Product Launch and Business Growth Blog » story marketing

Story marketing: Why it works and why you should try it

JeffS — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 19:00:20 +0000

FADE IN:

INTERIOR/DAY: A crowded office

(Actually, there are only two people in the roomy space, but it feels “crowded” to them.)

They TYPE on their notebook keyboards.

Looking up from his task at hand, RICK (50ish) stares down JEFF (50ish-er, beard).

RICK
You know what? You should post something on the blog.

JEFF
(not looking up)
Sure. After the 32 things I have to do next…

RICK
No, really, you should post something on the blog – I’ve got a
thread going about “stories” in marketing. Right up your alley.

JEFF
(stops TYPING/looks at Rick)
C’mon, you know I’m super busy with -

RICK
Like I’m not – and I still blog… Go on, post something, will you?

JEFF
Fine.

RICK
Okay, fine.

JEFF
Fine.

They resume TYPING on their keyboards.

FADE OUT:

Hi, everyone – Jeff here.

I could have just begun this post by writing something like:
“…Rick asked me to post to the blog, so here I am.”

But, which method gave you more info?

Which held your interest more?

Chances are, even if you did not particularly enjoy the quick little scene above, you paid attention to it – if for no other reason than it was different from a typical, declarative statement.

The same holds true in marketing communications: a story-based communication method trumps standard announcement, declarative methods. Certainly I’m not advocating that you change your communications into screenplay format; but I do suggest that you start to work storytelling (in narrative form) into your marketing mix. Why?

Why you should try story marketing

Stories can help you reach more of your audience and motivate them to buy. A story-based communication or campaign sequence can increase email opens, click-through rates, opt-ins and conversions – and drive more leads into sales – by using stories that are truly interesting and useful to your readers, subscribers and customers – and turning those stories into powerful email marketing campaigns and site-based communications that produce above average results.

(BTW, If you missed Rick’s two recent posts/videos on using stories to effectively “break through the marketing noise” and get your message through to your audience, go here to catch up, or to review the videos again – it’s good stuff).

Why story marketing works

At any given time, a large percentage of the marketplace is in a “tuned out” state.

This explains why simply turning up the “marketing volume” typically provides diminishing returns; i.e., “yelling” louder in your communications and becoming more assertive only serves to cause people to tune out even further, increasing their “sales resistance”.

But, a story-based approach avoids triggering people’s resistance and self-defense mechanisms associated with more traditional email marketing, advertising and selling.

In fact, it leverages peoples’ natural interests and gains their attention and involvement, so it can enable you to reach that portion of the market that is tuning you out today.

Now, I’m not claiming that we are the only marketers to have figured out how powerful storytelling can be when properly applied – here’s an excerpt from Amazon.com regarding Seth Godin’s book “All Marketers Are Liars“, an interesting and entertaining work by one of today’s foremost thought leaders and authors in advanced marketing:

–
“After having fun with his opening salvo (“I have no intention of telling you the truth”) and beating the death out of his sarcastic, tongue-in-cheek point that marketers always lie, Godin makes a strong case that telling stories is your best bet to breaking through the clutter.” – Amazon.com
–

So, don’t just take my word for it. Why should you try mixing-in stories into your marketing motion? Because they work, that’s why.

And, for those of you interested in getting some specific, step-by-step, how-to info for constructing story-based campaigns, AND examples, templates and go-bys, too, check this out.

For those of you who would rather be doing (almost) anything rather than composing a story-based campaign, but still would like to experience increased sales conversions for your online business, go check out the Professional Services page on our site to learn the various ways we can do the work for you (if that’s not too much trouble)…

THE END

(Jeff Sulma is SVP Marketing for WinningWare.com. He likes a good story.)

When I Stop Talking, You’ll Know I’m Dead: Useful Stories

Rick Braddy — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 17:16:22 +0000

RECOMMENDED READING

I awoke early yesterday morning to re-runs of Larry King Live and the Glenn Beck show at 4 a.m. Sometimes fate steers us in the right direction (esp. when we say our prayers the night before – something I try to remember to do).

