories that drive action. Along with that, David posts the David Paul show stimulating stories from curious characters and is on the board of TedX Portland, which is the largest indoor TedX in the world. And for fun, we decided to have this episode come out on the eve of their annual event in Portland. So good luck to David and the whole TEDx Portland team for your event. I'm sure it will be amazing. If you want to share a little love for their team, follow and comment to edxportland on Twitter. I'm sure they will appreciate it. Now, really quickly, before we get into the conversation, I want to be sure you know that there are links in the show, notes for everything, including related past episodes, links to articles and books, and so much more. It's all within the app you're listening to and@the brainybusiness.com 289 now let's jump right in. David Paul, welcome to the Brainy Business podcast.

Oh, thanks so much for having me. Been looking forward to this one.

Oh, yeah, I'm so excited. I know. I'm trying to think. I think it was two years ago when we did the Flip of this and you interviewed me for a podcast. Because if I remember correctly, it was just before my first book came out or like right around that time and I was definitely pregnant. I remember. I remember sitting and having the conversation.

I think it was around that time. Yeah. And yeah, it was. It was great. One of one of my favorite convos because, you know, we're so aligned on the whole behavioral psychology side of communications and business and everything. So I don't often get to go super deep on that topic. It's fun.

Ooh, well, guess what?

Guess what, Here we are today.

You definitely get to. That's all. That's what we're all about here. So for everyone who doesn't yet know you, can you share a little bit about your background and the work that you do?

Yeah, sure. So my work spans kind of the worlds of market research and strategic messaging, communication. So I'm the founder of a company called dialsmith which develops the dials that you may have seen on like Fox News or CNN during presidential debates or State of the Union, when a focus group will turn dials up when they like what they hear and down when they don't. So we make those dials and an online version with a slider. That's our technology side. And then we also have a more of a consultancy called Lillian Labs where we. It's more full service where we help craft and then test and then refine messaging, stories, presentations, speeches, you name it. So that. That's the main core of my, you know, my day job.

And so with the dialsmith. So coming up with the. The slider piece, the virtual piece is some of what you did.

Yeah, we did, yeah. So the. The physical dial has been around for a long time. I acquired that 13 years ago. Now, the online version with the slider is something that we've developed in recent years. So that can be done in a survey if we're testing a speech or presentation, or could be done in an online focus group, or we send it out to employees of a company to pre test, maybe a keynote that their CEO is going to do, all kinds of ways to. You'll be able to do it online, which of course doesn't have any geographic barrier. And then for in person is when. When we pack up a case and travel around and go to the city in the world where we need to be.

Yeah, well, it feels like another lifetime ago when I was running the marketing department at a financial institution we had created. We had some TV commercials and someone was coming into the, you know, NBC affiliate or whatever where we were running our ads. And ours got selected to be part of the test using the dials. So maybe we sort of work together at some point. Different life. It didn't even realize it.

Yeah, well, we are the producer of dials. As you can imagine, it's a niche industry, so there aren't too many of us. So we either work together or you worked with our Dials with somebody else. But cool. One way or another, we definitely cross paths.

Oh, fun. I know. I thought it was such an interesting thing, even at that time. And this would have been 2013, maybe something like that. You know, 2012. Something around there. The process of where people don't even realize as they're turning a dial in a way that when you ask in like a focus group or something like, did you find this interesting? Was that good that I thought that was such an interesting aspect of someone. Couldn't tell you that they don't realize how far they're turning it. Like, we forget so quickly those peaks and valleys that I find it so fascinating. And I think that actually is something getting into, you know, this type of work in behavioral science that you can't ask in the same way that we don't even realize what our fingers are doing in the moment. I don't know. I'm sure you have plenty of thoughts on that. But I thought that was interesting in that moment. I felt it was pretty inspiring.

So, yeah, you latched in on really the key benefit. You know, you can't ask. You can ask, but you're not going to get a reliable answer on what did you think or how did you feel? There's no way for someone to be able to accurately give you that because that's history. Right. Their brain has to reconstruct how they think they thought or how they think they felt, and that becomes a new thing altogether. The only way to really capture what someone thinks or how they feel in the moment is to lock it in in that moment before they're influenced and biased by anything they've experienced after that. So the dials really provide a diagnostic where people do hold the dial and they will start to just turn it somewhat non consciously, where they turn it up a little as they're feeling positive, down a little as they're feeling negative. Then it's our job to interpret those results. Then we can have a conversation and as aided recall, we can play back for them a clip and we can show the line, go up and say, watch this clip. And then we're going to talk about why you reacted the way you did. And that then snaps them back to that moment. And at least they can. Then they're prompted by something they have physically reacted to at that time instead of having to completely construct something in their head that, you know, may or may not be accurate.

