Deb Zahn: Hi, I want to welcome you to this week's episode of the Craft of Consulting podcast. This podcast is interesting because what you're going to learn is, you're going to learn the art and structure of storytelling that is going to help you get clients and get them really interested and excited in working with you. We're going at this from the side, which is I brought on this fantastic storyteller who works with nonprofits in developing videos that help them tell their story. Through this, he goes through exactly how it is that he's able to construct their stories to yield the results they want. All of it is relevant to what we're going to be talking about.

We also hit upon cold calling, which is what he had to do to build his business. He talks about how he did it and how that inevitably let him go from zero clients to having the business that he ultimately wanted to have. So much good stuff packed in here. Let's get started.

I want to welcome to my show today, Woody Harrison. Woody, welcome to the show.

Woody Harrison: Thanks for having me, Deb.

Deb Zahn: Let's start off. Tell my listeners what you do.

Woody Harrison: I am a video storyteller. In a nutshell, it's video storytelling and video production for nonprofits and mission-driven organizations.

Deb Zahn: That's beautiful. I love how clear and crisp that was. So anybody listening, if you are not that clear and crisp go back and become so.

Let's start a little bit about your actual business. You started your business during COVID. How did that happen?

Woody Harrison: I've been doing this line of work for almost 20 years. The first real business that I started was in 2009. There's just been different iterations of various types of businesses for different types of people. This particular business, the Woody Harrison Films, where I work exclusively with nonprofits, yes I started that back in probably really November/December 2019 and really started ramping it up around there into January 2020. That really came around because the type of work I like to do is what I call storytelling, where I'm talking with people and getting their stories, finding the conflict.

It's not necessarily the shiny, flashy, 3D graphic computer floating in space, or the commercials that you see on TV that are quite frankly meaningless, empty and faded. I had done enough boring corporate videos in my life to know that I just didn't want to do those anymore. The projects that I enjoy the most are when I get to talk to people and really hear their story about something meaningful in their life. It always came back to nonprofits. Those were always the ones that had the stories and the ones that valued the stories.

Personally, that's the work I like to do. Business-wise, it was trying to match my desires with somebody who could pay for them, quite frankly. That's another reason that the nonprofit world was such a good thing, is because they love having these stories. They naturally want these for their marketing, promotional, fundraising purposes. It works perfectly for them. So it was just a perfect match.

Deb Zahn: That's great. I know from when we talked last time that when you were first reaching out to these mission-driven organizations that you most wanted to work with, they didn't know you. It wasn't like you were buddies and you said "Hey, how about I do a video?" How through this cold calling technique were you able to get them to say, "Yeah, this is our guy and we want this"?

Woody Harrison: That's true, I had zero clients when I started. The way I did it, is I'd made a lot of cold calls. I made hundreds of cold calls. I approached it in such a way that I wasn't your typical salesperson. It really all came from a place of wanting to help, genuinely wanting to help their nonprofit tell their story better. I know that I can help with my skills. All it was, was starting a conversation with them about this particular thing. If they liked what I had to say in the conversation that we had, if something happened, then OK great. That led to more conversations, and if I got lucky it led to business.

A lot of times, it didn't. A lot of times it was just a conversation about what they're doing, and sometimes I just didn't fit or they had somebody else. Or for whatever reason it just didn't work. Perfectly fine. Again, I didn't come at this from an "I have to get business. I need your money. We have to close today. How much do you want to buy? Sorry, today's the last day for the special," all that stuff. I'm not selling used cars or knives, and it genuinely was just trying to be helpful, inquisitive and conversational.

Deb Zahn: That's right. I work with a lot of nonprofits, and particularly when you're talking about people in the leadership role, most of the time they're just solving problems all day. Nobody is coming to them and saying, "What is it that you care about? What's your vision? What would you like to see?" They're not having those conversations with folks.