These days, I can only seem to take about 30 to 60 seconds of Glenn Beck and his erratic, “political historian” stammering and posturing, so I very quickly ended up on CNN – while my brain rebooted after Tex-Mex and margaritas the night before…

Larry King was interviewing Jerry Weintraub, a famous Hollywood producer and serial entrepreneur. I was soon absorbed and mesmerized by the short stories of Jerry’s amazing success promoting stars like Elvis, Frank Sinatra, George Clooney, John Denver and many rock bands including Led Zeppelin – among so many others.

I could quickly tell from this interview that what I was seeing was merely the tip of an iceberg – one that went much deeper beneath the surface – someone I simply had to know more about…

In the interview with Larry King, Jerry talked about how he learned from his father how to take seemingly regular things and “repackage” them into something special, then promote them effectively to the masses as an “event. Well, as a product launch guy, this repackaging and event marketing stuff hooked me right away. I definitely had to know more – a lot more…

Jerry talked briefly about how he came back from the brink of death one day, and decided it was time for him to share his life story while he was still able, so he recently published his autobiography. I was hoping Amazon.com had the Kindle e-book version available for download, so I could check it out while it was still fresh on my mind.

Fortunately, they did. So I bought the e-book for $12 and downloaded it to my PC moments later (I don’t have an actual Kindle, just the free Kindle for PC and iPhone readers, which I like just fine). I grabbed another cup of coffee and before I knew it, I looked up and it was almost 9 a.m.

I had already spent 3 and a half hours reading one of the most fascinating success stories around – a kid who went from the Bronx to the top of the world, creating movies like Oceans 11 through 13, Oh God!, The Karate Kid, Vegas Vacation and many others – and who discovered and made stars like John Denver and many others what they became (among hundreds of other success stories).

One of the most important lessons in business and in life Jerry sums up toward the end that is absolutely true:

“Most important, I was never afraid to fail, which meant I was never afraid to try. I was never afraid to look silly, which meant I was never threatened by a new idea.”

Jerry exemplifies these statements when he describes how he managed to go from being a relative “nobody” to taking Elvis on his first cross-country national tour – and after that six-week tour, became a self-made multi-millionaire and launched his career as a world-class producer. After being told No, in no uncertain terms, for 364 days straight – every single day by Colonel Tom Parker – he finally got a call back saying Yes – and the rest is history…

I wonder how many of us could believe in ourselves and our vision of what is possible enough to be told no that many days in a row, and wake up the next day, looking forward to being that much closer to getting the Yes we know we need.

I highly recommend you take a moment to download and get your own copy of Jerry’s latest autobiography and learn from his experience, persistence and ability to forge lasting, profitable relationships and sell almost anything.

Believe me, it’s the best $12 investment I have made in a very long time. I finished my first reading in just two sittings – probably a record for me lately.

One of the things I like most about Jerry is his fearlessness, his belief in himself and an impeccable tenacity for success – traits that are absolutely essential for anyone to succeed in today’s hyper-competitive world. His life is filled with a series of tremendous successes, along with some failures, that were all predicated on his ability to establish new relationships, and then leverage and monetize those relationships to the maximum extent possible, while at the same time forging real, lasting friendships.

Jerry’s Lifelong Success Formula: (my interpretation)

Clarity of Vision - Having clarity of vision around what can and needs to be accomplished (that others often cannot see themselves as clearly)
Identifying the Path - Figuring out who holds the keys to the stepping stones for fulfilling that vision
Leveraging Relationships – Breaking through all obstacles to establish the relationships with key decision makers and influencers, which provides the necessary leverage to cause and sustain profitable change
Communicating a Shared Vision – Making clear, bold statements about what can be done to help the other party accomplish and achieve a shared vision (once in front of the decision maker)
Telling Persuasive Stories - Using master storytelling as an effective persuasion tool to sell the vision
Packaging – Effective “packaging” – positioning and naming things so they have extremely high perceived value (even when the intrinsic value may be very low)
Launching – Turning opportunities into “events” and then promoting those events effectively as a launch
Delivering – Doing whatever it takes to actually deliver the promised results as expected
Disruptive Innovation – where appropriate, changing the way things are traditionally done by replacing the “old way” with a new, improved approach that better serves customers (business models, distribution models, pricing models, etc.)

