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What's Your Story? Engaging your Blog Readers with the Power of Personal Narrative. Whether you’re starting a personal blog to share your thoughts and ideas, or blogging to promote your business, storytelling is the most effective way to engage your audience. Recitations of facts or personal journal entries might convey meaning, but stories provide your audience with a relatable entry point into your subject matter. Story inspires, teaches, and stimulates discussion. The well-told story is memorable and unique, positioning you as a trusted voice.
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Cindy Reed Writer | Blogger | Speaker | Teacher
Twitter: @Reedster2
www.reedsterspeaks.com
www.cindyreed.me
#wcavl
What’s Your Story? Engaging Your Readers
with the Power of Personal Narrative
© 2014 Cindy Reed
www.reedsterspeaks.com
Imagine…
Why storytelling for bloggers?
Stories engage.
Because Science.
If we listen to a recitation of facts,
just a fraction of our brain is activated.
“A story can put your whole brain to work. . .
The brain of the person telling a story And the person listening to it can synchronize.”
Leo Widrich, “The Science of Storytelling:
Why Telling a Story is the Most Powerful Way to Activate Our Brains” (December 5, 2012 Lifehacker) (discussing Princeton study)
Stories persuade.
“Facts tell, but stories sell.”
Bryan Eisenberg
“Content Marketing: Superheroes Teach the Art of Storytelling” (ClickZ Dec. 28, 2012)
So ditch the lists – unless . . .
… you can find the story.
What is story?
Story is more than an emotion or an idea.
“This happened and
I was sad or angry or elated”
is NOT a story.
Compare: Emotion vs. Story
Emotion: I am angry about the lack of diversity in
children’s media.
Story: “Mommy, why is Calliou bald?”
Story is more than a sales pitch.
“Use our services because
of these five bullet points”
is NOT a story.
Example: Sales vs. Story
Sales: Buy my scarves on Etsy because
they’re awesome.
Story: “I perched on a rickety stool, memorizing
the way my grandmother’s leathered hands
scraped the wool between the wooden
carding boards.”
How do we tell
stories on our blogs?
Tell it in a flash.
Flash Nonfiction
DON’T simply tell a fast
story.
TELL a story with ONE
core concept.
Break it down | Again with the Etsy Scarves
Wool
• Visited farm to
shear sheep.
• Grandma taught
to card wool.
Dyes
• Learned which
berries to use.
• Harvested
berries on hike.
Knitting
• Chooses patterns
from art.
• Knits as mindful
meditation.
Edit to 400-600 words.
CUT
Tangents
Asides
Exposition
Summaries
Use narrative structure.
“Not every word that comes
out of our mouths is a story.
Story is narrative.”
~ Christina Baldwin, Storycatcher: Making Sense of Our Lives through the Power and Practice of Story
In the beginning.
Grab the reader’s attention.
Don’t tell the reader what you’re going to tell them.
Jump in.
Short first sentence.
Short first paragraph.
Example: Wordy
“I’m back from the Blissdom blogging conference in
Nashville, and it was wonderful to take a break with so
many smart, funny, powerful, creative, and determined
women who are communicating their stories to the world,
one post at a time.”
Example: Punchy.
“I dropped into the window seat, on the wing.
The exit row.”
Stuck in the middle.
Show, don’t tell.
If you tell me, it’s an essay.
If you show me, it’s a story.
~ Barbara Greene
In other words …
Don’t say the old lady screamed –
bring her on and let her scream.
~ Mark Twain
Example: Crowded Taekwondo
Telling Showing
“It was crowded at my
daughter’s taekwondo class.”
“The backside of a
backpacked dad poked into
me, uncomfortably adjacent
to my face.”
~ Cindy Reed
“The Layered Look Only Works if You Wear Layers”
(The Reedster Speaks, Jan. 16, 2014)
Example 2: Grandma’s Old Car
Telling Showing
“My grandmother gave me
her old car.”
“She was wide-hipped and thirsty and I called her Bertha after the Grateful Dead song. . .
. . . a two-tone ’72 Cutlass handed down from my grandma.”
Louise Ducote, “Here, this is for you”
(Hair of the Dogs, June 18, 2012)
… and in the end.
Know when to stop.
NO neat bows
NO navel gazing
NO summing up
Follow the Coco Chanel rule.
Example: The Accident
Too much:
“Should I have done more?
Aren’t we defined by the
choices we make, in the
blink of an eye?”
Just right:
“When the local news called
today, I declined to be
interviewed on camera.”
Find your voice.
Who are you as a person? Be that as a writer.
DON’T write like you talk.
Write like you ARE.
Informal Voice | The Reedster Speaks
“When you juice things, you
bring out the micronutrients
. . . blah, blah, blah. I didn’t
really listen. But when some
non-physician dude in a
movie tells me I should
make everything into a
beverage or I am going to die?
I’m doing it.”
Cindy Reed, “My Juicer, It Mocks Me”
(The Reedster Speaks June 11, 2012)
Lyrical Voice | Bill Dameron
“When we drive along the
rocky coast of Maine and
watch the green ocean swell
like it is a living being larger
than eternity I do not say it.”
Bill Dameron, “Don’t Say It”
(The Authentic Life Jan. 5, 2014)
Minimalist Voice | Michelle Longo
“My mother would twist her hair at the nape,
secure it with one barrette, and walk around with
a wet washcloth around her neck.
If I aggravated her, she’d simply say, ‘Michelle, it’s
hot.’”
~ Michelle Longo, “I Am Not Safe”
(The Journey, Sept. 26, 2013)
Resources for writers.
Find a writing home … … and hone your craft.
Check local meet-up
groups.
Join an online writing
community.
Attend writers’
conferences,
workshops, and retreats.
Resources | Writing
Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within by Natalie Goldberg
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott
Zen in the Art of Writing: Releasing the Creative Genius within You by Ray Bradbury
On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King
The Situation and The Story: The Art of Personal Narrative by Vivian Gornick
Steering the Craft: Exercises and Discussion on Story Writing by Ursula LeGuin
Writing for Story: Craft Secrets of Dramatic Nonfiction by Jon Franklin
On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction by William Zinsser
Resources | Grammar
The Deluxe Transitive Vampire: A Handbook of Grammar for the Innocent, the Eager, and the Doomed
by Karen Elizabeth Gordon
Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation by Lynne Truss
Woe is I: The Grammarphobe’s Guide to Better English in Plain English by Patricia T. O’Conner
The Elements of Style by Strunk & White
The Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL) http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl
The takeaway.
Cindy Reed Writer | Blogger | Speaker | Teacher
Twitter: @Reedster2
www.reedsterspeaks.com
www.cindyreed.me
LINK TO MY PRESENTATION