Woody Harrison: Certainly based on my experience with sales and talking to other folks in leadership positions, that's right. Especially if you're talking about CEOs or Executive Directors, they're looking at big picture problems. Is telling the story a big picture problem? I think it is. Sometimes they can get wrapped up in numbers and this other kind of thing. Sometimes it's just when you call on that particular day, like where their head is at. You're right.

To be approached this way, in a helpful curious way and not in a typical salesy way, is refreshing for them. They can let down their guard and ultimately I think they can really be comfortable talking about something that is important to them, which is helping tell their story better, just helping reach more people. Ultimately, I don't have any numbers behind it, but ultimately raise more money so they can help more people.

Deb Zahn: Having worked with funders who fund nonprofits, I will tell you they care about stories. So yes, I think it exactly does that. One of the things that a lot of folks struggle with, including nonprofits, is how to tell a good story that actually does what you want it to do rather than just saying what you want to say and hope it lands somewhere. What are those principles of good storytelling? Once you get them to hire you and you get a chance to work with them, what are the principles that you try and adhere to when you're crafting their storytelling?

Woody Harrison: Conflict. One word. You can say beginning, middle, and end. You can lay it out however you want structurally, and that's a critical part of it, is it has to follow a structure. All the great stories do. You just don't realize it. But conflict, that is the most important part of any story and often the one that's either overlooked or downplayed because they just don't want to get into it. It might be risky to talk about conflict. It's inherently like "Avoid. Avoid." We've lived our whole lives trying to avoid conflict.

Yet two things, the first thing, what brought the person to your nonprofit in the first place? Probably some kind of conflict in their life. You name it. Especially if your health and human services-based nonprofit, and even if you're an environmental nonprofit, that's riddled with environmental conflict, I'm sure. From a health and human services, yeah it could be that depending on where you're at, what nonprofit. Poverty brought them to you. Lack of education brought them to you. A disability brought them to you. Some kind of lack. Almost inherently, some kind of lack is what has brought this person to your nonprofit looking for advice for help.

Dig into that. Find that. Dig. Don't be shy. Don't be scared. It's not comfortable to talk about. It's not. But that ultimately is what is going to make the story so much more compelling because that is when we get into the emotional part of it. The solution is nothing without this conflict at the beginning to set up the importance of it. That also goes back to selling principles. People buy emotionally and justify rationally. We all know that.

Deb Zahn: We all do it. All of us.

Woody Harrison: We all do it. Oh my gosh, we all do it so much. I look at the shoes in my wife's closet. Boxes. Boxes. 20 boxes of shoes. She's worn two of them in the last two years. You tell me what logic's got anything to do with that.

Deb Zahn: Well, she's not listening to this podcast.

Woody Harrison: Right, and they'll go, "Well, they were on sale so I got them." OK, fine. All right, whatever. That's exactly the same when we're talking about someone giving and making a donation, is the reason...I don't have all the science, and don't quote me on this, but a big reason why people are going to donate to a nonprofit is because they feel an emotional connection to it. In some way or another, either personally, or you just see something and go "Oh my gosh. OK," it just pulls at your heart strings. Conflict gets you there. There is no conflict, there is no tug at the heart strings. There are no donations, or far less. That is the single most important part of telling a good story, is conflict.

Deb Zahn: I love that you brought that up because I have actually seen many videos that nonprofits have done. I actually have been involved in some of the videos nonprofits have done, and others. You're right, they often skip that, and it's usually a "Here's what we do. Here's what we've achieved." And it's blah-blah-blah. And it's the part where if they show it at a gala, everybody goes to the bathroom because no one cares.

How do you get them to understand that it's important for them to structure it in that way, and to include this conflict, and to include the emotions in order to achieve what they want?

I can imagine for a lot, you're right, they're scared of doing it or they're uncomfortable with it. How do you get them willing to do that?

Woody Harrison: It's part of the conversation up front that I have with them, and it's definitely a work in progress on my part because for me the first couple of years was just trying to get clients under my belt, not trying to lead with these hardcore etched in stone principles. It's more like, “OK let's get to know each other.” It's what I tell people off the top, and it's one of the things I think that makes me different in that I will tell them that.

