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Business Storytelling: If It Doesn’t Hurt a Little, You Are Not Doing It Right

Business Storytelling: If It Doesn’t Hurt a Little, You Are Not Doing It Right

when it comes to business storytelling if it doesn’t hurt a little, you are not doing it right Ngalula Beatrice Kabutakapua

How many times have you heard: “tell the story of your business”?

And you actually start filling up pages and maybe start with when you opened it, where you were, the difficulties you had to face. Words, thoughts about your entrepreneurial journey start flowing easily and you feel like you are on the right track. The truth is though, that when it comes to business storytelling if it doesn’t hurt a little, you are not doing it right.

When I was a journalism student, I would work on essays and feature articles for my assignments. I’d present them to my supervisor and she would say, with a happy but strict smile: “This is good, dig deeper!”

And I’d look at her, pretending to understand what she meant. But I had no clue. For me, the piece was done, completed, final. What else did she want? What does digging deeper mean? How could I do that? Was there a template? An example I could be inspired by?

Structures and templates in business storytelling

We often have the same feeling the first time we try and share our business story. You might have done one of the following:

  • Check successful stories from other businesses
  • Using a template or a structure to write the story
  • Distractedly mentioning a piece of your personal story

But it didn’t work.

Because there are so many templates, structures, tips on how to tell your business story, it’s difficult to understand why yours doesn’t feel right or doesn’t work. And it also makes it harder to explain perspective clients what I do. Yes, I am a storytelling coach. And yes, I help people with their structure, editing and marketing. But what I really do is taking my clients by hand and guiding them through allowing themselves to fully accept their stories so that can feel ready to share them with the rest of the world.

Business storytelling: if it doesn't hurt a little, you are not doing it right Click To Tweet

Why does it need to hurt?

Business storytelling in my style, is a journey. And it’s often one you don’t know you can start, because:

  • you are afraid of being vulnerable
  • you are fearful about judgement
  • you don’t want to dig deeper

But think about what you are asking people to do through your story. You want them to trust you, to connect to you and to buy from you. Those are three big asks. And how can ask so much from a complete stranger, if you are not ready to gift a piece of yourself?

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Your story is important

And now it comes the part where you might think that your story is not dramatic, interesting, sad or exciting enough. Well, believe when I say: your story is perfection, it’s beautiful, it’s interesting and worth sharing. But you have to master how to do that.

Even the most effective story looses its effectiveness without some guidance.

So here’s my invitation to you:

  1. Dig deeper
  2. Master the art of storytelling

We can do it together or you can start your own journey. Just keep me posted on how it goes.

 

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