Storyteller, challenge yourself – it’s time for story experiences

In today’s business world, we are struggling to be noticed. At the same time, there is a lot of fuss about telling stories; about how to build brands and sell products through stories.

Storification uses a story-driven design to turn customer experience into a story experience. To start with, the core story of a company’s operations, which is a mixture of fact and experience-inspiring fiction, needs to be identified. In short, storification means developing your company’s services based on that story. The goal is to create a story world that is seen, heard, tasted, smelt and felt by your customers.

Why does this make sense?

A personal and emotive narrative makes buying and using a service easier and more entertaining for your customers.

Moreover, designing with a story can tie every aspect of the business together and help customers to move from digital to physical and the other way around.

Fiction should also be harnessed when using the story-driven design as a business tool.

In experience industries, such as tourism, storification is already starting to be used in an open-minded manner. Snowman World in the city of Rovaniemi, for example, is created around the story of snowmen.

That being said, it’s important to note that storification is not restricted to the experience industry, and it has lot to offer for B2B companies, too.

It has even been embraced by tech companies such as Islet, which used the analogy of a little islet in its communications: “The Islet is a stable island in the middle of the sea, and its dark and smooth rocks have been smoothed during our 20 years in business. Business processes and the technological systems that guide them are like a rich and diverse ecosystem under the sea.”

So, storification is not about a single marketing campaign or company history on a website. It’s a tool that pushes companies to take the elements of a story – dramatisation, plot, engagement – further, all the way to the core of the business. Companies can stand out only by making bold choices. Customers want to be entertained in a meaningful way.