Storytelling in Content
storytelling
Why should your audience, fan, or prospective fan, care about the content you’re producing?
What is the “so what?” for them?
An average person
sees 6,000-10,000 ads per ad;
Spends about 147 minutes on social media, daily;
Spends 581 minutes with major media per day (that’s close to 10 hours).
What’s the implication? Organizations must cut through that noise. You have 8 seconds to capture your ideal fan's attention.
Why is that important? Research shows that 2 seconds of attention increases recall, brand awareness, and can inspire action (in the next step of your funnel that could be going onto your website, exchanging an email address, or making a purchase).
Capturing Attention
As consumers, we are all selfish. The result? Our attention is captured when it speaks directly to us.
How do you speak to your ideal fan? You first have to know who that person is. The foundation is having an ideal fan profile.
An Ideal Fan Profile
An ideal fan profile is the overview of the person that you are trying to target. This is the person that will speak about your team/players/organization, make multiple purchases, be upsold on purchases, and engage with your content.
Word-of-mouth marketing is still very important. When your ideal fan speaks about your team, they’re bringing in an otherwise cold audience. That’s free advertising for you. AND the referral is coming in at a warmer stage (meaning they’re more likely to purchase and they don’t require as much convincing).
Marketers know that when you try to speak to everyone, you end up speaking to no one.
Ideally before creating your content, you’re going to have an ideal fan profile that dives into who this key person is, what’s important to them, where they hang out, how they consume content, what language they use, and the problem that your organization solves for them. You have the key insights so you can create content production that revolves around them.
You want the content to speak to them so that it inspires action.
What can content do for sports organizations and athletes?
Content can lead to many beneficial things for a sports organization and athletes. Content moves a fan along in their journey, it can encourage a casual fan to become a raving fan. Your content strategy has the power to position you as a thought leader, an industry leader, and a disruptor in the market. It builds loyalty with your fan base and your prospective fans.
Content has proven to be effective for your business funnel. How this works:
Content increases web traffic - it can be a driving force to pull people onto a platform that you own
Increased ranking - helps improve SEO and keyword ranking and it can reduce bounce rates
Increased sales - it can move a lead from cold to hot to conversion
Why are you putting content out there?
When developing your run of show/content plan, outline the exact purpose of the content that you’re putting out there. From here it’s easier to determine the platform(s), story, copy/creatives, and if and where it will then be repurposed.
Your content is going to fall into different categories based on the objective of said content which can include engagement, driving traffic, conversion (or the purchase), and sponsorship.
Connection is the driving force
Humans are emotional beings. When we make purchasing decisions, we buy based on emotions first, then justify it through logic later.
What does this mean for sports marketers? If you are able to clearly identify the problem that your ticket, merch, meet and greet, and sponsorship opportunity, solves for your ideal fan + if you are able to create a connection with them, they are likely to make the purchase.
Why is it important to identify the problem that you’re solving or the leap that your ideal fan desires? Consumers as a whole are selfish. While endlessly scrolling, we care about what said product/service does for us.
Why? Connection creates trust. Typically, a fan needs to know/like/trust an organization, team, or athlete before making the purchase.
How do you foster an environment that creates connection? Use storytelling in your content.
Storytelling in sport
Using storytelling in content
Why use storytelling in your content? The story evokes emotion. Emotion creates connection.
When storytelling is done well, a sports organization or athlete is then able to inspire action from their ideal fan.
Components of Story
There are various components of the story that need to be considered for a sports organization or athlete's content.
The clear takeaway.
I like to refer to this as the “so what” factor. It’s the overview of why your ideal fan should care. It outlines the importance (or lack thereof) for your fan. What is the key message that you want them to walk away from this piece of content with?
The app, main course, and dessert
A good story is similar to a good meal. What does every good meal have? An app, main course, and dessert? In a story, it’s your beginning (hooking the reader in), middle (the meat of your story), and the end (Call to action, inspiring the next step in your fans' journey).
The tie back to your organization or athlete
How is the story connected to your organization or athlete? This is from a foundational point. How do this story and piece of content connect back to your promise to your ideal fan? How does it connect back to your mission? How does it connect back to your big picture vision? Think about the pieces here that are important to your ideal fan, the pieces that will help enhance that connection for them.
What makes a strong story?
Developing a strong story goes back to knowing who your ideal fan is, what is important to them, and how being a fan for your organization or athlete helps them achieve/reach a goal that they otherwise would not be able to reach.
Sports organizations are enriched with history to pull from. Sports organizations have a number of current-day stories to pull from their employees, athletes, and fans. The story is all around you.
An effectively strong producing team is going to know their ideal fan, know their talent, understand the current trends, and from there they are able to craft a run of shows that speaks directly to the individual that they are targeting.
With every single piece of content, your goal is to take your ideal fan on a journey. No, that doesn’t mean that every piece of copy has to be a mile long.
Remember that your content has to matter to your ideal fan. If you want them to take action after seeing your content, you need to answer the “so what?” for them.
Storytelling is one of the most effective ways to build a connection that inspires action among your ideal fans.
If you’re interested in professional development for your digital and production teams and/or for your athletes, I offer customized training and consulting. Please inquire for more.