The secret to making corporate stories exciting

Being authentic is a crucial part of great corporate storytelling. What your saying doesn’t have to be wildly elaborate, so it’s important not to force it as exaggeration often treads into the territory of being untruthful. Remaining transparent and honest are the key components to connecting with your audience on a direct and more personal level.

This is precisely what we did for Wiltshire Council in our campaign to help them recruit more foster carers. We knew how important it was to the Council’s existing foster carers that our campaign messaging didn’t paint an unrealistic portrayal of what it means to be a foster carer. Our campaign instead brought to life ‘everyday’ family scenarios that the target audience could relate to. The friendly, caring, and ‘imperfectly perfect’ approach to the look and feel of the campaign was central to showing potential foster carers that this was a role that was equally about providing care and support to children, but also about picking up their dirty socks! Ensuring that the audience understood this was crucial to the quality and suitability of the applicants who applied, resulting in a higher conversion into real-life foster carers. Check out the full case study here.

You’ve probably noticed that we regularly reference our clients and the projects that we’ve worked on in our blogs. This is largely down to the fact that our clients, and the important work they do, drive our purpose as a marketing agency and make up the biggest part of our corporate story. But it’s also because we recognise that by sharing these real-life examples, it makes our message much more relatable.

Amazon did this in a very unique way with its #IAmAmazon campaign to launch their new StoryBoxes in India. Each Storybox had a photo of the seller and a QR Code on the packaging. Scanning the QR Code led customers to inspiring seller stories - a brilliant way to recognise the small and medium business owners that are making a living on Amazon!

A great corporate story will add value for your audience in some way, so it’s important to communicate a clear outcome with your audience. Start by setting the scene so your audience knows what you’re talking about, establishing why you’re telling them this story in the first place. This hooks your audience’s attention and compels them to keep reading all the way to the end.

Once you’ve clearly defined the outcome for your audience, you’ll then want to make sure that you follow up with actionable points that inspire your audience to engage with your brand.

Organisations often forget that their audience is made up of real human beings who crave connection just like the rest of us. And great storytelling helps us to connect with people and ultimately drive action.

If you’re looking for support with making corporate storytelling an essential part of your marketing activity, get in touch.