It’s easy enough to understand, but a formula that takes courage, relentless persistence and a healthy dose of creativity and a willingness to “do whatever it takes” to succeed and win – that should be every entrepreneur’s credo.

Finally, and perhaps most important, Jerry is a master storyteller. Stories provide the carrier wave for our messages that people will actually listen to, absorb and internalize – then make decisions upon.

Packaging the story up and then selling it as an “event” is the vehicle for actually delivering the end sales and generating millions in sales.

Much of what Jerry is actually a master at doing is what we now commonly refer to as “launches”. Instead of launching products or websites, he launches and builds the careers of stars, movies and performers like bands and musicians.

Boy – just when you think you know a lot about something like launches, you find out just how much more there is to learn… I’d sure like the opportunity to meet Jerry and learn even more about his fascinating journey someday. I wonder if I can break his record of 364 days?

Psychology of Social Product Launches – Part 3, Storytelling

Rick Braddy — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 23:31:38 +0000

In this post, let’s examine another key element: Stories and storytelling.

Stories are how human beings spread ideas that are important or interesting to us. Storytelling is as old as mankind. We tell stories in many ways – using words, images, sounds, gestures and expressions. Storytelling is at the heart of how we communicate with one another every day.

And the human mind is optimized for storytelling. Traditionally, oral stories were committed to memory and then passed on from generation to generation.

Jump forward to the Internet age, and the avenues available for sharing our stories are all around us: blogs, Twitter, Facebook, forums, YouTube, email, websites, article sites, books, TV, radio, and of course, the all important and powerful – word of mouth. The evolution of technology has made storytelling easier than ever.

As Steve Chazin, former Apple marketing executive says in “Marketing Apple”, to have your story repeated you must:

Make your message memorable – Think Big, Write Small
Boil the story down to its syrupy goodness
Make your message different and worth repeating

When we launch anything to an audience (a product, a company, website or a political candidate), we need to use stories to get our message across. These stories answer important questions for the audience, including:

Who are these people and where did they come from?
Why should I care?
What’s in it for me?
Why should I listen to you?
Why should I take action and actually do something different?
Why should I act now instead of delaying or just doing nothing instead?

Stories provide an interesting way to answer these (and other) questions people have about what’s being launched and how it could affect them. Stories can be conveyed in a variety of ways, including blogging, videos, newsletters, and emails.

Crafted properly, stories don’t sell – they simply tell and teach by example.

Stories provide the information that people need to make up their own mind – about you, what you’re launching and offering and where it fits in their life. Stories also enable readers to learn by example.

By allowing people to make up their own minds (instead of coercing them through slick offers and time-limited deals that everyone knows are lies concocted by marketers to get them to buy), people are much more willing to listen to what you have to say when conveyed as an interesting story.

And they’ll be more inclined to pass a simple, interesting story along to others, who will in turn be more interested than if you come across as selling your product. Incidentally, this storytelling approach to marketing works well not only in launches, but also in everyday marketing and advertising campaigns.

And stories are an extremely powerful way to structure marketing campaigns and advertisements today. Stories are more effective than traditional ads because they attract the reader’s interest and convey the benefits and features of a product in the proper context – the context of a customer who’s using the product.

In fact, storytelling is so important to use in not only launches but to incorporate into your everyday marketing mix, we created a “system” for story-based marketing campaigns. These campaigns have produced millions of dollars in sales when traditional broadcast-style, feature/benefit oriented campaigns fail. The reason is simple. People will take the time to read and comprehend an interesting story (and continue to ignore what is obviously an advertisement).

