What Is Brand Storytelling: A Simple Explanation

Brand storytelling is the process of establishing a connection between your brand and your target market via an emotional narrative, with an emphasis on developing empathy by connecting your brand’s values to those of your audience. Developing an emotional connection with your audience is essential for impactful storytelling. A great brand story should keep your audience’s attention, elicit empathy, and convince them to perform a specific action that benefits both the customer and the company. 

What is the Purpose of Brand Storytelling?

If you want to flourish in this global economy, you must express your brand narrative now more than ever. The internet has made reaching your target audience cheaper and simpler than ever, but the same applies to your competitors.  Taking into account the sheer volume of options available to consumers nowadays, companies need to identify a way to stand out. 

Ad-blocking software and marketing saturation are posing a massive challenge for marketers. What can be done to get a brand to stand out when conventional marketing strategies are not reaching their audience? The answer to this dilemma involves incorporating storytelling into your content marketing strategy. 

Why are Stories so Powerful?

Whether reality or story, researchers have discovered that the same region of the brain is activated for both. In our minds, reality and story are one and the same. Stories impact us both physically and emotionally. Chemical responses in the brain, such as the release of oxytocin and dopamine, occur during an escalation of conflict-driven events in a tale, overwhelming us with a rush of emotions. When the protagonist is in a tight situation, our hearts beat, our breathing quickens, and we sweat more. We grimace or maybe weep when we read a sad narrative. 

This is powerful stuff. A brand story, done right, with a strong emotional tone, can create equally strong emotional connections in the mind’s of your audience. But that’s not all – stories help us retain information.

A story is an excellent way to help your marketing messages to stick in people’s minds and achieve your marketing objectives. Stories enable marketers to engage with their target audiences by weaving marketing information together in a manner that elicits emotional responses, helps people remember what they’ve learned, and encourages them to make brand-friendly choices.

The reason why storytelling is such a powerful marketing tool has to do with empathy. A great story is one with which your audience can relate. Your audience will immerse themselves in your brand story if you succeed in establishing empathy in your audience. 

Brand Storytelling Draws Attention

A marketer’s most precious commodity is their audience’s attention. In an era of instant gratification, storytelling has the power to capture and hold the attention of your target market. Because you’ve established an emotional connection with your audience through your brand’s story, they’re invested in your protagonist and need to know how the story will end for them. Critical marketing messages will have a lasting impact on your audience with the help of clever storytelling techniques. 

Brand Storytelling Encourages Action 

Neuroscientists have studied a phenomenon called the open-mind moment, a short window of opportunity that occurs during a story’s climax, lasting roughly six to eight seconds. During this time the brain is flooded with pleasure and amazement, and will readily absorb and retain information. 

People take action only when they are receptive to receiving your sales communications. This is the power of brand storytelling: it opens people’s minds and motivates them to buy your product or service. 

Master brand storytelling that connects, impacts and influences with the Skillsme Storytelling Course.