Storytelling: Turn the Buzzword into Your Sword

— Here, a little mosquito will bite you a bit, bzz, and done! — The doctor said to 5-year-old me during the vaccination.

Back then, I didn’t understand it was a kind of storytelling and it worked to comfort me. Even now, I kindly ask for the same trick at the hospital.

Doctors, parents, priests, teachers — all people around us, including us, have been using storytelling since ancient times. In recent years it became a buzzword, a must-have, a trendy trend to follow. And yet, it’s often unclear what it is, and how one can use storytelling to the good without extra time spent on studying and honing the skills. 

To me, storytelling is about what and how you tell whatever you feel like sharing.

In this article, I’ll suggest ideas and give specific examples from the presentations I created. They can be utilized within a larger context of talks, dialogues, blog posts, even newsletters, to help you deliver your ideas faster and more efficiently.

Why do I need storytelling at all?

It’s not fair to limit telling stories to those in marketing or communications. To explain what happened, people created cave paintings, stone sculptures, and carved wood, much before the digital age began.

In short, everyone can use storytelling in one way or another. All you need is you and someone to listen to you. Don’t tell a story for the sake of being cool and trendy, but to turn “me & them” into “us”. Here’re three ways this can happen:

• Help them remember what you said. We live in an era when we’re constantly bombarded with new information. To stand out, you need to be memorable. The good story makes an impression and ensures further recalling the content of your speech.
• Make your talk relatable and human. Numbers and bullets may add credibility, but they don’t establish an emotional connection with your audience. Humans prefer humans who are at least somehow similar to them. Stories help to convey how alike you are.
• Show that you care about them. The well-structured presentation that is easy to follow and digest is a sign of respect. When you explain a difficult topic with examples and break it into chunks, you assist your audience and facilitate understanding.

How to come up with the story?

To some people it comes naturally, others might struggle more. In my previous article, I explained the approach of loading all your thoughts on sticky notes and organizing them. I believe it’s a good method to start with.

Once you wrote down everything you had in mind, go for a run, talk to friends about your ideas, take a bath, or walk your dog. New ideas often appear when you’re relaxed and don’t expect them. You can later come back to the board and recheck your notes.

Besides, you may also stimulate your imagination by visiting a gallery or a museum, speaking to a stranger, traveling, and even social media browsing. It’s OK if it takes time to think of a story. Step by step, storytelling can become a habit.

What exactly can I tell about?

Whether you got lost in the options and possibilities or keep blankly staring at the empty piece of paper with zero thoughts — it’s fine. You don’t need to create high-fidelity storyboards, be artistic or too detailed. A story can last for 30 seconds and still reach the goal.

Let me walk you through the three most common themes I usually use when adding storytelling elements to the talk. I’ll give two explained examples to each of them.

1. Describe the process.

a). The first approach is to talk about the process of your work. Show the effort behind the polished solution, explain the complexity and the trade-offs you made.

For example, here’re the slides from our team presentation based on the metaphor of The Three Little Pigs story. We framed the speech as a tale and this gave us space to fit the design thinking process in between.

b). The second approach is useful if your idea implies several steps, or you want to explain how your product works. Then, you may walk the audience through the process and progressively provide more details. 

For instance, check out our team’s service explanation with Francesco Duc’s illustrations. To introduce an unfamiliar concept to the audience, we walked them through each step.

2. Focus on people.

a). Help them empathize with your target audience profile. Build bridges by telling about someone people can relate to on a personal level. We are all humans, and we’re used to heroes in books, movies, and gossips.

To illustrate, here’s a slide from the pitch deck. PopOut savings club show they know the daily worries of the people they work for. I selected the photo that reflects their actual audience, not the stocky fancy image.

b). Highlight the ways people use your product. Especially, if something memorable or worth sharing happened with the help of your solution. However, it can also be a thing that effectively solves everyday issues.

As an example, my client from Pixomatic shared the case when the artwork created with their app went viral. We supported the story with the screenshots of the actual tweet & the wiki page of the author.

3. Illustrate with the analogy.

a). Compare with something people already know. Most likely, your audience watched The Lion King, heard of Harry Potter, and saw Apple products in their life. Use this, yet beware of the cultural context, keep your references simple and suitable.

E.g., my client talked about Nokia and Kodak to call attention to the importance of developing the core business to avoid failures.

b). Share possibly unfamiliar, yet curious stories. If you know some appropriate cases from books or history, use them to your advantage. Always check the facts before stating, and mention the sources.

For example, that’s how my client demonstrated the point of failing to achieve the goal in a direct way but succeeding in an oblique way. He explained how the shortest connection between the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans was found: by gold diggers, not discoverers like Columbus.

The endnotes: but what if?...

The audience is important, but you also should remember to take care of yourself. Whether you wish to experiment or stay on the safe side with the storytelling, check for the next signs:

• If you rehearse your speech and feel like the story won’t fit. It’s okay not to include it. Don’t try to justify your message-heavy talk by sneaking in bits of storytelling when it simply doesn’t work.
• If you don’t have enough time to tell a story. Ditch it, follow “content first” philosophy and don’t forget that stories only help to emphasize the core idea.
• If you don’t really have a story. You don’t need to mask your ideas with something artificial. Most likely, the characters and plots won’t come real and appeal to the audience. 

Whenever you decide to describe the process, focus on people, illustrate with the analogy, or go your own way, remember this:

Please, don’t tell stories for the sake of stories.

Make a point, deliver your message, share the idea, give people food for thought or a reason to smile — and be sure your story makes sense within the larger context of the conversation.

If you are like many people, you want to get your ideas out there. If you would like me to help you structure the information and polish the visuals, write at [email protected]. Let’s chat about your goals and discover how I can help you achieve them.