7 Tips to Promote Your Brand with Engaging Storytelling

At the heart of effective brand building will always be engaging storytelling. Consumers will struggle to build affinity with a product or company, but a great story can help solidify certain qualities that the brand represents. Whether it is a commercial, a social media campaign, or a print advertisement, there are ways to use storytelling to convey a strong identity. up.

Assuming you already have a business and product to offer, the following storytelling tips can be used to develop your brand.

Think About Your Hook

A good story will contain a hook that draws people into the narrative. Across all types of media, people are attracted to stories of underdogs and triumphs over adversity. Another common story is of a journey or quest to achieve a major goal. Alternatively, adding some humor can work, with a strange situation or a happy accident that helped in the building of your business.

Study Different Sources

There are really only a limited number of broad narratives you can use, but they can be shaped with their own characteristics. Studying a variety of sources, including similar brands, television shows, movies, and novels, will uncover a host of ideas you can adapt. Your story should be personal and unique, but don’t be afraid to draw inspiration from established sources.

Develop Personality

Personality is integral to brand development, with customers reluctant to trust a faceless organization. A brand does not have to be built around an individual person, but an ethos, identity, or outlook can give something to believe in. In many cases, though, the company founder may have an interesting story that can be developed. Many established brands are associated with founders who are no longer involved in the company, but the story still resonates with audiences.

Target Different Media

There are numerous outlets for promoting your brand, so look to tailor the message for the specific platform. Videos can tell a longer story, making use of narrative, visuals, and slogans. Social media and print ads have less space to tell a story, but you can still achieve a lot in an image. Various aspects, including color, font, logo, and design, all convey something to the viewer, so look to develop styles and threads that can run through all your promotional work.

Look for Authenticity

Inventing a compelling story might sound like an option, but this will lead to problems. A false story will eventually be found out as your brand grows, but most audiences can sense a problem before this happens. Look for authenticity in your storytelling, avoiding a disconnect between the company and the message. Of course, your story will need to be crafted for it to become memorable, but at its core it should be authentic.

Avoid Overt Marketing

There are occasions, such as a promotion on a shopping channel, where heavily promoting products will work. However, where you are attempting to build your brand over the long term, avoiding overt marketing will prove more successful. Focusing on the story of your brand, the emotions associated with a purchase, and the benefits of your products will help to make sales, but will stay with your audience far longer.

Be Memorable

A good story is hard to forget. Over time, whenever a person hears your brand being mentioned they will recall the emotions expressed through your advertising. Memorable branding can deeply embed an idea about your business, whether that is a feeling of luxury, inclusiveness, quirkiness, or any other powerful emotion.

Using these techniques, creating a compelling story is easily achievable. This story can be developed to build your brand across a variety of platforms. Many purchases are made for emotional reasons, so the ability to tap into these emotions can help you create a sustainable business that lives in memory.

5 Traits of a Great Leader From Richard Branson [video]

We all have life experiences. Some reflect failures and some are successes.

If you’re an aspiring social or business entrepreneur you have probably heard that you should surround yourself with people that do what you want to do and can lift you up.

Why not take a page or two out of successful entrepreneur Richard Branson’s playbook? His list of accomplishments is nothing to sneeze at. Now we might not all go on to create the next Virgin Records or Airline but we can learn an awful lot from a person who’s walked that path.

Whether you have heard these core tips before or not doesn’t matter. These are foundational pieces of advice that we all need to hear every so often as a reminder. It’s so easy to slip back into bad habits or poor lines of thought.

Take these seriously, apply them in your life, make them habit!

THREE: Expose Yourself

Richard Branson is visible.

You have to be willing to put yourself out there. No great leader hides behind a desk.

Branson always makes a point to visit his staff and meet customers.

During interviews, Branson has mentioned that when he is on one of his flights, he will go and meet his crew and passengers with a notebook in hand. Why? This way he can both hear and record their ideas (remember what we said about listening?).

This is a very busy person and despite that, he takes their names and email addresses and makes a point of responding to them by the next day. That is very powerful.

He also puts himself in the spotlight, whether it’s on the internet or TV or movies.

You can’t be afraid to put yourself out there!

FOUR: Challenge the Status-Quo

This is straightforward but many people neglect it because of fear. It’s easier and more comfortable to go with the grain than against it. But no “game-changing” idea was ever status-quo

Great leaders think without boundaries and believe in themselves despite what others say. If they think you’re crazy, maybe you’re on the right track then. Detach yourself from other people’s opinions and ideas and believe in yourself.

“Challenge the status-quo, disrupt the market and say YES! And remember that innovation is an endless quest.” ~Richard Branson

Branson broke the mold with banking. Virgin Money is a bank in Britain where the branches look more like living rooms than banks. There are tables for Wi-Fi, newspapers, and comfortable seating. This eliminates lines and teller windows.

Virgin Money Bank
Virgin Money Bank

FIVE: Money Shouldn’t be the Top Priority, Create Value in the World

Branson has stated that he never has gone into any business purely to make money. He believe that if money is your only motive, then you shouldn’t launch the business at all.

