7 Business Storytelling Techniques That Grab People’s Attention
No one wants to see ads anymore. In fact, most of us will try to avoid them as much as we can. In this commercialized world, people don’t want to look at another ‘buy our product’ or ‘avail our service’.
Simplicity does not work anymore. If your advertisement is not unique enough to receive a double-check from the audience, it has irrevocably failed. All that money is down the drain.
But recently, a new form of advertising has garnered loads of interest in the minds of the public.
What is Business Storytelling?
Business storytelling is a discreet and subtle form of advertising. People are more likely to remember a story from years ago than some numbers they read a few hours ago.
Business Storytelling course employs stories instead of facts and numbers to evoke the emotion of empathy in the viewer/listener. These stories are aimed to compel the viewer/listener to take some action, in this case, buy the product/service.
There are various business storytelling courses that can help you and your team understand the working of this form of advertising.
7 Business Storytelling Techniques That Grab People’s Attention
Following are some techniques for business storytelling that will help you grab people’s attention:
1. Be Authentic
The most important pointer taught in a business storytelling course is being authentic. A load of storytellers would end up borrowing fiction elements into the story to make it theatrical. But you don’t need to put together a bunch of fiction to make your business stories more intriguing.
Everyone appreciates honesty. It does not have to be heart-wrenching or soul-crushing. It only has to be true.
Today, inauthenticity is everywhere, from fake news to altered pictures. So, being real is crucial. The audience wants to hear a story that they can picture as realistic because the audience can sense unauthentic stories. If the story to them is unrelatable or unrealistic, they will discard it.
A sense of empathy and trust can only develop if the audience finds the story true. If not, it would not lead to desired effects.
2. Use Narrative Styles
Here is where a lot of stories taste dirt. A lot of the individuals drafting business stories would not focus on choosing the right narrative style and end up producing a monotonous piece that lacks any emotional or psychological depth. As mentioned above, you don’t need to add fiction to the stories. You can make authentic stories attention-grabbing with the help of narrative styles.
Following are some narrative techniques you can use in your business stories:
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Linear Narrative
As the name suggests, this style involves representing events in the order in which they occurred. This is a strict narrative style that leaves less room for creativity. For example, if the events took place in the order ABCDE, they would be represented in the story in the same order, ABCDE.
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Nonlinear Narrative
This is the opposite of Linear narrative. Events in a nonlinear narrative are presented in any order, excluding the chronological order in which they occurred. This style has great room for creative thinking. For example, if the events occurred in the order ABCDE, they could be portrayed as CAEBD, BADEC etc.
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In Medias Res
This is a Latin word meaning ‘in the midst of things. This narrative style plunges the reader into the middle of the action and then explains the past events through a series of flashbacks. This is a very dramatic style used in most of the literary classics. For example, if the events occurred in the order ABCDE, the narration would be CABDE.
3. Keep The Tone in Check
Some of us have that urge to use complex words and phrases that the receiver would not understand, thinking it leaves a good impression or to just boast of their knowledge. But business storytelling is not a place for showing off. Stories would be of no value if the listener/viewer had to look up the meaning of half the words.
These words and phrases hinder the understanding of the audience and thwart the connection between them and the business. This cutbacks the possibility of gaining trust and understanding from them!
The stories need to be communicated with the people in a conversational, relaxed and natural way, leaving out fancy and difficult words as if you are talking to your friends.
4. Create an Element of Suspense
Try to remember the last time you read a suspense novel or short story. That feeling, you know what I’m talking about. Wanting to skip to the last page to see who the murderer is! That is what’s called suspense.
Not saying you need to kill someone to get a suspenseful story for your business. Suspense can be in other terms too. It is important to understand that suspense is different that surprise. Surprise is dropping an unexpected plot twist amidst things, but the suspense builds up gradually. You can incorporate suspense in your stories by dropping hints and teasing the audience so they know that something is coming up but not what it is.
5. Keep it Concise
It is easy to get flown away into a particular part of the story and keep on detailing that until that is all left. No matter how interesting that part may be, you don’t need to fixate on that. For a business story, you need to cover all the important points, shedding light on important achievements and setbacks whilst still being concise.
If your content is lengthy, no matter how captivating it is, you will lose the interest of the audience after a certain limit.
Think of it as a time limit. Let’s say your audience only has three minutes to spare, so you need to be able to tell a gripping story in those three minutes.
6. Get in the Story
Literally, become a part of it. Although most of the stories are written in a third-person perspective, it does not allow greater insight into the characters’ depth. Since this insight makes it possible for the viewer/listener to connect to the story, it will be beneficial to use or at least incorporate some bit of first-person perspective into the business stories.
For example, if you are presenting a business story about how your employees benefited from a certain service, you could take quotes from those employees.
7. Own Your Mistakes
Last but not the least, you don’t need to cover up your mistakes in a business story. Instead, the audience would very much appreciate you owning up to your mistakes and proving to withstand them. This gives a heroic element to the story, and let’s be honest, a little drama never hurts.
Conclusion
These were the seven business storytelling techniques that grabbed people’s attention. There are certain business storytelling courses available that you can participate in to become better at creating business stories.
Orator Academy provides a creative and valuable business storytelling course that could be just the right choice for you and your business. You get access to private sessions, group discussions and a ton of in-depth knowledge in the fields of communication, public speaking etc. Why are you still waiting?
