This is the ‘win with stories’ newsletter. Every week I send an email with a message wrapped in a short story. I also share one actionable tip and a recommendation to help you ****enhance your storytelling skills.
Let me make a small announcement before I start with the newsletter. From this month(February 2022), I intend to host a webinar on business storytelling and its different aspects once every fortnight. These 90-minute webinars are free for now, and subscribers of this newsletter will be the first ones with access to the registration link. I plan to cap the no of attendees at 20, so it will be good if you book your seats right away! Below are the date, time, topics and registration links of the webinars scheduled in Feburary 2022.
Lessons from Airbnb and Brian Chesky’s Storytelling – 9th February, 6pm IST – Registration link.
Storytelling Lessons from Shark Tank India(Yes, we are doing this!) – 23rd February, 6pm IST – Registration link.
Now on with the newsletter…
First up, what’s a storyboard? It is the illustration of the key moments in a story. Most creative fields now swear by it. From live production movies to animations to powerpoint presentations, many of them start off as storyboards before the end user or the audience gets to see the final product.
In today’s story, I am going to share how the process of storyboarding has contributed to the Airbnb’s humongous success.
Storyboarding’s Contribution to Airbnb’s Success.
It was in the early days of Airbnb that Brian Chesky read his idol Walt Disney’s biography. By that time, Airbnb had seen some success and had started expanding internationally. However, Chesky did not want his company to be just another short-term rental company(Airbnb was not the first to come up with the idea).
Chesky chanced upon the back story of the animated movie Snow White in the book. This movie changed Disney’s fortunes and became the precursor for the feature length animated movies that we watch today. The book revealed that Walt Disney used the process of storyboarding for the first time to bring his entire team on the same page. This triggered an idea in Chesky’s mind.
‘Great customer experience is like a story. What if Airbnb used storyboarding to enhance offline customer experience and on the app?’, thought Chesky.
He then brought in Pixar animators to design cutting-edge experiences.
Storyboarding helps in many ways. But there are two that I feel matter the most to me as a storytelling coach. The process ensures that you empathise with your customer or audience – you have to think about their problems(or conflicts as they are called in stories), situations and aspirations. Apart from that, Storyboards provide a simple and logical structure to any design or communication. And structure is something I have seen many people struggle with.
Airbnb’s teams and animators created storyboards for guests and hosts helping the company optimise their experience. The process made them think about details like ‘how many bags is the guest carrying?’, ‘What gives him or her reassurance?, ‘Why is this family hosting on Airbnb?’ and so on…
With storyboarding, the company also realised that the Airbnb host was a mentor to a traveler when it came to stays. But travelers spend most of their time outside homes. This meant Airbnb had to help them find mentors who could make them feel like they belong in a new destination. That’s the story of how Airbnb Experiences was launched.
Communication tip for today:
My tip for today is ‘Storyboard every important decision or communication.’
Whether you are working on an investor deck or a speech or a report or even a plan, using storyboards(or story structures) can be immensely helpful. I am not suggesting that you turn into an animator or illustrator to create one. Text will suffice.
But think about the story you want to tell your audience or customers. If you manage to tell them a good one, not only will they remember it but they will also narrate it to others.
The question is which models to follow. There are quite few like Hero’s Journey, In Medias Res and Sparklines. You can get a quick gist here.
If this feels like too much work, then think of the simple 3C model(Character – Conflict – Change). If you have questions, feel free to write back. Also if you want me to share simple and useful info on storytelling models, just write back to me so I can work on sharing them with you in the coming weeks.
One thing you could read today:
While researching for this newsletter, I came across a good article on the story by John Blust on Medium. I recommend that you read it and also look at the simple storyboarding process he shares towards the end. You could try using that as well. Here is the link to the article.
That’s it from me today. Hope you enjoyed this edition of ‘Win with Stories’ newsletter. I’d be delighted to get a few words of feedback from you 🙂
One last request – forward this to friends and colleagues who’d find this story and the tips useful. If you received this email from someone and liked it, you can subscribe here.
