Storytelling: Strategy & Tips
I’m a photographer, a writer, a videographer – I’m a storyteller, and I seek collective effervescence as I listen to understand those that tell me their stories so I can capture it.
Storytelling: Strategy & Tips
I’m a photographer, a writer, a videographer – I’m a storyteller, and I seek collective effervescence as I listen to understand those that tell me their stories so I can capture it.
Storytelling in the marketing industry is a bit different than telling a story at a party. In my industry, I have been entrusted with telling someone else’s story and I have ensured that it will reach the intended audience to produce a certain outcome. To do this well, I have to commit to understanding the message by actively listening. I can tell you from experience, when you truly listen to someone’s story and understand them, whether a friend, client, content expert, or stranger, it’s an emotional experience. That’s why advertisements that include a story, like Nike’s remarkable female athletes or the Budweiser Clydesdales tug at your heartstrings and make you feel connected. People have a deep need to be understood and storytellers have a deep need to understand.
Before I can retell that story, I must adequately know my audience and dive into market research and analysis. By conducting research and analysis I am able to see audience patterns, know where to find them, and get a better sense of how to tell them this story – a story they must hear. I do this roughly at first through analytics, but primarily, secondary research avenues give me insight to actionably get to know my audience. Such as surveys and interviews. Surveys are fragments of a story I get to understand and draw conclusions from. While interviews are an insightful time to ask questions and to actively listen again. Then using all that data, I develop an empathic strategy to form a message and target the audience.
There are a lot of marketing tips out there on SEO, but I’m a storyteller and I tend to focus on the psychology behind forming an empathic message that will reach the intended audience. Depending on who that audience is, I may spend some time looking into personas to gain perspective. But no matter the audience, the bulk of my time is spent in consideration of my audience to ensure I make the connection. Like we said earlier, people have a need to be understood and when people hear a story that is relatable to them, they will listen. So, by placing the relevant material in front of them I can spark a movement, inspire commitment, and evoke buy in. Fortunately for me, most of the stories I get to tell are beyond worthy of telling, they are educational, interesting, and I hope they create a space for continued conversations to make for deeper connections.
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Keywords
- Photoshop
- Video
- Video Editing
- Video Production
- Storytelling
- Photography
- Videography