Listen and follow
Introduction
What is a Brand Story? It is a messaging or writing strategy used by marketers to describe products and other company subjects from the Brand perspective. It can be used in the website, Ads, DMs, videos, social media etc.
However, it is commonly mistaken as the story of your company, which most visitors are not initially interested in. What they do care about is how your company and products can help them solve problems or fill needs.
So Brand story is about your customers, be it consumers, or B2B companies. I’ll show you how to write a Brand Story and why it’s an important tool.
How to build a Brand Story
- A story starts with this basic format:
- Beginning
- Middle
- End
- The beginning is about a Problem. The middle is the resolution of the problem. The end is the Results.
- Problem
- Resolution
- Result
- Next you insert the Hero, Teacher and Happy ending
- Hero has a problem
- Teacher helps hero resolve problem
- Hero lives happy ever after
- You can see this in the original Star Wars movie:
- Luke Skywalker encounters imperial Dark Side
- Obi-wan instructs Luke on the “Force”, who then destroys Death Star
- And now there is “New Hope” (result)
- You can see this in a product Brand Story:
- Customer has a problem
- Your company helps customer solve this problem
- Customer experiences a positive change in their life (result)
Here’s an example of a Brand Story.
Beginning – Problem
Laptops with solid state memory drives are always filling up, and users are afraid to start deleting data. Attaching external drives are a hassle and there is a potential to misplace it.
Middle – Resolution
Brilliant Laptops come with two extra internal solid state drive compartments so you can beef up your memory drive space in the future.
Ending – Results
(notice the brand play on the company name Brilliant)
No more worries and frustrations about getting stuck with a laptop with ceiling limits on space. It’s Brilliant!
Problem, Need or Values
Note that the customer problem can also be replaced with a “need”, or “values”. Values meaning your product is related with ideals like “saving the whales”, or “climate change”.
Moral of this Article
So the moral of this article is that using Brand Story in your marketing material is interesting to your customers. Why? Because it tells the story of how they will solve their problem, with help from you, making a difference in their lives, and that’s a very immediate and emotional connection to your Brand – And that’s why they call it Brand Story.
And you can use it almost anywhere because most copywriting or Advertising can take the form of problem > resolution > result.
And remember, Brand Story is always about the customer, not you.
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