When we were young, our parents told us stories to teach us about morals or behavior. As grownups doing our marketing work, it’s time to take a page from their playbook. It turns out storytelling is the most compelling way to engage customers with the information you want them to know.

Why You Need a Story

You’ve devoted your career to your product – your client hasn’t. How will you win them over? How do you make your excitement contagious? Using good storytelling, you can help them feel that what you’re offering is more than a financial transaction about a good or a service. It helps them understand how your story intersects with their own.

What is the customer’s story? Think high drama! What problem are you solving? What scene are you entering? Where do you come in?

Now – what’s in your story for them?

This is something we keep coming back to – WIFM. “What’s in it for me?” This is the eternal question circulating in the minds of your readers, viewers, and, ultimately, customers. It’s one thing to tell a story, and another to tell one they actually care about.

 

How to Tell Your Story

The story you tell is as important as how you do it. Your story will be better received if you talk to your audience in language they understand. Don’t talk over them – talk to them. As you choose your words, keep asking yourself: how does this relate to what they’re concerned about? You’ll catch yourself on this, trust me. You’ll notice yourself going on a riff about an angle of your product or service that you think is important. Go back to the WIFM. Is it important NOW, or is it something better saved for an in-person discussion or later marketing piece? Be your own best editor.

 

How to Make An Emotional Connection 

The best way to strike an emotional chord with your audience is to be sincere. Shock! Horror! Yes, I really recommended that – sincerity. Any of us can see right through some BS marketing. When marketing is done for marketing’s sake, when the person who put it together doesn’t actually feel the benefit or story of the product, you feel that gap. (*This is actually why I have a hard and fast rule that I don’t on projects I don’t genuinely believe in!)

Getting to the core of your story and telling it in a compelling way is how you will secure the superpowers of your brand. This is where the marketing magic happens.

Things to consider as you write your marketing “story”:

• Who is your ‘hero’
• What challenges do they face?
• How do they overcome it? (Hint hint: with your product or service)

The good news is, with strong storytelling, marketing gets a heck of a lot more interesting, for your customers and for you!