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What’s Your Story?Creating Rich Storytelling Content

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92% of consumers reportedly want brands

to tell a story through their content.

IntroductionThe marketer’s role is to ultimately tell a story. Across every industry, vertical, and region, digi-tal marketers are storytellers. Whether it’s done through a months-long nurture email campaign or a single homepage image, these stories al-low brands and companies to connect with the consumer and deliver an emotional experience. It keeps shoppers intently engaged with your content and allows your brand to make a strong statement about who you are, and who your cus-tomer is.

In a recent study, a whopping 92 percent of consumers reported they wanted brands to tell a story with their content. The online shopper isincreasingly dissatisfied with traditional market-ing methods. They don’t want to be sold to, they want to be engaged with through new and unique narratives. And these online shoppers expect this level of creative engagement across every chan-nel they interact with – email, social media, ads, website content, and more.

In this ebook, we’ll examine further why story-telling content is effective, and walk through five live examples by leading brands. We’ll break down what makes these experiences powerful revenue generators and sources of inspiration, and how you can replicate them. We’ll include content by:

• Citizens of Humanity• Harvey Nichols• MSR Gear• Tibi• Godiva

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Content with an emotional component performs twice as well as purely information-

focused content.

Why Storytelling MattersHumans are naturally drawn to stories. They’re a means to connect, to share, and to deepen emo-tional ties. They inspire us, motivate us, shock us, entertain us, and most of all, they engage us. This engagement is why storytelling content matters to marketes. Engaging customers through stories transforms your website from a simple collection of products or services to a source of real emo-tion and narrative.

When it comes to content, the online customer wants to consume experiences that go above and beyond. They want shopping experiences with a narrative and a point of view. They want content that evokes true emotion. In a recent study by the Institute of Practitioners in Advertis-ing, they found that advertising campaigns with an emotional focus performed twice as well as content without emotion. Stories that evoke real feelings can make a difference.

So what happens when you deliver this story-telling experience? Your customers spend more time on your website exploring your content. They are more likely to share it across their so-cial channels, and they’re more likely to return to your site for more .And ultimately, they’re going to want to buy the products that are inextricably part of these stories. Storytelling content drives engagement, which naturally drives conversions. So you’re not just investing in beautifully crafted content; you’re investing in a significant source of revenue.

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Citizens of Humanity

Citizens of Humanity delivers this editorial experience through their #WEAREALLHUMANITY content series. Through a series of interviews with brand ambassadors across all walks of life, shoppers learn about the men and women profiled but also about the brand itself. As they read the stories of the ambassadors, they are simultaneously discovering what matters to Citizens of Humanity, and what the brand represents. They aren’t just connecting with the featured inter-viewees, they are also connecting with the company itself. This is a true example of storytelling content done right, adding a layer of authenticity to the brand.

When creating editorial storytelling content for your brand or company, follow Citizens of Hu-manity’s lead and incorporate interviews and personal stories. Having real people telling their authentic stories gives your customers a face to connect with your brand.

When you think of storytelling, it’s likely editorial content first came to mind. It’s certainly the most literal form of storytelling, and therefore editorial content is a strong way to begin creating storytelling content.

TIP: Interviews allow customers to place a face to your stories.

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Beginning with a literal party invitation via text and then finishing with post-celebration late night snacks, the story is simple but high-concept: a group of friends going out for a night on the town. There’s a distinct beginning, middle, and end, making the story easy to follow and engage with. Using interactive features like gifs and lightboxes allow the shopper to engage with the experience from start to finish, while an easy “shop-the-look” option makes the content shoppable and profitable.

What truly makes this Harvey Nichols experience stand out is how perfectly targeted it is to their customer. Their customer is glamorous and social, and this storytelling experience per-fectly encapsulates that. To replicate, consider who your customer is and what stories they not only want to hear, but what stories they want to be a part of.

Harvey Nichols

Harvey Nichols takes the concept of sto-rytelling content to the next level with their partywear guide. In one long-from, interactive, and highly visual experience, the brand takes you through an evening of parties and celebrations. But really, it guides the shopper through a night as a Harvey Nichols woman, creating an aspira-tional fantasy.

TIP: Consider who your customer is, and what stories matter to them.

