Everyone loves a good story. It’s the reason people spend billions each year on movies and books. A good story can make the audience feel an emotion, root for the protagonist, or hate the villain. A great story can captivate, motivate and provide a sense of thrill and excitement.
Marketing doesn’t have to be a boring sales pitch. You can use the time-tested strategies of Hollywood storytelling to make your marketing strategy more effective. Here are a few benefits to using storytelling in your next marketing campaign.
Customers get invested in your brand
When you watch a movie, it’s quite likely you’ve found yourself rooting for the good guys. You want them to succeed. You may also find yourself hating the bad guys. This creates the us-versus-them mentality. If done right, the storyteller will have you hooked. You NEED to know what’s going to happen to the characters. You almost feel like you’re in the story with them.
The biggest benefit to storytelling in marketing is that you can get your potential customers invested in the outcome of your story. Anytime they feel a connection to your brand, you’ll have created a very powerful bond that leaves a lasting brand impression.
This can best be illustrated in the “I’m a Mac, I’m a PC” ads that Apple created. You remember – the ones where the PC character was played by dorky John Hodgeman while Justin Long played the charismatic Mac computer? This method of storytelling allowed the marketing team to turn lifeless computers into characters that you can get to know, and love (or hate).
They used these differences to tell a story. The Mac was cool, hip and everyone wanted to be friends with him. The PC was dorky, awkward, and not that you didn’t like him, you just didn’t want to be him. You wanted to be the hero.
Getting someone invested in your brand this way can create a lifelong bond. They may not directly say “yeah, I’m more Mac than I am PC”, but you can be sure they’re feeling it.
Attention spans are short
You’re competing with many forms of entertainment, and if you ask people if they like advertising, most people will say no. However, if you show them ads that tell a story, you may get a different reaction.
Everyone hates the hard sell, come-down-and-get-the-latest-deal on a vacuum cleaner ads. People generally tune out. You can only yell at them for so long before it’s no longer effective.
This is where good writing comes in to play. Don’t worry if you’re not a great writer, there are plenty of websites that will help you improve your writing skills. Great writing will captivate your audience for longs stretches and have them asking for more.
When a commercial comes on, or you go to a website, or you receive an email, the story is what will hook someone in. When you’re competing against entertainment giants, you need to put a little effort into these advertisements. People can smell the bull from a mile away and tell a good story will suck them in for the long haul.
A great example of captivating an audience with a story is the Dos Equis “Most Interesting Man In The World” campaign. This story was very captivating and tied in well with the brand. Basically, Dos Equis was suggesting that by drinking their beer, you’d be more interesting. Something everyone craves to be.
The campaign told this story through a fictional character that only did interesting things, and doesn’t drink beer all the time – but when he does, he only drinks – well, you know how it ends. The audience was captivated, and now an entire brand is associated with this man.
You can bet when a new commercial aired, people were much less likely to turn the story off.
The story is your brand
Many people get hung up on the fact that their brand comes second to the story. This is only true if you’ve done a poor job of establishing what your story is.
What is your product or service? How do people use it? How are their lives made better because of it? These questions are the foundation of your story.
Dollar Shave Club rose to infamy due to one viral advertising ad when they were a nothing company. All they did with this one ad was tell their story. It had characters, humor, and a storyline. It sucked you in, and you heard why it is they exist – and how it made your life better. That’s the story.
This example is different than the above examples in that it directly told the story of their brand. Here’s what we are, and here’s what we do. The benefit to this method is that there’s no confusion on what the point of the brand is.
With Dos Equis, the brand was associated with being interesting. Very big picture. With Dollar Shave Club, the brand was associated with the product and how it will help you. With Mac vs. PC it was a hybrid of both. It told the story of the mac, while also associating it with being cool and hip.
How to find your story
Now that you know how storytelling can help your brand, how do you find your story? The easy answer is just to treat your brand like a person. What’s the personality of your brand? How would it sound if it talked? Who would it be talking to? Why is it talking? What would it do on a Saturday? How about a Tuesday? What kind of car would your brand drive?
All of these questions will help you build a character or story around your brand or product. Telling a story is extremely powerful, and the focus is a character. Once you define this, the rest will fall into place.
Try putting your character into situations. For example, if you sell hard drives, maybe the story is about reliability. This is a disaster movie! Maybe the story is about speed. This is a thriller movie! Maybe the story is about price. This is an adventure movie!
Just remember that your audience is at least as smart as you. Don’t treat them as beneath you when you tell the story. If you like the story, chances are they will too.
Luisa Brenton is the educational blogger. She was born in Italy, graduated from The St. Louis School of Milan and went to Chicago to pursue higher education at the Chicago’s Public Research University. Luisa is interested in modern literature and new films. She is interested in journalism as well.You can contact Luisa at Twitter and Facebook.
