Stories that brands tell
A story has the potential for great influence on customers. But what is the right story for a brand to tell? While the exact story will depend on the brand's attributes, the message, and the targeted customers, I've identified two common types of brand stories:
Customer success or satisfaction
Customer stories provide context and relevance by showing specifically how your brand's product or service makes customers' lives better. These stories can be simply dramatizations, like Cingular's dropped call ads, or real customers' testimonials, like Apple's more recent iPhone commercials. The latest series of iPhone commercials showcases real users explaining a situation in which the iPhone saved the day. In one example, a pilot recalls how he looked up the weather on the iPhone to help his flight avoid a three-hour delay.
Brand history
Brands that have been around a while or that have an interesting past benefit from sharing their history. Sharing brand history enables a company to share rational facts in an emotional context of nostalgia or credibility. For instance, 3M, a company focused on innovation, tells many stories of its inventions through its brand history on its website. Another example is Hershey's. The website shares the company's history and the founder's history. Additionally, the headquarter attractions in Hershey, PA feature a museum of those histories.
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