Marketing messages, social posts, print ads, billboards, product launches, offers, in-app alerts. Wait! Today, we also have AI-driven marketing tracking human behaviour and taking bets with “personalised” advertising. Brands are constantly exploring ways to stand out and gain valuable traction. The noise seems non-stop.
In all of this clicking for instant gratification, human connection is getting scarce. And the need to humanise your business and establish real connections is key to your brand’s success.
And the way to achieve that human connection is through brand storytelling.
What is Brand Storytelling?
It is a powerful way of communicating that uses narratives to bring together facts and emotions about your business. These narratives signal the reasons why people should trust you enough to do business with you. Brand Storytelling also conveys what your company believes in and the experiences you aim to deliver.
Storytelling has been the most powerful way to spread messages for centuries. It is an integral part of how humans think and navigate in this world and has deep neurological roots.
Storytelling enables emotional connections with people. Emotional connect is all about empathising and recognising customer needs, and catering to those needs. Most often, these are way beyond the needs your products or services meet.
Many successful brands use storytelling. Take Asian Paints for example. It is a popular Indian brand that sells paint. But they wouldn’t be market leaders by just selling paint. What sets them apart from their competitors is they go way beyond just selling their products. They establish emotional connections with their customers.
They do this by understanding that their customers are not just looking to buy paint for their walls. Services such as vaastu colours and colour visualisers enable their customers to bring their dream home ideas to reality. Asain Paints puts customers in the center, and helps them to meet personal tastes and preferences. And this positions Asian Paints as the most popular brand choice.
The best technology or an attractive campaign can grab attention towards your brand. But to build strong and deep ties with your audiences, the real mantra is brand storytelling.
So, does this mean you turn yourself into a movie maker or author? Of course not. The essence of Brand storytelling is to put your customers in the center, instead of your product or service. It requires you and your teams to adopt a narrative style of communication that establishes a deep level of trust in your brand.
If you’d like to discuss how learning storytelling skills can build your brand, we’re here to help.