brandingpart2Brand stories are taking over marketing, and it’s making a huge impact on the consumer. In part one, we covered the kinds of elements that should be in your story and how to go about writing it. Now we want to go over what to do with it.

Once you have a story, your work is only just beginning. First, make sure your story is simplified as much as possible. Don’t take a paragraph to say what a sentence can. Your audience doesn’t have the attention span. Second, you need to coordinate your story with the look and appeal of your brand.

To do this, you can answer a new set of questions. We like the suggestions in Wyzowl’s blog post “What is my brand’s story – and how do I tell it?”

  • Is my brand funny or serious?
  • Friendly or formal?
  • Is it positive or nihilistic?
  • Is it colorful or black and white?
  • Traditional or modern?
  • Elitist or inclusive?
  • What colors best represent my brand?
  • If my brand was a person, how would he or she speak?
  • Who is my ideal target customer, and what does he or she like in a brand?
  • How can I be different than my competitors’ brands?
  • What 3-5 words would I most like to associate with my brand?

The purpose of all this is to design your website, logo, packaging, marketing campaigns, and everything else that will tell or remind people of your story. Which brings us to our next point:

What to do with the story once you have it

You will not really be telling this whole story over and over again. You’ll launch it, and then you’ll allude to it. You’ll reference it. You’ll inspire the memory of it. You’ll lay the foundation and build a personality on top of it – one that your consumers like, trust, follow, and quote.

Your full story should appear on your “about us” page and anything similar to that. You should also launch the full story in some way – through commercials, YouTube videos, inspiring print ad, or whatever works for you. Get the message out. If it’s appropriate to put it on your product, do it.

Once people have your story down, you only need reference it. Create a strong tag line or motto to associate with your story. Put that tag line on your promotional items and marketing campaigns.

Your brand personality carries your ongoing story. This is the voice you use and the content you share on your social media. It is the style and content of your blog posts. It’s your marketing. It’s your packaging. It’s your face-to-face interaction, including everyone from management to customer support. Every reaction, response, word choice, commercial, promotion, and transaction needs to be consistent with that main story. This personality is what your customers build a relationship with.

Speaking of which, make sure you’re using descriptive, emotionally-driven words in your copy and content. Go back to those key words if need be. What is synonymous with you and your product? Strength? Trust? Pride? Reliability? What are the testimonials saying? Use strong words that paint a picture and conjure feeling.

In the end, you are using your story and personality across all of your touch points. Have fun with this – be creative in getting your story out and letting your brand’s personality shine!

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