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you need. MSR Gear does something highly impressive with their Winter Basecamp experience: they not only tell a complete story with a single image, but they make it educational as well.

The story being told is seemingly simple: two adventurers making camp. Using one-click ac-tivated lightboxes, the experience provides helpful tips to adventurous MSR Gear customers. What makes the content work so well is the context; in an instant, a shopper knows the story and can place it into the context of their own mountain adventures. With tips like “Place the tent at 90 degrees to the wind,” the experience provides information and content that is highly relevant to the customer.

Injecting education into your content can be as simple as leveraging one-click lightboxes. Be-cause they are denoted by a small clickable icon, they don’t disrupt the story you are trying to tell. And you can even customize that icon to make it even more organic within your content.

MSR Gear

Visual images are a powerful way to convey a story – in fact, the human brain processes images 60 times faster than words. But a series of images aren’t neces-sarily needed. When done right, a single image is sometimes all

TIP: Add an extra layer of engagement through educational elements.

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These small details make a huge difference. They add authenticity and realism to a fictional story, allowing shoppers to connect to it on a personal level. The story being told is complete, intimate, and rich. Readers feel as if they are going through the 24 hours with the narrator, from morning coffee and the newspaper to drinks with colleagues. It’s a schedule that is certainly familiar to the reader, allowing them to place themselves easily in the narrator’s stylish heels.

When it comes to storytelling, it’s all about the details. Even including the time of day for each outfit change adds a grounded element to the content. Whatever story your content is telling, be sure to add that level of intimacy through smart and strategic details.

Tibi

A strong point of view is integral to any sto-rytelling experience. Tibi delivers this in their “24 Hours In Tibi” experience by cre-ating a fictional and anonymous narrator to bring readers through a day in the life of a Tibi woman. Written in the first person, the experience not only provides the reason-ing behind the narrator’s fashion choices – a white dress and puffer coat for a lunch meeting, sequins for an art opening – but distinct details about their day.

TIP: Small details add intimacy and authenticity to any story.

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guide, they tell the story of their brand, their chocolates, and their chefs - and they do so through a rich variety of visual mediums.

As shoppers scroll through this long-form experience, they are guided through a multime-dia educational journey through Godiva’s chocolate collections. From learning where the word “ganache” originates to meeting the Godiva chefs, the experience tells the rich story of the Go-diva brand. Customers can even click to discover a timeline of the Godiva company. There’s so much to see and explore, shoppers are sure to stay engaged with the experience. And ecom-merce-enabled lightboxes make the whole experience shoppable.

Next time you’re creating storytelling content, consider playing with different content mediums like video and imagery. It’s a smart and easy way to make content dynamic and exciting, and to tell a story that truly comes alive.

Godiva

There are many ways to tell a story – through written words, images, or video. And sometimes you can combine all three for a dynamic, multimedia shopping experience. Godiva does just that with their Chocolate Education experience. Within this buying

TIP: Multimedia elements like video and gifs bring your stories to life.

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Conclusion

About ZmagsZmags helps ecommerce marketers create and publish rich digital experiences through a user-friendly interface that requires no IT involvement. Using Creator by Zmags, brands can create fresh, shoppable content that drives product discovery and inspires consumers to purchase. Creator integrates with all leading ecommerce and content management platforms enabling marketers to optimize their website content. Leading brands like Ethan Allen, Harvey Nichols, New York & Company, Vivienne Westwood, All Things BBQ, and Godiva use Creator by Zmags to deliver interactive and entertaining shopping experiences with rich content like buying guides, quizzes, lookbooks, video, and more. To learn more, visit www.zmags.com.

To learn more, visit www.zmags.com.

If your content feels stale and lacking inspira-tion, storytelling content might be exactly what your brand needs, and what your customers want. After all, messaging that is delivered as a story has been found to be 22x more memo-rable than just facts and statements alone. And the more memorable and high-impact your online content is, the more likely shoppers will not only buy, but will continue buying from your company in the future.

Storytelling content can seem intimidating to dive into, but it’s so versatile any brand or com-pany can effectively create it. From videos, to interviews, to images, storytelling content can be delivered in countless formats. What mat-ters is that it feels authentic, has a strong point of view, and reflects the interests and person-ality for your customers. When storytelling con-tent is done right, it’s more than a revenue gen-erator; it’s a brand differentiator.

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