They'll tell me the video they want to do, and the basic story. I'll say, "OK, where is the problem? From your perspective, where is the problem?" The big problem, or whatever. They'll kind of tell me their version of it, and I'll dig, and I'll dig deeper. Then it just becomes "OK, I'm hearing this. Are we going to tackle that in this video head-on? Are we going to address this head-on? Can you talk about this? Can the person we're talking to talk about this directly?" Don't sugarcoat it. If they say, "No, no, no we don't really want to…" well then I start talking to them about the things we just talked about how. Look, it's not easy to talk about this, but it makes a difference when it comes time to donate, when it comes time to move the viewer. That's the most important thing.

From there, a lot of them get it. Honestly, a lot of them have not shied away from embracing the conflict. Lots of them don't. Sometimes, it's just like "We are not doing that. We're not doing this," and then it becomes on me to go, "OK, well do I tell them no and hit the road? Or do I OK, OK we'll just make it the best we possibly can," and go from there? That's usually what I do.

Perfect example, two really good quick examples. I'm currently working on one for a nonprofit that basically deals with inequities to access of advanced math. They have lots of data, not hearsay evidence, that it's Hispanic, African American, and poor kids not given access to advanced level math. And they also show that advanced level math, the trajectory once you get involved in the sixth grade, is awesome.

That was a thing. I said, "OK, well are we going to talk about that directly? Because if that is the problem, and that IS the problem, that is THE problem, are we going to address this directly?” They said, "Yes." OK, and that gave us the freedom to talk to these administrators and teachers and very clearly state "Who is being left out of these classes specifically? Go into the data. Who is it? Tell me." They'll go, "Oh yeah, that's easy. It's Hispanic. It's African Americans. It's our poor kids. It's not right. It's not fair, and it has to be changed." You're like, "That's it. That's the story." Then everything else falls in line. I was really proud of them for that because it could easily be a hot button issue, but it's the truth.

Another one was this very personal story for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. I got to say, this is probably one of the easiest stories I've ever done and easily one of the most powerful stories I've ever done, just because she was so good. She basically said that she never made plans for her life because she was always told she was going to die as a child. "You're going to die as a teenager. You're going to die as a young adult." Bam, right off the top, that was her conflict. She spent half her life in the hospital. Loads of conflict. Let's just state it, there was no good solution for her problem. The cool thing was, is there is literally now. Literally, a miracle drug that she took. She's awesome now. She had a baby. Her life is back on track. It was one of the most "Are you kidding me?" Awesome, easy, cool stories I've ever done. That's conflict. Without that, it just doesn't have any teeth. There's no emotional pull.

I talked around that question for a little while, but basically, it's telling them straight up front, "If you're not going to do conflict, don't expect great results."

Deb Zahn: That's right because people aren't going to respond to it emotionally. For any consultants that are listening who are like, "I don't do this work with nonprofits," all of this relates to any videos you might be creating and what you're doing. Let's dig into a little bit more because I know you also talk about sincerity and trust and imbuing that in the videos. Again, I've seen that missing from all kinds of videos where we're going to describe the features, we're going to describe the benefits, but why should you trust me is irrelevant.

How do you build that into how to do it so that the folks on the other side aren't just moved emotionally, but they're moved to do something because they trust that their contribution will be meaningful?

Woody Harrison: I'll try to answer that. The people that I have telling the story are the people directly involved. The example of the math people and the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, for CFF, I have the gal who was her. She was born with cystic fibrosis. She's the one who suffered. And now she's the one whose life has been transformed. I talked with her, and then I talked with her mom, who has been there for everything. Hearing their story, there is absolutely no doubt that this the real deal, that truly just by looking at them and hearing how they remember the events, how they talk about the events then now, you can't possibly fake it. It's all very real. It's 100% true. It easily comes from the heart without anybody having to try.

