04 An intro to narrative design Chapter two How to optimize your storytelling There’s no doubting the impact storytelling can have at Stay authentic and set yourself apart from your company - but how can you create storytelling that the competition truly resonates with your target market? How can you “I think that the most important thing about creating spin a narrative that’s impossible to ignore? How can you authentic storytelling is to get into their shoes and just be become a true master of the craft and re昀椀ne open about it. If we’re tiptoeing around things, this makes the process? it more complicated and diluted. Magda Saralegui, former Senior Product Marketing Manager at ASICS, shared her insights on how product “The customer is smart and they’ll 昀椀nd out what copied marketers can make the best use of storytelling at aspects have nothing to do with the company. The most their organization. important thing is to be transparent and honest. It’s true that we’ve created a lot of products that even had the Use focus groups to optimize the storytelling process same name. But we also must create differentiation with “With the focus group, people get super creative because creating products and in the storytelling itself. they don’t really know if something’s possible, impossible, “There’s one great example that comes to my mind with or if it’s too expensive. two pieces of context. One is that it was in the middle of “You get a lot of information and when you’re creating 2020 and everyone had to work out inside of their house and bringing in a story, the information you get from a with the kids and the dog around, and there were all focus group is a bit of a mix but it adds into the research those uncomfortable aspects. that you do in trends and also gives insight into “The second is that tights are the biggest seller for the consumer. women, especially in sportswear. “When you’re in the middle of the focus group, it’s “So this UK brand started to focus on seamless tights. good that they bloom, get super creative, and bring up They came up with this great product story, which was so insightful ideas. Most of the time, they don’t really know honest, so direct, and the language was very relatable what they’re talking about, but as a product manager for women. you pull it all together and create really good ideas.” “The 昀椀rst time I saw it was on Instagram. So it was like a 15-second video that was so bright and clean that you just fell in love with it. I wanted to buy it and try it on because it looks amazing.”