Connect With Your Customers Through Storytelling

By Beth J. Bates, New Media Special Correspondent

Everyone loves a good story, especially when it's about them. Stories are full of life and fuel the imagination. They enable your company to connect with its customers on a personal level. That's how connections are made. Corporate storytelling is becoming a popular and effective way to share what a company, its employees and its customers are doing. Done right, it can build emotional interest and trust. There are a number of ways to present your corporate story. Here are a few ideas to get you started.

• Identity stories connect your customers with your brand. They like to know why a company came to be or how you were able to grow a company from a small kitchen-run business to a large corporation.
• Customer stories enable the people who use your service of buy your product to share their experiences. Stories might include how your product changed their life or how they used your service to better their community. People like to share good news and empowering them to connect helps build validity in your brand.
• Product stories explain how your product came to be. You don't have to give away trade secrets, but customers like to know why a product came from and who made it happen. It puts a human face on your product, and customers like to connect with people.
• Internal stories are a great way to share your company's greatest assets — your employees — with the rest of the world. Many of your employees, for instance, are probably doing great things within the community. They are volunteering and helping folks who are less fortunate. That can be a great story.

So, encourage your people and your customers to tell their stories ... and you just may live happily ever after.

Beth J. Bates consults with Hinge on social media tool selection and strategy and helps its clients find effective ways to leverage these new mediums to meet business goals.