Six Ways to Use Storytelling to Enhance Your Business Pitch

I can tell you from my own experience as an adviser and investor, what everyone remembers is a good personal story. Thus it behooves you to highlight your message with a bit of storytelling.

I’m not talking here about trying to be a stand-up comic, or weaving theatrical tales. Storytelling in business means personalizing your communication here and there with anecdotes to highlight important points, and make the message come alive to peers and constituents.

Here are some key ways that personal stories can raise your message above the standard sales pitch.

Investors tell me that they invest in people more than in products. That means you must convince your constituents that you are a real person, trustworthy, and authentic. Storytelling allows these people to see the real you, outside the context of a marketing pitch for a specific business or solution.

In reality, sharing stories is the first step to building a real relationship with other people in business, as well as in your personal life. Good relationships are the primary basis for trust in business, leading to supportive investors, loyal customers, and effective partnerships.

Facts and figures are easily forgotten, but emotions are long remembered. Find a place in your message for a story about the positive emotions that your solutions can generate, or the negative ones it can eliminate. Your audience will not only remember these, but will also assign them a large positive value.

When it comes to the art and science of persuading others, you can never afford to forget the power of emotions. At least one study has shown that 90 percent of decisions are made based on emotion, but that people then go back to logic to justify their position.

In most cases, a new startup idea and plan is driven by a specific personal incident that has instilled your conviction about this opportunity. Help me feel that same insight or pain that you felt, and I will likely remember and understand your message for a long time.

For the average angel or VC investor, who has heard about hundreds of disruptive technologies and many new ways to reduce costs and improve usability, the impact of your personal realization will stand out, and might even affect them personally.

These days, it is popular to highlight how your solution contributes to a higher purpose, such as saving the environment or helping the less advantaged. You can make this point much more powerfully by relating a story of your personal commitment to this cause, and your plan to use your solution.

A stellar example is Blake Mycoskie, founder of Toms, which donates a pair of shoes to disadvantaged people in other countries for every pair purchased. Mycoskie is never shy about sharing his personal stories of working directly in the field where the donated shoes are lifesavers.

Unfortunately, most elevator pitches, product descriptions, and marketing messages are abstract, and include no characters at all. People remember people, with associated emotions, whether that main person is you, someone you know, or a customer you lost. No long background stories are appreciated.

Rather than just listing the innovative new features of your solution, as well as your commitment to quality and service, use feedback from named customers or beta users to make key points. Testimonials from these people, especially if they are recognized influencers, are much more memorable.

Of course, it is possible to overuse stories to the point of undermining your credibility or wasting people’s time. Don’t expect your storytelling to be a substitute for basic business plan content, including competitive analyses and financials.