The right story can add value to your ideas and recommendations. The right story, preferably a personal one, can add value to you and your messages.
We went from our usual 8 delegate workshop to an 80 delegate conference last month in Scotland.
We had only two and half hours to inspire our large audience to want to tell their stories so that they could better communicate and sell their ideas to prospects and clients.
To illustrate how stories can add significant value we told them about some work carried out and documented in the USA.
An American sociological company http://significantobjects.com actually tested and measured the value of stories in increasing the value of objects.
They bought 100 low cost items – on average US$ 1.25 – and gave each item to a professional writer to write a story about each one. These stories brought the items alive so they had backgrounds, identities and personalities.
They then put the 100 items plus their individual stories on ebay and proceeded to sell them – with incredible success.
The items had cost them US$ 125. They sold them for just under US$ 8,000. An amazing 2,700% increase!
Just imagine if you could increase the perceived value of an idea you were selling by using a good story?