Evolve your story

- Storytelling is really critical when you want to create great staying power. Because, obviously, you want to know about the past, but you also want to know how the brand is progressing towards the future. A good example of that is how Nike took their Air Max, and they started out with basketball, obviously with the Air Jordans. But from there, they created stories about how it was relevant for golf, how it was relevant for soccer, and how it's been relevant for tennis and so many other different venues and they brought in new stars to sort of be part of that story and that franchise. So this idea of stories and how they can grow and how your brand grows with them, but still building on the past of the so-called performance of that air pocket is really critical. But there are other ways that can create a great story. A lot of times, people don't even know about your origins. So if you think about a brand like Airbnb, they have an incredible origin story. The founders are basically a bunch of guys who couldn't pay their rent and they were looking to, basically, figure out a way to cover their rent. And so they thought, during this one big convention where there's all these people coming into town, why don't they just rent out, literally, some air mattresses in their living room. And that's how Airbnb got born. And that story's such a powerful story for people to connect with the brand. But beyond the idea of origin, think about the name and how the name came about. But it's also the story of creation. If you've ever watched those Post cereal commercials and you see the people behind the scenes on the production lines or you talk about the guy who actually came up with the idea of marrying this cereal with that cereal, that's a real powerful way to talk about story. And lastly, talk about people who are using your products. Back about 10 years ago, there was a whole campaign around how people actually use ketchup and how there was this whole anticipation for trying to get your ketchup and the different ways, whehter you put a knife into it, whether you shook it or you hit it. Those are all powerful stories about how people were engaging with their brand. And the reason stories are so powerful is that, as humans, we are the only species on this entire planet that can make something out of nothing. And a good example of this is, if I said to you, look, I have a Bic pen and a Montblanc pen, and I said to you which of these are more meaningful, which are more iconic? Your natural inclination would probably be to say the Montblanc pen. But if I told you the story about this Bic pen. It looks really chewed up. It's pretty ratty. It's 13 years old. And guess what, I own it and my wife own it, and we only pull it out once a year to write anniversary cards to each other, and that's because, 13 years ago, when we went to the Justice of Peace, we forgot to bring a pen, and she so kindly gave us this specific pen to sign our signatures on our wedding certificate. So which one of these is more meaningful based on the power of a story.