Susan Friedmann [00:00:00]:
Welcome to Book Marketing Mentors, the weekly podcast where you learn proven strategies, tools, ideas, and tips from the masters. Every week, I introduce you to a marketing master who will share their expertise to help you market and sell more books. Today, my special guest is Doug Vigliotti. Doug is the author of 4 books, including Aristotle for Novelist and Tom Collins, A Slightly Crooked Novel, which is available to listen to on Slightly Crooked Good Stories Told Well, a podcast that also features his raw, unorthodox poem collection, Mini Heartbreaks or Little Poems About Life. He's also the host of Books for Men, a weekly podcast to inspire more men to read. Doug, it's a pleasure to welcome you to the show, and thank you for being this week's guest expert and mentor.
Doug Vigliotti [00:00:56]:
Thank you so much for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.
Susan Friedmann [00:00:59]:
Douglas, we were talking earlier before we went on the air. We're talking about storytelling. This is your expertise. I'd love you to share some things about how we can apply storytelling to marketing. Let's start off with how can effective storytelling help non fiction authors stand out in a crowded market?
Doug Vigliotti [00:01:24]:
This is a really good question. I think it's one that you'll find is manipulatable to every person's story. And there's fundamentals to telling any story, whether it's on the page, on the screen, or in one's life, or whether they're trying to tell a story about what their book is about or what their brand is, and, specifically, that relates to who they are. And there's 3 elements to that. And that is a protagonist who wants something, and there's something standing in their way. And those obstacles come in the form of external and internal. And your job as a marketer of your own work and of your own brand is to clearly define the protagonist, you, define what you want, and define what obstacles are standing in your way of getting it, internal and external. And that might not be evident why that's important, but people are entertained by stories.
Doug Vigliotti [00:02:22]:
And if you are able to overcome those obstacles, then it'll be a satisfying story for your reader, your listener. And if you succumb to them, it's a tragedy. And that is a short definition of what an Aristotelian comedy and Aristotelian tragedy is. So you have a protagonist who wants something, and there's something standing in their way. How could you communicate that to your audience in an entertaining way?
Susan Friedmann [00:02:46]:
And often, this is what their book is about, that they often experience something, they overcame it, and now they want to share that expertise with their reader, somebody else who might find themselves in that exact same situation. Now I know that there are several components to a story. Let's talk about these so that, as you said, you've got the protagonist, you've gotten something that stands in the way. But are there some other components of story that our listeners should know about?
Doug Vigliotti [00:03:24]:
We talked, you know, a little bit there about the protagonist and the plot. Right? So your plot of your story would be you or your protagonist who wants something. There's obstacles standing in their way, but then we have to start looking at how we define that character. This becomes something that Aristotle is pretty specific about, and he says that there's 4 traits to a character, and that is goodness, appropriateness, relatability, and consistency. And goodness would be character is good if their choices are good. And appropriateness would be is how true is the character you are depicting to who they actually are. So are you depicting them appropriately? And the relatability is something that I know you featured on this podcast in the past about imperfections. And it's are you showcasing the humanity in that individual? And that includes the imperfections and flaws because the only way to show something in its true form is by showing imperfections and flaws.
Doug Vigliotti [00:04:29]:
And then the 4th piece would be something that is probably directly related to the story that one is telling about themselves, and that is consistency. Are you being consistent? Readers, viewers, listeners can pick up on when a character is not acting consistently. And even if it's an unreliable character who is inconsistent, it's important that they are consistently inconsistent. That's the unreliable narrator that we all love so much. And, eventually, what we learn is that their words don't line up with their actions. And it's what they do matters more than what they say.
Susan Friedmann [00:05:08]:
That is so true. So as we're putting, stories together, I know that you talk about this in the book, and that there are some questions a writer must ask themselves about their story. What are those questions?
Doug Vigliotti [00:05:25]:
Yeah. So I think Aristotle is pretty specific in saying that there's 3 elements to a story one must be able to answer, and that is medium, object, and mode. Medium being the style and structure of your story. You first must have grasp on how you wanna tell the story. I think that this is, you know, metaphoric in outside of an actual story as well, maybe one for your life. Object would be characters. So what other characters are essential to tell this story aside from your protagonist? And then mode would be a sentence level question. So what point of view are we telling this from? What tense are we telling this in? It's addressing narration.
Doug Vigliotti [00:06:04]:
And, of course, you can go into all of the various I could go into the tenses and point of views and style and structure, but I think that's a a pretty good overview.