Mm. Oh, it's so interesting too. And something I know, you know, we're going to be getting into storytelling and Presentations and things. But, like, if you ask people what they thought or felt, it's going to be colored by what they think they should or would have, could have done or what they want to admit to in the moment, right? Showing, like, well, you turn the dial, we see what happened, can bring it in. And like, when I'm doing a presentation, I, I. So if I'm talking about anchoring or how many decisions we make, like, I'll ask a question, and I don't just say, you know, think in your head of a number, like, how many penguins you think there are in Antarctica. And, you know, and I'll say, are there more or less than a hundred thousand penguins in Antarctica? Is a question I ask a lot. And I make people actually say whether they think it's more or less allowed in the room and then make people give a number and then you can hear it. And then when I say it's actually 12 million, like, realize, oh, wow, we were way off, right? The number that we guessed. And so in that. But if I wouldn't have made them say it aloud, even if the number they were thinking was fifty thousand or a hundred thousand or seen what everybody else was saying, they would go, I bet I would have been close to that. I bet I would have been right. But that commitment is so important in understanding the outcome we're looking for. So as we transitioned to storytelling, that was my, like, makeshift attempt to make it so that our transition felt sort of seamless. Ish.

I think that's a winning attempt. And I mean that. That example of anchoring is fascinating because if you instead use 10 million instead of 100,000, the results would be completely different.

Exactly.

Our brains are so susceptible, and we're bombarded with it all day, every day, and most of the time don't even realize how we're being. I'm, you know, whether you want to say, manipulated or influenced, put a positive or negative spin on it, but that's super interesting.

Well, and yeah, I give, like, so then I ask how many polar bear. If there are more or less than, you know, 20 million polar bears, which, of course, everybody would say less, but it's considerably less than we think. And what if I had asked if there were a billion penguins, you know, how far off would your guess have been?

Right?

And it would have been way, way different. So. And we can all see that, and we experience it, and that helps its. People are telling their own story, you know, bringing this to the storytelling aspect in their own mind as they get to be a part of it, which is different. Little bit of IKEA effect there maybe. But I don't need to talk about storytelling. You're here to talk about storytelling. How did you get into that?

I became interested in storytelling through my work on strategic communications, strategic messaging, and realizing that the most effective messages were ones that took the listener on some kind of a journey and also had some way to tap into the heart, not just the head. So I really just decided to then start rooting all of my work as an area of specialty in crafting messages, presentations, whatever it is, in some kind of a storytelling framework to give it structure, but also to help the audience be able to become invested early on. And then through all kinds of techniques, you can take that audience on whatever emotional or intellectual journey you want to. So that was really just kind of the natural evolution of the work that I was doing. And somewhere where I felt I could just sink my teeth into something I found really interesting.

Yeah. And so how.

I don't know.

I'm trying to decide which aspect to ask about in that kind of journey. So with the storytelling piece, did you get into some of that speaking and doing stage stuff first, or was it more on the customer presentation side? Like, where. Where do these things kind of fall in together in that journey?

You know, it started to come together when I became affiliated with a conference that unfortunately wrapped up last year, and it's not. It's not happening again, but it was called the Story Conference in Nashville, and I think it went on for seven or eight years. I got involved about halfway through, about four years ago, frankly, because I was sitting at my desk one day and I saw something called the Story Conference. And I said, oh, that's interesting. And I checked it out, and the people who ran it looked really cool. And I loved the program. So I attended one year, and that really opened my eyes to the power of storytelling as a method of communications. And then the next year, I had the opportunity to speak there.

And.

And most of my talk was around behavioral economics and cognitive biases and how those influence the way people process information and make decisions. And we did some experiments and some thought exercises like you were just talking about, and it just really made sense to me and started to click. So that's where I decided, okay, I'm going to. I'm going to lock in on this, because I feel like this I can do really well. And then, yeah, worked with them for a number of years on some different experiments and then started trying it out also with clients and taking their temperature on how they feel about using some kind of a storytelling framework for their messaging and then testing that. Because again, it doesn't matter what I think or what my client thinks. It only matters what the market or what their customer thinks. And that's why I love the research side of it. Right. I have no ego about it. I tell people, please don't. Look, listen to me. You can take my advice. I can guide you, but I don't want to take my. I don't want to take my own thoughts as being right either. All I want to do is test it with the market and see if the market buys it. And if they do, then great, we're on the right track. And if they don't, then, you know, we need to pivot. And so for me, that's the beauty of. Of kind of where insights meets storytelling to create this, what I call behavioral storytelling, kind of the blending of the two.

