What’s Your Story? — The Art of Storytelling in Marketing
Stories have been being shared for basically forever and the desire to hear stories hasn’t changed, nor has the need to tell stories. When your audience hears a story relatable to their real-life experiences, they are intrigued and establish a connection with your brand. Incorporating storytelling into your marketing strategy can engage your customers, generate brand support, and create top-of-mind awareness in your customers.
Today, mostly due to social media, there are more stories than ever. The challenge becomes how to stand out among the noise. Standing out isn’t enough though, the goal is to be remembered. Regardless of your type of business, storytelling is a powerful tool that can mean the difference between being relevant and being just another brand. Stories create messages that people care about. People remember what they care about. When you engage listeners in a powerful, entertaining, and informative story, they remember it, and most importantly want MORE!
Top-of-Mind Awareness
Who doesn’t enjoy a good story? When we feel connected after hearing stories, we remember them more. What gets remembered, becomes top of mind. We all have our “car guy” or a “cake lady”. These labels stuck because these people did more than just “their job”. They gained popularity and local status by creating what’s known in marketing as top-of-mind awareness.
When a need arises for a service or product, ask yourself who is the first person or business that comes to mind? Whoever popped into your head has achieved top-of-mind awareness. The goal of marketing is for a brand to be at that top spot. This is where all the thought of a need or a want passes through.
Stories create buzz, and the more buzz about a product or service, the more awareness there is about that brand. The more awareness you have, the higher the probability of being in the top-of-mind position. Customers are making buying decisions constantly. Often, these decisions are made because of what comes to their mind first.
Storytelling’s Impact On Your Content Marketing Strategy
Today’s consumers show little interest in typical branded advertisements. Consumers instead are investing in a business’ story. Studies show that if you use storytelling effectively in your content marketing strategy, you could increase the value of your product exponentially. Here are a few examples of how storytelling can impact your content marketing strategy.
Increases Brand Recognition — Storytelling engages your audience for a longer period of time than other types of content. The longer you have their attention the more likely you will be remembered!
Builds an Emotional Connection — Storytelling that focuses on authentic and genuine experiences often triggers emotional connections. These connections make your audience want to engage with more of your content. If someone can relate to you, they tend to want to do business with you.
Opportunity to Go Viral — Storytelling can propel your content to go viral. In a social media world, it is easier for content to be distributed to different audiences. When someone likes your story, they will want to share your story with others, increasing your audience.
What is Your Story?
An effective story conveys your business’s values, mission, goals, and more. Storytelling should be an essential aspect of any content marketing strategy. Discovering your business’s unique brand story is the first step. Try this 5-step process to help you discover and implement your business’s story:
Brainstorming — Utilizing your team, jot down key highlights of everything your brand has done. Analyze your business’ history, vision, and mission statements. Encourage your audience to share their personal experiences with your brand with testimonials.
Create your Brand Persona –A brand persona typically consists of a set of personality traits and is something that a consumer can easily relate to. Start by asking the following questions: Whether your brand is a male or female? What is your brand promise? What are your interests? Who do you relate to? How are you different from your competitors?
Develop a Mission Statement — Include your primary and secondary goals while writing your mission statement.
Discovering Your Brand Story — Set a clear expectation by informing your audience why you are telling them a story. Continue with highlighting your unique selling points to distinguish your brand and demonstrate authenticity.
Using storytelling to create and sustain top-of-mind awareness is a long-term process. You will need a long-term plan. In marketing, consistency is key. Staying fresh, interesting, and relevant over the long-term will help your business to achieve and stay top of mind.
If you want to be top of mind, you also must put your message where you’ll reach your customers. The last thing you want to do is miss your target market. Let the world know you exist and what you have to say. Speak from the perspective of your customer, answering the question, “What’s in it for me?” Remember to be informative and make sure you emphasize your value.
Consumers are looking for tantalizing content. So, strap on your boots, dig deep, discover your story, and go hook your audience. The best storytellers for your brand may not necessarily be you or your employees, it could very well be your customers. Mastering the art of storytelling can transform your content marketing strategy. So, what are you waiting for? Start telling your story!