That's the other thing I like about these kinds of videos. I don't have to coach actors. Is that all I have to do, I say my job is to structure a good story and get out of the way. With someone like Lauren with the CF, I really just had to get out of the way and let her talk. She just set them up. For the math folks, we're getting administrators, principals who were former math teachers to talk about this real-world experience. Within our market of Austin, we have principals of...Everyone knows the school districts. They know the schools. They have authority. They have strong authority because somebody in our viewing area is watching this going, "My kid goes to that district."

Then we're also throwing a student in there who was more or less discriminated against. She was a victim of this unconscious bias. Hearing people just retell their stories in a way, again that embraces conflict, but that also you need to hit on the happy ending, or what can be done, or what's happening, or whatever. We have to have that release. That's what builds trust, is not always hearing from the executive director.

Deb Zahn: That's right.

Woody Harrison: Not hearing from actors. Not saying that it's not good or bad, but that's how you can really quickly build some trust, is by hearing from the people who have been directly impacted. Just let the people themselves tell the story, like I said, embrace conflict, structure it well, and get out of the way.

Deb Zahn: I actually saw a video where it was an executive director telling what should have been a story that brought tears to your eyes, but she had this remarkable gift of taking inherently interesting stories and making them boring. I don't know how she did it. It was almost magical. If they had actually talked to the people that had been engaged in it, it would have been a whole different experience.

Woody Harrison: Right.

Deb Zahn: What is the other structure? You start with conflict, and I know at the end you're going to have a good ending, which is going to be that emotional release. What happens in the middle?

Woody Harrison: What happens in the middle is, essentially, the journey or struggle for a solution to whatever the problem is. You set it up with the problem, the math folks. Again, I go back to the math just because I'm working on it right now, but also it's also proof that if you dig, ask enough questions, embrace conflict, you can find a good story just about anywhere. On the surface, you talk about math data and advanced math. You'd go, "What is the story there? It's math." You go, "OK, all right, well let's dig in."

For them, we've established...We've talked about this conflict. It's a disparity in access to advanced math for African American, Hispanic, and poor kids. That's the problem. The rest of the video is what we did…and this is not always how you structure it. This is how we structured it for this video. We had three different districts within the Austin area. Then we went into what each district did individually to address this disparity to access how they did something about it. Each one was different, but each one sort of had the same results, which was really cool.

It's like people completing each other's sentences when you ask them the same question. I love that. That's what we did. That's the journey to solve the problem, is "OK, we implemented Algebra for All. We made it a five-step approval process instead of just one teacher signature. We threw everyone in algebra in sixth grade. That's what we did." Then again, you go back and say "And what we found was, kids weren't dropping out. They were succeeding. Kids were actually liking it." It was amazing, and stuff we kind of knew all along, but whatever. There, it worked. That's what it is. That's what comes after that conflict, is the journey to find a solution.

Deb Zahn: I love it. I love it. Again, I love that there is a clear structure. Again, I've seen ones that have no clear structure, and they sort of ramble, and then they suddenly end, and you're like, "Oh, is it over?"

Woody Harrison: Right.

Deb Zahn: I didn't realize that. That's really helpful to hear. Now for consultants because I want to bring it back to how this relates because as I'm hearing you say this, I'm thinking about videos. Because I do think video marketing is a powerful thing for consultants to be doing, and I've seen good and bad versions of it and everything in between. If you were making a video for yourself, marketing what you do, how would you apply some of these same principles and techniques?

Woody Harrison: I would take that storytelling process, that story process, which by the way if you just look up Hero's Journey, just Google that. That's all it is. That's literally exactly what I'm talking about. There is no other story structure. It is the-

Deb Zahn: Donald Miller, for anybody who wants to look it up.

