Storytelling for software marketing

Story tell your (software) product

By Pietro Polsinelli

Twitter: @ppolsinelli

Blog: http://pietro.open-lab.com

E-mail: [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

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Who am I

I have been working in software development for too long. I’ve been working on software startups and software marketing since 2008.

I don’t have any great marketing success in my portfolio, but I have at least one total failure – which means I have some experience. You can see practically everything relevant I’ve done on my blogs and (3) Twitter streams – main is @ppolsinelli.

Here I am just trying to create an opportunity for starting a kind of work and research. Not supplying “solutions”.

Friday, April 7, 2023 Story tell your (Software) product

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Learn, learn, learn

In the process of learning that characterizes a lively startup, there are sensitivities to be acquired, which may be immature if coming from custom development, e.g.

Design

UI

Public testing

Public image

“Public Relations”“PR is the most underused resource in the world.” Barbara Corcoran http://mixergy.com/barbara-corcoran-shark-interview/

Customer relationship and support

http://mixergy.com/barbara-corcoran-shark-interview/

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Friday, April 7, 2023

Use creativity to replace budgetsTo maintain “percolation” (see later) and diffusion is a continuous battle. That is why being a startup as a side project does not work.

You need full time dedication: new ideas, experiment and flexibility are the only thing that can beat budgets.

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What will we do today

The question we will work on is this:

How to communicate your product idea?

This is a basic and most important question for a startup, and it’s never too soon to think about it.

Most marketing texts, meetings and experts are focused on communication problems of large companies and institutions, i.e. those that pay them as consultants. But (luckily) there are startups: who thinks about startup communication? And startups desperately need communication.

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Storytelling can be applied externally to present your software, but also internally as a software plot, for focus and motivation - in case of a large company, but also in a startup.

Here we focus on the external kind of storytelling application.

So “who are you”? “Startuppers” is a wide sense. You may be a project manager in an enterprise whom has to start a new large project.

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Storytelling is so popular…

But its not actually storytelling in itself that is popular, its “storytelling for…”. That is, writing and telling stories for ends which are not literary.

This comes from the fact that there are more definite and precise techniques for storytelling – at least, this is a diffuse belief.

Narrative techniques can be acquired with a lot of exercise, developing a specific sensitivity

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Can tell with infographics

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We will deal with the question “How to communicate your product idea?” by answering

(briefly) how to communicate

and

(at length) what to communicate.

Story tell your (Software) product


One of the aims of the workshop is to help startuppers describe their product using a terminology closer to an emotional model of the user.


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After today

A booklet of links for this workshop: http://bit.ly/storyTell

Marketing Ziggurat: http://bit.ly/mziggu

A rich resource: http://twitter.com/#!/storytellin

If you are a software developer – why not take a creative writing course? If my thesis is correct, this will be more useful than any traditional marketing course.

http://bit.ly/storyTell

http://bit.ly/mziggu

http://twitter.com/#!/storytellin

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After today: marketing

Crossing the Chasm by Geoffrey A. Moore

Tribes by Seth Godin

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First exercise

Write on paper what you will say if I’d ask you to present yourself to this group.

Write on another paper your product / service idea – how you would present it in a few sentences.

Startups’ evolving communication needs: the marketing ziggurat

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Percolating Ziggurat

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The model

People at a step are a set of potential customers who have a common set of needs or wants or potential to have new similar needs that reference each other when making a try / buy decision.

(Adapted from “Crossing the Chasm”)

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Entering the ziggurat

What is the top of the ziggurat composed of?

How do you enter the top of the ziggurat?

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Start a blog

A tweet channel

A page on Facebook

Tell your friends

Talk about it at a local event like this

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What I described in the previous slide…

DOES NOT WORK*

* Unless a miracle...

What you need is…

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“That's the press, baby, the press. And there is nothing you can do about it.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgdE-qPv6kw

You need to

TALK WITH THE PRESS



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Seems obvious – for many its not so.

The press- its scary.

Win the fear and write.

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Fearful because it is (a second) reality check.

Examples from my experience:

Bugsvoice –> Fail

Patapage –> Fail

Licorize –> Passed

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And what IS the press?

A blog with 5000 loyal followers in a field connected to what you dealing with can be more effective than a little blurb on Wired.

Build a marketing story for the press

Writing to the press is OK, but write about what?

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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.

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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.

Listing features vs. telling stories

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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

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marketing

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

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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 work.

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.

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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.

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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

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

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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.

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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.

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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



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Learning from “classical” storytellingThe 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.

Using stories

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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.

