Everyone has a story to tell. Brands too. And strong brands have leveraged storytelling to connect with their audience on an emotional level.
As a business owner, you must manage and align your brand with your business goals, target audience, and customer behavior. But even that is not possible without deliberate storytelling.
Wondering how to go about it? This article provides clarity and tips to help you understand and implement effective brand storytelling.
What is brand storytelling?
Brand storytelling is the process of using stories to connect with your audience and manage the meaning and feeling they associate with your brand. In other words, it is a way of emotionally transferring your brand’s vision through stories.
Every existing brand has a unique meaning or feeling associated with it. Even if a thousand brands operate in the same market, they will each be known for something unique. This is because their stories are different.
Companies like Coca-Cola, IKEA, Nike, and Adidas create an emotional connection with customers. This approach works because they’ve told their stories over time, often in the form of content, campaigns, and marketing materials.
Why is brand storytelling important for businesses?
Brand storytelling, when done well, causes a ripple effect. Below are some of its merits for business growth:
- It helps customers understand who you are and why you exist.
- It makes it easy to convey your brand message clearly.
- It helps you to establish a relationship with your customers.
- It attracts potential business opportunities and partners to your business.
- It increases brand awareness.
- It humanizes your brand, adding life to your business entity.
- It builds trust and credibility.
3 signs you’ve been doing brand storytelling the wrong way
Have you been making these brand storytelling mistakes?
- Putting your product at the center stage: You’ve built a great product, and your reputation precedes you. Yes, but people don’t care if what you do all day is harp on about your achievements and slam awards of your reputation on the table.
- Allowing customers to tell your story for you: Take control of your narrative, and don’t allow your customers to take charge of your storytelling. Unfortunately, they can develop a new story outside your scope, turning your brand into something entirely alien to you.
- Not doing anything internally to champion your brand’s story: Before going public, work on a consistent brand strategy or narrative. Make sure your entire team is on board with the brand story and vision.
Do not fret. As a business owner, it’s within your power to tell better stories for and about your brand. Here’s how to get started.
5 tips for effective brand storytelling
Here are some suggestions and tips to make your brand’s storytelling initiative more effective.
Identify your brand’s origin story
The origin story of your brand explores why it exists; a narrative showing what sparked the brand’s inception, where it is going, and why it’s doing what it’s doing.
Identifying and establishing your origin story helps you understand your brand’s positioning and align its essence with the vision, thereby telling your story from the inside out.
A brand with a captivating origin story is Airbnb, which went from roommates sharing a space to a global accomodation solution. On their “About Us” page, they take their customers on a journey from where they started and the motivations they’re running with to date.
Make your customers the hero of your story
Use the most popular storytelling framework, “The Hero’s Journey” to make your customers drive the central part of your story. Picture someone living an ordinary life, then one day, they begin an adventure, and they need a mentor (your business) to guide them through the journey.
Identify the fears, pains, and motivations of your ideal customer. Find out how they relate to your ‘why’ and how they consume content.
By knowing your audience, you can identify their struggles and lead them through transformation with your product. As Donald Miller of StoryBrand aptly put it: “Your brand is not the hero of the story. Your customer is.”
Grammarly’s “Write Like a Winner” campaign is a good example here. It shows an employee quarterbacking a project (adventure) whose deadline is looming (challenge). With Grammarly (the sage), she completed it in time and was celebrated by her colleagues. It is a typical heroic venture.
Create content that portrays the humanity of your brand
Businesses can fall into the rabbit hole of using marketing jargon and business speak, bombarding their audience with information overload. But stories? They cut through the noise.
Don’t just tell stories; design them with impact. Show people why they should care about your brand.
Patagonia, for example, does this well through the stories section on its website, which features the experiences of people challenging themselves to go out, explore nature, have adventures, and contribute to the planet.
So, regardless of what product or service your business offers, always find a human angle to tell your stories and share them with empathy. People react positively to stories when they can relate to them.
Make your brand and product part of the larger story.
You’ve established your customers as the heroes of your story. Now, you must infuse your brand and product into the big picture. Don’t harp on about your brand or product and how it’s the best out there. Make them a part of the larger story.
Show how your brand impacts people’s lives. Share what you envision your contribution to the world to be in the near future. Be aspirational, and make your customers see themselves in that future with you.
IKEA illustrated this perfectly with its “What If” campaign, which sold the company’s vision to its customers and showed how it could be a great player in the sustainability revolution.
Stay authentic and consistent
Customers can smell a lack of authenticity. Remain genuine in your communication and actions, aligning your messaging with your product and core values.
Also, customers love brands that always show up. Don’t start the journey with your heroes and leave them hanging on the way. Stay consistent both in the frequency of your customer engagement and delivery of your brand assets at various touchpoints.
Popular brands with great brand storytelling
If you want to get inspired by great brands who have aced brand storytelling, these three brands come to mind:
- Apple
- Coca-Cola
- Nike
Here’s how they aced the brand storytelling game.
Apple: Simplicity + Innovation
Over the years, Apple has gained a reputation as a marketing behemoth that strikes a deep connection with its customers through ads. From its popular “Think Different” campaign to “Silhouette” and “Photos Every Day,” Apple shows how it marries simplicity with innovation in its offerings.
One thing these ads have in common is that they didn’t sell any of Apple’s products directly. Instead, a lifestyle, showing their customers that they care.
Last year, Apple released an ad, “Mother Nature,” showcasing the company’s commitment to environmental sustainability and how it plans to bring its carbon footprints to zero by 2030 through…guess the word: INNOVATION.
Coca-Cola: The Taste of Happiness
Since the nineteenth century, Coca-Cola has consistently sold ‘happiness’ to the world through its products and stories.
The bottling and beverage company has used various versions of the hero’s journey in its ads to establish itself as a brand that cares about uniting people from all walks of life and taking them by the hand.
In 2018, for example, it released the “Sunset” ad, which follows a Muslim woman who missed her bus and was subject to discrimination as she walked through the city. In the end, a runner shares a bottle of Coke with her while accommodating her religious inclinations.
Nike: Just Do It
Nike is a footwear apparel company, but most of its customers see it as a partner in achieving their grandiose goals. The iconic Air Jordan commercial of 1999 is forever married to the idea of Nike.
This is a perfect example of making your brand and product a part of the larger story. Nike did not take up much space. Just enough to keep it top-of-mind for its customers, who are the real heroes—the people who want to Just Do It.
Take the bold step
Brand storytelling is the way to go if you want to connect to your values, direct your story, make your customers the hero, and show the empathic side of your brand.
But for your story to make an impact, you must connect with your audience or customers deeper than on a surface level.
At RoninPoint, we help brands tell their stories compellingly. Ready to take the bold step? Contact us today to run your brand story through all your marketing content.
Who wrote this?
Winifred Òdúnóku works professionally as a Content Writer and Brand Strategist. Outside work, she enjoys writing short stories and essays, where she explores different narrative styles in her writing.
With her passion for literature and publishing, she volunteers for literary magazines as a Reader and Editor.
