The hero’s journey is a story pattern that can be found in some of the most well known movies including Star Wars, The Wizard of Oz, The Bourne Identity and the list goes on and on. The pattern has some variations but ultimately follows a structure that allows the story to develop in a way that makes sense to the audience. And so, this is what is covered in Building a Storybrand.
The author Donald Miller explains how important stories are for getting across what it is that you and your company do. The trick though is to ensure that the customer is the hero. Time and time again we see companies talking about how great they are, what they do that is different etc.
All of that is making the company the hero of the story, not the customer. You simply must make the customer the hero of the story. Once you make that connection in your mind you begin to see how every single aspect of your business is geared towards answering a question that the customer is continuously asking themselves – ‘What’s in it for me?’ By putting your customer as the central heroic figure in the story, you are repeatedly telling them that you understand that they have a problem and that you have the solution. This episode covers the steps in the hero’s journey and the areas of your communication with your customers that you can audit and improve.
One of the key takeaways from the book is ‘Your hero has a problem, they have hit a road block stopping them getting to their goal’ and the author makes an excellent point here about the type of problem a customer might have. It might be an external problem or it might be an internal problem. Customers will find you if you can solve external problems (e.g. they need to buy a car) but they will buy from you if you solve the internal problem (e.g. they hate having to deal with shady salespeople and they hate haggling). This is a great example of how the book puts a unique spin on the hero’s journey to allow you to think about your customer as the hero in the story.
