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Sweet-Smelling Armpits and the Story You Can’t
Tell
Branding is what people say about you when you’re not in the room.
—JEFF BEZOS
T
hey say public speaking is one of the world’s greatest fears. And while I
suspect that old tale is a little overblown, it’s certainly not uncommon to feel
some anxiety before taking the podium. That’s true even for professional
speakers; it just goes with the territory.
My top-notch professional secret? Use great deodorant.
Okay, that’s not really my best public speaking advice. But if your goal were
to create a really lousy deodorant commercial, I think that advice might be your
starting point.
Cue the cheesy announcer.
Kindra Hall is a professional storyteller. And when the story gets tough,
she counts on her deodorant to get her through to the end. It’s why she
chooses Acme, the brand most trusted by story experts around the world.
Meh.
This kind of marketing makes me nuts for many reasons. One is it just
sounds cheesy. To be fair to Acme, this issue is a tricky one; as long as the
messenger is you, you run the risk of coming across as fake or inauthentic.
But more than that, these kinds of messages drive me crazy because they
reek of missed opportunity. There is a story there, but Acme just didn’t put in the
effort to tell a good one.
Fortunately, there’s a solution for dealing with this problem that’s just about
as old as commerce itself. To understand it, let’s look at a real-world counterpart
of our fictional Acme example.
My experience with Native Deodorant began like most online shopping
experiences. I made my purchase, filed away my email receipt, and received the
product. Fairly typical. But what wasn’t typical was what a great job of
marketing Native does. Their value proposition—deodorant that is safe,
effective, and made in the USA—is clear and easy to grasp, and they’ve put it
front and center. You need approximately three seconds on the Native website to
know exactly what problem they’re solving.
Where Native truly excels, however, is in the use of a unique story, namely,
their ability to capture stories from people like me
after
they’ve used the
product. Arguably the most challenging of the four story types, Native is on its
way to mastering the elusive but oh-so-powerful customer story.
The Customer Story
You already know the customer story well. You’ve seen its echoes in things like
testimonials, reviews, influencer endorsements, referrals, and recommendations.
The long history of customers praising (or panning) products is a pastime that
just keeps on giving.
Customer experiences have a natural edge over traditional marketing because
they come preloaded with what the Acme story lacks: credibility. When you tell
someone your product is great, that’s called marketing. When another customer
tells them, it’s called a referral, and referrals carry a whole different level of
clout. Studies consistently show that reviews and referrals have an enormous
influence on customer behavior. The power of social media and review sites like
Yelp and Angie’s List make leaving—and reading—reviews easier than ever.
Consider these findings from a BrightLocal consumer review survey:
• 85 percent of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal
recommendations.
• Positive reviews make 73 percent of consumers trust a local business more.
• 49 percent of consumers need to see at least a four-star rating before they
choose to use a business.
• Consumers read an average of seven reviews before trusting a business.
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But while consumers are seeking out and reading reviews, research also
shows that consumers are often skeptical and on the lookout for fake
testimonials.
A 2016 Pew Research Study found “business owners and consumers alike
have voiced concerns about the validity and truthfulness of the information
posted on various online review sites. And when asked about this issue,
Americans themselves are nearly evenly split. Roughly half (51 percent) of those
who read online reviews say they generally give an accurate picture of the true
quality of the product, but a similar share (48 percent) believes it is often hard to
tell if online reviews are truthful and unbiased.”
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This is where customer stories can help.
While referrals, reviews, testimonials, or other shared customer experiences
can be valuable, they don’t necessarily come packaged as a story, and as a result,
they don’t have the same impact a story can have. A review might answer
questions, but it rarely includes the normal—that first part of the story
framework—or draws people in with specific details that inspire imagery in the
mind of the reader. A testimonial might state the facts, but rarely does it include
compelling emotions. A product review might be good for business, but turning
it into a customer story is great for business. A customer story draws people in,
makes them care, feel connected, and perhaps most importantly, makes them feel
understood; for example, “Someone else, like me, has felt the way I’ve felt and
wanted the thing I’ve wanted and found the solution here. I want that. I’ll buy
it.”
Yes. A well-told customer story can make all of that happen.
Switching Storytellers: Customer Story Versus Value
Story
Story
Now, I will admit, there is a chance you are thinking this is a value story. Isn’t
this just a story to describe the value of the product? Is this a chapter I can skip?
The answer is no. No, you cannot skip this chapter.
I mean you can, but while value stories and customer stories are different
means to the same end, the difference between them is something you don’t
want to miss. Unless, of course, you’re okay with your competition figuring it
out and having a leg up on you. In that case, go ahead. Skip all the chapters you
want.
Recall value stories use the Steller storytelling framework to reveal the value
of the product. Good sales and marketing are often a value story job. The
identifiable character is the customer living in their own normal and having a
problem. Along comes the explosion (the product or service) and, voilà! the
problem is solved.
Normal → Explosion → New Normal
When Unbounce told the story of the marketer struggling to create and test
new online content while dealing with the bottleneck of budgets and developers,
they were talking about a customer. When Workiva told the story of the aspiring
triathlete who realized his dream because of the time saved using their product,
they were talking about a customer. And while all of these stories were about
customers, they were value stories.
A customer story is different.
A customer story has a unique twist.
A customer story, while it might illustrate value, is told by the customer him
or herself. Check out the Native website and you’ll see it. Stories illustrating
value but told by customers. Try this five-star wonder from Amy H.:
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