Your Story Is Not Simply A Marketing Tool - Use It To Grow Your Business
The importance of storytelling has been talked about in relation to marketing for quite a while now, however, don’t think of it as just a marketing tool – it can be used in so many other ways to grow your business.
I want to share with you how you can make your story more relevant, i.e., how it should be structured, and then look at how it can be applied to the key areas of your business. These areas can be subjective and so I’ve used the seven key elements identified in The McKinsey 7S model, one of my favourite MBA tools.
As I’ve already said, storytelling has been a priority for marketers for some time. An article on forbes.com, written in July 2018 gives three reasons why storytelling should be a priority for marketers.
Structure Your Story Correctly
Of course, storytelling is a great way to engage an audience, however, to use it most effectively, the structure of the story needs to resonate with those hearing the story that’s being told.
In any good story, there are characters. A common mistake made by many businesses is that they cast themselves as main character, or ‘hero’ of the story.
Donald Miller is his book Building a Story Brand, talks about the structure of every story following a pattern – a character facing a problem is getting nowhere until a guide shows up, gives them a plan, and then calls them to action. That action helps them avoid failure and leads to success.
In positioning your business as the guide, you can give your customers a plan, and then call them to action so they go from where they are now to where they want to be.
The Key Elements of a Business
The seven key elements are commonly known as the McKinsey 7 ‘S’ model, comprising 3 ‘hard’ elements – Strategy, Structure and Systems, 3 ‘soft’ elements – Staff, Skills and Style, all of which revolve around the 7th element ‘Shared Values’.??
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Here’s how I think your story, so long as the characters are cast correctly, can be linked to these elements to grow your business.
Strategy is the plan you have for building and maintaining a competitive advantage over your competitors. It is my view that the best competitive advantage any organisation can have is communication. Communication is at the heart of any good relationship. The way you communicate as a business with your stakeholders, if done correctly, will demonstrate to them why they should do business with you or work for you. Your story can be repeated in both your marketing, your Mission Statement, and communications (as opposed to communication!).
The Structure element of the model relates to how your company is organised. How divisions, departments and teams are structured. Organisations that are not structured in a way that is conducive to either good customer service or good management and leadership will often experience a high turnover of both customers and staff. When your story is continually reinforced to your people by their managers, they will understand why the business exists and that they are part of the business. When people know the Mission of the business and the part they play in achieving the mission, the organisation is more likely to achieve it.?
Your Systems are the daily activities and procedures your staff use to do their job. If created in the right way, they will put your ideal customer at the heart of everything you or your people do. I like to think if the activities and procedures of proof that the organisation does see it’s customer as the hero. Every activity and procedure should though support both the ‘Hero’ and the ‘Guide’. This means that the story is going to have a happy ending for both.?
Style relates not only to the style in which your staff behave, but also, more importantly to the style of leadership adopted. An organisation that sees its role as a guide to its customers is likely to have a very different focus tom one that sees itself as the most important party in the relationship. In my view, an organisation that is driven by a strong ‘Why’ will always be more successful than one that is simply chasing income. The style of your business comes from within and so the way your senior management team leads the organisation will determine the way everyone else acts.
Your Staff are the employees and contractors you retain to deliver the products and services your business sells. Attracting and retaining the best staff will often provide a competitive advantage that your competitors will find hard to match. As humans, we like to be part of something. If that something is a story, we need to know the role we play. The role can be ‘scripted’ in the form of a Position Agreement which specifies the result we are expected to achieve, the tasks we need to complete to achieve the result and the standards we are expected to maintain in conducting our duties. ?
Skills are relatively self-explanatory in that they relate to the actual skills and competencies of the people within the organisation. Conducting a regular skills ‘audit’ should highlight any gaps that exist within the organisation. These can then be dealt with by either training or recruiting new employees with the skills required. If for example, your organisation prides itself on its customer service, you will want to ensure you know how customers want to contact you and ensure you have the expertise within the business to meet their expectations.
Finally, the thing that every other element revolves around – Shared Values. These are the core values of the organisation and reflect its general work ethic. This is where your story really comes into its own. The Mission Statement and Guiding Principles for the organisation are going to be integral to making the story a reality. Your Mission Statement, the reason why you exist as an organisation, needs to be memorable and ideally communicate an abbreviated version of your story. The guiding principles for the organisation will highlight the key characteristics of your people, their values, and the critical actions they need to do to deliver the story.
I hope this article has been helpful in not only applying your story to the key areas of your business, but in how to cast the characters of your story in the correct roles.
If you position your organisation in a way that shows your customers how you can help to make the lives of your customers better and your people understand the part they play in making this happen, your story will always have a happy ending.?
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