Digital storytelling part 1 writing

Digital Storytelling:

writing By Pietro Polsinelli

Who am I

Pietro Polsinelli Twitter: @ppolsinelli

Blog: http://pietro.open-lab.com E-mail: ppolsinelli@open-lab.com

I’m applying storytelling to:

Web apps for team & personal productivity,

Videogame marketing

Videogame design

Saturday, March 17, 2012 Story tell your (Software) product

Today’s workshop

Writing Exercises part 1

On writing

Writing Exercises part 2

Feedback

Saturday, March 17, 2012

Story tell your (Software) product

Storytelling is so popular…

But what we do here is not actually “pure” storytelling,

its “storytelling for…”. That is, writing and telling

stories for ends which are not literary.

There are definite and precise techniques for

storytelling.

Narrative techniques can be acquired with a lot of

exercise, developing a specific sensitivity. Here you

can give it a first try.

Introduction: why digital storytell?

Many of your former colleagues

work (part or full time) is companies

that are “startups” in some sense. In

interactive educational tools,

videogames, music production

services, ... .

As a “jack of all trades” you will

need stories. Stories are presented

in many forms, but are mostly

created in written form.

Movies scripts, comic scripts, videogame scripts.

Here for…

Learn to detect / create / analyze / use / apply

storytelling.

Detect: not only ads

Create: exercises

Analyze: schemas

Use: used more widely than you may believe.

Ambiguity alert!

Applying storytelling can mean working on:

A product / service / company with a story at its heart,

that unfolds and guides work and developments.

Creating a short, sticky story that somehow “points” to

a product / service / company. Auto-conclusive story.

Storytelling gives…

A product / service / company with a story at its heart,

that unfolds and guides work and developments.

Storytelling gives coherence, sense. We have

stories in “continuity”.

Creating a short, sticky story that somehow “points” to

a product / service / company. Auto-conclusive story.

Storytelling can get and keep people’s

attention. We have auto-conclusive stories.

Acquiring storytelling sensitivity

helps in both cases

And in many kinds of

“stories”.

A soundtrack tells a

story.

A video.

A podcast.

A comic.

Learn to write

Its possible.

You learn by example,

practice, feedback.

Things are born interesting

or are made interesting?

Books: this is just the beginning

Exercises part 1

Write on paper what you will say if I’d ask you to

present yourself to this group.

3 Min.

Exercises part 1

Write on another paper your product / service idea –

how you would present it in a few sentences.

10 Min.

Concreteness in writing – part 1

1. Write down as many things white in color you may think of.

15 Secs.

Concreteness in writing – part 2

Write down as many things white in color that may eventually end up in

your fridge you may think of.

1.15 Secs.

Listing features vs. telling

stories

The USP approach

I here give a first negative definition of my approach, by contrasting with

some existing marketing habits.

The Unique Selling Proposition (a.k.a. Unique Selling Point, or USP) is a

marketing concept that was first proposed as a theory to explain a

pattern among successful advertising campaigns of the early 1940s. It

states that such campaigns made unique propositions to the customer

and that this convinced them to switch brands.

Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unique_selling_proposition

The USP approach

USP is like classical economics: assumes perfect information and

rational choices. Users are neither informed nor rational.

This fragmented approach does not help users in getting their insight.

Lacking a unified anthropological model of and for the user, this will not

Marketing recipes draw a simplistic picture of the marketing project.

A USP tends to obscure your real motivations, your agenda. A purely

functional description will leave out what is most interesting.

This also shows that deep limitations of AdWords based approaches:

you story is missed, you can’t do a contextual presentation.

Rational choice models

A few years ago, we had a brief discussion about the power of ads. A

friend of mine was skeptic about that, he stubbornly held that ads had no

effect on him. This is an example of illuministic optimism which is

factually false.

How wrong this belief is is shown by data from many possible fields

(next slide).

What matters for us is that this kind of wrong modeling of human

behavior leads to wrong marketing models: models based on the rational

choice idea.

Learn more

The political mind, A Cognitive Scientist's Guide to Your Brain and Its

Politics , George Lakoff

Idea Framing, Metaphors, and Your Brain - George Lakoff

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_CWBjyIERY

Establish the context

You should not talk in terms of differences with the competition (this too

is a mistake which several marketing “experts” make). This is the

traditional mistake of political weak candidates. Your point is to tell a

completely different story.

Obama stopped saying “Bush is doing this and that” He started saying:

“This is MY story. This is a NEW story.”

Story mark: by telling a good story, its you establishing the context. this

way you can win in the most unlikely situations

By fighting on features, you are adapting to a context where its the

others setting the context -> you are going to lose.

The storytelling approach

You are bringing a ship across a hill in the jungle: your effort *deserves

to be told*.

You product is a free creation, shaped from the learnings you can get

from early shipping.

The basic point of this marketing technique is simply to tell the truth, and

bring it across in its subtlety and complexity. It’s useful if what you are

saying is not trivial, if there are ideas to be expressed. Articulating your

proposal in a story instead of a USP is much more conductive to express

it integrally.

The MBA typical idea of “competitive advantage” results empty for this

perspective. The union of story and execution is no single competitive

advantage.

Using stories

Learning from “classical” storytelling

The first point is NOT saying

clearly (for you) what you

provide, and neither to talk

about users’ advantages.

The first point is getting

attention and start telling

YOUR STORY.

