EVERY BRAND HAS A STORY, WHAT’S YOURS?

“Once upon a time” if there was ever a word as the ultimate storytelling line or conditioner or phrase, that would be it. For ages, folktales and epic storytelling has been initiated with those four words. Perhaps you haven’t noticed, it’s like the golden words of storytelling that lets you know it’s time to take a journey into a whole new world, it’s time for a new adventure, undeniably, that’s the power of storytelling. Constantly, it gives the ability to travel, but still be seated at a spot, the ability to live the lives of those that came before you and the ones that come after you while being you… amazing isn’t it?

Undoubtedly, storytelling is world-building, impossible made possible, an exploration of human existence and a reality that defies the laws of physics based on how it is set up.

Besides that, storytelling is all we have when we cease to exist. For this reason,  Brands that want to succeed, capitalize on the endless possibilities of storytelling to give their business/company purpose and a reason to exist. Also, storytelling gives the audience a road map/ insight to your business as well as gives the audience something entertaining because stories are still entertainment.

But most importantly, storytelling evokes or sparks emotions used to fire up the audience, for example in the popular Dano milk commercial that uses the catchphrase-  go for it, the emotions they intended to light or spark in viewers was resilience, facing fears, never giving up regardless of what you think the outcome maybe, and getting results.

So you see, storytelling can inspire, can motivate, can educate, and can entertain, but it can only do that if told properly from the cast to the crew, from set designers to pictures everything displayed on screen. Consequently, every element displayed on screen aids in telling the story. Plus, they also allow the audience focus because the audience can be put off or confused with one wrong placement on set.

Fortunately, we specialize in bringing all these elements and essentials required to make a commercial worthy of more than praise. We walk the walk, so you can talk, the talk, it’s all about customer satisfaction for us. We are storytellers with an edge of limitless creativity mixed and spiced with the finest clientele services one can wish for.

What’s more, we don’t just give you attention that leads to sales but we give you an identity to stand amongst the best the media space has to offer.

Again, it is important to note that a lot goes into great storytelling but more important to know is that storytelling backed by visuals is still king, that’s why we create a story that combines the right type of pictures, tone, colors, scenery, and emotional intelligence.

You would wonder why emotional intelligence, the answer is quite simple. To understand where your end users/consumers have been in the bid to figure out where they are headed, you need to understand their story to know how to best deliver a media body of work that suits their taste.

Undoubtedly, once you have your user’s details and not just see them as consumers,( you can fully log into their problems and find the solution.

So it’s necessary to understand that certain elements have to be present in storytelling for it to give that desired effect and YES!! they are more than this article can take but for core elements, we can give you 3.

KEY ELEMENTS OF STORYTELLING

Perhaps you have probably told yourself while reading this article… this is not a movie, is this all about storytelling?. Well, my friend, it’s true that commercials can do without so much deep storytelling to get to the audience, but also true is the fact that tvc’s, media campaigns and more that have used storytelling as part of their media strategy have seen better sales and customer loyalty simply because a story explains more than a collection of beautiful motion shots and the reason why stories are effective are down below.

You have probably told yourself while reading this article… this is not a movie, is this all about storytelling?. Well, my friend, it’s true that commercials can do without so much deep storytelling to get to the audience, but also true is the fact that tvc’s, media campaigns and more that have used storytelling as part of their media strategy have seen better sales and customer loyalty simply because a story explains more than a collection of beautiful motion shots and the reason why stories are effective are down below.

STORYTELLING FOR VIDEO PRODUCTION– BELIEVABILITY

The world of visual storytelling is centered on ‘ make belief’, storytelling is an art of making the unreal, real by combining science to arts resulting in impeccable visuals and concrete message. So the question is, why then does my story need to be believed by my customers?

Firstly, regardless of how unreal the story world or settings you have created seems, one thing keeps it grounded and that’s the ability to personify these stories. Essentially using human flaws, human shortcomings, and human characters gives personality to storytelling.

Eventually, when this happens, even a commercial set in space would still hit its mark because the believable element- humanity, wasn’t diluted by the settings or the world created. Meaning, the believability of a story isn’t just in the world created or the settings, but in the story told and the human characters that drives the story forward. Undoubtedly, this is something you can find in all our works regardless of the physical settings.

