Oftentimes in life, we have these little moments of real time to ourselves, where there’s nothing but silence to keep us company.
In today’s always on, ever connected world, these moments in time become ever rarer, and we have to grab them while they’re here.
[Read more…] about What We Want Versus What We NeedTo build an empire takes more than one person.?It doesn?t matter if you?re a solo entrepreneur, a solo blogger, a solo musician or artist.
To truly build an empire takes more than the soloist you may be ? it takes a team.
From a solo point of view, that can mean a variety of things.
For solo entrepreneurs, it?s your partner that encourages you when no-one else will. Or the bank manager who approves your loan when you first start. Or the contractor who gives you the part-time skills for that job you couldn?t do otherwise.
For solo bloggers, it?s your readers who give you strength to keep writing when you want to give up. Or commenters that validate your thoughts. Or the social community who share your blog with new eyes.
For the musician or artist, it?s the fans who buy your work when everyone else says it?s worthless. It?s the manager or agent who never gives up on you. It?s the supplier that provides your tools of the trade to make the magic happen.
For the business owner or leader that has employees, your team is easier to define ? as is the fact that, just like the soloist, your team is everything. Without them, you have nothing.
Recognize that. Nurture them. Encourage them. Give them permission to err and give them the stepping stones to the right path the next time. But most of all, make sure they feel appreciated.
We can do a lot on our own ? but with our teams beside us we can conquer the world.
Want success? Make it about the team. Always.
We like to be entertained.
We enjoy storytellers that can transplant us into fantastical realms and take our imaginations on rides that we?d never usually imagine.
We like touchpoints.
We feel more in tune with those that directly reach out to us and hold our hands; guide us; share their experience and involvement with something, and make us feel that we?re the only people that they?re talking to at that given time.
Simply put, we enjoy being?part of the experience.
The best storytellers are that because their audience is enveloped by the words from the pen or the lips of the person telling the story.
The best touchpoints are the ones that leave us with a lasting impression long after the initial touch has happened.
[clickToTweet tweet=”The best #storytellers connect what is and what can be.” quote=”The best storytellers connect what is and what can be.”]
You need to be the storyteller. The touchpoint. The connection between what is and what can be.
This can be for your business, your blog, your online or offline persona ? in other words,?you.
So how do you become the experience everyone wants to be part of?
Our time is busy ? you need to offer us a reason to take part in whatever your experience is offering. We need to feel that there?s benefit or relevance ? otherwise, is there any point in checking out your experience to start with?
Some areas to consider:
Once you?ve created the experience, your job is only just beginning. But then that?s all part of good storytelling ? raise the interest then keep it going.
Create the experience. Tell a story around it. Draw in the crowd with a warm welcome.
Look after the?before, during and after.
Ask readers of your story and visitors to your touchpoints what they enjoyed, and how they?d like to see the tale(s) progress.
Feedback can turn into payback ? don?t lose that impetus.
We want to be entertained, but we want to be entertained honestly and feel that you mean it.
You can do that, can?t you?
A little while back, I took my daughter Salem to the local library, where we played games, made little toys, and read books together.
My wife was at an event all weekend with her publisher company, and my son was playing at the weekly sports curriculum at our local community centre.
Given my daughter loves her books at home, the library was an obvious choice for us to hang out while Ewan did his sports thing (the fact it’s in the same community centre didn’t hurt).
As we were browsing through the books in the children’s section, we came across a shelf marked “Wordless books”. On it were several books where, as the shelf sign suggests, pictures replace words to tell the story.
Salem chose The Boy and the Airplane, by Mark Pett, and we sat down on one of the little sofas and began to read. Or view. I’m not sure what the right term for the activity of going through a wordlesss book would be.
And it was magical.
Before picking up the book, I’d heard of Mark and his reputation as a writer and illustrator. As an introduction to him and his work, The Boy and the Airplane had me wanting more.
As Salem and I turned each page, the story of a young boy’s attempts to retrieve his stranded toy airplane from the roof of a house held the two of us enthralled.
