Narrative… It ain’t what you do, it’s the why you do it.
Every great love song that was ever written (ever) was about the start or the end of a relationship (although, I have it on good faith that T-Pau’s ‘China in Your Hands’ was based on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein). Frédéric Chopin (he played the piano) was famously quoted saying “Nothing is more odious than music without hidden meaning.”. What’s my point? Where am I taking you with such a random, tenuous, keyword barren introduction? Well, I’ll tell you. ‘Backstory’. ‘Substance’. ‘Meaning’.
If you’re still with me, what I’m trying to say is that your brand should also have meaning, a back story or at the very least a reason for your existence. In the context of branding, story-telling (your brands narrative) is one of the most overlooked and yet powerful ways to engage with your audience.
Charities are waist deep in narrative
If you’re a charity then your brand narrative will be evident from the get-go as it’s your calling, purpose, and drive that will be clear and ever-present in everything you do. Kudos and respect to you my friend. Charities are the easiest people to work with from a branding perspective as their proposition, audience, and purpose are very clear. And they all have stories. Great stories. Stories about success, challenges, heroes, and villains. Hands down, they have brand narrative in spades.
For the rest of us, bringing substance to our glossy brand facade is generally something that’s overlooked as part of a branding strategy. Actually, ‘strategy’ possibly isn’t the best choice of words. Your brand narrative isn’t something that should be fashioned or fabricated, it’s something that’s brought center stage and into the limelight. Your narrative should emerge on stage with a magnificence that would make Gene Simmons topple off his heels.
Your narrative should emerge on stage with a magnificence that would make Gene Simmons topple off his heels.
For some companies, narrative is the strongest, single most valuable and differentiating aspect of their brand, winning hearts and minds with clever, engaging story-telling. And these brand stories shouldn’t just exist to be told, with social platforms such as Twitter and Instagram stories can be acted out, continued or retold.
The essence of storytelling, therefore, is not to make your brand the hero of the story, but to give your customer the leading role. Your brands’ story can evolve over time and don’t be surprised if your audience takes it places you’d never anticipated. Social media is an uncontrollable, unpredictable, and scary beast.
The ultimate aim of any brand’s narrative is to give its audience a gut feeling. Even the most carefully crafted brand guidelines would fail to prescribe specific measurements or recipes that will deliver your brand with an exacting emotional punch. Your brand guidelines no longer tell your customers who you are — it’s your customers who will ultimately shape and define your brand through their conversations and actions.
Narrative, storytelling — it’s so, so very powerful. You have one. Find it. Use it. Keep it truthful, genuine, and transparent. One way to think about how to deliver your narrative would be to imagine preparing to be interviewed by a journalist looking for that inside story on your brand. So give them some headlines.
Simply put — keep it simple
All the best stories are based on a very simple premise. I’m amazed to this day they made eight movies about a boy who wanted to become a wizard. So maybe structure your story on a tried and tested plot formulas: Good vs evil, Love found, lost (and then found), David and Goliath, The Quest, etc, you get the idea. If you’ve literally lost the plot then you could use Lester Dent’s Plot formula as an inspiration.
Keep it sincere and genuine
People can smell insincerity a mile off. Keep your brand’s story truthful, honest and transparent. It’s much harder to keep a lie going than the truth and sooner or later the pieces of your story will be such a mess that even the writers of ‘Lost’ would struggle to nit them believably together.
Change your perspective
It’s not all about you. Make your customers the subject or heroes of your story. Identify with them, show empathy, respect and create a connection on a sincere level through sharing stories.
Conflict, obstacles and challenges
Telling stories around obstacles that may manifest in either your business or your customers’ life is one way to build a genuine connection. All charity brands are aware of the power of storytelling in this context. Personal transformations and triumphs make great motivational stories and are by their very nature wholesome, empathic, and honest.
What did you learn (that could easily have been learned elsewhere)?
People don’t relate to services or products, only to brands, the way they walk and talk. Your narrative is what ultimately brings your brand community together through their conversation and actions.
So find your brand story. Keep it honest, but above all make sure it’s engaging and meaningful. And as Taylor Swift would say:
…the fakers gonna fake, fake, fake, fake, fake
Baby, I’m just gonna shake, shake, shake, shake, shake
References
Lester Dent (1904–1959) was a prolific pulp fiction author of numerous stories, best known as the main author of the series of stories about the superhuman character, “Doc Savage.”