“As you design your product or service, remember your resolve to serve the public; business is about improving other people’s lives. Hopefully, once you’ve done that, more money comes in than goes out. From Virgin Records and Virgin Atlantic to Virgin Money and Virgin Active, our team has always launched businesses out of a genuine desire to disrupt the status-quo and improve things for customers. “ ~Richard Branson

This is a great piece of advice. Why?

A great business has loyal customers but loyalty has to be earned. You have to earn their trust and offer them a lot of value. When you build a business to solve a problem that offers people value, and that’s your driving force, money will follow.

ONE: Great Leaders Listen More

One of the most difficult of all, aside from attempting to stop complaining, even for a week.

Humans tend to wait for their turn to talk. We get thoughts in our heads which are triggered by what the other person is saying. As soon, as that happens we are no longer listening, we are planning what we’ll say.

Some people will cut you right off because they get so anxious they just can’t wait. Have you ever experienced this or even done it to someone? Don’t lie, you know you have! We all have.

Dale Carnegie, author of “How to Win Friends and Influence People” will back this recommendation up any day of the week.

It’s a bad habit and it takes practice to break a bad habit.

Richard Branson’s success is also attributed to the fact he was a great leader. Great leaders have learned the value and power of genuinely listening to a person.

You can have a conversation with someone for 30 minutes and just listen sincerely to them. They will walk away thinking it was a great discussion.

“To be a good leader you have to be a great listener. Brilliant ideas can spring from the most unlikely places, so you should always keep your ears open for some shrewd advice. “ ~Richard Branson

TWO: Keep it Simple

You want to be unique. You want to do something nobody has done before to stand out. That’s great but it doesn’t mean you have to do something that’s overly complicated.
Look around, there are many problems the world faces today which can be seen as opportunities simple business solutions.

“Maintain a focus upon innovation, but don’t try to reinvent the wheel. A simple change for the better is far more effective than five complicated changes for the worse.’ ~Richard Branson

So often, people feel the need to over-complicated things which not only makes it more likely to fail but it takes longer and requires more investment. Stay focused, keep it simple.

How to Quickly Write an Effective Content Marketing Strategy

All business owners should have a content marketing strategy to make sure they get the most out of their content. Those who have a written content marketing strategy are more likely to find content marketing effective for their businesses, have less content-related stress thanks to knowing what they will do and when they’ll do it, and have a clear idea of what their ROI is. To put it simply, if you don’t have a content marketing strategy, you’re writing in the dark.

What holds most business owners back from writing a content marketing plan is feeling overwhelmed by the thought and not knowing how to go about it. Creating a strategy for your content marketing is not as complicated as it seems. Here are the necessary sections your plan needs to embody:

#1 Reasons for Creating Content

Your content marketing plan should include a short list of reasons why you’re creating content in the first place. It sounds simplistic but you’ll be surprised at how much power and focus you get from taking a few seconds to think about WHY you’re doing something. Whenever you feel low on motivation to work on content marketing, read your list of reasons why it’s so important to your business.

#2 Clarify Your Objectives for Content Marketing

After you know why you’re using content marketing, create a new section in your content marketing plan for objectives. Specifically, what do you want to accomplish with content marketing? Do you want greater brand awareness? More leads? Higher customer retention rates? The goals for your content marketing will determine the direction it takes.

#3 What Makes You Unique?

Also write down what makes you unique. How will you be different from your competitors in your social media usage? This is similar to determining a unique selling point for your business. In fact, what makes you stand out in the social space may be the same as or close to what your unique selling point is.

#4 Which Platforms Will You Use?

A content marketing strategy should have a section that outlines which platforms you will use to spread your content. Include your objectives and plans for successful engagement for each platform. Because every social media site has its own culture and methods that work, you need to address that for each subsection. Your approach should be catered to each platform and clearly defined, so that you can easily find your voice when marketing your content.

#5 Determine How You Will Measure Success

Next, you must write down how you will measure your content marketing success. Determine what metrics you will monitor and how you will collect the necessary data. The metrics you choose as indicators of your content marketing success will be based on your objectives. For example, if you want more leads, a metric to look at is clickthroughs. There are many social media analytics tools available, so research relevant tools and write down which you will use to monitor your content marketing progress.

#6 Target Audience Research

Another crucial section in your content marketing plan is target audience. Provide a thorough explanation of who your target audience is, what they need, what their pain points are, where they can be found, etc. Writing down the most important information about your target audience will help you consistently deliver the right message with the right approach. A way to make this even easier is to create a persona, so that you’re talking to one person every time you market your content.

Conclusion

You now have all of the necessary components of a good content marketing strategy. Print out your plan when you’re finished typing and editing it, and regularly consult it while marketing your content. Don’t be afraid to update it when necessary. The worst thing you could do is never look at your strategy again after writing it.

Adriana has an interest in a wide array of topics, such as psychology, natural remedies, and relationships. Her articles reflect these interests because she writes about what piques her curiosity. Adriana also enjoys horse-back riding and watching Asian dramas.