Are you telling stories? A vital X factor in your marketing efforts

A relatively new player pulled off a potentially risky storytelling marketing campaign in the late 2000s. Today, the campaign is a case study for marketing enthusiasts across all sectors because of its ‘X’ factor.?

In 2009, UK-based BGL Group’s insurance price comparison website - Compare The Market - began telling humorous stories from the perspective of an animated anthropomorphic Russian species meerkat. The meerkat was named Aleksandr Orlov as the sophisticated founder of the website comparethemeerkat.com. Many advertisements appeared on YouTube, television, and other video platforms about Orlov’s frustration over the confusion caused to his website by another website called comparethemarket.com.?

Each of those stories told in the adverts was funny, and managed to send across the message that "everybody was logging on to comparethemarket.com, but his website was comparethemeerkat.com - a dating, and socializing website for meerkats." Each story ended with Orlov explaining the difference, and ending his dialogue with "simples”.?

The company managed to generate a strong buzz about its brand through humorous storytelling, while creating the impression that they were already famous. As a result, the website became the fourth most visited insurance website in the UK in 2009, while their sales doubled at the end of the campaign.?

How does storytelling in marketing work?

# 1 Evokes the right feelings?

Customers don’t buy products or services, they buy the feeling that the said product or service evokes within them. Harvard Business School professor Gerald Zaltman, in his book, quotes a study that claims 75% of purchase decisions are subconscious , and therefore, customers are more likely to convert through emotion-driven campaigns. The emotions that the above company evoked were FOMO (fear of missing out), and many people logged on to their website out of curiosity.?

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# 2 Shows the ‘how’?

Of course, every marketing rep knows the importance of 'how'. But when the ‘how’ is presented in the form of a story, it has better retention, and can provoke action. In the case of content marketing, it takes the customer closer to a purchase decision.?

# 3 Does not feel like marketing?

You are now dealing with possibly the most aware set of customers with dwindling attention spans. They are discrete about the time and energy that they spend, and so in-your-face marketing naturally repels them. The one factor that still has the power to hold their attention is a good brand story that does not feel like marketing.?

How to tell great brand stories that work?

1 Reward the customer?

As we discussed above, the ‘how’ factor is everything in telling a brand story. But that ‘how’ needs to show what the customer will receive. A principle that all great storytellers follow is this - reward the reader/viewer/audience.?

Your target customers should feel rewarded at the end of the story in the form of -?

• a satisfactory solution, or?
• the value the product or service brings, or
• a discount code, or?
• a loyalty program, or?
• an exclusive access

2 Pack an emotional punch?

There’s no telling a story without emotion. Consciously list down the feelings that you would want your customers to get while watching the story.?

Get ideas from some of these ‘high-impact’ emotional motivators -?

• compare before and after using the product or service?
• evoke a sense of freedom?
• create a sense of well-being?
• tie the brand story to a social cause that affects your target customers, such as climate change, cleanliness, the environment, etc?
• infuse the self-improvement factor into the story?
• infuse the feeling of being special among customers, etc.
• create humour

3 The truth factor?

The story that you create may be fictional or a case study, but it should still tell the truth in terms of its message. Try not to not claim things your marketing team cannot pull off later. Be truthful to your brand, and the value it brings. Follow this principle in all your branding or digital marketing campaigns.?

4 Connect with the audience?

A Harvard Business Review study revealed that across a sample of nine industry categories, fully connected customers turned out to be 52% more valuable than those who were just satisfied with the product.??

This is how you can do that -?

• create the personas of your target customers?
• create a detailed persona for the protagonist of your brand story?
• identify core values relevant to your customers. For example, luxury brands target feelings of status, confidence, first impressions, etc.?
• speak their language, slang, or dialect?
• call them to act (urgently, and now).

Final thoughts?

In his New York Times bestseller ‘The Confident Speaker," Harrison Monarth has stated: "A story can go where quantitative analysis is denied admission: our hearts. Data can persuade people, but it doesn’t inspire them to act; to do that, you need to wrap your vision in a story that fires the imagination and stirs the soul."?

If you wish to infuse this ‘X’ factor into your digital marketing campaigns, do talk to us .?

#storytelling #marketing #users