If there’s one buzzword you’ll hear over and over again when talking to marketers or reading about marketing, it’s “storytelling.” Whether you’re in a high rise boardroom strategizing on the next content marketing campaign for a worldwide legacy brand or you’re talking to a small creative company about dipping your toes into social media and content marketing, telling your brand’s story is the main goal.
The tools with which those two different groups will accomplish that goal, though, can be very different. Big brands might choose to piggyback onto traditional storytelling by having their products featured in films or TV shows. They might partner with a celebrity endorser who can profess their love for the brand’s products on social media. They might place glossy full-page ads in popular magazines to help craft an aspirational identity.
However, if you are a small-to-medium-sized business, you likely aren’t going to be doing any of those things. There are a few things that you can do, though, regardless of your budget, that will tell your story to those who are interested.
All action social media. Telling your story today isn’t about capturing an audience and breathlessly “telling your story” in one go. It’s about accumulating data points wherever possible that collectively tell the story. Though paying to promote posts is generally a good idea, creating profiles and posting is free. If you post great original and curated content that adds value to your audience’s lives, you’re off to a great start in communicating your company identity.
Your written perspective. Beyond social media posting, sharing your company’s written perspective is a great way to dig deeper into your brand’s personality. You can write blogs that are a direct discussion of what your product does and why it’s great. You’ll also want to write blogs that aren’t directly about you, but focus on parallel ideas that will be of interest and can add value to your audience’s lives.
A few good videos. While your blog will likely attract a few loyal readers, not everyone these days has a mind to read 500 words in one fell swoop. Most of us, though are more than happy to watch a 1-2 minute video. Though you may not go as in-depth as you might in a blog, you have the opportunity to speak and show the face of your product that much more clearly. This can help people relate to your brand quicker and more deeply.
SMBs may gaze longingly at the seemingly boundless marketing budgets of their largest competitors, but that doesn’t mean they have to sit on the sidelines and do nothing. Though free space on the internet is scarcer than ever, it’s still possible to tell your brand’s story on a budget. If you employ social media, blogs, and video in the ways I’ve described above, you’ll be off to a great start.
Image credit: CC by Kennisland
