This ad is a good example of an organization showing how it can change your life without ever talking about the mechanics of what it does. Please watch this story and then go through the reflections below. What is in your organization’s box? 23andMe is a saliva collection kit (can you feel the romance?). You never hear those words in the commercial. While 23andMe has a very real box for its customers, your organization may have a figurative box. Either way, you need to know…
Sometimes, silence is golden. A week ago, I was lucky enough to work with an organization changing the game for young people through mentorship. I taught a workshop for a dozen of its advocates and every story they created was genuine and impressive. Some stories were worth shouting from the rooftops but some they shouldn’t even whisper. Why not? Story, vision, and data are besties who should never fight. It’s so simple you might take it for granted. Every story you tell about…
It’s funny how we forget that we are not an entity (i.e., the business) talking to another entity (i.e, the market). Nor are we computers. We are humans talking to humans. Like Cameron Uganec said: When your colleagues ask you about a conference you attended or about how you spent your weekend, you don’t start with facts and figures…the number of people you met, the number of beers you drank or the amount of time you slept. You tell them stories. What you care about…
Oh, Kevin Spacey. He did it again. He gave a speech and the audience was smitten. At Content Marketing World in Cleveland, Ohio, he talked about how conflict and authenticity are essential to good stories. Agreed. My favorite point, however, applies to the world of marketing: “The audience doesn’t care about the platform—they care about the content.” Heck yeah. So many clients get excited about podcasts, billboards, Twitter, etc. as if those tools make their messages more intriguing. Create some good content, choose the…
My friend, Kim Ervin, turned me on to this great NPR story, Why Your Brain Wants To Help One Child In Need — But Not Millions, by Shankar Vedantam. Please give it a listen. A story about an individual victim affects us emotionally. But a million people in need speaks to our head, not our heart. “As the numbers grow,” [Psychologist Paul Slovic of the University of Oregon] explains, “we sort of lose the emotional connection to the people who…
Have you noticed that the word “story” has become a buzzword? Every few days, I hear someone use the word “story” when he or she is actually describing something else. Stories have their own requirements, benefits, and effects, which are not better or worse than other mechanisms. But to share something other than a story, you need different components. You also get different results. Story is just one way to structure content First, let’s look at the classic—the story. A…
We’ve talked about naming relationships in stories, creating obstacles, telling our own stories, and how to walk your talk. Now, in the fifth entry of our series about storytelling, let’s talk about combining story with data for maximum effect. The “two” in your one-two punch Many of us think data are king. Numbers seem like an objective, universal language. We may even believe that opening with data makes us instantly credible and our requests impossible to deny. What this assumption…