Successful marketing does one thing: it captivates consumers by appealing to some component of their psychology. It locates needs and wants and then, having located these needs and wants, it gives consumers a solution that addresses them. To say that marketing “exploits” consumers’ psychological processes sounds a bit sinister; it’s better to say that good marketing is based on an appreciation of human psychology.
And that’s why good online marketing needs to be about creating stories. Scientific research is increasingly making it clear that humans respond positively to the entrancing power of narrative. Marketers, whether they are operating in the social media space or are creating videos for YouTube, need to acknowledge this insight. Marketers who want to create successful online marketing content need to become bards and raconteurs.
In his book “Tell to Win,” Peter Guber, an American film producer and executive and Chairman and CEO of Mandalay Entertainment, argues that humans are unmoved by “data dumps.” Empirical data can impress them but it cannot compel them to take actions. He argues that what gets humans to act is emotion. This is the central and incontrovertible insight that you need to acknowledge if you are creating online marketing materials.
Guber isn’t the first author to advance this thesis but it’s one that is worth repeating, especially because science is starting to arrive at the same conclusion. What was once little more than an intuition is now substantiated by data.
Melanie Green and Tim Brock are just two of the psychologists who have done research attempting to demystify the power of narrative. Their findings suggest to them that listening to a story “radically alters the way information is processed.” In other words, information presented in a narrative format is ingested and handled differently than accumulations of disconnected data. In addition, Green and Brock have found the following:
• Readers who are captivated by a story are more impacted by it than readers who are not.
• Readers who are absorbed in a story are less likely to see inaccuracies, errors and logical fallacies in it than their unaffected peers.
Taken together, Green and Brock’s findings demonstrate that stories transfix us and turn us into putty in the hands of the storyteller. When we experience a story, our critical faculties are disabled and we are recast by the story. In contrast, when we experience other forms of communication, we remain detached; our defenses remain intact and we are, as a result, less likely to be impacted.
Guber compares the function of narrative to the Trojan Horse. Readers accept a compelling narrative and allow it to penetrate their defense because, for human beings, stories are “gifts.” But Gruber’s analogy doesn’t end at this superficial similarly. He adds that a story, like the fabled Trojan Horse, is a “delivery system.” It conceals the teller’s motivations and his/her agenda. Narratives, by virtue of their seeming innocence, sway humans in ways that other modes of communication cannot hope to replicate.
For online marketers the takeaway from these findings is clear: your online marketing content needs to tell stories. A YouTube video shouldn’t just enumerate the benefits of a product. A more effective way of conveying the same message is to have a consumer discuss his/her experience of purchasing and using the product. Such a video would be more likely to resonate with viewers.
Online marketing shouldn’t be about “selling.” It needs to be about “storytelling.” To create an effective online marketing campaign you need to adopt what the Russians call shamanstvo: “the enchanter quality.” You need to become a storyteller.