Improving Online Communication with Business Storytelling Techniques

Once Upon a Time there was a forward thinking business that instead of bombarding their customers with facts, figures and sales content, they focused their time and attention on creating easily understood stories that customers could follow, understand and relate to.

As a concept, the method of storytelling within business makes perfect sense. We all know the basics of a story; the beginning, a middle and an end and importantly there isn’t a single human on this earth that hasn’t heard one. From our first ever steps on this planet we are brought up on stories.

A Story will help us to understand a topic, relate to someone we’ve not met and help visualise a scene. The medium of storytelling is a great way to engage and maintain concentration levels while also reaching a more emotional, hard wired part of the human brain.

With websites being the business mode of choice in the 21st Century it is important for businesses to make a good first impression. Another key area is to keep visitors on your site for as long as possible to maximise the chances of a sale, a quote or a contact. Instant statistics from any website are easily acquired, this includes user counts, users decisions/ actions, conversions etc. Services such as Google Analytics will give highly accurate data regarding any visitors.

The correct implementation of relevant and well thought out stories on your website is much more effective than the old style of information overload seen on many sales orientated websites. With the help of website analytics the difference can be measured accurately.

Within the digital world there are some great examples of the story in action. British Telecom’s on-going tv advert storyline has created a decent following. BT allowed their followers to get in contact via social media and decide on the fate of the couple featured in the adverts. They had definitely understood the huge benefit of storytelling marketing. Viewers can relate to the situations portrayed and also engage and affect the outcome.

The main aim of online marketing whether it takes the form of the story or the more outdated ‘information dump’ is to successfully communicate a message that will bring about some sort of behaviour change or action as a result.

The storyline approach is best equipped to deliver the following:

• Elucidate your message
• Explain why is Action Important
• Clearly define what Action is required
• What the Benefits and rewards will be