Why Storytelling Should Be Part of Your Strategy

Storytelling is one of the easiest ways to humanize your brand. Telling stories that are engaging, authentic, and relatable will help your brand resonate with audience members.

Stories have always been a useful tool to help make a point. Remember the fables you read and listened to as a child? The Tortoise and The Hare teaches children the importance of patience, which is not the most interesting lesson to learn. Children continue to learn this lesson largely because the storytelling component has made an impression on them. Your brand can make this same impression by telling compelling stories as well.

With the advancement of technology, people have gained the ability to skip through messages they do not wish to see. Ad blockers are frequently used, ad skipping options are available on video, and click-through rates are at an all-time high. Audiences only view what interests them. Storytelling gives brands the opportunity to reach audiences with stories that matter and make an impact.

When choosing which stories to tell, it is important to remain personal. What stories explain your brand and what it stands for? What stories resonate with those in your target audience? Cater your messages with these questions in mind.

Typically, storytelling increases brand recall. Audience members identify more strongly with a story being told rather than numbers and marketing jargon being thrown at them. Think about Super Bowl advertisements you’ve seen in the past few years. Which advertisements stuck out the most? Odds are the ones that told a story.

Listed below are some excellent examples of storytelling advertisements:

Anheuser-Busch tells a story with no frills. There are no voiceovers or explanations. The story still made an impact on viewers, causing quite a stir before it even aired during the 2017 Super Bowl.

Google defies preconceived notion about what its technology is capable of with this moving advertisement. The only way the brand is advertised is through the logo being visible during several different actions in the video.

Dove’s long-running Real Beauty campaign has been extremely successful—it has been running for years and is still going strong. With over 67 million views, this particular video has been one of the most popular throughout the campaign.