3 Essential Elements of a Great Story for B2B Marketers

Storytelling is an excellent strategy to attract people’s attention. Everyone enjoys stories, especially when they give you some experience, something to believe in, when they make you feel better and even wiser.

Telling your brand’s story is an essential component of the overall inbound marketing strategy. It’s different than the news you write on your website, your blog, or social media. It’s your strongest tool to get closer to the audience and to share your company values and mission. Storytelling is also a way of creating alignment between your business, your prospects and customers.

Storytelling is about standing out in the overcrowded information marketplace. That is why the best story should be interesting for the audience and should respond to their needs or concerns. Offering advice, help or guidance creates more trust and better interaction. If you change the way your prospects think or feel, be sure that your story has its effect on their minds.

What do you need to make your brand story appealing and remembered?

Follow a simple questions scheme:

– Why are you doing what you’re doing?

– How will this help your audience?

– What are you offering?

And use the three essential elements – characters, conflict, and resolution.

Your story could consist of one or several characters. You should share to the audience about people involved in it. To make sure you’re focusing on the right characters, start with your buyer persona. This semi-fictional representation of your ideal buyer can help guide you to understanding the goals and challenges that your character will face.

1. Characters

Using the first-person point of view in storytelling (“I saw this” or “I learned that”) sounds more confessional. Being the real author staying behind the content makes it easier to establish a personal connection with the reader.

If you decide the character to be your audience, you should use second-person point of view: “You will see” or “you will learn”. Using “you” language shows empathy and understanding of your buyer personas’ concerns.

Buyer persona could potentially benefit from a story done in the third-person (“He said”, “She saw”). You can use case studies about your customers as a good example.

2. Conflict

Remember, when it comes to content marketing and storytelling the power is in what you are teaching. Conflict helps build developmental and emotional dynamics. It helps make a connection between two entities, and human-to-human connections are the foundation for a successful business.

Remember, you’re dealing with people, not machines – your company should provide answers, relieve stress, create happiness, and make life easier for the end user. The revenue your company has to come from a well-thought business plan and customers who believe in you and what you do.

Be genuine. The conflict should drive the overall story and affect how characters react. This is what should inspire your audience to engage. Make sure the conflict fits your prospect’s problems, needs, or stage of the buyer’s journey.

3. Resolution

Where there’s conflict, there should be a sort of resolution, as well. The reader always expects to hear what’s the end of the story. That’s the best moment to call your audience to action which is actually the purpose of your story.

Before start writing your story try to be specific. Define your correct audience niche, keep your text sincere and concise, find the human element of your brand, think about how your company or product can make people’s lives better and choose a kind of character you will use. The more prospects recognise themselves as characters in your story, the more grows the chance to like your product or service and to buy it at the end. A nice and relevant picture or a video is always a good idea, which would make your story more effective. This is the model which successful companies such as Apple, Google, Nike, AirBnb, Lego, P&G and others apply to create emotions and achieve better interaction between their brand and the customers.

source – http://bit.ly/2tjOh6i