This content was created by Sally Koering Zimney. This content was uploaded by Sally Koering Zimney. This is a podcast episode excerpt (Episode 319: "How a Story Can Illuminate Your Content") from April 13, 2022 featuring Sally Koering Zimney with a co-host (labeled here as Speaker B). The hosts discuss visibility and storytelling for speakers and entrepreneurs — promoting a free resource called "Be Visible Bingo," reviewing prior offerings (a Be Visible challenge and a Find Your Signature Story workshop), and teaching a framework that breaks persuasive stories into two parts (the moment and the meaning) and ties meaning to content pillars to grow audience trust and authority. The excerpt is instructional and promotional, aimed at helping listeners craft and leverage signature stories for business and speaking.
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Hey movers, it's Sally Z with Be Moved.
Let's go create some talks that will move this world.
We're going to talk with amazing speakers, share tips, tricks, resources, and we are going to be moved so that our audience can be moved.
This moved me.
What is moving You, wherever you are right now, I want you thinking about how it is you are showing up out front. Now you are listening to this podcast because clearly you want to step out front with more confidence and more clarity. We're digging into the stories that can move your audience and how you can show up fully, authentically as you. And I love that. But you know where we start? We truly start with getting visible, with the practice of showing up. Even if you are stepping out on the biggest of stages, you still need the practice of showing up every day to your audience, because when we do that, we build trust, We build authority, we build connection. They start to feel like they know you. It's like putting the magic of speaking to work in the every day. Let's be real, sometimes we lose our mojo on getting visible. So I have a new resource for you. It is called Be Visible Bingo.
It's Very simple.
It is an awesome PDF with all kinds of ideas for how you can show up and get visible with your audience.
Like today, like really easy.
You're gonna start building the muscles of consistency, which builds confidence.
That's how we get to confident.
We show up and we do. So go download this awesome, super simple freebie. It's at bemooved.com/bingo.
I'm so excited that you are here because we are in this on-ramp towards stepping out front with your story and your message. So way back in January, we were talking about you getting more visible, helping you through the Be Visible Challenge. Hopefully. You remember what I'm talking about and took part and practiced the art of showing up anyway, of showing our faces, of really being of service to our audience and working through those things that sometimes hold us back from stepping out front. My core belief for each one of you is that you belong out front. You belong out front, not just You're needed out front, but that, that can be a place where you feel like you belong and where you can make good on your purpose. You can make good on this idea, this mission that you have that you are intent on bringing out into the world. So that was January. We focused on helping getting you more visible. Then in February. We did the Find Your Signature Story Workshop. So that was the next step, right? As you're getting out front, the next step is, okay, let's get a handle on the content that I use as I get out front. We start with a signature story. So for those of you who joined that a few weeks ago, it was an amazing experience. So many of you had these really big, beautiful ahas. And you, at least I hope, took some steps to identifying at least one story that can serve your audience, that can uphold you as a person, as a human, so it feels like we get to know you a little bit, and also hold up your business and idea. It can do all three of those things if we find the right story. And now we're in this phase of what do we do with that story? Okay. We've identified it. How do we craft it? Where do we put it in our business? How do we make the most of that story? So today, what I want to share with you, I want to deconstruct a story just a little bit. I'm gonna give you a sneak peek into some really powerful content that I share my keynotes that I share in STS, in my programs, the Signature Talk Studio, and that we're going to be doing a really, a really powerful slice of how to really leverage your story so that it helps grow your business. Most importantly, you are here right now, so I want to share with you two elements of a story. Okay. We have, and when people think of stories, they tend to think of it just as I'm, I'm going to tell this story, but actually persuasive stories, what I sometimes call me leadership stories, those stories have two components to them. They've got the moment, which is your story. And then they have the meaning. Right? And our job as speakers is truly to show up and offer meaning to our audience. So sometimes when we are speakers, we think of like, I just have to show up and do an excellent job at delivering my story and they will take from it what they will. I've worked with speakers like that who are like, I, I don't want to tell people what they should take from this story. I just wanna let the story land and let people take with it what they will. And in some contexts, that may be the right thing to do, but truly most of the time, we, it is incumbent upon us as speakers. In fact, it is our job to make sense of the story, to take that story and pull out the significance and the meaning of it. For our audience. Now we're not telling them what to think. We're not telling them how to feel, but we are teeing it up and offering up our perspective or an insight. We are not hired for our storytelling. We are hired for our insights, but the pathway to the insight is through the storytelling. Somebody write that down. Quotable. Every once in a while I'm like, wow, that was good. That was silly. So the pathway to the insight and the meaning is through the story. So those are the two elements. You've got the moment, and then you have the meaning that you yourself need to create and set up and articulate for them. Now here is where we can be intentional and strategic with our storytelling. Whatever meaning you want to create right there, it should be connected to— and I hate, I hate the word should. I'm really trying not to use the word should anymore, so I don't mean to should on you. But if we want to leverage and be intentional with our storytelling, the meaning needs to be connected to what I call a content pillar. So do you know what your content pillars are? So, because you want to orient your stories around those content pillars. Okay. Because the meaning, the story doesn't have to be connected to your content pillar, but the meaning that you pull from it needs to be. So for instance, you might tell a story about something that has absolutely nothing to do with your business. But the point of that story, the meaning that you are drawing from it, upholds an idea or makes a point that is a content pillar for you. Does that make sense? So we sometimes get ourselves sort of like locked into thinking like, okay, I've gotta tell a story about my business. I've gotta tell something that directly relates and it, we box ourselves in and it, we lack creativity in our storytelling. Because what we're talking about is so limited. We're just using our scope, our story eyes as we're looking for stories is about this wide rather than seeing stories as almost metaphorical. Because when you can find that story that makes a point for you, that you pull out, so you pull out that meaning. And it's setting up a content pillar that is a story that people remember. That's a story that sucks people in because there's a surprise. There's a surprise aha in there for them. Now, there's lots of ways to do this. You don't have to do it like that. You can tell an absolutely clear and direct story. Like, I can tell the story. Of my friend and one of my speakers, Jen Whitmer, who just last week did her TEDx talk, her dream TEDx talk. And the process and the courage and the determination and the ongoing, the ups and downs of developing this message that we put a lot of heart and soul into and we have very high expectations for Like I could tell that story and it can relate very directly to what some of you may go through when you are putting together a message that you care deeply about and that, um, you have high expectations for. That's a directly correlating story and that is totally fine. As long as the meaning that we pull out of it is holding up a content pillar. So an area in our business, an area, a content area that we want to be known for. That we want to orient our services, our messages, our stories around.
Okay.
But it doesn't have to be that direct and correlated. It can be metaphorical.
Okay.
So we're deconstructing a little bit these two elements of stories, moment and meaning. When you have your moment, that's only half of the job. You could be an awesome storyteller, have beautiful stories, but if you are not pulling out meaning from that, that ties directly into one of your content pillars, you're not taking advantage of this beautiful, powerful storytelling strategy asset that we have. Okay. This is a quick one this week, my friends. I am so grateful for you. We are doing such beautiful things together right now. And we have done some big things over the last few months and we have exciting things coming. All right.
