Are you resistant to marketing your business? What’s stopping you?
Many business owners hinder their growth by not marketing for a number
of different reasons. It might be because of finances, time, feeling like the
return on investment (ROI) won’t be good enough. Maybe it’s because
self-promotion with sales-y tactics sound scary and well, a little tacky too.
In this guide, I share how a storytelling-first strategy is different to sales-y
marketing tactics. It supports sustained engagement from your audience and growth for your business.
At MP Storytelling, I help clients create content strategies and stories for their business or brand. With every client, I am a trusted partner helping people connect with their audience and grow.
Let’s dive in!
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A Storyteller’s Definition of Content Marketing
Content marketing through storytelling adds depth and quality to what you’ll be creating to reach and connect with your audience.
Content marketing refers to two separate things. One of these is content. The other marketing.
Content refers to the media you create. Examples include:
- YouTube videos
- Podcast episodes
- Social media videos or posts
- Email newsletter
- Blog
The marketing part of it is directing people towards a Call to Action (CTA), whether that’s subscribing to something or directing people to an offer.
Now, before you start creating content, there’s two things that are important for us to do for our business to stand out.
- Choose either a YouTube channel or podcast to share important personal and business stories about ourselves online. I recommend video, but if you’re not comfortable on camera, go the podcast route.
- Create pillar stories for your business, and center your marketing around storytelling first. That means that almost all your content marketing is focused on telling a story to your audience. It’s a story about your brand, about you, and it’s a consistent message that builds over time as more and more people get to know you.
Hare-brained Marketing vs. Tortoise powered storytelling
Why storytelling?
In the Aesop’s fable, The Tortoise and the Hare, the hare is making fun of the tortoise for being so slow when the tortoise challenges him to a race.
The hare is amused at running the race with the slow tortoise and agrees. Well, they start the race and the tortoise starts plodding along. The hare jumps out to a huge lead, but thinking his victory is 99% certain, he decides to take a nap.
The hare wakes from his nap, but he soon realizes the tortoise is about to cross the finish line. He loses the race to the tortoise.
Hare-brained marketing starts out at a sprint. It tries to do too much all at once, and then fades away. The content feels too sales-y, too promotion based. It feels forced and not real.
Tortoise powered storytelling on the other hand sees content as a long game. Here, we’re putting out something small everyday to remind people of who we are and what we do while occasionally sharing a high-value piece of content infused with storytelling.
Building, growing an audience takes consistency and time. They want us to show up, they want us to share more, and we have to be there for them.
Approaching Content to Work for You
Creating a tortoise powered storytelling content strategy means:
- Committing to the long game of content. You’ll see results, but it will take time. And even when we’re feeling discouraged, that’s when we know to keep posting, keep telling our story
- Tailoring and customizing the strategy to fit your schedule and style.
- Telling content from a storytelling perspective
Everyone has a different appetite for creating and consuming content. Some of us are okay with more while others want less. What ever way you want to consume, create and share content, that’s okay.
Create a strategy that fits your schedule, whether that’s two YouTube videos a week, or one every two months. If you’re creating less content, make sure it’s high-value for your audience. When you’re creating more, have a good mix of both personal and business content.
Find your comfort level when sharing and creating content. Be open to sharing new stories about yourself, and be open to seeing how different stories can open up avenues for insight sharing your business, products, or services.
You’ll develop your own personality and cadence with content over time as you become more comfortable sharing online and finding a specific style that works for you.
Content Marketing Example: An Essential Story for Startups
As a startup, it’s essential for you to have a great story about why you started your business. This is not just for investors, but anyone really who’s curious enough to ask about your business. You never know who could be a potential client or customer.
A story about how you got started is the founder’s story, or origin story. It’s the starting place for you to connect with people about your business or brand. For instance, the founders of AirBnB had a very relatable story about needing to afford rent, so they turned their apartment into a makeshift bed and breakfast. Then they thought, “Why can’t anyone do this, and why can’t we be the marketplace for it?”
Having a relatable, personal founder’s story with a product or service that solves a problem for people can be a catalyst for growing those first few fans and believers in your business. The founder’s story will set the tone and introduce your brand identity. It will be that beginning building block from which you share future stories to engage your audience as they continue to learn from and start to trust you.
Content Marketing Example: An Essential Story for Small Businesses
A great product story can be a catalyst for growing any small business.
A product story is about the product or service you sell. This story shows it off in a compelling or captivating way that gets people interested or aware of what your business or brand does.
If you’re a restaurant, this can be showing off an impressive presentation of a signature dish you serve. For a realtor, this could be going live on social media to give a sneak peek at a new house you have on the market. For a shop owner, this could be sharing multiple short videos throughout the week of new additions that have arrived at your store and why you think customers will love them.
In my office, I have a bag that says, “Low-hanging fruit.” Product stories are just that: Opportunities for people to learn more about what you sell, and why they should spend time getting to know, like and trust you.
How to Keep Fresh Content Looking Young
Connecting with your audience through storytelling and growing your business through marketing content is always a work in progress. It’s important to keep learning and improving how we can tell our stories better to make them more compelling and valuable for our audience.
For example, once you start creating content, know that you can adjust and revise your strategy. After sharing a variety of different stories, you can see which ones resonate with your audience and lean more into that specific type of content.
I want what you share to carry your personality and vibrancy. People will tune in not just because they like your content, but your personality too.
Quality Content Strategies and Marketing with MP Storytelling
Storytelling is one of the most powerful tools for connecting and bringing people together.
There’s no secret formula to creating a great story people will love. Anyone can do it! Content marketing for your small business or startup with storytelling can be your superpower too.
Let’s chat about how I can be a trusted partner for your business or brand.
Thanks so much for reading! Till next time.
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