Woody Harrison: Exactly. Exactly. Side note, he did a wonderful job of taking something that was proven tried and true and just shaking it up a little bit and applying it to a business world. He did a good job with that. He didn't invent anything, but he simplified it to where normal people could just go looking like "Oh, OK," because if you want to read Hero With 1,000 Faces,you can. It's dense. It's a long read. It's tough. But it's the mono myth, and that's what they call it, the hero's journey, it's just a mono myth.

If you want to tell your own story, it's the hardest, is trying to tell your own. Do the same thing. What I did was I looked at why I do what I do, and who I do it for. That was sort of my focus of the story, not why I like cameras, or why I like the video business in general, or anything like that. I'll give it to you in a nutshell. In 2008 I was faced with the biggest challenge of my life, and that was to stay in a job that I did not like, but get the paycheck, get the benefits, keep the stability, or venture out on my own, risk complete failure, bankruptcy, and forge my own path.

So I did. I jumped out and in 2009 I quit with about $300.00 in my bank account. I knew I had a market that I was going after, but I didn't know how to get them. It was cold calls in my underwear in the living room, doing it badly, not getting a lot of business, but what ended up happening was that the universe just sort of conspired with me. In a nutshell, it all ended up working out great. It wasn't easy. It was so much work. It was a lot of rejection, a lot of late nights, a lot of going "I have no idea where my next paycheck is coming from."

Fast forward to now, through all of that, I have finally sort of found my niche through a lot of hard work, a lot of determination, and a lot of mistakes. In there, I owned a production company with four people. We had four people on the payroll and a huge studio, and all this stuff. We had that, and it was not what I wanted. We were not doing the kind of work that made me happy. So I sold my part of the business to my partner in 2016 and had to get back into the video business, but I knew that I wanted to do it right this time.

It took me a little while to figure out where I wanted to be. Then it was like a light bulb went off. Nonprofits. Storytelling. Of course. Then it was easy because I believed in everything I was doing. I still do. Fast forward to today, in a nutshell, I'm making more money than I ever have. I'm still a 50-60% stay-at-home dad. I still have all that time with my kids. I don't work a full-time job. I don't. My work fulfills me, and I have plenty of time to do things for myself.

Deb Zahn: Tada. That is it.

Woody Harrison: That's just an example of how you could tell your story. Never underestimate the hook, the headline. Always think of that headline. In 2008, I was faced with the biggest challenge of my life. Boom. What's that? That didn't just come to me. I had to work on that. But think of it that way. What challenge, what reason, why are you doing what you're doing? If you're just doing what you're doing because it makes you a ton of money, OK. To me, it's not very compelling. If that's what you want to do, honestly, I can't help you because if you're not…

Deb Zahn: Yeah, I wanted a yacht story is not that compelling.

Woody Harrison: Right, right, right. There's nothing wrong with wanting a yacht, but look, if you want people to care, if you want that, if you want people to care and to identify with what you do, then you have to put yourself out there a little bit. You have to embrace that struggle. You have to get a little bit personal. It's not bad to get personal like that. No one's going to judge you. It's really not that hard. It's not going to hurt.

As a matter fact, I think if you do that, people are going to go "Wow, that was really cool." I can't tell you how many people have read my little bio on LinkedIn and said, "Man, that's a really good story." It's the one I just told you. It's just proof that it works.

Deb Zahn: I would agree because people hire people, and they want to know what type of person they're hiring. Most of the time what I tell consultants is, it's similar to Donald Miller's hero journey, is they're the hero. You're not the hero. You're the guide who's actually helping them go through the trials and tribulations.

Woody Harrison: I'll say, that's one of the things that the Story Brand thing really did well was flipping the role on its head and helping the businesses and nonprofits realize that they aren't the hero. They are the guide. Your clients, your people, they're the heroes. They're the ones in need of help. That was the thing I got because I took the course. That was kind of the thing I got from it. Telling nonprofits that, and they're like, "Oh OK," some of them get it. Some of them don't. Some of them thought about it. Some of them haven't. Some of them don't care. But that's how you tell the story in a really good, structured way that people go, "Oh yeah, all right. Cool, I got it. That was good."

