Martin Lee
There is a big buzz around storytelling in the worlds of marketing, branding and research these days. Everyone appreciates that stories help to forge a deeper connection with others.
And it’s true: they do. But for stories to succeed, it’s important they obey some simple structural rules:
- There needs to be a hero, someone we can identify with.
- The hero needs to be thrown into some conflict that forces him or her to make an initial choice. This conflict normally involves a ‘baddy’, someone the hero is against.
- The consequences of this choices kick starts the plot, a series of events that follow on from that first choice.
- The hero needs to make more choices, which have more consequences. Through these events, we watch the hero learn and develop. There is some progression as the story moves forward.
- There is a resolution to the story, in which all the characters get what’s coming to them and readers feel emotionally satisfied.
Now, it’s entirely valid for researchers to adopt a storytelling approach to the briefs they receive. The briefs we receive nearly always involve conflict – a brand’s battle with a competitor, say, or finding it hard to choose which customers to focus on in a broad market. All these involve choices, and there are consequences to all of them. In other words, all the seeds of a compelling story are in the brief, and as researchers, we can structure and design our projects to explicitly bring out the elements of story that are implicit in the brief. It makes for a far more vivid experience of research for our clients. Stories are more memorable than reports, more engaging, and ultimately more powerful. They also bring our own distinctive voice into play more. Successful storytellers make an emotional connection with their audience. They don’t value neutrality or objectivity, but make a virtue of bringing their own personality to bear. Given that so many researchers aspire to be seen by clients as consultants rather than ‘just researchers’, then adopting an overt storytelling approach makes all kinds of sense.
To help us do this, we need some storytelling methodologies, and one of those is asking participants to write stories themselves, in which the brand features, often as the hero, and in which conflict, choices, consequences and resolution are structural elements. In only 250 words, a participant can write a revealing story, which is full of insight about their own relationship to a brand.
At ESOMAR, we challenged delegates to try this themselves, and got some wonderful stories back. Four of them were prize winners, and we reproduce them here. Look out for the recurring theme in three of the stories, of how brands can become irrelevant in people’s lives when another competitor comes in to take their place – a classic demonstrate of conflict in action and a compelling demonstration of how business truths can be shown through storytelling.
Matija Lozancic
University of Maribor
Dear M.
It’s been a while since I last wrote to you.
I’ve been thinking about you a lot lately. Even after all these years, I still don’t fully understand what it was that drove you away from me.
Luckily, time has a way of slowly fading those unpleasant memories away, leaving us with only the nice ones.
I can still remember the first time you held me in your hands. Oh, how warm they felt. I found it adorable how you handled me carefully, making sure you don’t accidentally drop me on the first day we were together. I also remember that time you finally told J. that you loved her, and I was happy to be the one who made sure she got this important message.
Even after you replaced me with someone newer and better, I still happily laid in your drawer quietly for years, biding my time and waiting for the day you might hopefully need me again.
Sadly, now I realise it was nothing more than a silly dream.
They told me I’ve been acquired by some American company, owned by the richest guy on the planet. They also told me I need to leave this beautiful Finnish forest and look for a new apartment somewhere far away in China. They may even force me to change my name. If I’m still here by the end of it all, then maybe, just maybe, I might find my way into your heart again.
Love,
Nokia
Maja Jovicic
Universita della Svizzera Italiana
The Coat of a Pirate
Once upon a time, there lived a pirate by the name of Black-End-Decker. He was lacking a conscience and good with a pistol, like every pirate should be. He could pillage and plunder, and murder and maim, but he had one problem: nobody feared him.
For a pirate, this was very bad. They measure their reputation in fear, so having nobody fear him was a terrible thing for Black-End-Decker.
He tried asking his victims why they saw him as less dangerous.
“Well,” said the first man, “you don’t really look like a pirate. You dress simply and it makes you look like a priest. Now, one-eyed Makita is a fearsome pirate; he has an eye-patch AND a peg leg!”
Black-End-Decker didn’t like this answer, so he made the man walk the plank. However, the next victim said the same. And the next. In fact, so many people told Black-End-Decker he was a bad pirate that he disappeared one day, retiring to rob fishing boats.
Not a lot of people missed him. In fact, they had no time to think about him, since there was a new pirate sailing the sea. He was said to be the evilest pirate of them all, wearing a coat of yellow and a cutlass of finest steel.
His name was Mad-Dog DeWalt
Marlon Plazo
Heineken
The Last Brand on Earth
Tide was one of the first and also the last brand left in the world. All other brands came, and for a short period of brilliance shone beautifully. But one by one they were so focused on who shone brightest, who spoke more eloquently, who had the most likes, that they forgot a simple secret- that while they amused people at first, what really mattered was whether it made their lives simpler, better, or easier. And one by one consumers walked away from the flash and pomp and one by one the brands died. And then one day, Tide looked around and saw it was alone in a sea of store brand shelves. And tide felt proud. And it puffed its chest for it had outplayed and outlasted. And it thought – hey maybe I am the best. Hey people cannot live without me. And it was at that moment that the last brand on earth started its own demise.
Simon Patterson
QRI Consulting
Once upon a time there was a small man who lived at the bottom of the garden, a long long time ago.
One day, the man decided to go to market on the other side of the hill to buy some Coca-Cola. He loved Coca-Cola but could only get it when he went to market. And the market was on the other side of the hill.
On this day, it was very hot and by the time he had got to the market, he was exhausted. So the first thing he did was drink a litre of Coke.
Then he had a problem. His favourite Coca-Cola was regular Coca-Cola, but because it was such a warm day, he was worried that the Coke would become too warm by the time he got it home. (There weren’t any refrigerators in those days!) He believed that diet Coke lasted longer in very warm weather, but he hated the watery taste.
Faced with this conflict, he decided to buy what he liked and to take the consequences later.
On the way home, carrying his 5 litres of regular Coca-Cola, he was getting hotter and hotter as the barrel of Coke was very heavy. When suddenly, it started to snow. The man who now was utterly exhausted, was thrilled and was able to get the Coca-Cola home without any problems because of the cold weather.
He gave the Coca-Cola to his family. And they all lived happily ever after!
