How To Sell A Product Nobody Understands Storybrand

TITLE: How to Sell a Product Nobody Understands CHANNEL: StoryBrand With Donald Miller DATE: 2026-04-21 ---TRANSCRIPT--- How would you use a StoryBrand soundbite strategy to sell a kitchen appliance? This is the Sous Vide Supreme. I actually think they have a new evolution of this, but I grabbed this out of my kitchen cuz I really, really love this thing. I make a 72-hour short rib that is incredible. Literally, I can put my short rib into this thing, leave on an airplane, and I’ve done it. Leave on an airplane, come back a couple days later, wait another day, and I pull it out, and my wife thinks I’m an amazing cook, which I’m not. It’s cheating. And by the way, we’re not sponsored by any of the items that we create a StoryBrand soundbite strategy for. These are just items that we really like, sometimes pulled from our kitchen, sometimes the staff brings something in that they think would be interesting to talk about, but uh no money is changing hands. This is a completely objective take on what how we would sell an item like this. However, before we get to how to use a StoryBrand soundbite strategy to sell a kitchen appliance like the Sous Vide Supreme, let me explain to you how a StoryBrand soundbite strategy works. There are three parts to a soundbite strategy. The first is you need to pique people’s curiosity. That gets their attention, turns them toward the product. You do this with five soundbites. I’ll show you those later. Only after you pique somebody’s curiosity do you move into enlightenment, where they’re saying, “Okay, what’s a Sous Vide machine? Like, how What is this like French thing that’s going to be sitting on my counter?” And how could I go Oh, there’s a recipe here. And you begin to familiarize them with the product, with their life what their life would look like using the product, how much it costs, all that kind of stuff. And then and only then do they move to phase three, which is commitment, where they buy something. Now, with something that costs less than 500 bucks, this is about 500 bucks. With something like that, this process is going to happen a little bit more quickly, but they are probably going to spend some time in enlightenment. If it’s 10 bucks, they may spend 5 seconds in enlightenment just reading the product description on the back of the bottle before they buy it. But with a product like this, enlightenment is going to be really important. Why these three phases? These three phases are the natural phases people go through when they make decisions, especially relational decisions. This is how you you were curious about your husband or your wife, you dated them for a while, you got married, right? You thought about sending your kid to this particular school, you looked into it, you made the decision. And so, in a messaging campaign, you want collateral for people to read and see and hear that will pique their curiosity, date the product for a while, think about whether or not they want to commit, and then spend the money. If you don’t have all three aspects covered, you do not have an effective messaging campaign. Why does it work this way? Well, it’s kind of like a house. This house has five front steps, a front porch, and a front door. Your front steps represent your curiosity soundbites, and I’ll show you those in a second. And then the front porch represent enlightenment collateral, where people are getting used to the idea, they’re thinking about buying it, they’re researching a little bit, and then some incentives to actually get them through the front door. We recommend five soundbites, three pieces of enlightenment collateral, and at least three pieces of uh closing collateral, so that you are incentivizing people to go through the door. If you do those things, you have an effective messaging campaign. Sadly, most of our messaging campaigns look like this, and we don’t realize it. We do not have curiosity soundbites, so nobody’s interested, and we’re making it harder for people to come up to our business. There’s no enlightenment collateral, where we are actually or the enlightenment collateral is just wrong. The YouTube videos that you’re putting together are not actually enlightening people in the way that you think they were. And you don’t have uh closing collateral that incentivizes people to buy. You’ve got to make this look more like this. This is a warm and inviting house. This is your current business, and we are going to fix that. Now, the key to a StoryBrand strategy is different than any other ad agency or marketing company. We don’t believe cute or clever work very well at all. In fact, we believe in simple messages that people can understand with what we call zero cognitive load. What is zero cognitive load? Well, the more the cognitive