STORY is the big new word in marketing & advertising. Stories are sticky-memorable-and people want to hear them. Stories are very old but it sounds like modern marketing gurus have just discovered the concept. Tell the story of your product and you’ll be a multi-millionaire overnight. It sounds simple, and it is…but first you have to understand how stories work and honor their structure. That’s sometimes tricky.
Let’s look at two companies that tried to infuse story into their message, one was more successful than the other.

Example #1 – Coke-a-Cola and Santa Clause
Just about everyone in the Western Hemisphere has seen the picture of Jolly Old St. Nick with his snowy white beard and bright red suit holding a bottle of Coke. The image of the soda pop drinking Santa first appeared in 1931, long after Clement Clarke Moore’s famous poem “The Night Before Christmas” in 1823. Images of the red clad gift giver were seen on magazines and books before 1931, but using Santa as product placement was new. Instead of eating a cookie set out by children, he took a moment to refresh. It all fit into the narrative and the branding sizzled. The soda pop just expanded the image of Chris Kringle and created a fresh chapter to a delightful story. Great illustrations and a sense of humor made this branding story a best seller for decades.

Example #2 – INOX Watch and the NYFD

August 2014 Vitorinox, a major fashion brand that originally created the Swiss Army Knife, rolled out a new watch. They joined forces with the New York Fire Department and created a flashy event at SIR Stage 37 on West 37th St in Manhattan. They’re hoping to create a branding story using images of the most famous fire fighters in the world to show off the durability of their watch. We heard bag piping firemen and saw dramatic demonstrations of the watch’s durability. The INOX watch kept ticking after a fire engine rolled over it and a washing machine washed it. The durable watch was boiled in a tea pot and froze in a mountain of ice. Lots of wow, but where’s the story?

Stories work because they create connections and give us a sense completion, that’s why they’re memorable. I walked around the party and asked how the FDNY and INOX are connected but got no real answer. “They thought it was a good idea.” “The FDNY wanted to try something new.” Yep that’s what I was told, but that doesn’t make a story. I asked if the firemen were going to be given these durable watches and the Vitorinox spokeswoman said maybe. Images alone are not enough. Don’t get me wrong. I love the image of the watch in the teapot, but it’s just an image. The marketers might be hoping that the watch buying public will create their own story from the images. Sometimes that works but it feels like they just missed creating a branding story that will last for generations.

Santa will always enjoy a Coke during his midnight ride because a complete story with a beginning, middle, and end was set up before the first 1931 image and is remembered every time we see it. The jury is still out about the firefighter’s timepiece.