I recently co-hosted a standing room only panel discussion on Social Storytelling at High Point Market with my long-time collaborator Ginna Christensen in the beautiful Universal Furniture showroom.
The conversation was going well.
Like really well.
The panelists we brought together were literally top of our industry and included AD100 and Elle Decor A List interior designer Corey Damen Jenkins, celebrated #TrimQueen Jana Platina Phipps, and the ever-sparkling Aviva Stanoff.
Each led with killer energy, deep and insightful comments, and actionable feedback that I’m still getting emails and DMs about from clients and industry friends. It was amazing. ✨
The time for Q+A arrived. The questions were thoughtful and the panelists responded with authenticity and candor.
We had just wrapped a series of questions about being authentic and transparent and the mic was passed to a woman in the front row who had been eagerly waiting in the queue. Before asking her question, she prefaced it with this…
“You two ladies hosting remind me of the SNL skit Schweddy Balls, with your mannerisms—nice and soft.”
Wait, WHAT?
The panelists and audience had a good laugh from it, and it certainly made the whole event more memorable. And she did go on to ask an actual question. But the surprise of the whole situation got me thinking…
Just how often are we actually prepared for curveballs?
Just when we think things are going well, we’re humming along—maybe it’s a client presentation and you’re killing it, or a pitch meeting where you’ve just dropped a strategy plan that will bring a new channel of business to your client for years to come. Maybe, like me, it’s overcoming the anxiety of public speaking and to “speak up” for your work, your brand, or your business.
What I’ve learned throughout the years of living on the edge of my comfort zone is this: somebody’s gonna throw a ball your way and you better be ready to catch it, or at least punt it back. To be ready to set up your colleagues for the goal with a Lionel Messi-level assist. I’ve learned the hard way that it’s easy to get knocked down when your feet aren’t firmly on the ground.
But there’s a fix here, and it lives in the delta between the quality of your response and the quality of your preparedness.
Whether you visualize success before a game like LeBron or strategize on-field like Messi, you practice giving your speech 10x times, or you’ve crafted your brand story and pitch to be watertight, being prepared (and often overprepared) will serve you tenfold when communicating your value to clients, giving presentations, and telling your story on social media.
Know what you know, and practice anytime you can. This is especially true for your own brand story. I’m pretty sure that Schwetty Balls wasn’t part of the story any of us anticipated coming out of this event—but finding a way to work it in may actually make the story better.
Here’s the link to the full replay and a transcript below from my intro that brings it all together in case you missed the event. Enjoy! ✨
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WHY WE TELL STORIES….
This panel is about Social Storytelling, but before we talk about brands and social media, I want to talk about how we got here.
Story sharing, actually, is one of the oldest ways we have of communicating with each other over time.
Before any of us had a way to record what was happening in our lives, we shared our stories and oral histories in ways that were easily memorable—and that was really important—things like where to find food or water, what plants to avoid eating, and who our friends, and enemies were.
Our survival really depended on stories, and the ability to be a good storyteller.
In fact, early stories used the same elements, or formulas, as our modern stories do –
- There’s typically a character that someone can easily identify with (so it’s personal)
- There’s going to be something at stake—at risk, a danger maybe, or imminent success, or failure
- Maybe there’s a plot twist, or something to hold our attention and keep it interesting
- And there has to be a resolution of course, an event at the end that culminates in a lesson or shares a value. This is really the heart of every good story.
So this was the formula for the way we told, and STILL tell stories to this day—to our friends at dinner parties, in the plots for our favorite movies, and even on social media.
Our ability to tell stories became something much more than just a means of survival; stories became a way to preserve our history, to educate about our culture, and eventually as a means of entertainment.
As we evolved over time and up through Maslov’s hierarchy of needs, from survival to delight, our stories have always come along.
And stories are the one beautiful thing that unites us across time, culture, and language. They offer us a universal system, or way, to express ourselves through words and images.
Of course business leaders and marketers began to see the power of storytelling to connect their brand, services, or products with their customers pretty early on.
To craft stories that were memorable.
Enjoyable.
Repeatable.
Stories we could relate to. That speak to us. To our hopes, our dreams, and maybe our fears.
In fact, the idea of story and brand are so intrinsically tied that we often don’t know the difference.
Brands that have mastered the art of storytelling can seamlessly deliver a consistent experience to you each and every time you interact with their products and services – and as you may have seen over the last few days, storytelling is present in the best showroom experiences, in your sales materials and team bios, on your website, and certainly on social media.
Our guests today are masters of storytelling, each in quite different, but extraordinary, ways.
They have built powerful brands and successful businesses, and lead our industry with joy, insight, and an abundance of creativity.
I’m honored to open our conversation today about Social Storytelling with my long-time collaborator Ginna Christensen and to welcome our esteemed panelists – Jana Platina Phipps, Corey Damen Jenkins, and Aviva Stanoff.
Before we ask the panelists to introduce themselves, we wanted to ask YOU to pause for a second and answer three quick questions about your brand. You can jot down your answers in a notebook or on your phone, or just let your reflections guide you to questions you’d like to ask the panel at the end of our talk.
- What are the biggest challenges you’ve faced in telling stories about your brand?
- What gets in the way of you speaking and living your brand story?
- What are three things you do really well to share your brand story on and offline? (relationship building, mentoring, etc…)