What’s your business narrative? Did you even think about how stories can pave the way for successful businesses to thrive and stay that way for a long time?
We have a definitive term for it. It’s called brand storytelling! Surprisingly, it effectively creates a long-lasting impact as well.
Well, at the crux of it, brand storytelling is crucial, pivotal, and extremely vital to hold the nerve of the market. In this post, we will tell you just why and how it is the way it is in fair detail.
But first, let us understand in a jiffy, what is a brand in the first place.
Brand – Decoded
Most people tend to think quite erroneously that any particular business, product, or service is a brand. It’s definitely not so.
Let us put it this way, Who do you think is the most important stakeholder in your business?
Well, undoubtedly, your customers!
And, therefore, what your customers (along with other stakeholders, such as your investors, bankers, financiers, taxmen, employees, media, etc.) feel about your business is the brand of your business. It’s the perception created in the minds of your customers regarding your business, product, or service.
So, while your business, product, or service is tangible, your brand is entirely a perception in the minds of your customers, and so it’s intangible and immensely valuable.
Understanding Brand Storytelling
Alright, so what is brand storytelling? It is the narratives and stories that evoke emotions and establish an emotional and value-driven connection between your brand and the customers.
And, what is the need for it?
Well, we humans, at our core, are emotional beings. At the deepest level, maximum decisions are not based on logic, data, facts, and statistics for an average human being. Rather, the decisions we make have a deeper emotional base to it. It is well put in business parlance as, “a customer may forget what your business, products or services offered them, but they will never forget what those offers made them feel”.
And, therefore, to make them feel the right emotions for your business, products, and services, and to evoke those emotions with empathy, brand storytelling is important. Thus, it has become a very effective tool for marketing communication.
The Secrets of Brand Storytelling
As you may understand, storytelling in business is another communication piece, but it is a special one. It is rightfully a content, but a very different kind of content. It requires a strategy to steer the narratives in a way that deeply resonates with the audience and ultimately achieves its objectives of creating a favorable perception of the brand in their minds.
Ultimately, as with any content creation, a successful brand storytelling strategy follows the 3Cs of conveying marketing communication effectively and building a favorable brand perception.
Craft. Create. Conjure.
Before we delve any further into explaining those steps, it is important to understand the purpose of steering a brand story. Invariably, it’s the customers with whom you want your brand to connect at a deep level. Therefore, customer engagement becomes the most important goal of brand storytelling.
As they say, successful brand storytelling can garner loyal and hardcore brand loyalists and brand advocates, who go on to spread the word about your brand in their way further. It spirals into a domino effect, and when rightfully paved, the path to a deeper connection is engrained with it.
More importantly, it becomes a two-way communication, and an astute marketer will read their customers like they are talking to a friend.
Let’s get back to the 3Cs of brand storytelling.
1. Craft
It is where you need to build a broad outline of your strategy. Consider what your communication will be, what you want to say to the audience, and why. Then decide where you want to say it and how – the platform and medium of your communication are equally important.
Now, create a story, a fiction, or a hypothetical case, and join the dots with the central theme of your objective. You may also share a real story if it serves the purpose.
The best stories not only evoke emotions, but they use emotions in the storytelling itself. So remember to add the human element to your narrative, as this creates a personal connection with your audience.
2. Create
Spend time here, and craft a story that will resonate with your audience at a personal level for a long time to come – maybe the emotions could even grow stronger as time goes by.
Evergreen contents are often universal in their intrinsic nature. They evade time and space and resonate with the audience even years later.
Therefore, while creating content for brand storytelling, it is wise to avoid focusing on fluctuating dates, seasonal events, etc. Instead, use narratives to tie your brand’s features and your audience with universal human emotions. Successful brand storytelling uses elements of happiness, surprise, sadness, fright, disgust, contempt, anger, humor, satire, etc.
You may use various formats of content though – listicles, tips, product demos, videos, etc.
3. Conjure
Use data heavily to know what your audiences are seeking. Here, the data is not for your audience. Rather, it is for you to understand your audience, their needs, preferences, pain points, and expectations – in other words, their perception.
Once you know that, you can mold your narratives and conjure images for your audience through storytelling, establishing the conversation and the coveted connection.
One intrinsic characteristic of brand storytelling is it gives equal importance to how the content is delivered. For instance, a simple how-to video, if created from a brand narrative perspective, will remain in the memory of audiences for a long time.
Make a Place in the Hearts of Your Customers
In this sea of plentiful choices, you must hook your audience with a narrative that will differentiate your brand from the rest. Brand storytelling can do that. Use narratives to share your beginnings, the journey, the hardships, the successes, the values.
Weave your communication into a story and transport your audience with simplified information, provoking the right emotions and engagements. It goes a long way and pays the dividends long after the message is delivered.