Remember how excited you found yourself when you were a child and it was story time? That same notion of story time applies marketing your company as well.

In the past, success stories when  published in a magazine or in a newspaper reached a limited audience. Fortunately today, the existence of social media allows for a much easier spreading of the word when a company gives or creates a good experience.

If your company does not already create stories from the good experiences surrounding customers, products, or anything else, it should look into it. The benefits are immense, from greater sales to more company visibility.

Let’s explore the different types of customer stories:

• The Customer Service Story: This is the type of story that doesn’t get told, even though for many companies customer service is first. The customer service story revolves around a customer experience where the customer gets service that goes above and beyond their expectations. This type of story is a delight to any company because it proves that they have good people handling skills. A company with a good customer service story is shoe-retailer Zappos.
• The Product Story: The product story starts with a company product, as opposed to that of a customer.   A good product story emphasizes the story of a product that has changed the lives of a customer or transformed an industry. Many companies like to focus here. For example, Facebook likes to use its product as a story to tell how many people have discovered love, and cancer treatment, or found a group that really satisfies their needs.
• The Company Story: This story starts with the founding of the company; it is often used to explain to people why the company was started in the first place. The purpose of the story is to explain company values and hopefully discover customers are also aligned with those values. A lot of traditional companies tend to focus here. For example, computer maker Hewlett-Packard likes to tell the story of how the company was founded in a garage in Palo Alto, chronicling humble beginnings into a multi-national empire.

Do any of these stories describe your business? If so, brainstorm ways that your company can better tell its story of the audience at large.

We will talk about how to tell your success stories next time as we explore mediums and execution methodologies. Stay tuned!