load, the less people buy. What do I mean by that? The more people have to think about what you’re saying, the more complex your offer is, the more nuanced your offer is, and yes, the more clever and cute your offer is, the higher the cognitive load of your message as it relates to your product or idea, and then the less people buy. So, we have seen over and over when people use five simple soundbites, the cognitive load goes down, and the orders go up. Let me show you what I mean. Let’s look at a house. This would be the Sous Vide Supreme, and use that metaphor to talk about how we would sell a product like this. Well, we’re going to go first to the curiosity phase, where we’ve got five soundbites. Now, I chose an angle, and the angle is it’s hard to cook fine dining quality meals at home. Now, I could have gone a bunch of different angles with a machine like this. I could have gone best tasting food. I could have gone ease of use. There are a lot of angles. I chose this one because I happen to know in almost every fine dining restaurant, the best restaurants in the world, they use a Sous Vide machine. It means under vacuum in French. So, it’s a French word, means under vacuum. What you do is you vacuum seal a piece of meat, a piece of fish, you vacuum seal vegetables, you literally suck all the air out of it, put it in a plastic bag, sink it into a bath, and you heat the bath up to say 145, or if you’re cooking chicken, 165, or something like that, and you let it sit, and it sits for sometimes an hour, 2 hours, and I’ve gone 72 hours with a really tough piece of meat like a short rib, and it cooks it perfectly. I mean, perfectly. I actually was at a fine dining restaurant, a friend of mine owned it, and I said, “How do you get your steak to be this tender?” And he leaned over, he said, “The secret is Sous Vide.” So, they’ll Sous Vide a steak, and then they’ll flash fry it real quick to get the color, and it’s just fantastic. I chose that angle. Another great angle that I was tempted to choose was the fact that almost every other Sous Vide machine is a wand. It’s just a stick, and you put it in your own pot, and you clamp it to the side of the pot, and you’re the reason I I I Those things are great, they work great, but you don’t get them out. You don’t get them out and use them and put them together and screw the thing on. I use this machine all the time because it sits on my kitchen counter permanently. All I do is about once a week I change the water, and that’s it. Uh uh and it’s just ready to go. I could have chosen that angle for all people who already understand Sous Vide, and then said, “The reason that you want this one, you want to pay about 100 bucks more for it, is because it sits on your counter all the time, just like a microwave, meaning you’ll use it more.” If you buy the wand, you’re going to love it, you’re going to use it once, and then you’re going to it’s going to get buried in the back of a drawer. You won’t use it as much. That is one angle to take. I chose a different angle. I chose the secret of fine dining food. I say that to illustrate you do need to figure out an angle of your StoryBrand soundbite strategy. You can’t use multiple angles at the same time. I can create a soundbite strategy for why this is better because it sits on your kitchen counter, but that is a different strategy. Uh I like this soundbite strategy, so I chose it. It’s hard to cook fine dining quality meals at home. The empathy statement is world-class cooking shouldn’t be a chef’s secret. So, I’m empathizing with the problem that the customer has. You want to cook like an award-winning chef, like a Michelin star chef, but you don’t know how. Uh world-class cooking shouldn’t be a chef’s secret would be my empathetic soundbite. Again, there are five. The next soundbite is answer. This is where we position the product as the solution to the problem. Sous Vide Supreme puts the secret to fine dining quality on your counter. So, zero cognitive load, it’s hard to cook fine dining quality meals at home. World-class cooking shouldn’t be a secret, zero cognitive load. Sous Vide Supreme uh puts the secret to fine dining quality on your counter, zero cognitive load. The next soundbite is change. You’ll share a secret with the world’s greatest chefs. This means you are going to be, you know, aspirationally, at least in your ability to cook a steak, or or, you know, or fish or anything else, you’ll be on par with the world’s greatest chefs to some degree because you’re using their secret. That is a change. The change soundbite is where you offer a personal transformation associated with buying the product to add value to the product itself. And then finally, the end result soundbite, fine dining any night made by you in your own kitchen. That is the happy ever after vision