Deb Zahn: I love it. And I'm the hero. For consultants, having videos where you're describing the conflict and the quest for a solution, and the good ending for the folks that you want to work with can be extremely powerful if you structure it that way. I have found lots of folks that I've worked with want to know why I'm a consultant. I get asked that all the time. It's not a bad thing to have your website to share with others similar to how you shared that story on LinkedIn, of what your journey has been because it's going to make sure that the folks that are drawn to you are actually more likely going to be a fit for you.

Woody Harrison: That's absolutely right. That's absolutely right. I think in some ways it can be a filter to keep people...Because if they read that and they're like, "This is a bunch of sentimental junk," I don't want to work with those people anyway. If someone reads it and goes, "Wow, this guy's really invested in this. He's really personal. I would like to at least talk to this guy." OK, great. It's probably going to be a good, at least conversation.

Deb Zahn: Yeah, I love it. That's wonderful. Where can folks find you because there are consultants, I'm sure in the Austin area, who are going to listen to this and say, "Wait, my clients need a video." Where can folks find you?

Woody Harrison: The easiest way is just to go to the website, which is WoodyHarrisonFilms.com. Just go there and check out the work. I think it's pretty universal. I used to say it may not be for everyone, no it kind of is. If there's something there that you just go, "Wow, I want that. I was looking for something different," or whatever, OK, that's fine. But just go there. That's a good starting point.

Deb Zahn: That's wonderful. Let me ask you this last question, which you've actually hinted at because you described what the proportions are of your life. How did you create that balance in your life of being a stay-at-home dad, time with your kids, with building a business?

Woody Harrison: Balance is hard. Balance is something I'm still working on. I would say it was intentional, definitely intentional, but also just sort of bound by our life situation with me, my wife and two kids. When I first started, she works at a hospital, and so she was working 12-hour shifts three days a week, which meant that I had two days a week to really sit down in earnest and get stuff done. That was it. That was my two days. The other three days, I was with them also on the computer when they were watching TV, trying to do stuff. It was a lot of cram. Man, up until recently, it's still that way. It's still tough to do this. My wife still works. The kids are not in school full-time. It is a balancing act, man.

I'm not going to say it's easy at all, especially if I have to travel. It gets tough. Juggling all the schedules, it's really tough. But along with that, I always tell people some of the best things I've ever done was get clear about who I wanted to work for and the work I wanted to do. That's so important for creative people to do because so many of them just sort of do whatever for anybody. They just never know where to hang their hat, and they never really get good at one thing. Once I figured that out, the rest was honestly sort of setting up the dominoes and knocking them down.

I know who to call, exactly who to call. I bought a spreadsheet. I took sales training. I knew what to say. The rest was on me to do just do it. So I used those first couple of months just to make calls. I say intentionally, and also just a result of our situation, would I be working more if I had more time? I probably would. In a way, being limited as to how much I could work was sort of helpful because I can't work 40 hours a week. I can't. That's good because it forces me to look at the volume of work that I have, which I haven't been doing a great job of lately, but also look at that and go, "What's important? How much time is this going to be?"

I'll tell you, getting intentional about who I wanted to work with and the kind of work I wanted to do was so important. That freed me. That freed up my life. That freed up my brain. That increased my creativity, and it increased my satisfaction about what I wanted to do. There was also at the beginning like, "OK, I'm going to go after nonprofits," and then people would say, "Nonprofits don't have any money. How are you going to do that?" Well, that's not the case. They're like any business. They have varying amounts that they can devote to this stuff. Early on, I decided I'm just going to be flexible with them. There is no one price with this.

If the story's really good, and quite frankly, I don't have to work that hard on it, let's just do it. What do you have? I would rather end my life knowing that I was able to meet these people and tell some of these stories than be like, "I didn't have the money. I didn't do it." That's fine if you want to do that. That's not for me. I'm not saying do a whole bunch for free. I do believe in charging something.