Learn to properly incorporate storytelling in your marketing mix and you will be amazed at how well it works, not only in launches, but in your everyday marketing.

ALL BUYERS ARE LIARS: Stories we tell ourselves to get what we want

Rick Braddy — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 22:06:43 +0000

ALL BUYERS ARE LIARS

The Stories We Tell Ourselves to Get What We Want

Whenever we buy something we want (vs. just what we need), we lie to ourselves about the reasons we need it and what it will do for us. These little stories we tell ourselves help us justify our own selfish need to get what we want…

For example, when we pay over $100 for a pair of Nike tennis shoes, we tell ourselves things like… “my friends will think I’m cool”, “everyone will be impressed by”, “I’ll be just like Michael Jordon” and other little lies that make us feel better about ourselves – and justify an otherwise unreasonable expenditure on something we really didn’t need, especially at that price – the same basic shoe that costs $20 at Wal-Mart and $3 to make in China.

In his book All Marketers Are Liars, Seth Godin examines one of my favorite marketing topics – the power of storytelling in marketing, on which I have written extensively this year.

Those who master the art of tuning in to the stories buyers are telling themselves, and then tell the right stories in their marketing, will continue to earn above average market share and results in today’s “give me what I want” world.

The premise of Godin’s book says that instead of appealing to basic “needs”, which people can typically fulfill in many different ways these days, simply by going to Amazon.com or Google and doing a quick search, we must instead look for clusters (what I’ll term “segments”) of buyers who are telling themselves a similar story already about what they want – and have similar biases and “worldviews”.

The “worldview” reflects how a buyer sees her world; i.e., the beliefs, biases, and values the buyer places on things, which directly shapes how a given marketing message and its product will be processed by that buyer. These worldviews are extremely powerful, acting as sophisticated “filters”, blocking the things we disagree with, and allowing the things we agree with to get through.

In the past, marketers learned to segment markets in a variety of ways. Segmentation based upon worldviews is a form a psychographic segmentation. Godin makes a compelling case that by properly identifying these worldviews marketers can achieve breakthrough results by crafting authentic stories that get through a buyer’s filters and then resonate within the mind of the prospect – creating the urge to buy. I agree.

When we created the original story-based marketing system, we realized just how effective storytelling is when applied to advertising and email campaigns; however, Godin’s astute observations (as usual) help us realize why some stories work better than others (and some stories do not work at all).

To be truly effective, the stories we use in our marketing and advertising must:

Be interesting, relevant and timely
Agree with our belief systems, in order to get past our rejection “filtering” rules
Support the “lies” that we tell ourselves as buyers that enable us to justify getting what we want.

For example, back in the late 1990′s, my wife and I owned a couple of Thomas Kinkade Signature Galleries, which exclusively sold Thomas Kinkade limited-edition canvas paintings, along with various knick-knacks with his images on them. These “paintings” are basically inexpensive replicas (copies) of an original oil painting, reproduced in the thousands! They look great and make people feel good. So how can a replica of a painting make people feel so good?

The Thomas Kinkade brand has a large Christian following and many of the paintings convey religious symbolisms, peaceful scenes and landscapes, gardens, gazebos, etc.

The titles of the paintings are often inspirational, like “Bridge of Faith”, “End of a Perfect Day”, “Perseverance”, “Stairway to Paradise”, “Clearing Storms” and the like. We taught our sales people to tell a story associated with each painting. These stories described the artist’s inspiration for the painting, described key elements in the painting, and anchored to the buyer’s existing belief systems, values and biases; i.e., the paintings represented elements of their ideal worldviews.

In short, the paintings made you feel good because the stories were inspirational, they were painted by a deeply religious artist and they visually represented the buyer’s worldview. And by hanging them in your home you could share those same feelings and worldviews with your family and visitors, creating a great environment for all to share.