of a brighter future for the uh for the customer. Problem soundbite, empathy soundbite, answer soundbite, change soundbite, end result soundbite spells out peace because every story is about taking a hero who’s not at peace and returning to the them to peace. They are not at peace because it’s hard to cook fine dining meals. We empathize with that. The answer is this machine. It’s going to allow you to do this at home. You, by the way, will transform into knowing a secret that only fine dining chefs know. And at the end of the day, you will have great food made by you in your kitchen. These five soundbites, simple, zero cognitive load, then need to inform an actual messaging campaign. You will use these, you’ll cross out all sorts of stuff on your website and put these sound bites in. You’ll use these sound bites in your product description. You’ll use them all over the place. Every good StoryBrand sound bite strategy is an exercise in memorization. We are trying to get the public to memorize these, so we want to put them everywhere. And then we’ll go to our front porch collateral. Now that we’ve piqued their curiosity, let’s create some front porch collateral, some enlightenment collateral, that gets people used to the idea, introduces them to the idea, familiar with the idea of buying this product. So we can go a million different directions here, but let me give you three, and we recommend at least three. A PDF download, the fine dining secret to cooking a juicy tender steak. I’m going to probably download that. I want to know what Nomad is doing. I want to know what Canlis out in Seattle is doing. I want to know what Eleven Madison Park is doing. Well, they’re not doing this cuz they don’t cook meat anymore. They’re all vegetarian. But anyway, they’re probably cooking their vegetables in a sous vide machine. But that PDF download is going to be effective. Why? The fine dining secret to cooking a juicy tender steak is a short, beautifully designed guide. Again, it’s a it’s a high-end fine dining machine. So a short, beautifully designed guide revealing why precision temperature matters, how sous vide works, and why even top chefs rely on it. This would include mouth-watering visuals, exact time and temperature charts, and a clear CTA to bring the secret home. So this is going to be an effective lead generating PDF, but let’s not stop there. Let’s continue to give them something to look at and read on the front porch, so that they are more likely to go through the front door. A PDF recipe collection, five restaurant quality meals you can make tonight using the sous vide supreme. People love recipes, so we’re going to give them that. A free recipe booklet featuring foolproof dishes, steak, salmon, chicken breast, crème brûlée. Yes, you can even cook crème brûlée in this. And veggies. Emphasizes ease and elegance. One button, one bath, perfect results. Positions the product as the shortcut to looking like a pro chef. Let’s get another one. Short YouTube reel series. Fine dining meals made at home using the sous vide supreme. You can hire a chef to make 50 different items and then put it on your social media feed. A three-part video mini series showing a home cook achieving stunning results with zero stress. Here’s some episode ideas. The perfect steak every time. Fine dining salmon without breaking a sweat. Why vegetables should be given a bath. I kind of like that. Each video ends with a soft call to action. You can do this, too. Here’s how. So a social media mini series mini series with a chef using this is going to help sell the product quite a bit. All right, let’s look at Now that we’ve we’ve warmed them up, they’re they they kind of want the machine, let’s incentivize them to actually buy it with some front door commitment collateral ideas. Now before we do that, there is a sixth sound bite called the StoryBrand decision trigger sound bite. And it’s a formula. It is if you are struggling with X, buying Y is the right decision. We recommend that formula for asking for the money every time you ask for the money. With this one, it’s if you want fine dining quality in the convenience of your home kitchen, using the sous vide supreme is the secret. So if you want X, or if you’re struggling with X, buying Y is the right decision. That sentence needs to go everywhere. And it is going to encourage people to buy because it reduces the cognitive load in the question, is this the right decision? We just literally tell them this is the right decision. And it reduces that cognitive load at point of sale. All right. If you buy now, we’re going to give you a chef starter’s bundle. This is a free gift with the purchase. It’s a limited time offer. It’s a free gift, limited time. Limited time tends to increase sales. So get a free chef starter bundle, premium vacuum