Story Marketing: The Customer’s Journey

In marketing these days, it’s all about grabbing your audience’s attention as quickly as possible. You need to be flashy. You need to be bold. You need to be sexy and interesting. You need to sell, sell, sell. At least, that’s what many marketers believe.

But what humans crave more than anything else is story. They want their imagination to be captured. They want something to believe. That’s why story marketing is on the rise. If you don’t know what that is, then read on. It’s something you should not only learn about, but should use on daily basis as a marketer.

What Is "Story Marketing?”

Story marketing, at its core, is creating an ongoing narrative that a customer can follow either consciously or subconsciously. It’s a way to entertain your audience and guide them closer and closer to the product you’re advertising as they move down the marketing funnel. More specifically, you bring in your customer as the hero or heroine of the marketing story, allowing them to participate. This may seem like a pretty vague definition, but it’s one that’s been implemented several times in various, widespread campaigns.

One great example is HBO’s marketing campaign for their hit series, Game of Thrones. It was brilliant, even if I’ll argue that the final episode of the actual product was a bit of a letdown. Leading up to the final season, their marketing team hid Iron Thrones across the United States, and it was up to the audience to physically begin a quest to find them and “sit the Iron Throne.” For a brief moment, the audience could become a hero (or a villain) join the characters on the show in a competition to claim the Iron Throne for themselves.

Another great example is “Dear David,” a story on Twitter that went viral and launched the artist’s career (and fame). It was a great example of using short-form, one-line statements to create a creepy and compelling story that not only captivated an audience, but then brought them in as fans of the creator, an artist by the name of Adam Ellis.

Finally, there was the brilliant marketing campaign that Bungie released before their video game, Halo 2. Titled “I Love Bees,” customers had to solve a hidden message in the new, Halo 2 trailer and then find audio logs and solve further puzzles to learn more about the backstory of the game. It was a wild success, and Halo 2 launched amidst a huge amount of media buzz (I’m not sorry for the pun).

Creating Your Story Marketing Arc

Of course, not everyone has a 20 million dollar budget, like Game of Thrones did. Hiding massive thrones across the U.S. might be a bit out of range. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t create your own marketing story arc.

First of all, take a tip from most storytellers and decide what sort of story your audience wants to hear. If you’re marketing for a wedding venue, you may want to consider what would attract couples to that venue most. If you’re marketing for a hair salon, perhaps you want to learn about the salon’s ideal customer. Once you have a bit more information, you want to create your actual arc — the story that you’re telling the customer.

This story, whatever it is, should spread across all forms of media as your marketing campaign. Each piece should culminate in a larger picture — a bit like chapters in a book, or episodes in a series. Over time, you guide your audience to eventual purchase. You don’t need a 20 million dollar budget for this. You can get by with social media, print, and other media to get the word out. What’s more important is guiding it to hit your audience with the right story.

How Does This Differ from Regular Marketing?

Many marketers may think this sounds a lot like a regular marketing campaign. It’s not. Instead, the audience becomes involved — actively participating in the campaign. In some ways, it’s a more complicated form of marketing, only because you need to see how your audience grows and develops with the story.

This does mean that you need to be more committed to a longer form of marketing. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and a story wasn’t written in a night. This does mean that when designing your story marketing arc, you need to make sure that you include the time it takes to develop.

Conclusion

In the end, story marketing is just one more tool in your arsenal as a marketing professional. I firmly believe that using it, as well as flashier tactics, are a great way to develop out a client’s audience and customer base.

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