The sales people were taught that the best way to sell these paintings was to “sell the experience with a great story, and the customer takes the painting home as a souvenir“. And it worked very well! The best sales people learned to speak briefly to each customer, learn a little about that customers interests and worldview, then pull the customers into an appropriate story for each painting – the do what sales people do… qualify then close the sale.

The customers loved the stories as much (perhaps more) than the paintings themselves. And they spent many hundreds and thousands of dollars on these “limited edition” painting replicas, took them home and hung them on their walls. The stories were interesting, relevant to and consistent with the buyer’s worldview and enabled the buyer to overlook the fact that they were paying a lot of money for a replica of a painting – not an original.

The stories allowed the buyers, who were not sophisticated art collectors, to justify the price paid and get what they actually wanted - a visual representation of their ideal worldview – lies about a world that typically doesn’t exist anywhere else in their life, except as told through that painting.

Stories definitely work wonders, and not just in marketing. Human beings are “wired” to be storytellers. It’s something we’ve been doing as long as we could communicate with each other as primitive beings.

And what is “word of mouth” after all? It’s storytelling…

I highly-recommend All Marketers Are Liars. Once you’ve read it, you’ll better understand how story-based marketing works and why it works so well in today’s noisy world.

You may also want to take a closer look at how The Precision Marketing System can be applied as a proven methodology for crafting effective story-based marketing and advertising campaigns, by precisely targeting your buyers’ wants – and working with your buyer’s beliefs, biases and worldviews.

Instead of continuing to waste time and money trying to “break through” the clutter and noise by spending more and turning up the volume (which doesn’t work at all today), figure out what stories your customers (and non-customers) are already telling themselves today, then see if there’s an authentic story you can tell that maps to what they already believe and want to hear.

Finally, I find it interesting that Godin chose to focus the title of the book on Marketers instead of Buyers (which is what the book is really about). I suppose he must have thought it would resonate with his target audience – marketers. He said the title was chosen to be “edgy” and remarkable (one of his “Purple Cows”).

My first impression was that I actually disagreed with the title, so I instantly rejected the book outright (my own filters based upon my values and integrity as a person kicked in), so I originally found the title offensive enough not to read the book.

Boy. I’m glad I finally managed to get past that incorrect initial perception and read this particular book. It has changed my outlook on segmentation that works in today’s highly-competitive world, and provided me with a fresh framework for how to focus on learning more about what people want and then crafting authentic stories that tell them how our products and services will help them get it.

So, what stories have you told yourself lately to get what you want?

And what stories have you heard other people tell you lately about what they want?

Story: Struggling organic farmer saves the family farm

Rick Braddy — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 04:00:37 +0000

“Struggling organic farmer saves the family farm and discovers new growth opportunities”

This blog post is quite a bit different than most. In this post, we’re going to explore an actual example of how effective storytelling can be at grabbing a reader’s attention, conveying the benefits of a product by way of example, and stirring emotional interest and desire in a prospect’s mind, leading to more sales from a portion of an audience who is ignoring or increasingly resistant to traditional marketing and advertising methods.

First, let’s take a look at the usual way this “case study” kind of information is used. Have a look at the PDF Case Study, which is typical of case study documents on literally tens of thousands of websites across the Internet. Unfortunately for these companies, this is as far as these cases are ever explored or communicated – an enormous missed opportunity.

Case Study

Next, I would like to share the story of how AgriOrganics Labs products saved their customer’s farm, then helped them grow the farm into a thriving business. Here’s the story:

“Struggling organic farmer saves the family farm and discovers new growth opportunities”

Jimmy Dunn, Jr. awakes before dawn and enjoys a cup of coffee on the front porch, just like his father and grandfather did before him on the family farm, where he’s lived and worked as long as he can remember. However, this day isn’t like any of those other days before. Today, he realizes just how close he is to losing the farm.

Over the years, the family has fought droughts, locusts and even the Great Depression and somehow managed to hold on to the farm – but today things are different. The big farming coalitions are blocking the flow of their produce to the national market, forcing the farm to sell its products locally at a steep discount and lower volume that’s threatening to bankrupt the farm – and his family.

