Effective storytelling for business

As content takes its rightful place at the forefront of marketing, I'm seeing many marketers fail at basic storytelling.

Marketers are ineffective when they use the classic "customer testimonial" format and pop that onto their blog or make it into a video. "Here’s our product. It is great. Here are customers who say it is great. Now buy some of our product." This just doesn't hold people's attention.

How interesting would a book or movie be were it to have this plot?:
Boy meets girl.
They fall in love.
They get married.

That's what most people do with their business writing.

Effective storytelling

The best stories drip with conflict. They have a hero and sometimes a villain. There is a story arc. As a writing teacher once told me: "Writing without conflict is propaganda."

Movies and novels have these elements – the best open with conflict in the first scene, on the first page, or even the first paragraph. Usually, it's one character in conflict with others (Batman against the bad guys). Sometimes it's a character in conflict with herself ("I really shouldn't go into this bar, but...").

Example of a good storytelling TV ad

Here an example of a story driven TV ad Audi aired during the 2012 Super Bowl called "Prom". I really like this ad because it is an example of all the elements of a good story. A slightly insecure teenager is unhappy about going to the Senior Prom without a date. But when Dad lets him borrow the new Audi S6 for the night, he gains more and more confidence with every mile, arriving at the Prom a changed young man. There's a confrontation and a resolution. And it all happened in one minute. (The YouTube version of the ad has 10 million views.)

Direct link to Audi Prom on YouTube.

Example of a good storytelling blog post

For an example of a story-based blog post, check out Weather Happens – Be Prepared by Kristiana Almeida on the American Red Cross blog.

Kristiana writes about her life as a kid on Cape Cod and uses that to educate on being prepared for a blizzard. Great stuff. What does the Red Cross really want? A donation. Is a donation mentioned in this post? No.

You too can be an effective storyteller

Here are a few ideas to get you thinking about telling stories that people will want to pay attention to rather than propaganda they will ignore.

- Instead of "creating copy", think about sitting in a restaurant with friends and explaining a little about your work to them. How would you say it? How would you hold your friends' interest? Write that down.

- Rather than talking about the features and benefits of your products and services, consider how you help people to solve problems.

- Who or what is the "bad guy" in your market? Is it the big, famous company that everybody does business with but nobody really likes? Is there some silly government regulation that holds buyers back? How can you weave those into a story with conflict?

- What is the status quo? Use that as the bad guy in your story.

Bonus for reading this far: Here's how I create many of the stories of success I share in this blog, in my speeches, and in my books: I think of the story as a movie or novel and cast the people from around the world whose success I showcase as my hero and traditional offline advertising and the PR pitching approach as the villains. That's what I did in this post. Audi and the Red Cross are my heroes and the traditional customer testimonial is the villain. (Shh... don't give away my secret.)

Want more?

Several years ago I wrote a free ebook Gaijin Male Model: A Case Study in Conflict-Driven Business Writing.

If you’ve got a few minutes and want to dig deeper into using conflict in your own writing, this is a good place to start. No registration required.

Comments

[Dave Thackeray]

Thanks, DMS. Getting to the crux of a story is all about putting your passion and personality into it. You've nailed that.

I think that's why I suggest people learn radio skills to accelerate their storytelling ability. Sometimes you lose some of the excitement in your writing - it feels a bit flat. If you use a podcast as a method of expressing yourself with personality, you can always transcribe the results as a way of bringing your pixels to life.

[David Meerman Scott]

Dave - Great point on radio skills. I'd agree with that. The other (related) aspect is public speaking. If you can nail it from the stage, you can tell it in writing or on video.

[Bill Gluth]

Great post, David. It really drove home an important piece of making a point in a memorable way. Thank you for sharing it

[Craig Lindberg]

For years one of the things I would always talk about early on with prospective clients was every company has a unique story, one that needs to be told well. Occasionally a few of them would let us do it and those were the ones that got alot of recognition. Great storytelling visually, written and spoken has the power to gain mindshare. With authenticity and goodwill, it's irresistible.
Thank you David for this very useful post.

[Cheryl Smithem]

Superb advice. when I try to help clients with their copy, I try to get them to think back to the feelings that started them along the path that led to where they are now. Capturing that joy, or hope or belief and telling the tale of the issue that one wants to fix, solve, resolve, or improve is the essential touchstone for most of us.

