New research into local TV news storytelling can give your corporate blog’s digital content strategy the boost it needs to better connect with your audience.
Research from Northeastern University found when local TV news providers included visuals and elements of emotional storytelling, the pieces resonated with viewers.
Now the business of TV news, and news in general, is entirely different to the purpose of corporate blogging. Journalists are important civic actors, and they play a role in building an engaged and informed citizenry that’s needed for democracy to function effectively.
That’s why I bristle at the term, “brand journalism”. There is so such thing.
But, I do think that content creators and marketing teams can learn about compelling ways to design content from news companies. One look at companies like BuzzFeed and Upworthy shows the power of digital news.
That’s why a closer look at the insights from Northeastern might offer a fresh perspective on how to package content for your business blog.
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Now in most cases, the new elements didn’t add any new information but did provide addtional context.
Here’s a video report summarizing the research, and you can read the full writeup on Poynter.
A PDF of the full report is also available.
Viewers Want Visuals and Emotion
One test compared two versions of a piece on the Facebook data breach. The original WLS-Chicago story included soundbites from the state attorney general.
The new version added emotional elements like interviews from Facebook users. The piece also has moving graphics.
Emotional Storytelling and Visuals for Business Blogs
Emotional storytelling appeals to TV news viewers, and the research shows the same goes for customers when they make purchase decisions.
There’s a large body of research into the connection between storytelling and consumer psychology, suggesting that when brands use storytelling, consumers are more interested and engaged.
And products with better stories, command higher prices, according to an experiment by Origin, Hill Holiday’s consumer research arm.
Here’s a few of the experiments they ran:
- A hotel room with a story from someone who stayed at the hotel was worth 5% more than the same hotel room accompanied only by a typical room description
- A piece of art that was marketed with the artist’s personal story commanded 11% more than an ad with only an image of the artwork
- A winemakers story increased the value of the wine by 6%, when compared with a product page displaying just tasting notes.
It doesn’t matter what industry you’re in – or whether you are B2C or B2B – good stories matter. There’s even a movement in B2B marketing, calling for a shift to human to human marketing; an approach that would be well-served by brand storytelling.
And visuals have an equally important role in your content design.
Visual elements, that were useful and relevant, aided in viewer’s understanding of the story. Now if you’re creating marketing content, this is not a new concept.
Jeff Bullas shares the following stats:
- Articles with images get 94% more views
- Press releases with images and video get 45% more views
- 60% of customers are more likely to contact a business when an image shows up in local search results
Now let’s look at the business blogs who can inspire our own visually appealing content.
Starbucks
Starbuck’s post on the world’s most romantic Starbooks stores gets it right on two fronts. It’s released around Valentine’s Day so it’s timely. And then it appeals to customer’s sentimentality, coveying that Starbucks offers “a place to connect with loved ones”. It’s not only a coffee store, it wants to be included in customer’s most special moments.
Smashing Magazine
If you’re working with techical content, you might battle to design rich, and beautiful, web experiences for your readers. Fortunately, there’s several blogs that serve as great case studies for tech content creators. You can apply these types of techniques to any industry, and they include screenshots to add to the reader’s understanding and graphs to visually communicate facts.
A great example is Smashing Magazine, a blog covering a whole of topics including web development and e-commerce.
Here’s one example where the writer takes a complex subject and uses graphics throughout to break up walls of text and make the document easier to read. And that’s no easy task; it’s a comprehensive tutorial taking reading time up to 12 minutes.
You can view the whole post here, and it might inspire you, no matter what industry you’re in. if you’re a social media agency for instance, you may want to include a post discussing the free Facebook Audience Insights available to users. In addition to screenshots, you can use screencasts to guide readers through the process. Best thing is, you can get a lot of free to create professional screenscasts and other visuals.
Buffer
Overall, Buffer is a great case study in how to do content marketing right. In addition to that, the blog is an excellent resource for anyone needing to enhace their social media marketing game.
And it uses illustrations, graphics, and screenshots to add to the content, not merely for the sake of adding visuals.
This piece on how to write a good blog post has graphs, screenshosts and infographics throughout.
