When Thomas Reardon, M.D., president of the American Medical Association, spoke to the Federation of State Medical Boards of the United States, he used a personal story to make his key point:

1. Find the desk-pounding moment.

Want to write a great brand story that builds emotional connections with your potential customers while revealing the truth about your brand?

Whether you’re writing a piece of content marketing, a social media post or a vision statement, you can reveal your brand personality and engage people with a compelling brand story.

What’s the secret to brand storytelling that shows people your product or service in a new light? Find the desk-pounding moment: Ask your subject matter expert when she realized the importance of the point you’re making — or when she saw the problem in action. That will help her recall events, encounters and other occurrences that can help you make the point.

Sometimes the best stories come from executives’ own experiences with the problem or situation. So take creative agency and make personal stories part of your brand story. Your target audience will love them, and your brand strategy will flourish.

2. Ask, ‘What’s your story?’

Warren Buffett, chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, uses this personal story in one of his letters to shareholders to illustrate the problem with executive spending:

So how do you get these stories?

When presentation trainer Lynn Espinoza was helping a Fortune 100 executive prepare for a speech on the company’s environmental efforts, she asked, “What’s your story?”

“It turns out that she is personally committed to the environment in an unexpected way,” Espinoza writes. “So committed is she that she and her husband bought 60-acres in the Australian outback. They are restoring the downtrodden land with the hope of returning it to the adjacent Australian National Park. She takes international conference calls from inside her tent, hoping that the Kookaburras don’t make too much noise.”

What stories could your subject matter expert tell — if you’d only ask?

3. Move from situation to implication.

Executive speechwriter Les Bendtsen uses this approach:

“When I ghostwrite, I sit down and say, ‘Here’s a topic we’re thinking of writing about. When have you, your family or your ancestors confronted a problem like this before?’ I try to get away from the facts of the situation to the implication. Not, ‘How will our company weather this rough market?’ but ‘What did your dad do when he lost money in a venture or started his own business and failed?’”

As communicators, we concentrate a lot on focusing our lens to gather specific details. But sometimes zooming out to the broader theme can help you find the story.

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Source: “Heed this ‘golden rule’: Tell a good story,” Speechwriter’s Newsletter, Sept. 1, 2000

The post What is your brand story? appeared first on Wylie Communications, Inc..

The other day, my wasband came home with a bottle of Kelt — not his usual cognac. When I asked why he’d switched brands, he pulled out the box and started reading:

My wasband takes his cognac seriously. Why did he change his brand? The story made him do it.

Whether you’re writing social media or blog posts, content marketing pieces, stories on your website or even your mission statement, you can connect with your target audience with a great brand story. Brand storytelling can help you sell products, services, programs and ideas.

The good news is, your brand story probably already exists. In fact, you may already be telling it. Here are four ways to spot a good story that might be right in front of your eyes:

1. Tell your inception story.

The trucking insurer Great West Casualty Company makes its inception story part of its brand:

From Nike to Warby Parker, inception stories can form the foundation of a brand’s storytelling. Show how your company solved a problem, challenged the status quo or turned an industry on its head.

Whether you’re working for a multinational or a nonprofit, helping small business owners or building your personal brand, ask, “What’s my inception story?”

2. Share your product’s history.

Want a little drama to go with your drink? I read this story off a bottle of Blenheim water:

Must be something in the water. Perrier also tells its interesting history, including these highlights:

We can’t all claim that Julius Caesar used our product. But most of us can reveal interesting stories from our product or services’ past.

3.Tell the stories behind the lists.

Too often, communicators cover employee awards by running lists of winners’ names. But that reduces the drama of human achievement to a series of bullet points and a few dry words.

Instead, take a tip from FedEx World Update, and run mini stories about award winners. In boxes throughout the magazine, the editors cover the company’s Humanitarian Awards with stories like these:

Now there’s a real story that connects with your audience. Substitute drama for lists … and give award winners the attention they deserve.

4. Tell your process story.

I first fell in love with St-Germain over a Poivre (St-Germain, pear vodka, champagne) at Luke in New Orleans. Had my wasband’s cooler head not prevailed, I would have retired on the spot and devoted the rest of my life to savoring these luscious cocktails.

My second meeting with my new best friend occurred over appetizers on our foodiest friends’ deck, where they topped the elderberry liqueur with Prosecco.

That’s where I read St-Germain’s process story, delivered in a gorgeous little booklet attached to a bottle right out of a 19th-century French perfumerie. Here’s the story:

No, you could not.

Since Coors differentiated its beer through a process story — it was the only major brand to use cold filtration rather than pasteurization — companies have been building their brands by telling the stories behind their processes.

Sometimes “how we make it” can make a great dramatic narrative. What’s your process story?

Learn how to tell a process story.

What’s your brand story?

Create a brand story that supports your brand personality and builds an emotional connection with potential customers.

Finding your brand story isn’t hard if you know where to look. From company history to employee achievements, from how we got started to how we make it now, your successful brand story is just waiting to be told.

The post How to come up with a brand story appeared first on Wylie Communications, Inc..