As the sun rises over the hills, Jimmy ponders their options. His wife, Victoria, thinks they should just sell the farm to the coalition and find another way forward. Working this farm is all Jimmy knows and wants in life, and he’s not about to just give up and sell out to the big guys. They’ve faced adversity before and prevailed – there has to be a way.

Jimmy realizes he’s powerless to overcome the stranglehold the coalition has formed against the independents like Sunrise Farms – at least if he continues to play by their rules. He stands up, walks down the stairs onto the front lawn and out of the corner of his eye notices the bag of fertilizer next to the flowerbed. It says “Organic Super-growth Formula”, and claims to be free from chemicals and safe for organic gardens. Their gardener was using it to plant some tulips in the flowerbed around the front porch. Then it hit him.

“Of course,” he said to himself aloud! It just might work. They would convert the farm over to growing and selling organic vegetables. Organic vegetables are fetching a premium price at the markets, and are in extremely high demand, both locally and nationally. How hard could it be to learn organic farming?

Jimmy immediately began the process of switching over to organic farming methods, took out a loan to get the new equipment required, and filed for their organic certification inspection and permit.

Victoria continued to worry, feeling like perhaps they might be going in the wrong direction. What if they couldn’t sell the organic products or something else unexpected happened? The loan they’d taken out was looming over their head like a dark cloud, and money was so tight she’d sold her grandmother’s diamond wedding ring to raise money to pay bills last month. She could feel they were running out of time.

About 3 months later, the farm received its organic certifications and Jimmy began contacting various buyers of organic produce. Their crop wouldn’t be available for a few more months, but experience has shown it’s better to sell as much of the crop ahead of time, if possible. It was tougher going than Jimmy had expected, forging new relationships with buyers they didn’t know, and with a new, unknown organic farm with no track record, there were lots of questions Jimmy wasn’t sure he knew the right answers to when asked.

As Jimmy drove past one of their fields on the way to church one Sunday, he noticed something didn’t look right – the field had a yellowish tint to it. That afternoon, Jimmy drove over to the field to take a closer look. What he discovered made his heart sink – the entire field was infested and the crops were damaged, some beyond recovery.

And from the looks of it, the problem was spreading toward the rest of their main fields. Jimmy knew if he didn’t get this infestation under control fast they could lose the entire crop – and the farm.

Under normal circumstances, they would just dust the crops with the pesticide they’d used for years. In fact, there was enough of it still sitting in the barn to do the job; however, using that pesticide would violate the organic certification they’d worked so hard to earn over the past few months.

When Victoria heard the news, she panicked. “We have to do whatever it takes to save that crop, Jimmy. Besides, who will know? It’s our farm and we can do whatever we must to protect it!” she said.

Jimmy replied, “I’ll know. I’ll know we’ve cheated and that our crop isn’t qualified to be sold as organic – and it’s a violation of state law to claim a crop is certified as organic when it’s not. There has to be another way.”

Their 16-year old daughter, Vanessa, listening to the conversation and seeing how upset and worried both her parents were, decided to see what she could do to help. Unlike her parents, Vanessa is technology-savvy, like most kids today. She quickly goes to Google and researches “organic pesticides” and finds several options.

A very promising company named AgriOrganics Labs claimed they could address most any vegetable crop infestation using their state-of-the-art organic pesticides. And unlike the other options, AgriOrganics Labs offered a free testing service, where you just send them a sample of the plant and infestation, and within 48 hours they’ll ship you the solution. This sounded like what was needed – a quick solution they could count on working the first time, before any more damage was done to the crop.

Vanessa filled out the free testing service request form and printed everything out to show her dad.

He was sitting on the porch, staring out at the dark clouds and lightening of a thunderstorm that was growing closer. She said, “Daddy, I know how worried you are, so I went online and looked around. I found something that looks like it might help our farm.”