[David Meerman Scott]

Thanks Bill - I've been meaning to do this post for a while.

Craig, I'd agree with you that few companies *really* want to tell their stories. Most just prefer to talk up their products.

Cheryl, Good point to push people back to the stuff they did early on.

[Daryll Bellingham]

Yes, nice post. Interesting comparison between the very slick Audi advert and the 'homely'Red Cross blog post.

One story feature the blog post did give us was a more specific setting - Cape Cod. One strong story feature the Audi advert gave us was 'direct speech'. When characters speak, they come more alive. This made up for the generic setting. The Audi advert had a stronger resolution as well.

[Sheetal Sharma]

Story telling is a art very much needed by the new age marketers, in an era of information outburst, where the customers are more informed than ever,the biggest challenge posed in front of marketer is to keep his target market informed and engaged about their services.Kulwinder Singh is the man at Synechron who has mastered the art of story telling and is kind enough to pass on this art to his team members.

[David Meerman Scott]

Daryll - Yes, I used those two examples for that very reason. One was a multi-million dollar Super Bowl TV ad and the other a simple blog post. Thanks for providing additional observations on these examples.

[MacLeanHeather]

Thanks for another great post. Brands have become too focused on forcing a product or a service on the consumer. They aren't making it real. Consumers want an experience. They want to feel something, rather than just be pushed. Creating a story makes it real. Having a protagonist and a an antagonist is great way to keep the focus on this.

[David Meerman Scott]

Thanks Heather. Yes, we all want experiences.

[John Running]

Really very effective things you shared with us. I got huge of important idea from your post. Thanks a lot for sharing with us !!

[Robert Moss]

Thanks, David; I agree creating a story of good versus evil that shows how a brand/product/service enables people to overcome a problem can be effective.

But I don't agree that, "Writing without conflict is propaganda." Plenty of propaganda uses the same format ;-)

Writing without conflict is just boring.

[David Meerman Scott]

Robert - good point that propaganda can include conflict (!!)

[Lisa Stockwell]

This is one to print out and keep by the keyboard. Great thoughts. And reading your story of modeling in Japan made my Saturday morning. It brought back memories of my own start in advertising in the late '70s and the freedom we had, even in this country, to spend money on great creative. We had fun, which is really what I got from your story, even with the conflicts you acknowledged.

[David Meerman Scott]

Lisa, Glad that you liked my story! It was a fun adventure. I can imagine that ad work in the 70s was also an exciting time!

[Kristiana Almeida]

Hi there - thanks so much for mentioning the Red Cross blog post. We're certainly honored to be mentioned as an effective storyteller!

I did want to take a quick second to explain why we don't ask for money in most of our blog posts. Especially in these personal experience posts (this one was written by one of our communicators, Donna Morrissey), we like to view it as an opportunity for us to be sitting down in a comfy chair next to a friend. And after sharing a very personal story with your friend, it might be weird to change the the tone of the conversation and ask them for $20.

We try to find personal experiences from people across the country to help with the preparedness aspect of our mission. Humanizing aspects of our mission may make it easier for others to connect with us.

So while fundraising is important to our work, we recognize that making the ask isn't always the appropriate strategy.

Thanks again for the kind mention, and I hope this explanation sheds some additional light on our organizational storytelling philosophy.

[David Meerman Scott]

Hi Kristiana,

Many thanks for taking the time to comment.

I totally agree with your strategy. Too many people and organizations ask for money at inappropriate times.

Keep up the great work.

David

[Stephanie]

Love the audi advert, feel as though the "bravery" theme and tagline should be extended out amongst other story lines and therefore appeal to target audience who are likely to buy audis though?

[Nick]

Very nice post David! I can definitely agree that the way stories are portrayed through advertisements can play a huge impact on the impressions of the audience. However, it does not explain some advertisements which have no plot or reasoning e.g. some fashion ads like the Dolce and Gabbana ads - I guess it depends on your target audience and the method you need to use to glamorize your product.

[David Meerman Scott]

Nick, Yes there are some industries that are somewhat different. Fashion (indeed most luxury goods) are about image advertising.