5 Reasons You Need to Incorporate Storytelling in Your Marketing Efforts

All businesses are in the storytelling business, even if they don’t realize it. Your job as a marketer is to tell the story of your product, service, or brand in the most compelling way possible—and that doesn’t necessarily mean with text. With the advent of content marketing and social media, it’s easier than ever to use tools like video, infographics, and even podcasts to tell engaging stories about your products and services in ways your audience will love consuming! Here are five reasons you need to incorporate storytelling into your marketing efforts today.

1) Storytelling Creates Empathy

In today’s world, social media has allowed people from all over to connect. Because of that, businesses have a chance to reach new customers and create relationships with them that haven’t existed before. The only way you can do that is by giving them a reason for doing so. Compelling storytelling can help you establish a connection with your audience and foster an emotional response – something your followers will remember long after they forget what your product or service does. Use storytelling as part of your content marketing strategy by presenting customers with stories about people who use your product or service and those who don’t but could benefit from it, thus making viewers feel empathetic toward those people and your brand. For example, instead of saying we sell plastic storage, tell a story about how they saved your customer’s clothes when her house flooded. Instead of saying you need our teeth whitening kit, say how a person felt terrible about herself until she whitened her teeth thanks to your company. Take time each day to tell compelling stories rather than just talking about features, benefits, and price points.

2) It Creates Leads

Engaging content that inspires an emotional response (good or bad) will inevitably provoke someone to take action. Whether it’s a comment, a share, a like, or a link—every piece of engagement is a sign that your marketing efforts are working, and you should embrace it. When you tell stories about your customers and their experiences with your brand, you’re essentially offering them up as leads who have already converted. That’s something traditional advertising can never do. In addition, if you structure your social media updates so they flow from top to bottom with captivating images and short sentences, they become more shareable by nature—meaning more exposure for your brand.

3) It Creates Long Term Relationships

The use of content marketing has helped many brands create long-term relationships with customers. The simplest example of content marketing is what would be considered inbound marketing. Inbound marketing uses content to help educate your audience. By doing so, you are creating quality information for them to view and learn from, therefore making them more likely to form a relationship with your brand. However, by creating that type of relationship, you gain credibility as an expert on that topic.

4) It Sells Products

Regardless of your industry, storytelling is a powerful way to sell products. You can draw your readers in quickly by introducing characters and setting them up with a problem that your product can solve. Once you hook them with your content, chances are good they’ll come back for more—or they might even buy something. Of course, you want to avoid blatant selling techniques like buy “now!” or “hurry before it’s too late!” Even if those phrases aren’t present in your story itself, their impact will rub off on people who read about them. If you want people to buy what you’re selling at some point down the line, it’s best not to spell out what is happening.

5) It Helps You Get Featured

The rise of content marketing and social media has meant that everyone is vying for attention, and it’s getting harder and harder to get noticed. The best way to stand out in a crowd is by telling stories. If you tell engaging stories that capture people’s attention, chances are you’ll be featured somewhere—and that means more exposure for your brand.