Even though Salem was only three at the time, and wasn’t quite at the stage where she can read for herself, the book’s beautiful illustrations made sure she understood what was happening.
When she saw the images above, she looked to me and said, “He’s happy.”
When the boy’s plane landed on the roof in the image below, her demeanour changed and she said, “Oh no, boy sad.”
As we made our way through the book, and the various things the boy tries to get his airplane back, we shared little looks and words with each other, and what the boy was going to do next.
When the boy finally resolved his problem (and I won’t spoil it for you – seriously, get out and buy the book, even if you don’t have young kids!), Salem looked at me and said, “Aww, that was a good story, daddy.”
And it was. And it showed how a simple book, with hand-drawn pictures, could tell a story many other books would need several thousand words to do.
One of the things we’re constantly being told online is that we need to “tell our story” to connect with those we want to connect with – blog readers, business customers, potential employees, etc.
And it’s true – after all, if we don’t connect with the person or business that’s looking to attract and retain our attention over the countless other options?out there, why should we bother?
As a tool to help foster these connections, storytelling is a great tactic to have in our arsenal. Of course, it can be easier said than done.
My friend Mark Evans, one of Canada’s leading tech and startup advisers, has a new book out, Storytelling for Startups, that looks at this in more depth. In it he shares examples of how storytelling can work for pretty much any brand.
Gini Dietrich believes this too, and often shares examples of how storytelling has helped shape a brand’s voice and direction.
So, it’s clear – storytelling can play an important role in any goal we may have when it comes to growth.
The question is, of course, how does your story get told? Is it through words? Pictures? Videos? Testimonials? Employee advocacy?
There are many ways for a story to be told, but only one way for a story to be heard – and that’s through the eyes and ears of your audience as the path to capturing their hearts.
Much like Mark Pett’s wordless book, get that part right and you’ve almost won the battle before it’s even begun.
Recently, I was chatting with some friends about blogging, and how it’s changed over the years.
From social media to richer forms of content creation like videos, podcasts, story-driven blogging, etc, it could be forgiven to think that blogging as we know it (writing a post, publishing, hoping others read it either on the page or vie email/RSS) is about to disappear.
One of the reasons that came up was the fact there was so much mediocre blogging on the web. And, to a point, this is true.
With so much emphasis placed on eyeballs and clicks, quality can often be forgotten or eschewed for some other metric.
It led to a nice discussion on what was really important when it came to blogging.
One of my friends mentioned that the most important part of a blog post was the headline. I countered that?the headline didn?t matter if the content sucked, while my second friend’s take was a killer headline can help guide the post.
This then led to the question of the post itself.
I mentioned that it?s not always possible to post killer content every single post, as much as we try to as bloggers looking after our readers. My second friend asked?if the reader learns, then isn?t that killer?
I responded yes, which means that in that respect even mediocre can be killer.
This turned into a great follow-up discussion about whether you should post at all if your writing is just mediocre, with my second friend suggesting that instead of regular posts, only publish when and if you?re going to knock it out the park every time.
I don?t disagree with him that mediocre posts shouldn?t be published (it?s why I used to have about 25 posts always in draft mode, waiting on some tinkering with content).
Where I do differ is that it?s down to interpretation.
As a blogger, I go out of my way to try and make sure that whatever I publish has both relevance and information that will help my readers. I?m pretty sure every single blogger out there is the same.
Yet the relevance and ?brilliance?, if you like, is down to the reader.
Say I write what I think is a killer post about social media monitoring tools.
To some readers, it could be the greatest thing since sliced bread. To others, it could be, ?Meh, I know this, this post has no value to me. Next.?
To that person, the post is mediocre because of the information (or lack of) inside the post. Yet to the reader who never knew this information, the post may be killer because it?s opened their eyes to something they never knew.
As I mentioned to both friends, no-one sets out to deliberately write a mediocre post ? but sometimes some posts will always be better than others, that?s just natural.
The point is to be happy that what you wrote doesn?t short-change you or? your readers. Unless you have that confidence, don?t publish.
Thoughts?