Deb Zahn: Yes, skin in the game.

Woody Harrison: Yes, but it was intentional. It was intentional to not work full-time. I don't really believe in luck so much. I believe in opportunity and preparation, but there's something about being in this business, in the video production business, with the technology and how it's evolved in the last 10 years because when I was working TV and news, man our cameras were that big. They were $35,000.00. They were 25 pounds. You can't afford that. Now, $10,000.00 gets you into a full setup and you can make a lot of money on these DSLRs. You can make a good living now.

So to be in this line of work at this time in history, with the level of experience that I have, that's luck. When I started working in news, this was not the goal. It's extremely fortunate in that I don't have to work 40 hours a week to earn a paycheck, to get the hours, to get the overtime, to do all that stuff. I don't. I'm fortunate that I can charge a premium for what I do, get that, and have a good living off of that. For that, I'm lucky.

Deb Zahn: Yeah, that's beautiful. I want to punctuate before we get off, the point you made about getting that clarity about who you wanted to work with and what work you wanted to do, every single consultant should do that as well. Anybody who's providing a service to somebody else, once you have that clarity, everything else gets easier.

Woody Harrison: Two of the things that I always recommend…one thing is sales training. There's a great training out there just for creatives called Win Without Pitching. I don't know if you've heard of it.

Deb Zahn: I have not. I like the name of it.

Woody Harrison: It's fantastic. One of the great things he says is, the people who don't talk about money don't make any. That's one of the hardest things to do, is to talk budget and money. Get that out of your head and just start talking about it. He goes into that by saying you have to, and this is also a creativity exercise, when you start eliminating options. We are going to tell a story using just our iPhone, a flashlight and in one house. Whoa, that's actually pretty powerful. When you start eliminating all these other options, especially when you're talking about marketing and sales, if you're just a general video production company doing it for anybody, who are you going to call? Everybody? No, it's paralyzing. It's paralyzing.

There is an idea, it's a myth and it's wrong, that once you eliminate all the other things and focus on this, you'll have less opportunity. Not the case, at least in my world, not the case at all. It focused me. It let me focus my energy so much easier on everything. I knew who to talk to. I knew where to network. I knew if I wanted to advertise. I know where to go. I know what to say about my business. That is so powerful, but it takes courage to do it and it takes a lot of thought because it is a commitment.

Deb Zahn: Oh, yeah. Then you have to stay committed to it when you get freaked out. Yeah, I usually think of it as once you know the "who" and the "what," the "how" gets easier because it's basically like unlocking a door because you've got the right key in the right keyhole, and then you open up your world of opportunity there.

Woody Harrison: Absolutely.

Deb Zahn: I love that, and I'm glad you brought that up because I know so many people skip that. Please don't. Please do the work. It's worth it. Woody, I want to thank you so much for joining us today. This has just been fantastic. For any consultants listening, all of this relates to what it is that you should be doing, including with your own video. Go do it. Get your hair done. Go do it. Again, thanks Woody for sharing all this with us.

Woody Harrison: You're welcome, Deb. I appreciate it.

Deb Zahn: Thanks so much for listening to this episode of the Craft of Consulting Podcast. I want to ask you to do actually three things. If you enjoyed this episode or if you've enjoyed any of my other ones, hit subscribe. I got a lot of other great guests that are coming up and a lot of other great content and I don't want you to miss anything. But the other two things that I'm going to ask you to do is, one is, if you have any comments, so if you have any suggestions or any kind of feedback that will help make this podcast more helpful to more listeners, please include those.

And then the last thing is, again, if you've gotten something out of this, share it, share it with somebody you know who's a consultant or thinking about being a consultant, and make sure that they also have access to all this great content and all the other great content that's going to be coming up.

So as always, you can go and get more wonderful information and tools at craftofconsulting.com. Thanks so much. I will talk to you on the next episode. Bye-bye.