John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing tells about the importance of communicating your most important marketing elements through a powerful narrative rather than a traditional bullet point on a brochure. In this post, he adds:
Your marketing story is a tool that can and should be included as one element of your suite of education based marketing materials, but done correctly, can facilitate a prospect’s ability to connect and trust in ways that are far more powerful than any other marketing document.
Your marketing story tells about your struggles, your journey to success, your road of perseverance, your dreams, your ideals, etc…so much that you can’t just list out in a numbered list about “why do business with us.” Anyone can write about what makes them great. But customers feel a connection with a business that shares their values and has a story that resonates! This could be what differentiates you from your competitors, too. Guy Kawasaki shares “The Nine Best Story Lines for Marketing” – good stuff.
Here’s the story of the Marketing Twins – even now as I re-read it, I think of things I want to update!
Fellow Duct Tape Marketing coach from Virginia, Tim Nagle, shares his story on the AMEX Open Forum. If you missed my post from last week on AMEX, it’s on charitable giving and small business, something that seems to be resonating with people this time of year. Add your comments to the insightful perspectives already there.
-Randy
*QUIZ: What’s the name of the actress AND the character she portrays in the image at the top of the post?
Lily Tomlin as Edith Ann. Knew the actress and remembered the character but had to look up the character name.
-ryan
Great post Randy. We have a great story and it should be an inspriration to others to create their own story and document it for others to see.
QUIZ: Is that the great Lily Tomlin playing Edith Ann?? Always loved that skit.
Ryan’s the winner! (plus, I’m bettin’ Donny Googled it first to know the answer!)
Yes! Lilly – I am old enough to really remember her well. Loved her operator “One Ringy Dingy” sketch.
Thanks Brenda for the comment – yeh, used to love Edith.