The light of storeytelling for startups has shone brightly, everyone has seen it. Everyone including your competitors. We’ll do you one better and let you in on the fact that most brands are getting the memo and incorporating storytelling techniques in their marketing communications. Well except you but that’s why we’re here, isn’t it? To get you up to speed so you too can play in the big leagues.

Almost everyone is preaching the gospel of storytelling and the advantage of telling compelling stories, but no one is saying (or has said) anything about how you can tell your startup’s story.

In this article, we’ll tell (no show you) what storytelling is, what storytelling for startups looks like, how you can tell your startup’s story, why it matters that you do, updated channels for effective storytelling in startup marketing, and how to measure the impact of storytelling in your marketing efforts.

 

 

What is Storytelling?

Storytelling is not just what you read in books, it is the reason behind your purchasing decision, the service you like so much that you give a 5-star review every time, the brand you make an excuse for when they don’t meet up to your expectations. Whatever you have bought wasn’t just you patronizing a brand, you bought a story, a narrative. That is what storytelling is. It is the perfect startup story that resonates so much with your target audience that the product or service you sell, becomes a symbolic representation of the compelling and strategic story you have told.

Storytelling is your most subtle bet at infusing your marketing strategies without directly shouting “Come and buy”. In some cases, it can be the powerful marketing tool you need to connect with your audience. That is what effective storytelling is.

 Now, for many startups it can look different, you’re not offering the same solution so how it looks like for Startup A will differ from what it looks like for Startup B. The problem is everyone has heard of storytelling and wants to do it the same way someone they saw is doing theirs (wrong). Let’s show you what it can look like for you.

 

What does storytelling for Startups look like?

Storytelling in marketing especially for tech startups can take different turns. Amongst other things that are essential in projecting a narrative, one thing stays constant: Telling an Authentic Startup story. There’s a whole lot of noise in the market, a good number of companies dragging poor, innocent customers by their feet, arms, and heads. Everyone wants a piece and it’s clear customers are the goal. The story that works is a fine blend of both product and customer point of view; balancing emotional appeal with hitting business objectives. 

The perfect story starts by making it what the audience wants to hear. What this means is that there has to be product-market fit. Essentially storytelling for your startup is not delving into a huge market size with a half-baked product that wasn’t built based on research and expecting your prospective customers to “see” the value in your product. 

What it looks like, is dabbling into the art of persuasion with a simple story, one that your audience can relate with.  All you need is a script and as your company grows, like any story, the plot will thicken and can take any turn you want it to, bearing in mind that your business goals and satisfying your customer at every stage of their journey are paramount.

Does it sound like tough work? Well, there are specialists for that, skilled in handling the nitty-gritty details and showing results, you can have them working for you by reaching out to us here 

 

 

How To Tell A Compelling Startup Story

If you’re an early-stage company, this is easier because you’re just starting and can mould your narrative with ease. To tell powerful and compelling stories, you need to draw on the personal experiences of your customers and tie them to your company’s mission story, with a strong eye on the business model your company operates. In simple terms, the key elements are: Why, Who, and How.

The Why is always the Founder’s story. It’s how it works, there was a reason behind deciding to build a solution. The founder saw a problem that needed solving. You need to humanize this reason and make it as relatable as possible to the customers you’re serving. Not in your own words but in the words that they would typically use, of course, to do this your communications team has to have their hands on deck with the market speak.

What you don’t want to do is be the only one moved by your own story when countless numbers of your prospective customers are not. A good way to communicate your “why” is by making your founder more accessible. A lot of times early-stage startups make the mistake of assuming that they are in the same league as bigger companies, making their CEO/Founder appear inaccessible in a bid to look more put together and bigger than they are. It doesn’t work, not for early-stage companies.

You can start by telling a real story of why and how you started (or in this case, why you’re building what you are currently building), sharing the real picture of what it looks like to build humanizes your brand, allowing your target audience have an immersive experience into what it looks like building from ground up. Or your founder can make videos answering FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions), here’s a video of Co-Founder/COO of Piggyvest, Odun Eweniyi doing the same. The goal is to have your founder as involved as possible with telling your startup story in the best ways possible, especially as an early-stage startup, but don’t just take our word for it, check through Money Africa and see how involved their founder, Tosin Olaseinde preaches Money Africa’s gospel..

