🎧 Podcasts: The story every founder should be telling on podcasts (and more)

In 2002, Jeff Bezos was invited to give a talk on mobile computing and shopping behaviours to students at MIT.

The result? A 67-second story that even makes him feel relatable. The prompt:

Stories like this are keynote and podcast GOLD, but rarely do we hear them told because most founders overlook them.

Told right, it's a story that says 'Look how far we've come' without actually needing to say it.

Here’s why it works:

1. It’s extremely relatable ✨
   In a room full of aspiring founders, this is a story that quite literally meets the audience where they are at.

2. It’s centred around a trigger event 📌
   A single moment that allows you to give your story depth and colour.

3. It’s (perfectly) imperfect 🎭
   Which makes it real and honest. The best stories don't go to plan.

In that final point is a mindset shift that will transform your ability to tell good stories. And it doesn’t just apply to first-ever customer stories.

It applies to every single story you need to tell. Especially in higher stakes scenarios.

Like when speaking with your team…
Like speaking with investors…

What I’m really talking about; the point I really want to land with you all this week is the power of the untold story…

Why? When we sanitise our stories (which we do to protect our businesses and reputations), they become ordinary.

It’s why they so often struggle to break through the noise.

This is what Jeff does so well in this clip, and why 23 years later, it’s still getting shared. Have a watch…🍿.

Now, let’s take this principle and look at how it could apply in 2 far higher-stake scenarios than a university talk…

1. A Company-Wide Announcement
   
   ❌ Tell the team you’ve ‘thought long and hard about X but ultimately have decided Y.’
   ✅ Take your team back to the moment you realised something needed to change and walk them through the decision making process.
   
   The latter route helps them see the announcement from your point of view.

2. Investor meetings
   
   ❌ ‘This is a dead cert… we’ve identified this problem, we’ve come up with this solution, what could possibly go wrong?!’
   ✅ ‘We haven’t got this all figured out yet. But here’s what we’ve learned so far. We’ve identified this problem. We’ve come up with this solution. Here’s what the world will look like if we succeed. These are the challenges we’re going to need to overcome. And here’s why we believe we’re going to be able to overcome them.’
   
   Which pitch would you trust more?

When it comes to untold stories...

The cost is courage,
The reward is trust.

One more thing…

Storytelling magic lies in the gap between your audience's expectations and the messy reality of entrepreneurship.

Alex