Business, Branding and the Art of Storytelling, by Jonathan Fields

Ever wonder how to make yourself stand out from all the other business puppets?


One of the most compelling ways to launch and build a business or brand is to create a legend around it. Tell a deeply compelling story that draws in not only clients and prospects, but employees, partners, collaborators, mentors and evangelists.


I’m not talking about fabricating a story from thin air, but, rather, bringing substantially more art and deliberation to the way you craft and share yours. Done right, with integrity and authenticity, it can transform the way you do business and make everything from day to day operations to sales and marketing infinitely more easy.


There are many powerful story lines around which to build your legend.


The reluctant hero is a classic example. Elements include:


• Setting the scene


• The ordinary Josephine or Joe stepping into the role of protagonist


• Exploring and deepening a pain or yearning for something


• Being forced with great reluctance into action by the inciting incident, which creates…


• The unlikely hero/adventurer/discoverer, vision-quester…you… and


• Sets in motion the quest for an answer, during which there comes


• The inner struggle, which inevitably leads down the wrong path


• That circles at the last possible moment back to


• The revelation, an awakening or moment of discovery, which leads to


• The solution, that sets in motion a new fully-awakened path, then


• Salvation, innovation, creation and adoration


When we tell this story in the context of defining, launching and building a brand or business, the purpose is not to provide a respite, escape or moment of entertainment, but rather to so closely pace the experience of the reader that they actually step into the story, they experience a sense of transference that goes beyond rapport.


They become the protagonist. And, in pacing their current experience, you are telling their story, sharing their tale of woe, their pains, frustrations, emotions and deep need for resolution.


You bring them to a place where they’re hanging on every word to find out just how the story resolves itself.


Because in the story’s resolution, they find their own resolution.


And, this is the moment you bridge the gap from pacing and agitating the readers’ current experience, from telling their story through the lens of your own quest to leading them into the part of the story that’s yet to unfold. The events, people and solutions that will bring solace, remove pain and deliver them into a place of exaltation. Salvation. Respect. Success. Devoid of pain.


And, guess who those people, events and solutions are?


They are you, your ideas, your products, your services, your solutions.


This is just one example of how to tap the power of a well-crafted evolutionary metaphor, the reluctant hero, to build a connection between you and your prospects, then deliver them into what seems an irrefutable desire to buy what you’re selling as the only logical way to resolve their own pain, to solve their own problem.


So, my question to you is…


What’s your story?


Your legend?


Your journey of discovery?


The one capable of defining your quest and revelation, fueling the growth of your community and driving them to action?


http://www.jonathanfields.com/blog/storytelling-business-brand/