The Who is your audience. There’s no doubt that you want to be the first choice when people think of the niche you’re situated in. Your customers have lives and interests, same as they have challenges they are facing. To make the right choices that lead to conversion, you need to have sold the narrative that your product is the solution to the challenges they face, which by the way are unique cases for different sets of your customers. Nobody really goes deep into these things when talking about how to incorporate storytelling into your marketing strategy. It isn’t just art, a lot of research work has to be done.

 In the book “How to Make Friends and Influence People”, the author suggests that to win people you have to be vulnerable, in this way, you are goading the other party to let their guard down and embrace vulnerability with you.

Well, in this case, you can’t tell the perfect pitch deck story if you don’t understand the story of your target audience. You can’t possibly ask everyone individually, so you would have to use research methodologies to find out the reasons they would need your product, rank these reasons from the most popular use case to the least and tell stories from this point of view.

An example is Piggyvest having conversations with customers, telling their personal stories that revolve around the sector that Piggvest operates in; here’s one. Find something that works well and implement it.

The How is the nature of delivery. You can have a really great book but when it’s read aloud with the wrong charisma or inflections, it becomes boring. Understanding what format is best to deliver these stories is key. In order to do this, figure out what your audience would resonate with more, which could be blog posts, videos, audio content (X spaces, IG Live), etc. However, don’t underestimate the potential of each format. 

Everything is content; the company culture, the building process, the satisfactory responses from customers, the not-so-satisfactory experiences of your customers, the strategic partnerships and everything else that makes your startup what it is. In fact, we dare say that embracing the idea that storytelling is beyond content marketing is a solid ground to activate the best results when it comes to finetuning your storytelling technique. 

This is also where you align both product story, company values and customer stories in order to achieve your business objectives. Usually, there’s a percentage and it’s the customer stories e.g. customer success stories, that have the higher ground when it comes to navigating what makes it to the public eye. Find what works, stick to it but don’t be rigid or afraid to think outside the box.

Now there’s a lot more than just the why, who and how but taking the time to comprehend these three factors is a good way to start. From reading this you might also get the feel that storytelling in marketing can be a lot, it’s why companies these days are hiring specifically for that role, a storyteller who can infuse actionable storytelling techniques into market strategies and campaigns. Moni Africa is on this table, setting the pace by employing a chief storyteller, Adebola Zoe. You can too by reaching out to Blurpe via our website, right now

 

 

Channels for Effective Storytelling in Startup Marketing

Before you consider what channel is best to communicate with your target audience, research should be your first go-to. Marketing without research would ultimately lead to failure. Where would you most likely find them? What time are they most active on these channels? And what are their interests on these said channels? When you have crossed that out of the way, you can get started. We should add that social media is not the only channel, there’s television, offline events, and even user experience, etc. Most startups stick to social media because it has a wide reach but then again, you are not most startups and as the Web3 market would say: DYOR (Do your own research).

Now we’ll be straightforward with you, a good number of recent startups have utilized social media to sell their stories, especially X (formerly called Twitter). From PayDay to Chicken Republic, ChowDeck, Piggyvest, and Paystack; the list is quite frankly endless. Why? It’s easier to go viral on that platform. When exploring channels for storytelling, it is crucial to consider platforms and mediums that offer you the most reach and that allows you to engage with your audience. Some channels to consider include:

 

• Your Website: This is the first contact some of your audience will have with your brand. Infusing a compelling and unique narrative on your website ensures that you stay memorable. Take into account the experience your company is aiming to give potential customers and put that in writing. An example of a unique website is Kaijego’s website, you should check out the brilliant narrative Alma Asinobi incorporated into the startup’s marketing communication, here you go. 

 

• Blog Posts: Long-form content like the one you’re reading is also an avenue to educate your audience on topics of interest to them. Your blog posts can be easily distinguishable if you take the time to establish your tone. A very good example is Zikoko’s blog content which captures the essence of the brand.

