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Telling Stories Session1
- 1. Chris Bell +44 7769 978 237 chris.bell@plain-advice.com @chrisbell
- 3. I Stories
- 4. Why Are We Here?
- 5. Did You Hear About...
- 7. Branding 101
- 9. Visual Identity is Static 1910’s 1960’s 2010’s 2000’s 1990’s 1980’s 1970’s 1950’s 1940’s 1930’s 1920’s
- 10. Visual Identity
- 11. Product Names Tone of Voice Stories
- 14. Verbal Identity
- 15. Stories Spread
- 16. Know Your Partners Customers 3 to 5 years C?O Costs 3 months to a year Manager Conditions Up to 1 month Technician is the company’s sweet spot, the sell-to point, where the money is…
- 17. Talk to Your Partners C?O At last, somebody who understands exactly what we want. I’ll go tell someone else about this. It’s great! Manager Technician is the company’s sweet spot, the sell-to point, where the money is…
- 18. Compose Short term story Tech support, pre-sales Medium term story Account manager, finance department Long term story Owner, investor
Editor's Notes
- When communicating with customers, a company has two identities. Visual and verbal.The visual identity is what many of us recognise as a ‘brand’. That is, a logo, colours, typefaces and so on.The verbal identity is rather more subtle, encompassing elements such as product naming as well as stories (as we have discussed) and tone of voice.
- A company’s visual identity is used to provide immediate recognition and reassurance about product quality
- However, once a visual identity has been established, it is very hard and expensive to change.
- When communicating with customers, a company has two identities. Visual and verbal.The visual identity is what many of us recognise as a ‘brand’. That is, a logo, colours, typefaces and so on.The verbal identity is rather more subtle, encompassing elements such as product naming as well as stories (as we have discussed) and tone of voice.
- Any business to business relationship has to be successful at all levels within the customer organisation.To understand the customer company, it helps to consider it as being made up of three layers of staff. Technicians are at the bottom of the heap. They think no further than the next payday or round of redundancies and talk about their employment conditions.Above them is a layer of management. They think in budgetary cycles, probably up to the end of the quarter, and talk of managing costs.At the top of the pile is the CxO team. Their thinking may run out as far as five years into the future and their major concern is gaining and retaining customers.
- For a successful relationship, the selling company needs to create three sets of stories showing how their products and services can meet and exceed the expectations of everybody in the customer organisation.There need to be short term stories that explain how Technicians conditions can be improved. There need to be medium term messages to appeal to managers and their incessant cost controlling, Finally, C-level staff need to see how the sellers’ products and services can address their need to gain and retain customers.The right stories will spread quickly through the customer company, helping build trust and confidence between the companies. It is precisely these kinds of stories that we are adept at creating.