Susan Friedmann [00:06:13]:
How about an author identifying their own stories? I think, for me, personally, storytelling has been a challenge. At one point, I remember telling somebody, I don't have any stories. And they're like, That's rubbish. Of course you do. Your whole life is a story. And then all of a sudden I realized, yes, I have so many stories. I've been fortunate enough to travel a lot and have all sorts of incredible experiences. But actually putting that into story form and making it applicable to a point, which is something nonfiction authors often have to do, is that they've got a point and to bring the right story to highlight that point.
Susan Friedmann [00:06:59]:
Can you talk more about that? How could that be an easier task for somebody like me?
Doug Vigliotti [00:07:04]:
I think that's a great question, but I'll go back to how I started this conversation and say that there's 3 fundamental elements to stories. There's a protagonist who wants something, and there's an obstacle standing in their way. We looked at it from a macro perspective, in that is what someone's book might typically be about. But if you walk through your day, everything is a story or at least the start of a story. In a conversation between 2 people, 2 people want different things and there's different obstacles standing in the way. That's the basis of drama is tension. And so if you learn to look at stories through that lens of a protagonist who wants something and there's something standing in their way, external and internal, then you could see the story in almost everything you do throughout the entirety of your day. It's very intrinsically linked into our life stories because Aristotle, we talked about this a little bit before we started, he was very insistent in one thing in saying that the reason why humans have taken to storytelling is because of imitation, and we are imitators of life.
Doug Vigliotti [00:08:09]:
And that's why stories that we tell on the page or on the screen or, in this case, obviously, directly to our life should be reflective of life because that is why we are drawn to stories because we are imitating life, and we learn to imitate as young people, as kids, and that's how we learn to live. And so that's why a lot of these principles and the things that we're talking about work in both your life and on the page or on the screen. But, ultimately, nothing deters from that original stance on what a story is, a protagonist who wants something, and there's something standing in their way. And that happens 15 times in one day, maybe more if you're really paying attention.
Susan Friedmann [00:08:53]:
It's paying attention and then recording that somewhere because I don't remember half the things that go on in the day, but yet it's true. Unfortunately, the other day, I had my computer hacked. That was drama. And there were ways in which I was able to overcome that drama, but it did take a little bit of effort and something I had to learn from that. So that, definitely, there's a story there, and I remember that. There are things that happen during the day that I don't even pay that much attention to. So how does one go about paying more attention to things that could make up a great story?
Doug Vigliotti [00:09:36]:
I think that's a a great question. I think you're getting to what makes each writer unique, something that is very hard for me to pinpoint. In my work, what I point to is that there's a difference between story and the writing of a story or, in this case, the telling of a story and their style and their sensibility. And I try not to dabble into tell people stylistically what is right and what is wrong, although I have my opinions, obviously, because there's so many different ways. And you you take 2 different individuals to explain the same story of their computer getting hacked and what that was like. 1 might be wildly entertaining and one might not be. What makes somebody able to pay attention? That's the ticket. Right? Like, write stuff down in a notepad, whether it's in your phone or on that.
Doug Vigliotti [00:10:30]:
I use my phone notepad. It's full of notes, and then I transfer them over into my big master Google Doc. And then I sift through and create a master notes file, but I'm constantly utilizing the simple notepad on my phone throughout the day. I mean, I'd give you an example. As I was driving up Vermont Route 30 not too long ago to go to a wedding, I was just writing single word descriptors of the entire drive up, and I came away with probably 40 of them. That could be nothing, but it's just paying attention. It's shingles and rust and wood and worn down barns and creeks that are half full, bare trees and branches, and, like, just these ideas. And then you go back and you transfer those onto your computer, and and you sift through, and you use what you can.
Doug Vigliotti [00:11:19]:
I mean, that's just the way to describe setting, but it was just an example that I had in my mind.
Susan Friedmann [00:11:24]:
I love the fact that you illustrated that because I wouldn't have thought of just writing words down like that to remind myself. I would have written the whole thing, or bullet points, at least. I love to write in bullet points. How can you identify the most powerful stories, our own stories, that would work well and can be integrated into our marketing. There's one thing telling stories in the book, but then as it relates to actually marketing the book or marketing ourselves. As we talked earlier, stories are so powerful that I might not listen to what you're saying about how great you are, but but you tell me a story and, like, oh, that's interesting.
Doug Vigliotti [00:12:13]:
The question is, how do you figure out the most powerful story to tell in your book?
Susan Friedmann [00:12:20]:
And what so in your marketing, what would the best way be? Because, yeah, there's one thing in the book. But then when you're marketing yourself or your book, how would you find the right experience to make what you're saying more powerful?
