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Articles filed in: Storytelling
The Bounds Of Possibility
filed in Storytelling, Success
Just twenty years ago, it wasn’t probable that you would launch a successful company, publish a best-selling book or get your idea funded by people you didn’t know. Twenty years ago, we operated within the laws of probability. We knew our limits. We lived, sometimes frustrated by, but mostly contentedly within pre-determined educational, geographical or societal boundaries.
And then the internet changed what was possible. The internet enabled us to share ideas. But more importantly, the internet helped us to find more of the people who believed what we believed and believed in. This changed the bounds of possibility, inviting us to think beyond the probable.
Now that we are no longer bound by the constraints of probability, we must face the fact that we have a responsibility to own what’s possible. Opportunity abounds. And that’s both a scary and empowering thought.
The onus to create the future we want to see for ourselves and others is on us. We get to own the story we want to live and tell.
Image by several seconds
10 Benefits Of Strategic Storytelling
filed in Story Skills, Storytelling, Strategy
We humans have long recognised that stories are a great way to transfer knowledge and wisdom. We know that better stories result in more resonant messages. But we’re selling storytelling short by putting it in the ‘communications’ box. This limiting belief that story is simply how we impart information means we don’t harness its full potential.
A good story well told helps you to:
1. Communicate with clarity and confidence.
2. Achieve emotional resonance with your audience.
3. Be more persuasive and influential.
4. Consistently act in alignment with your mission.
5. Attract the right people, whether they be customers, employees, volunteers or donors.
6. Inspire people to buy into your mission or get behind your cause.
7. Execute plans as you work towards your vision for the future.
8. Add value to your products, services and company
9. Spread your ideas.
10. Change the culture and create the future you want to see.
Stories do more than help us to tell and sell. Shared narratives are powerful catalysts for change and the building blocks of our culture.
Image by Scooter Lowrimore
Planned Progress
filed in Storytelling, Strategy, Success
You will do things today that you hadn’t planned to do. You will react and respond to someone else’s agenda and put the things you’d prioritised on the back burner. You will find yourself entering digital rabbit holes that distract you from doing the work that matters. Maybe you’ll get a lot done, but will those things you accomplish be moving you closer to your goals?
If you’re going to build the business or create the impact you want, then you must be intentional about how you’re going to do it. You have two choices. You can wait for the next opportunity to present itself, or you can purposely plan for the progress you want to make.
There is no such thing as accidental momentum.
What’s your planned progress strategy?
Image by Dan DeAlmeida
Invest in Second Contact
filed in Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy
How many times have you bought something once from a business, and never returned?
How much time, energy and money did that business owner, or any company, devote to getting that first point of contact with a customer? The doughnut shop that attracts a passer-by with its signage, the hotel that pays for placement in the travel magazine, the artist who spends hours grooming her Instagram account.
Having done the hard work of attracting people, how much do we invest in ensuring we get another chance to serve that customer tomorrow?
We have come to believe that attention and awareness are the currency of success. They’re not. What matters more than getting someone’s attention is what you do to change how they feel once you’ve got it. Successful businesses are built on earning the second interaction, and the one after that.
Both the business and the customer win when we prioritise affinity over attention.
Image by Garry Knight
What’s Your Promise To Your Customers?
filed in Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy
It’s easy to revert to long-winded descriptions about what differentiates your products and services from those of your competitors, as you market your business.
A better place to start is by clearly stating your promise to your customers.
Are you the dentist who listens or that marketing agency the cares? The cafe that sources local ingredients or the gelato maker that’s on a mission to impact employment and business practices and consumer happiness.
There are a thousand ways to stand out with a better story. And you get to pick one.
What are you promising your customers?
Image by Patricia Prudente
When Subjectivity Wins
filed in Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy
Does Nike make the best running shoes in the world?
Does Starbucks serve the best coffee?
Does Warby Parker design the best reading glasses?
Does Dollar Shave Club sell the best razors?
Does IKEA sell the best furniture?
Objectively, the answer is no. But ‘best’ is rarely objective.
Successful brands craft and tell stories for their ideal customers—the people who are ready to hear and believe them.