Unifying power of storytelling

Your aim is to create an opportunity for a “magic”

meeting of needs, tastes, choices. You are facilitating

it, but you are not the cause.

Unifying power of the storytelling approach: if you defined your story, this

gives unity to the expression of your idea in different media (see Licorize

in the examples). Once you have a story, it becomes easier and more

interesting to write articulated connections. And to write other, connected

stories touching other fields.

You may articulate your idea through many media and means:

blog post

home page of your site

Podcast

Mockumentary

e-book

ipad app

iphone app

generic mobile app

Tweets

facebook etc.

Marketing stories

“Potential customers cannot buy

what they cannot name”

Journalists cannot write about something that has no novelty: you’ve got

to serve them the concepts, the story, the novelty. A new feature is not a

novelty.

Marketing stories

“Most people resist selling but enjoy buying”.

If you manage to define the buy situation,

victory is in your hands.

We’ll get back to this later.

USP get old fast: stories don’t.

Storytelling supports seriality: it is a wonderful way to put criticism and

failures to our use.

Like Balsamiq failed release -> visibility and positive remarks.

Berlusconi prostitutes -> that’s how I am -> hero’s flaw, adds to heroicity.

Coherence

Having a story gives you a sense of coherence, will

also make you stronger against the 2% of skeptics.

Alienating the 2%

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2010/11/alienating-the-2.html

Simplicity

Warning: Sun exposure is

dangerous

Sun exposure: how to get old

prematurely

How startups can learn to

pitch the press

http://pietro.open-lab.com/2011/04/08/how-startups-can-learn-to-pitch-

the-press/

Some mistakes Brad lists:

the 1000 word e-mail

lack of a story

pitching on Mondays

The importance of a good ending

Imagine a coffee machine that when

the coffee is ready makes a bright

light.

People talk & remember endings.

http://www.ted.com/talks/daniel_kahn

eman_the_riddle_of_experience_vs_

memory.html

Storytelling schemes

Base schema for product narration

Consumer’s fatal flaw

Reading and knowing your

audience fatal flaw is the first step

in building any marketing strategy.

Existential myths

The myth of “salvation”

Myth of “cure”

Myth of “evasion”

Themes for the existential myths

Cure/protection rhetoric

Power/possession rhetoric

Exploration/curiosity rhetoric

Auto confirmation/self-celebration rhetoric

Negotiation/projectuality rhetoric

Gossip stories are a GREAT way to

see the basic schemes in action

(read Barthes’ Mythologies)

Examples

Balsamiq - http://balsamiq.com

The reason for success for a

long time escaped me - yes,

he told an interesting story of

the startup trip but that is not

the key.

What/where is the narrative?

Which is the fatal flaw?

Balsamiq

Fatal flaw: prototyping is hard, and a great

source of conflict. More detailed it is, more

likely it is to generate conflict.

-> Smooth corners: a tool that is easy to use

as play, and does not go much beyond play

(though it is very useful).

Balsamiq

Messages:

“We are not working, we

are playing”

“The prototype is not

definitive”

Balsamiq

Messages:

“How can you not love this Winnie-

the-Pooh like mockup?”

The tone of communication is “back to

draw like when you were a child”. Gets

tons of tweet “loving this”. It is a

communication strategy built-in the

product.

Licorize: our stories

I've read I don't know how many times

this reaction to Licorize on Twitter:

"this is exactly the product I was

looking for!”

This anthropological fit is actually also

a construction, a construction of

Licorize' storytelling. The perfect fit is

felt because the story works, the

identification works. Of course just a

good story without a high quality

product and design would not make it.

We did alienate the 2%: the very first reactions were very bad. Negative

review, lacking USP, unclear … . How I reacted? I did nothing. I changed

nothing.

But soon, very soon, the voice that really matters – people, many

people, appreciated it. The comfort of numbers, and the comfort of

competent reviewers.

The first 2% is not the real press.

The press: they don’t react using their Lizard Brain. They look carefully –

trust them.

We didn’t do permission marketing. We had a story and the press (which

today does not mean paper press) took it and talked about it.

Major:

Auto-confirmation

Myth its more “salvation” than “evasion”. But

introducing playfulness gives hope to work, seen

as oppressive – this is the fatal flaw.

Minor:

Design -> seduction

Exploration

Did work: Licorize

Result: 50 positive reviews (by

meaningful sites) in 90 days,

thousands of tweets. And they both

keep coming.

Reviewers fell in love with the story –

which we had written for them.

Also a bit of luck helped – Delicious

crisis.

Multiple entry points Multiple stories and media:

Curation, GTD, e-books, info overflow

Video 1 minute

Instructional detailed videos

User guide 100 pages

Examples usage in the application

What is the morale of the (story)

product?

Licorize: no bookmark is an island.

37'signals Basecamp: people have now an online life

and need very simple management.

Most products have no clear morale.

Licorize: other’ stories

http://licorize.com/projects/ppolsinelli/blogBookmarks/licorizeBuzz

Exercises

Base schema for product narration

Exercise part 2

[Distribute schemas]

Write again about your product / service idea – how

you would present it in a few sentences.

Blind idea clinic – 1 minute after

Rewrite the beginning. It can be better.

Discuss results

“Made to Stick” scorecard

Check Message 1 Message 2

Simple

Unexpected

Concrete

Credible

Emotional

More…

Some links:

http://licorize.com/projects/ppolsinelli/Storytelling-for-

software-marketing

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