 

• Social Media Platforms: This honestly is the most popular channel, especially in 2023. Most startups have even pulled experimental content on platforms like TikTok, with even more leveraging X, Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn. Know what works for your customers and maximize that platform.

 

• Influencer Marketing: Not every influencer would serve in the best interest of your brand. Cold and bland influencer collaborations are old school, your audience can smell it from a mile away. Using influencers to corroborate the narrative you want your audience to connect with, will do your brand more good than you can possibly imagine. An example is the Aquafina Padi of Life collaboration with Jemima Osunde, Hilda Baci, Young John, Munachi Abii, Aproko Doctor, and Jide Kene.

 

• Offline Events: This channel offers you the chance to connect on a more personal and physical level with your target audience. Most B2B startups find this more resourceful and result-yielding than online platforms. For this channel to be effective, you would have to curate the experience you would like your audience to have.

 

• Others include Podcasts, Television / Radio Adverts, Partnerships / Collaboration etc.

 

Measuring The Impact of Storytelling In Marketing

Every marketing effort is supposed to be measurable, that’s how you tell what’s working and what isn’t. Storytelling for marketing in tech is not an exception. What makes marketing both an art and science is the fact that creative thought processes and executions can be monitored and data gathered to check their effectiveness. It is important to analyze how impactful the narrative your startup is spinning is and how it resonates with your audience so you can improve on what works, amend or pivot from what doesn’t and make the best out of your marketing and communications effort and team.

 “How can I measure it?” “Isn’t that tricky?”, “What exactly am I looking out for?”. All great questions, let’s take a look at the four metrics to measure to know if your startup’s storytelling method is working or not.

• Engagement: You can tell if your efforts to connect emotionally with your audience are paying off when the engagement rate across your channels increases. It’s simple, you have also interacted with cases that left an impression on you. Your audience would do the same when you leave an impression on them. Metrics such as comments (the nature of the comments), likes, shares and mentions.

 

• Conversion: This cuts across all channels. Are they taking the actions that you want them to take? Monitoring the conversion rate of an event or campaign where you have deliberately woven a narrative would help you ascertain whether or not the strategy worked. For instance, if in a bid to increase the number of sign-ups, you revamp your landing page using a better storytelling approach; you should monitor using an analytics tool, the conversion rate to compare the impact of the storytelling approach versus the previous landing page.

 

• Customer Behaviour: when you’re incorporating something that resonates with your audience, they will acknowledge it. Again, think of what you do or how you react when a business you patronize hits the spot for you in terms of service. Exactly! An example is Chicken Republic, a fast food organization that recently updated its comms, their target audience on Twitter was quick to recognize it, appreciating their upbeat responses. This definitely led to quality mentions which they doubled down on and used as part of their marketing campaign. Good storytelling techniques will reflect in your customers’ behaviour.

 

• Sales: while this is not a short-term impact of storytelling (we repeat, it is not a short-term impact… there’s a reason we have the sales guys); storytelling for startups can definitely chaperone your customers into an increased usage of your product or service. When you establish a genuine and authentic connection with your audience, the resultant effect is that your brand stays top of mind when they think of the niche you are situated in.

 

These four metrics are the umbrella metrics for others like email open rate, bounce rate, click-through rate (CTR), Page views, etc. By analyzing and regularly monitoring these metrics, you can gain in-depth insights into how effective your storytelling efforts are and how you can improve your strategy to ensure that it aligns with your customers while attaining business objectives. As with growth-inspired marketing, decisions are data-led, this means that every analysis made should be used to refine future storytelling techniques and methods in order to achieve better results.

Conclusion

The truth is, you are most likely in an overcrowded market where startups are striving to cut through the noise and captivate their target audience. The key to achieving that lies in the power of storytelling and no two startups can tell the same story, even if they do; one would always be a better storyteller. By weaving compelling narratives, your startup can elevate their marketing strategy and create an emotional connection with their audience and in today’s digital age, it has never been more important. Craft a brand story that resonates with your customers, differentiate yourself from the competition by sharing authentic stories, and ultimately create strong and lasting customer loyalty.