5 Keys to successful storytelling
As advocates of merging brand journalism and marketing, storytelling is our tool. But how do we maximize the output of the proces and make sure we end up with the quality that rocks the boat?
How do we counter the consumers‘ feeling that from the back pocket of our communication will always come a push message focussed on conversion? They have a well-developed conversion radar (should we call it otherwise?), trained for decades. The authenticity hype that we lived years ago was a powerful message to ourselves, and still lives on balancing out the Age of Push Marketing.
How do we get people to relive the feeling of getting a postcard from your best friend on summer holidays on digital platforms?
The answer: good storytelling. Let’s get back to 5 of the most important basics.
1. Speak the language of your diversified audience
To inspire and intrigue people, you have to know what moves them. You have to be able to log in on their motivation and social conversations to understand them, speak in their language, sit next to them. In real life, you change your tone and language moving from your 14-year old daughters friends to your dentist, do you? The audience directs your tone in real life, it should do so in digital life as well, serving your objectives. Do not expect to gain credibility if you use the same images on Instagram, Tumblr and Pinterest.
2. Your story needs a content strategy
The content idea is the core of the story, the blood in the transfusion. A strong concept connects yout story to your brand and stands on firm ground. Enabling you to pivot and make intriguing choices on aspirational level. Enabling you to follow Plato and talk about ‘the idea’horse’’, instead of talking about an actual pony. Get people ready to saddle up.
3. Good stories create engagement
Experienced storytellers produce engagement. When being trained in journalism as well as advertising, combining the best of both worlds means that the marketing expertise empowers well crafted stories to get in touch with the audience on an activation level. A deeper and more valuable level. It makes your stories last and your brand accepted.
4. Make technology serve you Successful campaigns come from the marriage of compelling technology and good storytelling. If you want your invested energy and money to flourish in the right places, you need to be sure your content isn’t taken for granted. So we follow analytics and serve the platforms. But goosebumps are hard to measure, so following your experience might be the best lead sometimes.
5. Quality execution lifts you up
everyone involved. So that means good energy, a great projection on your brand, and a step-up for the associations users will generate around your products. A good execution is like a team interacting on different platforms, connected and supportive to all, dressed in award-winning design. It invites people to come back, re-experience the good atmosphere you create. Unmeasurable but of twinkling value to your brand.
Put another star in the sky.