1.) Do you have a clear grasp of what you want to say or offer?

• Brand, product, and/or service …doesn’t matter.
• Genre, story arc (entertainment) or WHY-HOW-WHAT (business)
• Can be effectively summarized in one sentence (clearly defined in an abstract)
• Marketing specific: Do you know your mission, vision, purpose, product or service?

2.) Do you have a clear picture of the individual you want to offer it to?

• Who are they?
• Where are they?
• What do they like/share/follow, etc.?
• Marketing specific: Do you know your ideal customer profile (ICP) and key decision maker personas?

…Not based solely on “-ographics” data and segmentation, but on the actual person/people you want to connect with.

Storytelling hack:

Always tell the story as if you’re writing to one person. Just like people can “hear your smile” on a call – the same concept is true for text, video, & audio storytelling.

3.) Can you—in likable human fashion—connect your why with theirs?

• What’s in it for them? (Business or Entertainment)
• How might you make their life better?
• What problems do you solve?
• How will you make/save them money?
• How will you reduce risk or waste?

4.) Can you back up your why with quantifiable positive results?

• Who have you done this for already?
• What was the before & after “HUZZAH!“?
• What have others said about you and your brand/product/service?
• Who is advocating for you or your brand?
• Creative specific: What are they fans of that is similar to yours? (“Because you watched ___, …”)

Note to Business Owners: For the love of all that is good and consumption worthy …How smart, attractive, passionate, dedicated, or hard working you are is something you prove and let others tell you. Claiming these things is not how you differentiate.

• If you’re leading with those things as a first impression, you have bigger issues than improving your storytelling.
• If you wouldn’t lead with those things as a first impression—why would you say them in your storytelling?
• “Hi, I’m Jason. I’m intelligent, wicked funny, inexplicably attractive, and superior to everyone else who may claim the same …and you are?”

5.) Do you have enough to create a hero story that can be seamlessly repurposed into “snackable” content to reach:

• The right person/people
• In the right formats (text, video, audio, image, event)
• On the right channels (website, blog, video channel, social, email, broadcast, billboard, direct, et al.)
• At the right times (when they are actually consuming content/will see your story)
• Across all consumer journey stages

…in a way that doesn’t look and sound like everyone else?

Bonus: Do you regularly follow and consume great storytelling from other great storytellers?

• Web and mobile that deliver remarkable experiences
• Video and blogs that keep you coming back for more
• Thought leadership from tellers you aspire to tell like
• Commercials/Ads that you want to watch …and share (see my blog on Saving Simon)
• Fiction/Non-fiction books or articles

If you answered, “yes” to all of the above—you have all the ingredients needed to tell a great story.

If not, why not and what are you going to do about it?

J

PS: To my fellow marketers—I deliberately omitted owned, earned & paid media interconnection, MarTech stack integration, data/testing insights, market/cultural versioning, go-to-market strategy, and the rest of a long list of essentials for effective inbound/outbound marketing, sales, and brand content creation …not the least of which (for me) includes graduate school and a few decades of on the job growth.

Great storytelling is relational and all relationships start or don’t (and succeed or fail) based on timeless human truths that predate algorithms and actionable insights.

Disclaimer: Like any DIY, the right ingredients are key but do not guarantee a “great” outcome. Great usually comes through a dedication to trial, error, and perpetual improvement. There’s typically a history of undaunted perseverance behind every “overnight” success story. Make sure you have the right ingredients and then get on with becoming great at it.