Jimmy perked up out of his near depression state, and said, “What’s that, Honeybee?” Honeybee is Vanessa’s nickname that her dad has called her since she was just a little girl, working her little honey farm out back.

“I found a company that makes organic pesticides and guarantees they can get us a solution to our problem in 48 hours or less,” she said, handing the printed papers to him. “All we have to do is send them some samples and they’ll ship us what we need to get rid of those caterpillars and beetles. And they’re certified for use in organic farming – that’s what we need, right?”

Jimmy pulled his glasses out of his shirt pocket and put them on, studying the material more closely now. Then he smiled and said, “This looks like just what the doctor ordered, Honeybee. I’ll give ‘em a call first thing tomorrow. Thanks darling“, reaching out and giving her a big hug and a peck on the cheek.

The next morning, Jimmy called the toll-free 800 number and spoke with a very nice person, who explained exactly what they needed in order to run their tests. Given the presence of caterpillars and beetles, the man was very certain they could address the infestation with one of their best-selling organic pesticides.

The AgriOrganics Labs organic pesticide was about three times as expensive as the usual pesticides they had been using, but well worth the price if it worked as advertised. Jimmy quickly visited the infested field, gathered the samples, and placed them in a small box that he then sent overnight to the AgriOrganics Labs folks.

Sure enough, 2 days later, Victoria came outside and said that the lab people were on the phone. They told Jimmy they had exactly what’s needed to treat the infested field as well as the rest of the farm to prevent further spread and damage – a product they called “Formula 5™”. They also said that Formula 5 would protect the farm against 73 other potential pests, and would last about 6 months between treatments.

Jimmy placed his order over the phone on the spot, not wanting to waste another minute. Fortunately, AgriOrganics Labs has a distribution center just 75 miles north of the farm, so they could deliver and apply Formula 5 within just a few days.

Jimmy was happy to pay the nominal delivery and application service charge to have it all taken care of for him at this point, and to ensure the product was applied properly by the experts this time.

The AgriOrganics Labs team called and set an appointment to arrive on Friday morning, and said they planned to work through the weekend to get the job done. Jimmy was impressed by how professional they looked, wearing their white lab coat uniforms.

This was definitely different from anything else he’d ever seen. He was grateful that they weren’t wasting any precious time and were willing to work through their weekend to take care of everything. He just hoped and prayed that it wasn’t too late…

Jimmy watched them prepare their equipment and go to work. They applied the Formula 5 using a “fog” delivery system. They used the wind to help distribute the Formula 5 across the fields. It took only about a day to treat the entire farm. They came back and repeated the same treatment two more times over the weekend.

Then Sunday afternoon, they came by the house and said they were finished, and that their early testing results showed the infestation was cured. They asked Jimmy to accompany them to inspect the fields. As promised, there was no sign of any caterpillars or beetles. Jimmy thanked them and they took off their white lab coats, climbed into their truck, and drove away down the gravel road.

Victoria brought out a tray with plastic glasses and a pitcher of iced tea, and they sat on the porch together, watching the sunset. Victoria said, “Well, they sure were very nice people. Do you think the crops will be OK now?”

Jimmy said, “Yep. That Formula 5 product of theirs worked better than anything I’ve ever seen – heck, better than anything I’ve ever heard of. I’m going to tell Jed and Barry about this stuff, since their farms are also showing signs of those same critters now.”

About then, Vanessa drove up in her white Mustang convertible, and parked on the grass where she usually does. Jimmy said, “You realize our little Honeybee saved the farm, don’t you?” Vanessa said, “Yeah. Let’s go into town and celebrate with a nice dinner at that fancy new restaurant, Jimmy.” Jimmy replied, “You betcha. We definitely have a lot to be thankful for and celebrate today. Let’s go.”

The following week, the phone rang again. It was the AgriOrganics Labs people following up to make sure everything was alight. Jimmy explained how there was still no sign of those “pesky critters” (as he called them), and gave them the names and phone numbers of his nearby farmer friends, who were also in need of Formula 5™, since the traditional pesticides they’d tried didn’t seem to be working very well on the beetles for some reason.

