Thursday, 9.20pm
Sheffield, U.K.
One of my great regrets, and I don’t have many, is that I spent too long putting people’s status and reputation ahead of their more important qualities. I learned far too late in life that a long list of letters after someone’s name is no guarantee of compassion, kindness, humour, all the far more relevant stuff. – Bill Nighy
I have had Will Storr’s “The science of storytelling” lying around for a long time.
Yesterday I finally blitzed through it.
Stories, it turns out, are fundamental to human nature. They’re wired into our biology. Language evolved, some think, so that we could tell stories.
But what is the power of story?
Stories are the basis of tribal propaganda. We can bring together and hold the minds of a group with a story that makes them heroes and the others the enemy. Stories are how leaders get and hold power.
Stories can make people do bad things. More violence has been done by people who believed that they were following an ideal way of being than has been done for greed and ambition, or pure sadism.
Why am I telling you this?
Because if you have the power of storytelling you must use it carefully. You can do great harm.
But you can also do good.
But first, let’s talk about how it can make you money.
Imagine you have a product and you have a prospect in front of you.
What do you have to get across – what’s the one message they need to get – so that you make the sale?
Have a think – it’s not obvious.
Is it that it solves a pain that they have? Perhaps.
Is it that they’ll make money? Meh.
We are social beings and what’s the one thing we crave?
Status.
We crave status. We want to have it now. We want to have more of it. And we’re miserable when we see people who have more of it than us.
Well, maybe you don’t. But it’s safe to assume that your prospect does. A little bit at least.
So what you have to do is get across how you will help them gain status.
If you’re a consultant, how will your approach help them look good in front of their boss, or get more power and responsibility/
And it’s not hard to remember that adverts for luxury watches and cars are all about status.
Or, closer to where the naked lust for status is more visible, just see how children fight over a desirable Pokemon card.
Use your storytelling skills to show your prospect how you will raise their status and you will become rich.
Cheers,
Karthik Suresh
Handcrafted insight 