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You may articulate your idea through many media and means: blog post home page of your site Podcast Video Mockumentary Cards e-book ipad app iphone app generic mobile app Tweets facebook etc.

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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.

Storytelling schemes

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Consumer’s fatal flaw

Reading and knowing your audience fatal flaw is the first step in building any marketing strategy.

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Existential myths

The myth of “salvation”

Myth of “cure”

Myth of “evasion”

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Themes for the existential myths

Cure/protection rhetoric Power/possession rhetoric Exploration/curiosity rhetoric Auto confirmation/self-celebration rhetoric Negotiation/projectuality rhetoric

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Base schema for product narration

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Gossip stories are a GREAT way to see the basic schemes in action (read Barthes’ Mythologies)

Examples

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TOMS Shoes

All the details together tell a unique and coherent story. You won’t forget this site.

http://www.toms.com/our-movement


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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?

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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).

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Balsamiq

Messages:

“We are not working, we are playing”

“The prototype is not definitive”

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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.

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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.

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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.

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Theme

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

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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.


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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

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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.

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Licorize: other’ stories

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



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Stout: his story

http://thestoutgames.com/:DinnerDate

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Stout: other’s stories

http://licorize.com/projects/ppolsinelli/blogBookmarks/dinner%20date



Learning to write tell

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Can’t help you, sorry – help yourselfThis is not the topic of this workshop, but it is a skill that is assumed.

It can be learned. Literary skills can be acquired:

Jeff Atwood, How to Write Without Writing

Over the last 6 years, I've come to believe deeply in the idea that that becoming a great programmer has very little to do with programming. Yes, it takes a modicum of technical skill and dogged persistence, absolutely. But even more than that, it takes serious communication skills:

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2011/02/how-to-write-without-writing.html

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/CollegeAdvice.html



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Limits of this approach

Requires a considerable and prolonged effort.

Once started, very hard to change techniques.

Exercises

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Base schema for product narration

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Exercise: The product is a story

Which story does you product tell? Is it heroic, moving, a thriller, noir? A redemption story or a apprenticeship one? A lucky intuition or a hard earned success?

Try to guess the kind of story that you’d like to tell through your product and select its essential roles.

Which kind of story would you like to tell? What or whom does it involve? Which problem or need it must solve / fulfill? What or who is the opponent? Which trials it must pass? Who is helping and who is hampering? How do we know the target has been reached? Which other characters appear?

Compose all this elements in a story: [write write write]

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Exercise: Opponents and needs

Who are your opponents and competitors?

Which is the need you are fulfilling?

Which is the deficiency you are fulfilling?

The desire you satisfy?

The problems you meet?

For each of the above create a character, then try to take their point of view and tell the story: [write write write]

Re work on your initial texts

Remember to think about the fatal flaw and the biographical moment of the audience.

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Classical elevator pitch – by Amy Jo Kim

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Story told elevator pitch and more

Re-write your elevator pitch as a brief story.

Write e-mail for a reviewer.

Discuss results

Sparse practical hints

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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



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Permission marketing and more

You can use your story based product & marketing core to do both permission marketing and also more traditional, press/blog based marketing.

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Story for the second step

“Resistance from inertia can come from commitment to status quo, fear of risk, lack of a compelling reason to buy.”

Again the story idea can help you out of this. Maybe a new story.

With a story you can also define the contest of your competition. By telling a good story, its you establishing the context.

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Story for the second step

You have to distinguish:

actions that increase (or create) conversion

actions that keep you visible - though the two things are not completely separate

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Down the ziggurat

How to appeal to non-technologists?

The story, amplified and enriched by the press, will help a lot, because a wide spectrum of people can understand it. A feature based approach here will not help, instead, and this is likely one of the causes of failure to cross.

The power of “word of mouth” has been greatly extended by “word of Twitter”.

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More…

Stratify your message: gossip is not the only frontier of knowledge

Stories are powerful, can be manipulative or educational

You have to understand the target’s biographic moment and area: taking care.

It is most important to do the analysis in terms of expense propensity of the target

Create a presskit page on your site pointing explicitly to the different stories.

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Image attributions

Photo "Day 135" by pasukaru76 http://www.flickr.com/photos/pasukaru76/4206297395/in/photostream/

Red and Wolf from Hoodwinkedhttp://www.imdb.com/title/tt0443536/

Images from Balsamiq http://balsamiq.com site.

Screenshots from



http://gawker.com

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pasukaru76/4206297395/in/photostream/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pasukaru76/4206297395/in/photostream/

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0443536/








http://gawker.com/

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Storytelling for software marketing