Businesses are collections of people who work together to produce a good or service they sell to the market. That’s the standard definition. But it’s also a little restrictive. Companies are actually much more than collections of people. They are also mythologies.
If that sounds a little strange, think hard about what branding actually is. Partly, it’s what people say about you when you’re not in the room, as Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s founder, famously quipped. But it is also partly about the stories that you tell. It’s all the made-up stuff that isn’t physically embodied in your products.
Think about Apple, for instance. The tech giant is known all over the world for its iPhones and tablets. But when you hold and use them, they aren’t all that different from the competition. The reason they are so successful is because of the Apple brand. It’s the mythology around the company that really makes the products fly off the shelves.
In this post, we take a look at all of the reasons why your business should have a backstory. Here’s what you need to know:
Reason 1: It Clarifies Your Vision
Having a backstory clarifies your vision. It puts everything that you want to do into context and makes it easy for your stakeholders to understand you.
Think about how difficult it is to understand most software companies. Most of their marketing is jargon-packed and not at all clear to the average customer.
But now imagine if they dropped it all and adopted a story instead. This way, they could explain their vision to customers and colleagues in simple terms that everyone could internalize.
Reason 2: It Helps With Innovation
Having a story also helps with innovation. R&D departments focus on developing ideas that are more relevant to the future that you want to create. If the story is clear, any tangential projects will become blatantly clear and staff will shut them down before they start consuming resources.
Reason 3: It Makes Presentation More Interesting
Some consumers find products and services exciting in and of themselves, but they are a rare breed. Most prefer some sort of story to keep them engaged and entertained.
For this reason, many businesses are choosing to use documentary video production. They’re actually creating feature films describing some interesting aspect of their business (or something closely related to it).
You can think of this approach as a form of native advertising. Instead of trying to sell to your audience, you’re appealing to them indirectly through exciting opportunities relating to your industry.
Reason 4: It Makes Life Easier For Marketers
Lastly, having a backstory makes life much easier for marketers. They have a much better concept of what you are trying to achieve.
Marketers aren’t necessarily storytellers by themselves. But if they have something to work with, they can be considerably more effective. They understand the general direction you want to take your firm. And this can make it considerably easier to get your message across.