Finding inspiration is crucial as an entrepreneur, and surrounding yourself with powerful movies and TV shows is a great way to do that. It’s easy to experience excitement, awe, and insight from their stories, because on-screen narratives are a multifaceted art form of visuals, sound, and performance.
After watching an incredible movie, it may even lead you to wonder, “Why can’t my marketing have a similar impact on my customers?”
Movies have a huge influence on the narratives we create, even in writing — but not everything works while transitioning your stories into writing, especially for marketing. If you want to tell your personal story in a compelling way, you have to step outside of yourself and put yourself in your customers’ shoes. Here are two main rules to guide you.
No. 1: Remember that customers don’t consume commercial content the same as other content — but you can still make a real impact.
If you’re looking to create a real impact with your customers, you can certainly utilize cinematic know-how to create impressive videos for your social media. You can write content that tells compelling, true stories about your product or service, and why it makes a difference.
However, if you don’t strategize on how to overcome your biggest challenges to impact customers, it will lead to disappointment — and your biggest hurdle is customer indifference.
According to a Havas Media Group survey, the majority of people worldwide wouldn’t care if 73% of brands disappeared tomorrow. Would people say the same about directors, actors, and artists? It’s hard to say, but we can assume there’s a reason why customers don’t care about a majority of brands. So why would customers care about you?
Coincidentally, we sometimes hear from prospective clients that they’re concerned about creating personal content for this very same reason. They recognize that customers aren’t expecting entertainment — customers mainly want companies to solve their problems. That’s true. However, customers also need reminders that they’ve made the right decision choosing you.
How does a customer know they’ve picked the best company, with the best product or services, with the best people? When you personally connect with your customers by telling your story, it’s not just about you — it’s about showing your reader that you care enough to be honest, whether you’re sharing expertise in your industry or in life.
So, tell your story. Storytelling content is a great way to educate a customer while establishing your own trustworthiness, quality of service, and creating rapport before you even officially meet your customer.
No. 2: When copywriting, fit a lot into a little for a cinematic effect.
You want to tell a story, but you want it to feel a little more cinematic and impactful. Okay, great! The first step is deciding where to start your story. Then, decide where to end your story. After you’ve decided those two things, it’s a lot easier to decide one of the most important steps for any storytelling marketer: How do you condense this story into its most true, impactful form?
You don’t need to change facts to create an impactful story, but you might be surprised how contemplating a story will evoke details that will make an impact. For example, let’s say you’re a dentist. You want to tell a story about a patient who suffered from terribly low self-esteem due to his teeth. Even though it’d cost a significant amount of money, he decided to trust you and your team to fix his smile. And it all worked out! He became a loyal patient with a handsome smile.
A reader doesn’t need multiple paragraphs to understand that story, but you can still bring them into the story by bringing them into certain moments. What details do you remember about the day he first came in? What details do you recall about the day he left, happy and smiling?
Instead of saying, “He left with a handsome smile,” you could say, “He left our office with a stunning smile — as if it were the first day of a brand-new life. It made me proud to be a dentist.” You could also choose to include details about the scenery or weather that day, like, “He left our office with a stunning smile. It was raining, but, with that smile, nobody would know there’s a cloud in the sky!” It’s a flattering, narrator-like observation that perfectly expresses someone’s pride in their work. Even for a reader with a short attention span, these little, powerful observations into your story will create a more vivid, impactful, cinematic-like effect.
We hope these tips help your team with your storytelling content, whether for your print newsletter campaign or beyond! Have any storytelling questions for us? We’d love to hear them! Don’t hesitate to reach out to our team thepros@newsletterpro.com or post your question in the comments below!
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