Yeah. So share a little bit then. That's kind of the lead into it. But what makes storytelling more behavioral? Do you have an example of a client or something you worked on that you're able to share about a transition into that sort of behavioral storytelling? So people can, as we're saying, see themselves in the example?

Yeah. Yes, I do. So, you know, we do a fair amount of work in like, like climate. Climate issues. And so what we usually try to start with is isolating what's. What's the real problem that's being faced. Because if you ask people what they're concerned about or what the problem is, they're usually going to give you something that. That's pretty superficial. And it's kind of peeling back the proverbial onion to get to the heart of what's the real issue that's causing the real pain, and then tying that to what the stakes are if that issue doesn't get resolved. Because if there are no stakes, there's no problem at the end of the day. And then we try to get people to visualize through, you know, through research exercises, what's the perfect outcome. You know, if you could have the perfect outcome that takes away those stakes and removes that real problem, you know, what does that look like? Then we'll design the call to action. And that's where we're bringing, you know, behavioral psychology into it to really based on knowing how people process information and make decisions, we can craft stories that lean into that. And then ultimately we make sure we tie in, you know, testimonials and social proof, kind of following, you know, Seth Godin's point in his book, Tribes. People like us do things like this and, you know, nobody wants to be out on a limb by themselves. They want to follow along with people that they can relate to. So when we're doing client work, sometimes we're doing that with the client and we're saying, okay, let's talk about what's your real problem? What's at stake if you don't get it solved? I use that a lot in the sales process to help me, frankly, close business. Right. And then on the other side of it, when we're crafting messaging, it's okay, what's your target market's real problem related to your topic? What's at stake if it doesn't get solved? What's their perfect world outcome? And then how do we craft a call to action that's relevant to what you offer and give them the social proof that's going to make them comfortable?

Hmm. I love it. Can you summarize for us kind of what those steps are to be looking at when we think about behavioral storytelling?

Yeah. Yeah. So I call it the Respect Framework. Rspct. Just leave out the E's. It's first determining what's the real problem for your target audience that you are seeking to solve. And then the S is what's at stake for them if they don't solve that problem. Because if there are no stakes, then there's no problem, then we move into P, which is what's the perfect outcome for them once the stakes are alleviated and the real problem goes away? What does that perfect outcome look like for them again, relative to what it is that you're offering them? C is the call to action, which is then kind of the meat of the story, where you're really telling that story in a way that's going to resonate with them psychologically, often non consciously, by using all of the tools and techniques that you and I both use in our work to understand how people process information and make decisions. And then ultimately at the end, we need T, which is testimonials and social proof because no one wants to be hanging out on a limb. They want to do what others like them do and feel like they're in the company of similar types of people. So that social proof is really key to bringing it full circle and helping to alleviate any possible doubt that might still be hanging out there.

Yeah, that comfort piece is so critical where you know when you're talking about that, and I think so often people want to stress the problem so much and you end up with when I talk about hurting this way. I talk about it in this unintentional normalizing of the behavior you're trying to change. Right. So to say that you mentioned the political dial piece. Right. So to say 80 million people didn't vote in the 2020 election, which. Okay, but 67% of the population did, and it was the most ever and whatever. But if we stress this negative piece of it and then we start to think, oh, well, if you didn't, there are 80 million other people that didn't, so I guess I shouldn't. And if you did, you kind of feel like it's hopeless and maybe I shouldn't. Where we stress the problem so much, but it makes it feel isolating and that the thing that you don't want people to do actually feels more safe than. And you know, if you never include the testimonial or the social proof to help them to feel comfort in what you're encouraging them to do and just stressing the problem too much, it can make it to where that story doesn't have its nice close point.

Yeah, exactly. And back to anchoring. If you, if you anchor the, the conversation in the negative statistic, then that overshadows the positive statistic. Even if the positive statistic is stronger, is the predominant one, you still focus on that. You know, however million didn't vote, despite the fact that many millions more did. It kind of maps to also a story, you know, how every year they come out with the happiest country in the world and it's always, you know, it's like Finland or Denmark or something like that. And a couple of years ago, there was an article, I think it might have been in the New York Times where, where it said, you know, happiness rates in Finland are slipping only 90. I'm going to speculate, it was like 93% of people declare themselves as being happy. I don't know if that was the exact same number, but I read that and I'm like 93% of people declared themselves as happy. And the headline is they're slipping.

Right.

