Burn the Deck
John Brunswick

How Storytellers Win When Everyone Else Sounds the Same

Running the BTD Playbook

Overcoming the 5 Buyer Shifts and Winning the Conversation

6 m read

The guide below shows exactly how each chapter transforms your approach from what most sellers do today to what creates real differentiation to overcome the 5 Buyer Shifts and win the conversation.

Prepare

Buyers have already decided if they trust you before you walk in. These chapters teach you to stop leading with your product and start leading with their world. Master this, and you'll never again be dismissed as "just another vendor."

Plan

Same slides, same talk track, same forgettable pitch. The chapters here show you how to engineer moments that stick and build trust before you ask for anything. This is how you become the one they remember when the decision gets made.

Building Trust Through Presence
FROM

Transactional presence

  • You present professionally but impersonally, hitting talking points without connection.
  • Buyers sense no genuine investment and evaluate you on specs alone.
TO

Authentic connection

  • You show genuine passion and empathy for their specific challenges.
  • You become the human they remember when everything else blurs together.
Structure for Clarity
FROM

Information overload

  • You cram maximum content into limited time, exceeding cognitive capacity.
  • Buyers forget 90%-nothing stands out from the information dump.
TO

Structured delivery

  • You frame, unpack, summarize, and transition-respecting cognitive limits.
  • Buyers retain your core message because each concept stands out.
Engineering Memorable Moments
FROM

Flat demonstrations

  • You walk through features in a linear, predictable way that matches your deck.
  • Nothing stands out-you sound like everyone else they evaluated.
TO

Designed peak moments

  • You build anticipation and engineer surprises that trigger emotional responses.
  • Buyers have something remarkable to discuss when you're not in the room.
Boost Engagement with Interaction
FROM

One-way presentation

  • You present at your audience while they passively watch with cameras off.
  • Consumption mode requires no brain-you create no ownership in your solution.
TO

Co-created experience

  • You involve buyers through choices, hands-on moments, and varied media.
  • They become invested because they helped create the experience-it's theirs now.

Present

Information doesn't close deals. Stories do. These chapters give you the exact formulas to turn your expertise into narratives buyers retell to their CFO, their board, their team.

Next
From Vendor to Valued Partner