Doug Vigliotti [00:12:36]:
This is a great question. And it gets at something that is central to not just the Aristotelian method of storytelling, but what I think makes a great story, whether it's on the page or in one's marketing. And that is unbelievable is not a good thing. Everything you do must be believable. So if you're watching a story or if you're listening to a story and you start thinking to yourself, I don't believe that, you're much less likely to pay attention to what that person is going to say next and what they have to talk about and what they have to teach you or what they have to do anything. And in a story, believability, it's all about maintaining that believability and suspending disbelief in your audience. That's gonna change from person to person because Susan is different than Doug, and the story Susan's telling is different than the story Doug is telling. But the key element is you have to maintain believability, and that gets back to how true is the character.
Doug Vigliotti [00:13:46]:
You know, I talked about goodness, appropriateness, relatability, and consistency. All things that could affect believability in the eyes of a consumer or a reader or a viewer or a listener. And one thing that Aristotle always says is that in characterization, and this is talking about us, the protagonist, and the story we're telling, we should always aim at what is necessary or at least probable. Or he'll say, so the character does what is needed or likely. And the reason why all those words, needed, likely, necessary, probable, is because it's all about believability. And if you believe something, you'll continue with it. If you don't believe it, you won't. And that's why I say unbelievable is not a good thing when it comes to stories.
Doug Vigliotti [00:14:38]:
So look for the thing that's believable for your story.
Susan Friedmann [00:14:42]:
What's coming up for me there is, and I know that many of my speaking colleagues, exaggeration. You know, this is like, oh, let me tell you something and it's really exaggerated. And you're right. I mean, there are times where I'm listening to to somebody, I'm like, that just doesn't sound believable. That's so far fetched. I can't relate to it. And I think, you know, one of the things that you said is relatability. So I've gotta be able to relate to what you're saying.
Susan Friedmann [00:15:12]:
So exaggeration is out. Correct?
Doug Vigliotti [00:15:15]:
Correct. It gets to what Aristotle would say as the ways that stories can be fairly criticized. So how could stories go wrong? And there's 5 ways, really. One of them is impossibility. So this is not possible based on everything else I know. That doesn't mean that it can't happen. It just means based on everything that we know, this doesn't seem like it's possible. And you are the person who controls that information on the page in your own story as a brand or marketing something.
Doug Vigliotti [00:15:46]:
Right? But if it's impossible, a story could be criticized. If it's irrational, so the story isn't logical. It doesn't make sense. Things are not happening consequentially. Strong storytelling is cause and effect. If I tell you I walk into a room, you expect me to tell you what happens in the room. You don't expect me to tell you what's going on out in the parking lot. And if I am telling you what's going on in the parking lot, you're expecting that it relates to what's going on in the room because everything is consequential.
Doug Vigliotti [00:16:15]:
And so if you break that logic and it's irrational, it could be fairly criticized. Contradiction. That's another way that a story could be fairly criticized according to Aristotle. And that's what you told me earlier, this is contradicting with something that you said earlier. Now, all of these things are would be important for one to take as macro concepts into the marketing of their book, their life, anything. Right? It's like, is it impossible? Is it irrational? Is it contradictory? These are all ways that could something could be fairly criticized according to Aristotle. And then he also says, the other 2 don't apply necessarily to marketing. I'm sure we could find ways, but it's harmfulness and artistic standards.
Doug Vigliotti [00:17:01]:
And harmfulness would just be not is it harmful to humans, but are you depicting depravity or brutality in your story that isn't necessary to telling the story? If it's not necessary, then it's open for criticism. If it's necessary, you must tell it. And then the artistic standards, there's plenty of artistic standards in both fiction and nonfiction, grammar wise, genre norms, all different things that would apply that if you break them, doesn't mean that you can't. It just means it's open for criticism.
Susan Friedmann [00:17:40]:
So funny what came up for me as you were saying that. I was like, Aristotle would have a field day with some advertising copy out there that is so exaggerated, full of puffery. It's like, okay. Now, what would he say about that?
Doug Vigliotti [00:17:58]:
He'd probably say exactly what you said.
Susan Friedmann [00:18:00]:
We're surrounded by marketing messages, you know, how many umpteen times a day. Those messages, some of them, you pay attention to, and others, you're like, this is a waste of time, or I don't believe this, or you're already making those criticisms in your head before you have a time to pay attention to it.
Doug Vigliotti [00:18:23]:
The other thing that that calls up to me is another thing that Aristotle is pretty insistent about, and that is the essentialness. So how essential are the elements of the story that you are telling to the story that you are telling? Meaning, all of this extraneous words and offshoot chapters and details, and it could be tiring and it could be weakening your story. And so, you know, he has a quote in, Poetics where he says, a plot should be structured so that if any of its episodes were rearranged or removed, the whole story would be disturbed and dislocated. If this isn't the case, then that episode is not an essential part of the whole.
