Cut Through the Clutter: Woo Them with a Memorable Story

This blog was originally posted on LinkedIn

The average person sees 5,000 – 8,000 messages per day. How will you cut through that clutter to make sure your message stands out? Tell them a memorable story.

Information Obesity Epidemic

There’s an obesity problem in the world today. There’s just too much information out there – and we have a voracious appetite for it. According to Dr Paul Marsden:

• 90% of all the data in the world has been generated over the last two years
• Information consumption in the US is in the order of 3.6 zettabytes (3.6 million gigabytes)
• The average American consumes 34 gigabytes / 12 hours of information per day – outside of work
• “Between the dawn of civilization through 2003, about 5 exabytes of information was created. Now, that much information created every 2 days” (Eric Schmidt – former Google CEO)
• In the US, people who text send or receive an average of 35 texts per day
• 28% of office workers time is spent dealing with emails
• The typical Internet user is exposed to 1,707 banner ads per month

Think about it – text, phone, IM, email, websites, apps, mobile ads, billboards, radio, print, television… the list goes on, and we can’t seem to focus on one thing.

Now, consider your customer’s day. All of the above, plus whatever it is that they need to get done. Not to mention their concerns about family, health, finances, etc… How can a mind cope? Also consider that you probably have at least 2-3 formidable competitors trying to achieve the same goal as you – Get Their Attention, and Sell Tell Them Something.

How Do I Break Through the Clutter?

People love a good story. From jokes to books, to movies, to the late night news – everyone wants to hear a good story. When we were children, we always wanted to hear a bedtime story. People at the office water cooler: What’s the latest story from this weekend? In sports or evening news: Who has the exclusive story? The Bible: a collection of stories.

If you want to become more memorable, more compelling, and cut through the clutter of the day, you have to become a great storyteller. Since the first cave paintings were found, we have communicated from generation to generation through storytelling. Let’s face it, no one starts a conversation with “Let me tell you about this spreadsheet I was working on today..”

So how do I tell a great story?

It has to be told from your point of view – namely something you have personally witnessed or experienced. It also must be relevant, meaningful and have simple language that we can easily process, and remember. That adds credibility to the story, and, if you’re good enough in telling the tale – and as with any great book, joke, or movie – your audience will be focused solely on you, wondering “What happened next?”.

So in your marketing, your ads, your product collateral, your white papers, your feature-benefit presentations, your blogs, website, articles, advertorials, social media – whatever it may be, ask yourself: “Am I telling a great story?”

For more on why storytelling has a strong base in our culture, simply ask your significant other or kids at the dinner table, what they would rather hear about: your latest project, database, financial report, spreadsheet etc., OR – a really great story someone told you today.

Ray Beharry is a Marketing & Sales Leader based out of the Greater New York City area. He can be reached via LinkedIn, email – ray.beharry@gmail.com, and is also on Twitter @RayBeharry.