For just a moment, Jimmy reflected how they’d been tempted to by-pass the organic farming rules and use conventional pesticides just a few weeks earlier. In retrospect, that could have cost them the farm, since these particular beetles were not responding to traditional pesticide treatment.

Then the AgriOrganics Labs representative asked Jimmy something unexpected. She said, “We noticed you’re growing organic tomatoes, corn and squash. What if your organic vegetables grew up to 50% bigger and faster – would that be of interest to you?”

Jimmy said, “Yeah, sure. Why do you ask?” She went on to tell a story about an organic vegetable farmer who doubled his profits last year using their new OrganiGrow™ fertilizer product. She said it was one of the best-kept secrets in their industry, and it came with a money-back guarantee, like all AgriOgranics Labs products.

Jimmy thought about it a moment. He realized they had lost nearly half of that first field before curing the infestation, and could really use some kind of boost to recover fully. She said they were even able to provide the product on credit, since they believed in it so strongly and knew it was a great investment for his farm.

Jimmy said, “Well, if it works as well as Formula 5 did, I’d be a fool not to try it!” This time, Jimmy was able to apply the fertilizer himself in a couple of day’s time using his regular equipment.

They were only a couple of months away from the harvest now, and the future was already looking brighter to Jimmy. Even Victoria seemed to believe they were going to make it through these tough times.

A few months later, the harvest went smoothly and they found several buyers, but only sold about half of the crop. The tomatoes were the biggest, most beautiful Jimmy had ever grown at their farm. Jed asked him what kind of “steroids” he was using on them! Jimmy just smiled, realizing the AgrilOrganics Labs folks really saved his farm.

The next day the doorbell rang. A man introduced himself as a representative for a national grocery chain supplier. After a good discussion and a few glasses of iced tea, the man placed an order for their entire remaining crop, at a price that was 25% higher than market prices.

Jimmy signed a contract to sell their next three years crops, all they could grow, to this one national distributor. The man mentioned repeatedly that the demand for organic vegetables was doubling every year, and it was tougher than ever to find top-quality organic produce like Sunrise Farms’ was selling.

After the man left, Vanessa said, “Daddy, I saw the Bruner’s are trying to lease their fields – maybe we could expand our farm by using their land and help Mrs. Bruner out.” Mr. Bruner had passed away that summer, there was nobody to run the farm for them, and Mrs. Bruner was now struggling financially.

“That’s a brilliant idea, Honeybee!” I’ll give Mrs. Bruner a call and see what she’s asking for a lease.

That was two years ago. Today, Sunrise Farms continues to grow and expand – along with AgriOrganics Labs, who continue to supply Sunrise Farms with its premium quality organic fertilizers and pesticides.

Learn more about how to use powerful storytelling techniques in your marketing mix…

Discover how easy it is to create powerful stories that reach a part of your audience who will very likely continue to ignore you… until you do.

Note: This story is fictional, serving as an example of how to use storytelling in marketing. Any relationship to actual companies, places, people or things are completely coincidental. No beetles or caterpillars were harmed in the making of this story.

See the difference? It’s like night and day… especially to a customer!

Customers are much more interested in stories about other customers who are like them than they are in your (or anyone else’s) product. That’s why case studies need to be turned into compelling stories – and these stories need to be promoted as low-key, high-powered campaigns that boosts your sales.

These stories are everywhere around us, just waiting to be told.

These story-based techniques are responsible for generating millions of dollars in sales in a matter of days… (in the Internet Marketing arena). They work anywhere human beings are involved (which is still around 100% of any market, at least until “V” really shows up!)

That’s why we created “The Precision Marketing System” – to provide our customers with a way to unleash the untold power of these stories.

What kind of stories do you have to tell?

Next steps: Watch this video

Product Launch and Business Growth Blog » story marketing

Story marketing: Why it works and why you should try it

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