Hi there
Great stories, my old creative director would say, are what lie behind every great marketing campaign because they connect us with something bigger than ourselves.
But in this digital age, many would argue that storytelling is dead because the short-form communications like Twitter and MSN simply don't allow us to tell big stories "in this digital, impersonal world".
I couldn't disagree more. Just this article in Ad Age this week shows how brands are telling stories, using data visualisation, in new and unique ways. But if stories are still thriving in campaigns, and I think they are, there is no doubt that something has radically changed about how we tell them.
The most powerful aspect of Web 2.0 is putting the user at the centre of the experience, and this has meant that stories no longer focus on JUST the brand's story, but has instead shifted to you, the user.
Marketers can no longer just try to push out a single, fixed, defined brand story for mass consumption and expect success. Instead campaigns now look at how to enable users to take our stories and create their own - through blogs/ photos/ tweets/ profile/ films/ art/ music - then share and mash and enjoy these with other people.
Below I've described what I see as the main changes in how we tell stories, and examples of companies taking advantage of this digital storytelling revolution.
1. Create a new story: User generated content was one of the first big changes in storytelling a few years ago. Since then we've had fabulous campaigns, for example the recent Doritos Crash the Superbowl Campaign , which open up brand communication to the user in new and entertaining ways. We can all be movie makers. Writers. Reporters. Photographers. Artists. Musicians. Money Managers. You name it. That's why sites like YouTube and Flickr were created.
Of course UGC can be done badly, I mean who really wants to see people talk about how good your tea is, and it can leave your brand open to criticism as in this automotive nightmare. In the end you need to balance the freedom of the user to create how they want, with the need include and manage the brand's story as part of the campaign.
My most recent favourite was The Best Job in the World campaign, where people submitted multi-media entries on why they should be chosen to work in an Australian resort. Brilliant.
2. Make your story mine: Brands haven't stopped telling stories, but they are realising that to relate to people's lives now you need to be able to open up the story to interpretation, re-imagination, to mash-ups and users contributing to the story. My favourite from last year was the HBO Voyeur campaign. This brilliantly allowed people to dig deeper to find out more, and contribute to, all the stories within the campaign.
A great example of this happening is through something called ARG - or alternative reality gaming. This is where brands provide an real world component to an online game, such as treasure hunts, quizzes, hiding clues, etc. in offline media. Check out the great campaign to promote last year's hit The Dark Knight and watch the videos here (bottom right of page) to get the idea. This is one of the biggest developments at the moment with many brands creating ARG campaigns to combine the best of online and offline storytelling in all media.
3. Be part of something bigger: The idea of crowd sourcing, collaboration and wikis - people contributing together to create something just for the sake of it - may well be the most powerful driver of content and stories at the moment.
Allowing users to all contribute towards something bigger - for example the community within the Pepsi Optimism campaign and the Earth Hour Website Tools - lets people really feel a part of the campaign and to generate a life of its own. Whether that's a cause, an event, a game or a campaign.
Some current examples we're doing here are for Tourism Thailand and Heineken. For TAT we created a site where people can add real stories and blogs to their favourite Thai destinations, which can then be found by other people looking for packages online.
For Heineken's current UEFA campaign, the main idea is that people can add their own 'Hieneken can' to a stadium we are building made of cans here in Bangkok. We've created a site for people to create their personalized can for their favourite football team, and build it with fellow team supporters, adding a bit of competition along the way!
The exciting thing I think for marketers and agencies everywhere is that to make great stories nowadays, we can give people the right tools and inspiration, get out of the way, and let them do it for themselves.
Interesting times indeed.
Cheers, Rob
Feel free to add comments below, or for further questions or advice contact me at rob.h@th.arcww.com
