Do you ever feel tense or angry after reading something? Do you ever feel a level of stress that you didn’t have when you started? Does it feel like a chore to finish? And how do you feel when you’re done? Happy? Sad? Or ready to fight someone?
Sometimes the subject itself is tense, and we can’t help but come away feeling fired up, emotional and even angry about what we just read. Other times, though, it’s the writing itself that is the issue. In other words, it’s not what is being said, it’s the way it’s being presented. Maybe it’s just bad writing.
Author Jonathan Gottschall wrote an interesting article a couple years back in Fast Company on the power of storytelling that illustrated this concept.
“When we read dry, factual arguments,” Gottschall writes, “we read with our dukes up. We are critical and skeptical. But when we are absorbed in a story we drop our intellectual guard. We are moved emotionally and this seems to leave us defenseless.”
He’s right, and he’s captured a common set of reactions. It’s true, when information is presented in “factual” ways–gobs of data, lawyer-speak language, or with a heavy sales pitch–we put our “dukes up.” It’s not that we’re feeling anger in an emotional way; it’s that we’re put on edge. We immediately feel that someone is trying to pull a fast one, twisting our arm on a sale or trying to confuse us with a big pile of statistics. It’s like we’re being pushed into a place we don’t want to be, and that makes us uncomfortable. We glaze over, or worse, we just walk away and never come back.
On the other hand, when the language and the voice you’re using is more inviting, we’re far more inclined to keep reading. This means we’re in a better place to actually absorb the words and the message–to engage. And for content marketers, this means we are also more inclined to potentially buy into the concept you are ‘selling.’
Stories help us get to this friendlier, more open-minded place. They naturally draw us in. So as much as you can, avoid tossing around numbers or pushing your product with all your might, even if you are offering a ‘can’t miss’ or ‘limited time only’ sale. That will only put us on edge. Instead, tell us a story. Maybe it’s an experience you just had yesterday while running errands–something the clerk said to you, or the look on a person’s face you saw sitting at the bus stop–or maybe it’s something that happened to a friend or relative, a story they told you that has stuck with you.
Related: NPR’s Scott Simon on ‘How to Tell a Story’
Keep in mind, too, that it doesn’t have to be a difficult exercise: You’d be surprised how many storytelling ideas are right in front of you. (Need help finding ideas for stories? I’ve got some tips.)
The bottom line is that storytelling is a valuable tool, even in a business context. Don’t ignore it. Instead, learn how to use it.