Susan Friedmann [00:19:15]:
Oh, my goodness. That's deep.
Doug Vigliotti [00:19:18]:
And I think it is deep. But I think what you're getting at is no matter how big or small this story that you're telling, the best ones are super concise and tight to the through line of the story or the marketing message. They don't deviate. They're very tight to that messaging, and that's what makes them memorable because that's where the power comes from in what you're depicting. Does that land?
Susan Friedmann [00:19:48]:
It certainly does because then you're being very precise about the words that you're using to depict whatever it is that you want to say. And what's also going through my mind is how companies are using story. They're telling the story of their company, how they started, something about it that makes it more interesting and personable for people. That is definitely a trend that's been going on for a few years now, but more and more companies are doing this because they're getting away from this exaggerated advertising marketing copy that obviously doesn't work.
Doug Vigliotti [00:20:30]:
Well, what they're getting closer to when I look at it is exactly how I led this and what I keep bringing back. The company is the protagonist. What do they want? What are the obstacles standing in the way? And how do they overcome them? It's fundamental storytelling that they're trying to utilize by putting the company in the shoes of the protagonist and building the story around it with basic elements of storytelling. And just one other thing, because it was on my mind when we were talking about the essentialness of a story or staying tight to the through line of a story, whether it's in an ad or what have you, is I have a theory that I usually utilize in my writing and in my work. I call it 1 plus 1 equals a half. And that means if you give somebody 2 of something, it reduces the impact by half. So you're better off giving 1 and making it as best as you can. So instead of giving 2 analogies, make one analogy really powerfully.
Doug Vigliotti [00:21:33]:
Instead of talking about the character in, you know, 2 ways, talk about it in one way really powerfully. 1 +1equalsa half. It's a theory rooted in minimalism and that essential nature of leaning things out to the through line of what you are trying to actually say.
Susan Friedmann [00:21:55]:
That's so fabulous that you said that because this is like a call to action, you know, at the end of a sales or a marketing pitch. It's like give somebody one thing to do, don't give them 2 or more because they won't do it. They'll only can really only remember one thing. It's honing in on that one thing, and I think that's exactly what you're saying. Is that correct?
Doug Vigliotti [00:22:20]:
Yes. It's the idea that if you give somebody the same thing twice, it reduces the impact of Yeah. The time they said it the first time. I realized that I'm kind of, in a meta sense, doing this right now. Right? Because I just said it, so I'm bringing it back. But, hopefully, it's for reiteration, not for
Susan Friedmann [00:22:39]:
Yeah. Well, and that's it because sometimes people hear it different ways, and we absorb information differently. And some people like to see it, some people need to hear it, some people need to feel it. I mean, it's all of those. You're painting a picture with your words. You want people to relate to that, and they can see it or hear it, however they take in information.
Doug Vigliotti [00:23:01]:
That's the goal with these podcasts and with these conversations.
Susan Friedmann [00:23:05]:
Tell our listeners how they can find out more about you.
Doug Vigliotti [00:23:08]:
Very, very easily. You can either go to my website, douglasvigliotti.com. Or if you're interested in the book that I've been referencing and talking about, you can go to AristotleforNovelists.com.
Susan Friedmann [00:23:21]:
You gave us so much goodness and what we could get out of that book. I mean, I didn't realize how incredible Aristotle was. You've really given me a whole new appreciation for that. Thank you. If you're gonna leave our listeners with the golden nugget, Doug, what would that be?
Doug Vigliotti [00:23:39]:
I'm not gonna deviate. I'm not gonna give you 2 of something. I'm gonna give you my golden nugget. And that is, as far as possible, a story should contain no unbelievable parts. No exaggeration. Believability is the key element in the story that you are telling on the page, on the screen, or in your life.
Susan Friedmann [00:24:01]:
That is absolutely fabulous. I've learned so much, Doug. I really appreciate this for you sharing your wisdom.
And listeners, you're gonna have to listen to this many times because there was so many golden nuggets throughout, some treasures, gems. I want you to go back and listen to them all. By the way, if your book isn't selling the way you wanted or expected to, let's you and I jump on a quick call together to brainstorm ways to ramp up those sales because you've invested a whole lot of time, money and energy, and it's time you got a return that you were hoping for. So go to Book Marketing Mentors to schedule your free call. In the meantime, I hope this powerful interview sparks some ideas you can use to sell more books.
Until next week, here's wishing you much book and author marketing success.
