There are so many inspiring movies that show the art of storytelling in business, and… eventually, businesses started using the art of storytelling to help their customers?
Why are some businesses more successful than others even if they too offer “fries with their burger?”
Here’s why; why do digital marketers love to shop at Holland & Barratt’s I was asked once jokingly? Because they have a lot of organic content!
In case you are wondering or didn’t pick up the ambiguity in the above question and answer, then, let me explain it. Every founder of a business (in a business context) has stories over time on their failures and successes around the business/trade they are currently in. These stories make a business unique over the risks they have taken over time that has worked for them, and as the years of business grow the more stories are created.
Imagine! Imagine if we all had no story to tell, no risk we’ve ever taken, never failed never succeeded, then we all would be doing what? Imagine buying the same product, the same innovation over and over again without any progress in advancing the product or the innovation? There would be no technology companies, there would be no competition, there would just be the base line. Imagine if we had no reviews, how would we remain unique, how would we know the customer’s point of view/story, how would we become a business that could be or do any better at what we presume we are offering to help our customers with?
Holland & Barrett is a chain of health food shops with over 1300 stores in 16 countries with their products being mostly natural and organic or at least the majority of what they sell. One could say that The Body Shop is one of their competitors, or even iHerb when it comes to edible health products.
Did you watch Jerry Maguire or the pursuit of happyness? I am sure you have your own movies that come to mind, even books that you might have read. In both the movies mentioned here, there is the business owner, employee, customer and the desire to transition to a better life. This is why the art of storytelling in business relates, especially to the person/audience looking for the solution or a better solution.
The purpose of artfully telling a story in business
Getting better over time and mastering the art of storytelling in business requires the content writer to know the product/s and the solutions they provide to the audience looking for the solution. The combination of the right wording and selected keywords using search engine optimization can help reach the audience looking for the solution ideally choosing your solution; your product/s or your company.
The art of storytelling in business allows the audience to relate to their pain points even using facts and figures to help the potential buyer or to convince the buyer that the solution is the one that will solve their pain, genuinely solve it.
When a business aims at genuinely solving the consumer’s pain points artfully using storytelling in business along with other ways in which they may reach their potential buyers this is when the customer chooses that business’ solution over all other solutions that may be presented to them thereafter because their search for their pain has ended either temporarily or permanently. This is when a brand grows, this is where brand loyalty is observed.
The art of storytelling in business helps make the story of the business different, unique and even stand out from other businesses as time goes by. Depending on how transparent the business wishes to be or how unique it is the customer that goes through the journey with the business can either tell a negative story or a positive story as the customer has their journey so does the business. Whom the business forms an alliance with, who they support, do they help the economy, does it help the community, is it an inspirational brand that lives up to good values and morals, these are just some other elements that consumers and loyal consumers lookout for or become a fan of over time; all these little stories and steppingstones over time is what makes a brand reputable and strong. The willingness of the company to share their stories in an engaging way to the audience helps the business be found not only via the internet, television, social media but by word of mouth. The consumer won’t likely buy the product because of the price or the quality of the brand, they will purchase it because there was a strong deep connection formed by knowing, liking and trusting the brand/business/product.
The art of storytelling in business allows the customer to feel the company, brand, or product without a very salesy push instead via a genuine story that the consumer can relate to that convinces, persuades, inspires, makes aware, motivates, influences consumer behaviour.
Market trends shift, consumer behaviours change, circumstances are always present and with consistent artful storytelling, the business slowly gains the trust of the consumers.
The art of storytelling in business has to be intentional taking the stages of the customer journey into account while optimizing the right keywords within the content so that the writer can attract their audience genuinely to their proposition through the content.
The art of storytelling in business should include the main and final intent of the reason that the content was created; to include the unique value proposition (UVP) in the buyer’s journey using storytelling art in business to genuinely serve the customer in helping them have convincing reasons as to why they should choose that particular product or company for their solution.
Understanding where the customer is at in their journey can help formulate the argument using emotions, facts, pain points and reviews to make a compelling reason for the consumer to have all their reasons or doubts dissolved so that they could choose your company or product and be satisfied that it does what it’s been created to do.
The customer journey can have 9 stages if one wishes to break the stages down for targeting specifically however to me in a nutshell there are 4 stages.
The stages that should follow in the art of storytelling in business are as follows:
Awareness
Early on in the planned content that will be set out for the business’ blog, or magazine awareness of the consumer’s situation should come across, be felt through emotion and the solution to the consumer’s problem should be described through awareness of the company/brand or product that is being delivered. This is a very important part of the art of storytelling in business because there are just as many people in the world who don’t know they have a “problem” unless they are made aware of the problem through awareness. As the content/story becomes more relatable or similar to their own this will result in the potential customer sticking around to find what solution is being offered. A business/brand is likely to lose the consumer’s interest quickly if the content isn’t interesting, informative and engaging with the potential buyer, which then leads to the engagement stage.
Engagement
At this stage, of the content the brand/company is funnelling the consumer down to the engagement stage where the consumer makes a small commitment by entering their details through a squeeze page, or subscription so that they can access more information for free that may convince them of the solution of their problem. Once convinced, persuaded, motivated or even inspired the consumer will take action which leads to the next stage of the marketing funnel, conversion.
Conversion
At this stage the consumer has made a bigger commitment through their time and money. They have purchased the product or the solution the company had offered.
Retention
At this stage of the marketing funnel the consumer becomes a loyal customer to the brand/company or product and as long as the product or services keeps its promise to resolve the consumer’s issue and keep the customer happy it is likely that the business will grow due to positive reviews and recommendations.
Storytelling weaves through both the customer and the company’s journey and over time if the business is doing things right for their customers the more stories there are to tell.
You know, I really wanted to add a piece of how to create artful storytelling in business but I rather leave it to Bronwyn Fryer – Storytelling that moves people – Harvard Business Review as this is by far the best advice I have read to businesses and writers that inspired me in a very long time since the time my English teacher taught me Literature.
After reading the Harvard Business Review article above, I bet now you know why Romeo and Juliet didn’t handle things better!
Lucky Shakespeare didn’t write a prequel to Hamlet I could just see it being called Piglet!
You can also have a look at The art of storytelling short video.
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In the next article, I will be going into the elements of storytelling.
Yours sincerely
T. Dench Patel
