Inspiration Dose 03

"For Sale: baby shoes, never worn."
Ernest Hemingway called the above line the best short story he ever wrote for good reasons. It’s concise while being full of possibility. It’s factual yet emotional. And it’s always a good read – time after time.

In fact, members of the struggling writer set have created multiple communities on the web that are dedicated to this not-so-new art form: “flash fiction”. Compelling, intriguing tales are spun in only a handful of lines. Also known as “micro-fiction” or “postcard fiction”, the tradition of compressing great meaning into a small group of words dates back to Aesop’s Fables and has been harnessed by the likes of Anton Chekov and O. Henry. You can harness it too.

When businesses want to tell stories about new products, financial performance, or changes in brand positioning, they often struggle to connect with an audience that is drowning in the deluge of our multi-channeled, mega-aggregated modern reality. Personal information atmospheres are so supersaturated with information that it’s nearly impossible to cut through the chatter.

While working with the media affairs team of a Fortune 500 company that was struggling to communicate new information to their stakeholders, we landed on three key “sticky” story qualities for effective messaging: simplicity, surprise, and emotion.

Simplicity is essential because your audience needs to retain your story in its entirety in the minuscule moment before they get hit with other messages. Surprise means focusing on one or two unexpected facts that will spark intrigue and engagement. Emotion is delivered when you connect the audience to the outcome of the winner or a loser in the story. Imagine finding Hemingway’s story as a handwritten post on the bulletin board of your office next to the flyer for the ‘93 Honda Civic. You would remember it.

additional fodder:

In his book A Whole New Mind, Daniel Pink illustrates the difference between simple information and a story: “The queen died and the king died.” (Information) “The queen died and the king died of a broken heart.” (Story)

Luc Sante recently earned raves for Novels in Three Lines, his translations of 100 year old news items written by anarchist Felix Feneon for a Parisian newspaper. Often centered on a tragic event, Feneon infused his mini news items with irony and poetic commentary: “There is no longer a God even for drunkards. Kersilie, of St.-Germain, who had mistaken the window for the door, is dead.”

Now you try:

1) What is the most unexpected piece of information about your business you could be sharing? (Example: We switched to double-sided printing for all documents).

2) Who wins as a result of this? Who loses? Pick one. (Example: shareholders, finance department, purchasing team, or green employees.)

3) Why should you care? (Example: I don’t really care that much but my 25 year old marketing manager thinks it makes us “cool.”)

4) Tell a noteworthy story about your business in two lines or less that includes all the above information. (Example: A old line financial institution discovered that young employees stay twice the years with half the paper.)