#577: How Almost Nothing Changes Everything in Your Brand Storytelling, With Ryan Kohn

#577: How Almost Nothing Changes Everything in Your Brand Storytelling, With Ryan Kohn

From Business of Story by Park Howell, Brand Story Strategist

July 20, 2026 · 51 min

About this episode

Ryan Kohn discusses how radical simplicity in brand storytelling can effectively address complex issues like climate change.

What makes a brand story powerful enough to move millions of people on the world's most complex issue? Not more data. Not louder messaging. Not a bigger ask. The answer, according to serial entrepreneur Ryan Kohn, is radical simplicity — and a single theme that makes your audience feel the truth of your idea before they ever think about it. Ryan Kohn is the founder of Point One, a global business initiative that asks companies to commit just 0.1% of their revenue to accelerate the clean energy transition. That is one dollar for every thousand in revenue. A rounding error for most businesses. But pooled together, it is enough to fully fund clean energy access for the entire world within 15 years. In this episode of the Business of Story, Park Howell sits down with Ryan to unpack how he turned one of the most fatigued conversations in modern business — climate change — into one of the most compelling brand stories in the world. And what every brand builder can steal from it. WHAT YOU WILL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE How to find the single brand theme that compresses your biggest idea into your most powerful message. Ryan and his team distilled an impossibly complex global challenge into…

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Host: Park Howell

Guest: Ryan Kohn

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Organizations: Point One

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