Reading Time: 2 minutes In a world of choice, it’s tempting to retouch your brand story to make it more appealing.
Tag: storytellers
Layering your story
Reading Time: < 1 minute In this presentation from last year I talk about how great stories are structured and about the power of the nutshell of truth that lives at the centre of a great story. I show how changing just one word of that kernel can have dramatic effects. Towards the end of the excerpt I touch on […]
Brands as extended storylines
Reading Time: 3 minutes The temptation when you’re working with a brand is to continue to treat it just as a product or service. It’s simpler to do so. It’s contained. You can add features to it or introduce a variation to it. But I’ve wondered aloud with marketers in the past whether treating a brand as the personification […]
Declaration: Step 5 in building a purposeful culture
Reading Time: 2 minutes At some point, a culture that is serious about what it intends must put those intentions in writing. That’s about a lot more than documentation. Declaring what you come to work for collectively amounts to a commitment. So many companies squander this opportunity in my view. They market what is happening rather than explaining it. […]
Branding behaviours not just products
Reading Time: 4 minutes Dr Gerrard Gibbons once shared this wonderful insight: “Every day, brands make bets on human behaviour”. He’s absolutely right – but it’s a confronting thought because, at first airing, it puts so much of what marketers do at risk and beyond our control.
Who’s your brand story working for?
Reading Time: 3 minutes Some marketers like to work forwards. Advertisers for example often tell a story and then wait to gauge the reaction they get. Direct marketers on the other hand start by quantifying a reaction (in the form of a return) and then craft a story to generate that response. What I’ve been discussing recently is whether […]
Tell all your brand’s stories
Reading Time: 4 minutes Marketers often talk about story as if it is one thing. But brands with multiple stakeholders need to cater for different responses and priorities by streaming a range of stories to a range of audiences at different times. The reason is simple. The things that make a brand attractive in one context are different from […]
Could CMOs be doing more with stories?
Reading Time: 3 minutes Marketers are busy talking up the value of telling the stories of their brands. But why aren’t more organisations structuring their own strategies and issues as stories, and what role are marketers taking in making that happen?
How to avoid short-selling your brand story
Reading Time: < 1 minute I’m dismayed by how frequently the conversation around content seems to devolve to quantity and tactics. That’s hardly surprising in some ways because of course the two are quickly linked. When everyone’s using the same tactics, quantity starts to look like the only differentiator.
Unlock a competitive brand story
Reading Time: 3 minutes Everyone has a story now. Or at least most brands claim to have one. But having a story in many ways is like having a product. Really it means nothing if it is not competitive as a narrative and personally relevant to each recipient. So your story must be distinctive from the other stories that […]
Should your brand tell a counter-story?
Reading Time: 3 minutes Stories add to the humanity of brands. They help consumers think through and act upon a narrative that is fundamentally rooted in human truths. Stories generate empathy. We see ourselves in the tale. Or we see a side of ourselves. Or we see the ‘me’ that we would like to be. Without that narrative, everything […]
Brands and history
Reading Time: 3 minutes Everyone loves a good story, and the critical strength of heritage brands is that they have such stories in abundance. Little wonder then that as American consumer confidence starts to look up, the brands that remind consumers of what they have, where they are and where they’ve come from are doing well. It’s a timely […]