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Month: August 2017

What is Your Origin Story?

Posted on by Merrill

There is a reason why most superhero movies start with an origin story.

They tell the story of why.

What is your origin story?

Why are you doing what you do?

Where did you come from? What drove you to choose the career that you did? Why did you decide to start your own company? What problem are you trying to solve? What questions are you trying to answer? Who are you trying to help?

Check out this article on why your company’s origin story matters
– The most compelling story you can tell

If you know where your journey began you also know why you’re getting up every morning. When the going gets tough (as it always does) your “why” is one of the things you can lean on to motivate and energize yourself. There is a common thread and cause behind what you’re doing.

But the “why” is just as important for the people around you. Your family, friends and employees are on this journey with you, and they need to understand the “why” just as much as you do. They are supporting you, following you and helping you — and they need to know why.

The Emotional Power of Storytelling in Marketing

Posted on by Merrill

Here’s a great article on why storytelling is so important in today’s marketplace. There is so much noise out there. It’s getting increasingly difficult, not only to be heard but to differentiate yourself. By connecting to your audience through your own unique story, you create an emotional attachment that cuts through the noise. – Why storytelling is still crucial in 2017

Because we’re not as rational as people once thought. And storytelling appeals to the irrational mind. Where the rational mind will initially draw us into a product (why we need it, its practical uses), the irrational mind will convert us to the sale. This irrationality comes under the name of ‘emotion’, and it changes everything.

Podcast – Byrds Books

Posted on by Merrill

Most avid readers tend to daydream about owning their own bookstore someday. Just imagine, hanging out all day, surrounded by books, talking with other people who love books…

The reality, of course, is very different.

In this episode of the Bethel Business Podcast, we discuss the joys and headaches of running an independent bookstore in the age of Amazon with Alice Hutchinson of Byrds Books. Discover some of the challenges in choosing the right books to stock, why events and social media are so important, and some great advice for those who dream of opening their own bookstores one day.

 

A Salty Tale

Posted on by Merrill

When people ask me what kind of books I like, I say “Well written ones.”

Seriously, fiction or non-fiction, old or new, as long as the writing is extraordinary and engaging, I will read books on just about any topic.

I just finished “Salt – A World History” – and yes, it turns out that a 450-page book on the history of salt can be fascinating and funny and endlessly interesting. And it leaves me wanting to know more.

This is why I love working with scientific and technical companies. I love the challenge of taking what could be a dry and boring description of atomic absorption spectrophotometry or preclinical bioluminescent imaging and turning it into something that even non-scientists find intriguing.

If you can tell your audience an engaging story, no matter the topic, their response is usually “Tell me more.”

Podcast – Barts Tree Service

Posted on by Merrill

A new episode of the Bethel Business Podcast is out. Listen to this wide-ranging discussion that covers the difference between a landscaper and an arborist, what new enemies your trees are facing, why you should check out the health of the surrounding trees before buying a new house, and what it takes to be an arborist, including the fact that a growing number of women are entering the field.

The Golden Age of Podcasting

Posted on by Merrill

I fell in love with podcasts three years ago due to a confluence of a new job with an hour commute each way and an unexpected interest in professional hockey (Go Pens!). I started with several hours of hockey podcasts, then expanded on to other productions (Welcome to Night Vale, Serial, This American Life, etc..).

It was only a matter of time before I started producing podcasts myself. Being a marketing professional, I saw the inherent power of sharing a brand’s story through the medium of a podcast.

You have thirty seconds to tell your story in an elevator pitch. What would you say if you had thirty minutes?

Check out this article discussing why podcasts have become so incredibly popular over the past few years, and why they have such power to engage an audience…

Attempts to rationalize the advent of the golden age of the podcast frequently miss the mark. Mechanistic explanations that attribute the popularity of podcasts to the availability of listening technologies simply do not capture the appeal in a meaningful way. At least one plausible explanation is that humans inherently desire to hear, engage with, and receive stories, and that podcasts, because of their auditory nature, fulfill this desire in a way that alternative modes of storytelling do not. When we listen to podcasts, then, we are participants in a tradition that stretches back for millennia and just happens to reach audiences through the innovative means of Internet radio.