enteRETAINment

The Surprising Science of Motivation

What do social scientists know but most managers don't? Traditional rewards aren't always as effective as we think. In this TED talk by author Dan Pink he examines the puzzle of motivation, and how the business world is missing the facts behind why contingent motivators do not typically work.

His new book on this topic will come out later this year . . . Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us  

Backstory: Selling by Storytelling

"Whether you're selling movies or toys," says veteran Hollywood marketing consultant Terry Press, "people will buy a good story." A good story is exactly what Jeff Gomez crafts. A recent BusinessWeek article titled Giving Products a Good Backstory, highlights the "backstory" strategy used by heavy hitters like Mattel, Coca-Cola, Hasbro, Microsoft, Walt Disney, and director James Cameron. Gomez and his team at Starlight Runner take an existing entertainment property and/or consumer brand . . . movie, toy, soda, etc. and maximize its value by preparing it to extend across multiple media platforms.

Using a backstory that includes detailed character development, the Starlight Runner team creates a book of stories that the customer can select from. The stories are designed to provide new details and introduce new characters in each medium (books, comics and graphic novels, video games and alternate reality experiences). Multiple storylines in each medium offer a rich experience and are more engaging to the viewer than following the story in a single medium.

U.S. Army and interactive video training

Here is a good article on the CNN website . . . Army hopes interactive videos make smarter soldiers . The article highlights the U.S. Army’s use of high-end interactive videos & storytelling for soldiers' cultural sensitivity training in Iraq. In an era of a young soldiers reared on video games, using realistic movie-like combat video scenes make sense. The e-learning course places soldiers into a series of scenarios and presents them with choices. The soldiers select their choices at the end of each scenario and discover if it was the correct one. The combination of powerful video, compelling characters, and engaging the users in the decision-making process appears to be a winner. There is a good video clip on the main web page of InVism, the producer of the course, that explains why it works and how it was produced.

The Art of Storyboarding

Walt Disney began using storyboards in the 1920's as part of the process for developing animations. In the film and animation world, storyboards are used as a blueprint of the movie before going into production. In e-learning, storyboards are used in the same way. They help the designers and developers visualize the flow of the content, imagery, animations and interactions, and are a great way to see what is working and what is not. Storyboards allow subject matter experts and clients to see your vision for presenting the content and save production costs by cutting out a lot of unnecessary work.

The 13 minute video clip below is a great explanation of the storyboard process from the Disney animation perspective.

Job interview tip . . . tell a story!

A number of career experts are urging job seekers to tell an engaging story about their accomplishments. How will it help you? Since the human brain is hard-wired to remember stories, it can help an interviewer easily retain some important information about past projects or accomplishments the interviewee had at previous jobs. It is a tool that marketing folks have used for many years.

According to Katharine Hansen, a college professor, Ph.D. and associate publisher of Quintessential Careers, "Storytelling makes you more memorable. It makes you stand out. There's an emotional connection when a story is told; the brain locks onto it."

Check out Katharine Hansen's book . . .

Tell Me About Yourself: Storytelling to Get Jobs and Propel Your Career

The Story of Stuff

If you haven't seen the The Story of Stuff yet, you should. The 20-minute story takes you from stuff's extraction through sale, use and disposal, and how it affects communities at home and abroad. It exposes the connections between a number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable world.

Right Page Last Panel

In a recent blog post - When it comes to Marketing or your Personal Brand what is your "right page last panel"? - Saul Colt, a comic book writer and publisher, discusses applying successful comic book techniques to your personal brand marketing. His tip is a great storytelling technique to keep in mind. Saul feels that the secret to writing a good comic book is the "right page, bottom panel." Most comic books are read left to right and top to bottom. To keep the reader engaged throughout the book the first panel of the left page and the bottom right panel of the facing page become extremely important to the story process.

In the first panel of the left page you lead with a reveal (sharing new information, answering a lingering question, etc.). On the right page bottom panel you close with a cliffhanger, something interesting or even pose a question. The obvious goal is to make people want to turn the page to find out more.  Keep in mind that as powerful as the cliffhanger is, the reveal is even more powerful. If the reader is disappointed in the reveal, you'll begin to lose their trust and subsequently their attention.

panel above is from The Adventures of Johnny Bunko

What Is Your Story?

What is the story of you . . . today?  . . . tomorrow?   . . . next year? What is your passion? Are you living life? These Nine Predictions for 2009 by author Tom Asacker will help guide you toward "writing" your story.

Pink’s Travel Tip #2: Bring down ‘da noise

I'm a big fan of the author Dan Pink. His books are fantastic. So is his blog. Dan's recent blog post titled Pink’s Travel Tip #2: Bring down ‘da noise is a great example of enteRETAINment. It's brief - 2 minute video, informative - 5 key points, and fun! Make sure you check it out.

Politicians Telling Stories

Most successful politicians and political strategists are master storytellers who can spin a story that captures the attention of their audience. Often the story isn’t completely factual, and sometimes not factual at all, but it often has one great strength . . . it gets an emotional response. Finding the right context for the story and the emotional hot button so that many in the audience can relate, helps the story take hold.

Truth takes a back seat and emotion and conviction jump to the forefront. The story is told, and then retold and after hearing a passionate, emotional story enough times, the audience starts to associate it with their own real life events and experiences and they start believing it. The Republicans have been masterful at this technique for the last 8 years. Find the emotional hot button, craft the story and watch it take wings.

The age of information and rich media may change things. As more and more people have access to information, rich media, more engaging stories and more story experiences, the audience becomes “story skeptical.” While the audience becomes better listeners, they begin to do more than just listen. The want, need and require a story that makes sense. They ask questions, search for the truths, the values and the realities within the story. They see beyond the emotion and hold the storyteller accountable for a story that is not only engaging and emotionally charged, but also believable.