Maybe they're slipping from 95% the year before, but I don't think the fact that, that they're slipping is still the crux of this story.

Right, right. And if we talk about it in this way, I just was talking about this in an episode. I, I just refreshed the hurting episode a few weeks ago from when this will come out and this piece of the news station or, you know, whatever the article they want you to, they, They're Selling the click and the story that makes you want to go read that is what they're in the sales of. And so in that way, it's doing what it's supposed to do. But understanding then as an organization or the thing that makes you surprised or shocked or oh my gosh, is a terrible statistic. We need to change this. And then you go and tout that negative statistic when you're trying to sell. The positive solution can really be getting this like short term win of surprise for the long term loss of them feeling like they're not going to end up actually buying what you want. Which like you say here, you know, what's the real problem? I always talk about starting with really understanding the problem and knowing that's, you know, 9, 10 of the issue is really knowing the problem we're trying to solve.

Right. If you try to solve the wrong problem, then the entire exercise is, is pointless. So it all starts with that.

Do you have any tips for people as they go through a process of trying to understand the real problem? Any points where people have problems in identifying their problems?

Yeah, I mean, my number one tip is keep asking why until you can't ask it again. Right. So if you ask someone what their problem is and they tell you, it's like, okay, great. Why is that? And if they can give you an answer to that, it's like, okay, great. And why is that? And when you finally hit a wall and you can't ask why anymore, that's the problem. And that's the most foolproof, simplest way that I think anybody can do it. I mean, you know, parents can use it with their kids too. Right. Kids come home from school, they're in a really bad mood, and you want to know what's wrong and how you can help them. What happened today? And they give you something, you're like, oh, that's kind of weird. Why'd that happen? And you follow that same exercise and you finally end up getting to this root of something that your kids got going on at school that you didn't even realize, maybe they didn't even realize was the real problem for them. And these, you know, these aha moments can come up. So it's useful in all areas of life.

Yeah.

And it might be such a slight reframe of what you thought the problem was, but that little tweak makes all the difference, 100%. Yeah. Well, we talked a little bit about speaking stuff, and I asked you at the beginning if you were open to talking about Ted, not, you know, Your friend Ted, Maybe it's your kind of like your friend who has you spend so much time with.

But I spend a lot of time with ted.

Yeah, Ted's your best friend. How did you get involved with ted? And for everyone who is listening and is interested in the idea, I think so many of us have the dream of doing a TED, a TEDx one of these days. You know, what sort of tips or thoughts do you have as you know, one of the speaker coaches with ted.

Yeah, so I'm involved with tedx Portland, which is for those who are familiar with tedx events. They're independently produced mini TED conferences that are under license by ted. So if you want to put one on, you have to get a license from the TED organization. You have to follow their guidelines. Most of them, there are, there are thousands of them around the world that happen every year. Most of them are small, 50 to 100 people. Then there are a handful around the world that really break out. And TedX Portland happens to be one of those. We produce the largest indoor TEDx event globally. Last year we had 7,500 people in the Modus center in Portland, Oregon where the Trailblazers play. This year we're going back to a little bit of a smaller, more intimate performing arts center. It's just more the vibe that we're looking for. But yeah, it's just a great part of my life where I get to work with really passionate people who are all volunteer and want to just put some of the most groundbreaking ideas on stage that can then spread throughout the world because TEDx talks end up online just like TED talks do. So I got involved with them a few years ago and one of the things I do with them is on the script development of talks and speaker coaching. And I will say for anyone who's really interested, hearing it from the Master himself, Chris Anderson, the curator of Big TED the ted, wrote a book on crafting the perfect TED Talk. I don't recall the title, but easy enough to find. So that's a great resource for us when we're helping to develop talks and make them as effective as possible. One of the rules of thumb is always to make it as short as possible. There's a reason that TED talks are no longer than 18 minutes. That's been scientifically proven is kind of the outer limit of when people can really continue to stay focused. We try to keep our TEDx Portland talks more to 12 to 15. And it's really just that when you put that constraint around it, you force the issue to just get distilled and distilled and distilled, and you cut out anything that doesn't need to be there. And then every word has value. So general rule I would always say is the magic is in the edit. It's never in the first draft. It's always in the edit. Getting it down really as small as you can possibly make it, and then making sure that there's added value to the talk. You know, there can be great, compelling stories told that can be very emotional or very interesting or very funny. And that's nice. But we're not there just to entertain. So there has to be tangible takeaway for people when they leave the building to say, oh, I'm going to go put this into practice and better my life. So that's another thing that we really look for is, is it a big original idea? Does it have tangible takeaways that people can use in their everyday life? And can it be told succinctly in a matter of minutes where you don't need two hours to try to communicate something important? For those who are TED geeks out there, I mean, the average length of the 10 most popular TED talks ever on Ted.com is 15 minutes. I did the math myself because I wanted the stat. And Bill Gates got up on stage and talked about how we're not ready for the next pandemic, and he did it in eight minutes. So for anyone who doubts that big, complex issues can't be clearly boiled down to a matter of minutes, just has to sharpen that pencil and just keep editing.