bags, instant digital recipe pack, steak seasoning blend when you buy within the next 7 days. Why it works, adds real value, feels like insider access, and creates a natural deadline. That’s going to work really well. An instant rebate or discount, restaurant week special. And this is a save 75 bucks off the sous vide supreme when you order before midnight. Of course, discounting a product is a decision. I I it’s not a decision I love when you’re dealing with a a bit more of a luxury item. And it we’re we’re we’re positioning this as a luxury item. However, it does work with a lot of buyers. By the way, why don’t I like it? I don’t like it because I think discounts often devalue the products. What I would rather do is add a bonus like the chef starter kit or the bundle. But let’s a lot of you don’t agree with me, so we would do a discount offer here. Why it works, simple, clear, and urgent. A price drop with a countdown creates strong motivation to act now. A third would be exclusive sous vide mastery virtual class access. You know, if you if I get access to a chef teaching me how to use these things for a limited period of time, it’s going to be a great motivator. Offer, get free access to an exclusive live cooking class or recorded master class with a professional chef available only to customers who purchase by a specific date or within a window, and you you repeat that window every quarter. Feels exclusive, builds confidence for new buyers, and adds value to the product itself. So these are the three pieces of collateral we recommend to get people through the front door. And as you can see, we’ve got five sound bites feeding three pieces of enlightenment collateral feeding three pieces of commitment collateral. This would be a very healthy, robust, effective StoryBrand strategy. And every product you have needs a StoryBrand strategy. Your overall brand needs a StoryBrand sound bite strategy. Any ideas that you have, internal communication needs a StoryBrand sound bite strategy. Nothing should leave your office. Nothing should leave your business without a StoryBrand sound bite strategy attached to it. All right, why does this particular strategy work? Well, it shifts everybody from curiosity about what a sous vide machine is to clarity, reducing the cognitive load, increasing sales. The piece five sound bites, those front step sound bites, explain why sous vide supreme matters, not just what it is. This turns a niche kitchen tool into an obvious solution for a relatable problem. Positions around a universal aspiration. This taps a clear emotional motivator. I want to cook like a chef at home, like a fine dining chef. It offers that aspirational identity. Builds trust over time. All of that collateral is like dating. We’re slowly building trust. Remember what I say in the on-demand course, people don’t trust you to begin with, and you have to earn their trust. It’s just like a dating relationship. I I get into this not knowing whether or not you are somebody I can trust, and I’ve got to earn your trust over time. So this builds trust over time. Front porch collateral, guides, recipes, short videos, creates familiarity, earns attention and credibility before asking for a purchase, lowering the resistance at the door. It also anchors the decision. The StoryBrand decision trigger gives a clean, confident answer to, is this the right choice for me? Removing cognitive load at the moment of buying. Finally, it creates urgency with value, not pressure. A lot of you don’t like pressuring clients. This is great. Compelling front door offers, start starter bundle, discount, exclusive class, rewards fast action while reinforcing the product’s premium positioning. All right, if you need a StoryBrand sound bite strategy, and if you want to learn how to create one, I would love to to transform you into a sound bite specialist. You can do that many ways. You already know about the on-demand course, but you can also attend the StoryBrand Your Business Live Workshop in Nashville, Tennessee with me in the room. You get a coach in the room with you. You break into small groups. We get your your strategy created for your product. You can book a StoryBrand team workshop where we send a facilitator to you, or you can work one-on-one with me. I only do this once a month for a StoryBrand sound bite breakthrough intensive. Or if you just want it all done for you, go to hire a StoryBrand certified guide at marketingmadesimple.com. You can hire somebody to create your entire sound bite strategy and execute it for you. That is our StoryBrand certified guides, and they are at marketingmadesimple.com. The bottom line is this, if you are struggling to clarify your message, creating a StoryBrand sound sound bite strategy is the right decision, and you can do that at storybrand.com.