The more subjective we can be in our sales and marketing, the better.
Image by Banter Snaps
Get Specific To Get More Customers
filed in Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy
When your idea fails to resonate, it’s easy to assume that the product or service, the pitch or the pricing are flawed. Before you go back to the drawing board, you must challenge those assumptions. The first assumption to test is if you’re reaching the right people.
One of the biggest marketing challenges we face is understanding our audience. It’s hard to know where to start. Begin by describing your ideal customer, just one person your product has helped or can help.
Who is that person?
What’s her backstory?
What does she want or need?
Who will she become in the presence of your product?
If you were opening a vegan tattoo studio, you’d know exactly where to open it, what inks to stock and what story to tell, because you’d be crystal clear about the worldview of the specific customer you’re serving.
Successful ideas gain traction because they draw on the existing values and beliefs of people they’re designed to serve. The more specific you can be about who your work is for and who it’s not for, the better your chances of gaining traction with more people.
Act like a vegan tattooist. The Story Strategy Course can help.
Image by DeMorris Byrd
Everything Speaks
filed in Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy
Business is picking up at the new restaurant I told you about a couple of weeks ago. Passers-by are poking their heads around the door. They like the look of the venue, the menu and the prices—so they’re giving it a try. I can confirm that the food is good! The owner, Sam, has got the basics right.
But here’s the thing, people don’t come back for the basics, whatever they say. If they did, $20 hamburgers wouldn’t exist. People come for the experience. People don’t just buy what we serve—they buy how it makes them feel. The fundamentals alone don’t garner loyalty.
So, it’s not good enough for the waitstaff to plonk a $50 bottle of wine in the middle of the table and walk away. It’s not good enough that the sharing dishes come without serving spoons. It’s not okay for the bill to arrive as a rolled up till receipt in somebody’s hand.
If Sam wants people to keep coming back, he must work on the experience—the theatre, the rituals and the way he and his team will commit to showing up to serve. They need to start by considering the ‘hows’ of the customer journey because it isn’t just the food in a restaurant that speaks for the brand.
It is:
How the customers are greeted.
How menus are offered.
How the wine is poured.
How orders are taken.
How the food is served.
How plates are cleared.
How the bill is presented.
How customers are farewelled.
Sam needs to design for the outcome he wants, by aligning the experience he creates with the story he wants customers to tell.
What speaks for your brand?
Image by Roman Arkhipov
Small Acts Matter
filed in Storytelling
It was still dark when a dishevelled man wearing a hoodie walked into the city centre convenience store at 6 am. He seemed agitated. He swore loudly when he realised he didn’t have enough money for a big bottle of Fanta.
The sales assistant asked if she could help him. The man explained that he had $2.50 and couldn’t afford the drink he wanted. Without missing a beat, the assistant came from behind the counter and showed him where the small, more affordable cans were stacked. As he was paying, she looked him in the eye and asked if he’d like a straw.
It took a moment for her question to register. The man looked puzzled for a second, pausing before accepting.
‘Yes, please,’ he whispered as if she’d offered him the world. Which of course, by treating him with dignity, she had.
How we serve matters. Our smallest acts have the power to make the biggest difference.
What are your small acts?
Image by Tina Leggio
What’s The Story The Customer Is Telling Himself?
filed in Marketing, Storytelling
For a long time, our family’s favourite salt came in either 125g or 250g boxes. Last week I noticed the supermarket now stocks it in a 55g refillable mill. It’s the same product in different packaging—except for the price that is. It costs 37 cents per 10g when you buy the salt boxed, and $1.45 for 10g when you buy it in the mill.
Most people would argue that nobody in their right mind will pay almost four times as much for the same product in different packaging. And yet they do. We do! All the time.
We pay more money for convenience and status. We go out of our way to buy products that align with our sense of identity. We place just as much value, if not more, on how something feels than on how well it works.
Often, the key question when it comes to pricing and value isn’t how much is it worth, or what will people pay. It’s, what’s the story the customer is telling himself about what the product is worth to him, and why?
Once we know that, we’ll tell a better story.
Image by Aaron Thomas