My last blog was about the importance of point, purpose and audience in delivering a relevant story.
In this blog, I want to share, how to craft a story that conveys the point, is on purpose and relevant.
Let’s try to look at this through Matt’s eyes…
Who is Matt?
Matt works in a corporate organisation and is responsible for selling cloud services platform for a technology company.
Matt has to tell a story about cloud services platform to 3 different audiences, on three different occasions.
Occasion 1 : In a boardroom to government officials
Occasion 2 : In a roadshow to consumers
Occasion 3 : In a partners’ conference to partners
Now, Matt can’t possibly tell the same story on all of these 3 occasions.
Things he need to be clear about are,
| Matt’s Audience | Matt’s Purpose | What matters to audiences? | Where is Matt telling this story? |
| Govt Officials | Sell | Trust | Boardroom |
| Consumers | Generate interest | Functionality | Exhbition |
| Partners | Provide insights, tools and support | Success | Conference |
After mapping this, say, Matt is going to craft a story for govt officials. So, what he is doing is – Boardroom Influencing via storytelling. These are the set of questions I would suggest that Matt asks himself.
| Occasion 1: In a boardroom to government officials | |
| Questions | Answers |
| Who are the people in the room? | Govt Officials |
| What are the objections from your listener? | I am not sure if I can trust what he has to say |
| Why am I telling a story? | Our cloud services are trustworthy |
| What do I want the audience to say/think after I have told the story? | I am willing to listen to this person and I think I can trust him |
| What is your overall purpose of this interaction? | You move forward in the sales cycle |
After you have all of this, the only question you have to ask is,
Who do I know who is exactly like the person I am talking to? Meaning, another govt official for a govt official. Another partner for a partner, another consumer for a consumer that I have provided our cloud services to, and what happened in that case.
If you stick to the rule of who do I know who is like this person, your emotions, your narrative and your ability to achieve the desired outcome will all fall in place.
Stories in a presentation need to be tailored to the audience and purpose of the presentation, and you can’t use just the same story for all presentations.
In our next blog, we will give you an example of a story which is crafted on the rule of, who do I know who is like this person?
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