We folk have spent much of the past year encouraging business owners and entrepreneurs to go back to the beginning of their journey and remember what their purpose was in those early days.
Inspired by the founder of 'Start With Why', Simon Sinek, we've helped clients to see that what they thought was a strong 'why' was actually a list of 'whats', and that the initial spark of purpose that ignited their vision had been lost.
We have been helping them to reconnect with the needs they were originally trying to solve, and what is was that gave them the impetus to create their own thing.
At Folk, we believe that those that tell stories now, and in the future, will be the ones that grow and grow - but we're not talking about stories in the traditional sense.
Tales that focus on a whole bunch of 'whats' may inform us, but they certainly don't inspire us.
They don't touch our emotion or ignite a mutual camaraderie of 'whyness' - a shared story with purpose, a never-ending story in which both parties contribute. These tales are a matter of fact and they're dull.
The concept of storytelling is by no means new, in fact everyone is talking about it and that's wonderful, but we question whether all of them know WHY they are here in the first place. That's where we see the 'sweetspot' for brand storytellers.
So, why isn't everyone doing it?
Well, what our team have seen when they meet with Marketing Directors and E-commerce Directors of brands, is that they have added more and more channels and mediums into the mix - not as strategy, but as a 'me, too' bun fight not to miss out on the next big opportunity in digital.
They've created lots of compelling whats, built whole campaigns and landing pages around the features and benefits of their brand … but they don't know the original seed of purpose that was planted in their brand at its conception.
The lesson? Without connecting to the heart, we cannot craft authentic, engaging brand stories.
What do you think? Join the discussion @folkdigital