Want to build your brand? Never stop telling your story
In 2014, Yuval Harari published Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind in English. The book was an immediate hit. The U.S. President at the time, Barack Obama, named it one of his favorite summer reads, saying, “It is a sweeping history of the human race from 40,000 feet.”
Harari has his champions and critics, but one inarguable premise of Sapiens is that humans, more so than any animal, understand the world through narrative. “Homo sapiens is a storytelling animal, that thinks in stories rather than numbers and graphs,” Harari has said.
For Harari, our capacity for shared belief was one of the forces that drove humans from the African savannah into the modern age. For marketers, the lesson is more down-to-earth: If brands are a shared belief, then stories are one of the most powerful tools to build them. How you tell those stories, to whom, and how frequently are some of the most consequential decisions in brand development.
Stories Upon Stories
Strong brands tell powerful stories, but great brands tell powerful stories all the time. The reason, says Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, is that, “A brand for a company is like a reputation for a person.” Reputations—or good ones, at least—are rarely made overnight. Rather, they are the sum of many small stories told over time. Such consistency establishes a dialogue with audiences and regularly reinforces an organization’s values and promise.
Leading research- or patient-led organizations embrace this lesson. Every newly published paper, successful therapy, product launch or customer experience represents a storytelling opportunity, as do the vast network of researchers, doctors and patients behind every one of these events.
MD Anderson (MDA) is one of the most widely known cancer-treatment centers in the US, but it is also a formidable research organization. MDA researchers regularly publish work in top oncology journals. MDA recognized that each of those research achievements represented an opportunity to tell a deeper story. By sharing those stories, they are building their reputation among entirely new audiences, driving credibility and research partnerships.
Illumina is one of the leading manufacturers of sequencing equipment, software and array-based technology. Its equipment enables life-science research and therapeutic development around the world. Illumina has a crowded calendar of product launches and a deep roster of research partners and key opinion leaders. Each one represented a story that could be told to scientific audiences to help build Illumina’s brand around innovation, efficiency and ease-of-use.
The Institute for Basic Science (IBS), in Korea, opened in 2011, making it relatively young for a research institution. Though IBS opened 30 research centers throughout Korea, it was struggling to get attention outside of ac
ademic publications. IBS decided to use its publishing success as an opportunity to tell research stories, bringing their work to a global audience.
At Nature Partnerships, we partner with institutions, corporations, charities and funders to share their stories with our audiences. Springer Nature publishes more than 3,000 scholarly journals and has 11+ million readers each month. Our specialist writers and editors ensure that every story told upholds Nature’s editorial standards and will appeal naturally to our audiences. Our marketing and social media experts make certain that they reach the intended audience through targeted promotions on our site and social channels.
For partners, our team can help identify compelling and relevant stories, develop a quarterly or annual content calendar, and suggest audience targeting that ensures results. That content calendar quickly becomes something our partners can rely on to plan their own marketing around.
If stories are indeed the way humans understand the world, telling them effectively and to the right audiences, should be a top priority for those building a brand.
If you’re interested in learning more about storytelling with Nature Partnerships, reach out to our team today.
