How to Grow Your Creative Brand!
Do brands create stories or do stories create brands? Is the power of storytelling for brands? Is branding simply so pervasive we can’t even begin to see the end and the beginning?
Storytelling is an ancient art married with science and it’s tackled in so many domains, from the study of ancient cultures to movie making, fiction writing and branding. Yet, storytelling has never been ‘hotter’ than today. The principles and success factors are closely related with word-of-mouth, social sharing, social media in general, brand perception and the very essence of content marketing.
The Impact of Branding in a Creative Career
Storytelling is so much more than telling stories in marketing and communications. Believe it or not, humans are natural storytellers. According to author Jonathan Gottschall’s new book The Storytelling Animal, we humans can’t help telling stories, and we turn things that aren’t really stories into stories because we like narratives so much. Everything including faith, science, and even love needs a story for people to find it plausible. No story, no sale.
What is the difference between soulless content as companies continue to create it on one hand and stories that don’t just stick but also engage on the other? How do you create stories, nurture them, stimulate them?
Here are 7 easy ways you can start growing your creative brand with storytelling:
1. Create a Narrative Around What You Do
What is the story and narrative behind everything you do as a creative brand, ranging from what you stand for to the reason why you developed solution X or decided to support ‘good cause Y’? How can you get to that story that’s part of your brand and even people’s DNA instead of to just the facts?
2. Connect With People Using Their Language
How do you actually connect with people in the language they understand best? This is the language they can “visualize” in a story-like context? And even further, how do you ‘create’ the stories that will cause a change in behavior or a change of perception? In this point I want to reiterate the fact that it’s imperative to use a platform and its content in native form. No matter if it’s using a website, Youtube, Facebook or Instagram, learn the platform and use it to tell stories.
3. Use Stories that Appeal to Your Audience Persona
I’ve talked about the importance of defining and finding your audience persona in the past. What types of stories appeal to your audience “personas”? In marketing, a persona is a composite sketch of a key segment of your audience. You will want to build about three to five of these. You want to know who the person is, what they value, and how best to speak to them.
4. Identify the Stories Your Audience is Telling
Consider the stories your audience is already telling. How do you listen to those and include them? How can you even come to some form of collaborative storytelling that goes far beyond any reach or goal you imagined? It’s important to find out these small details in order to create a genuine connection with the people you are trying to reach. Connect with them!
5. Learn About Losing Control
How much ‘control’ can you realistically have in an age where the value of a brand increasingly is in the eye of the beholder and their social connections? Where perception is more about personality, trust, openness, transparency, relevance and participation? About standing for something as a brand and voicing it in an utterly customer-centric, yet genuine and firm way? How can storytelling with these shifts in mind place your brand in the minds, hearts and wallets of people? Or in other words: do consumers create stories and brands?
I know this is an interesting concept, but worth thinking about!
Bonus: How do you make use of digital information and the user-generated content out there, as well as of all these new ways we have to tell stories in digital storytelling, combining art (creativity) and science (data)? There are multiple tools available in all major digital platforms that speak data. Data can be a bit intimidating but it’s the tool you need in order to understand the life and engagement of the content you’re putting out there. Take time to learn how to use them!
That’s it! There is so much more to be said about stories, from all potential goals in trying to grow your brand. What are some of the ways you’ve started growing your brand? Let me know in the comments below!