Yeah, that's one of my very favorite TED talks of all time is from Derek Sievers. I believe it's S I V E R S on being a fast follower or the importance of fast followers and being a really great leader. And that's. I was just looking it up. It's 2 minutes and 52 seconds.

2 minutes and 52 seconds.

Wow.

That's amazing.

Yeah. And he has a really great, like, video in it that he's talking. And I think it was even, like just a little transitional TED bit, like, in between two things. And it's so interesting and well done, and it just, like, resonates and sticks with you. Also with the power of a short story, I always lean on when people say, oh, I couldn't possibly tell this story in 90 seconds. Like, I couldn't. There's no way I could tell the whole thing. I say to look it up. The first 90 seconds of up the movie. Right. We have an entire lifetime with no words told in like 90 seconds. And so there's so much you can do with that powerful edit and like you said, culling it down to what matters. And I always say with clients and stuff, it's like, what's the least amount of stuff you need to say to get someone to do the thing you want them to do?

Yeah, yeah. Albert Einstein had a quote you related to scientific work. Make it as simple as possible, but no simpler. And I adopt that to my work. Make it as short as possible, but no shorter.

Yep. I love that. Well, we could talk storytelling and brain stuff all day. And I'm sure that you and I will, over time, we'll have many more conversations. Maybe just not with everyone else getting to listen to us. But for everyone who does want to have more conversations with you now about dialsmith or Lillian Labs or storytelling or anything else, what's their best way to reach out, get in contact and learn.

More, the simplest way is just to hit my website, which is davidpaul P A U L L dot com. I've kind of aggregated everything that I work on there so you can learn a little bit more if you're interested. And you can ping me directly through there or bounce out to the other websites of the companies that I'm a part of.

Perfect. Well, we'll definitely link to that in the show notes. We'll also link to that book about writing or giving a great TED Talk. You know, we'll find it to take the work out of it for everybody else and, you know, just. Thank you so much again for coming in and talking about brain science and storytelling with us.

Thank you for having me. It was as fun as I hoped it would be.

Thank you again to David Paul for joining me on the show today. What got your brain buzzing in today's conversation? For me, I really love the RSPCT Respect framework and how simple yet important it is for understanding customers and applying behavioral storytelling. As a recap, it starts with the R of what is the real problem? Because whatever people say the problem is.

Rarely is the real one.

You need to keep peeling back the layers until you find the underlying problem. Asking why, until there's nowhere else to go, is how you get through this phase. Then you want to ask what's at stake. What pain that your audience wants to avoid is at stake. If the real problem doesn't get solved, as David says, remember that quantifiable is better than squishy. And if there are no stakes, there is no problem. His next step is finding what that perfect Perfect outcome is if they could wave a magic wand and make the real problem go away, what would the perfect outcome be? Describe it in a way that can be felt and not just thought. That's where the importance of storytelling comes in and why I refreshed the episode with Michelle Auerbach earlier this week when she talked about how emotion is needed for people to make a decision and stories evoke emotion. Great stuff. Of course, that episode is linked for you in the Show Notes as well. The next step is finding that call to action.

What is that?

How does your offering solve the real problem, alleviate what's at stake and deliver the perfect outcome? Here's where you tap into how people process information and make decisions. And finally is Testimonials and Social Proof how will embracing your solution put your audience in the good company of others like them? Sharing testimonials and social proof will help people feel comfortable. And you know, I've linked to the episodes on Hurting and Social Proof for you in the Show Notes along with that episode with Michelle Auerbach and the Dose brain chemicals, related books and so much more. It's all waiting for you in the app you're listening to and at the brainy business.com289 and thank you again to David Paul for joining me on the show today. It was a delight to chat with and learn from you. Join me Tuesday for another Brainy episode of the Brainy Business Podcast. It's going to be a lot of fun. You won't want to miss it. Until then. Thanks again for listening and learning with me and remember to be thoughtful.

Thank you for listening to the Brainy Business Podcast. Melina offers brain virtual strategy sessions, workshops and other services to help businesses be more brain friendly. For more free resources, visit thebrainybusiness.com.