For this reason, stories need to remain believable no matter the settings or story.

Secondly, the believability of a story makes it all the more engaging and interesting to play over and over again. Besides that, the best commercials to ever grace TV screens worldwide carry this element of belief and they have done so in the capacity of telling stories using human wants, desires, struggles, pain, joy and a whole lot more.

“But it has to be relatable to be believable, don’t forget this”.

STORYTELLING FOR VIDEO PRODUCTION- RELATABILITY

As believable as a story is, a stronger force comes that could make it lose its authenticity, that force is relatability.

How relatable is the story you are telling?

These are questions to be asked in board rooms, online meetings, and content creation meetings, because customers have to be able to relate to what’s on their screen to be interested in its service.

Now, this brings us to the target audience- usually a demography covering the age group, or business sector a story is aimed at getting.

For instance, how relatable would a commercial for thick layered cardigans be for the people of Sokoto?. Bearing in mind, Sokoto is one of the hottest regions in Nigeria and their wet season is still hot and cloudy. In the same light, how relatable would an internet-savvy product be for a group of men in their late 60s… wait, wait, that doesn’t mean men in their 60s aren’t internet savvy but a collection of men in their 60s compared to boys in their 20s for an internet savvy product would always take the side of boys in their 20s.

Therefore knowing your target audience becomes a guideline for keeping yourself in check to tell a story for your target audience and this way your relatable content can never be lost. From clothes to hairstyle to lifestyle, everything has to tell the story for your story to be relatable.

Lastly and most importantly, relatability opens the room for sympathy. The audience or viewers have to be able to feel some form of emotional connection to the human actions displayed on their screen.

“It’s all about making people feel, Pretty simple”.

STORYTELLING FOR VIDEO PRODUCTION– SIMPLICITY

Finally, simple is best. The power of simplicity is still underrated in storytelling. Likewise, lack of simplicity aids customers to lose interest, as well as get confused about what exactly your product does and you don’t need us to tell you what comes next.

Without a doubt, customer frustration can be created by poor product usage and compounded by its storytelling when it’s not simple enough to understand. Clearly, storytelling doesn’t thrive on complication brought by an infusion of one-too-many ideas posing as creativity. Storytelling and creativity should be seamless and interwoven to create simplicity for anyone and everyone.

Consequently, complicated storytelling for your brand will leave you with angry customers- at least we would. Simplicity in storytelling is knowing you can do away with all the unnecessary add-ons and just tell a simple, believable and relatable story, so customers can keep coming back for more. This is Adamu, Adamu works all day under the sun and spends all night preparing for the day hoping to increase his savings, so Kudirat, his daughter can become a university graduate… even you can’t deny how simple that story was to read. Now, guess what you might not have noticed, how you probably could see yourself in Adamu’s shoe… now that’s relatable and —-. Ultimately you know what comes next, please tell us in the comment section, we would love to know and probably we don’t want to feed your mind with our words.

In addition to that, what we just did there was combine all the key elements listed above to create a story for a financial institution that sees the common man achieve his common goals.

Now, that leads us to inclusivity. Although this isn’t listed in the key elements but remember as stated earlier, we are focusing on the 3 key elements, but they are not the only elements.

Creating a story that includes the common man shows your understanding of the larger population because the common man is always more than the affluent man.

Additionally, it makes them feel appreciated, feel loved, feel like they haven’t been forgotten in society, knowing their activities from day to day don’t get rewarded or recognized. An inclusion of them with a story they relate with, only earns you a loyal customer.

As well as, it shows the depth your storytelling takes to see that the ones who aren’t seen or heard get a chance to know a brand/company out there is watching.

Lastly, it’s important to understand telling a story with visual-aids, means telling the story with every physical element in sight because one-off design on set could tell an entirely different story. So it’s important to let your believability show throughout all visual aids used in telling and achieving media content and that hits the bull’s eye.

Let’s work for you, we are ERONLANX.

Here are some stories we have created in the media world. Check out our portfolio here

Head writer- Ogbuka Belu.