Learn How to Find & Tell Stories | Storytelling Deep-Dive
September is for storytelling! This month we’re diving into every step that goes into telling a good story in order to equip you with basic skills to go out and tell stories! Today we’re going to focus on why you should be telling stories, what goes into a good story, the structure you should be using, and more!
Today kicks off our month of giveaways, including the Filmmaking Kit grand prize that one lucky member of the Youtube community is going to win! We’re talking everything you need to improve your storytelling game - audio, lighting, and tripod. Plus, there’s some sweet swag to step up your fashion game! So what gear are we talking about? The filmmaking kit includes:
Rode Wireless ME
Aputure Amaran 60x COB light and Light Dome Mini SE
Ulanzi CG02 Handle Grip
80” Tripod
If you win this contest, you’ll have all the tools you need to add a bit extra flare to the stories you’re telling. Is this gear required to tell good stories? Not at all, but gear can help you to overcome limitations of your smartphone’s camera. So how do you win? Easy!
Make sure you’re subscribed to the Smartphone Storytellers channel, then like the video and comment the answer to the question I ask in the video. I’ll pick one winner from all the entries for the month, then announce the winner on October 4th! There’s another chance to enter each week, so make sure you check out all four videos! Full contest rules are in the description for the video. Alright, enough business, now onto week 1 of the “September is for Storytelling” content!
WHY SHOULD YOU BE STORYTELLING?
Simply put, storytelling helps you to connect with your supporters. A supporter doesn’t need to be someone who’s contributing financially, either. A supporter is someone who’s following your organization or the work you’re doing. It doesn’t matter if you’re an individual telling stories or an organization helping others, stories connect with people on a deeper level than a simple informational video. Trust me, if I could figure out a better way to deliver these tips in a storytelling fashion, I’d jump at it. It’s one thing to tell someone the cool things your organization is doing, but it’s another thing when you’re able to share a story of how it’s actually changed someone’s life.
There’s a reason you always saw those corny testimonials during late night infomercial videos. You know the ones - some guy is opening his cabinets and then suddenly hundreds of mismatched tupperware containers fall on him. But, if he bought the product being sold that night, his life would be changed by better organization in his cabinets!
The stories you’re telling should have more weight than those, but it’s a similar idea. You’re showing people how whatever you’re offering has helped to change someone’s life. It’s not intended as a gimmick or to “sell someone,” but instead to validate the fact that you actually are offering something that will help them in some way.
Similarly, if you’re an organization telling stories, it gives them a glimpse behind the veil to see what is actually happening in the organization. They get to see how their support is helping to actually make an impact.
You also can be reminded of why you’re doing what you do in the first place if you take the time to share stories. It can be lonely working in a silo, doing whatever work you’ve been called to. I’ll be honest, it can be lonely working to create content for this channel. My heart is to help people to tell better stories using the gear they already have, but there’s a lot of work that happens behind the scenes to make an impact. Earlier this summer, though, when I traveled to Brazil to teach storytelling, I was reminded of the impact this could be having. It was there that I discovered that there’s a teacher who shows my videos to his classroom each week, helping them to grasp storytelling on a deeper level. I wasn’t able to record a testimonial video with him while I was there, but that story showed me how I could have an impact equipping people in a completely different hemisphere, helping them to tell stories. When you seek out stories and share them, you find fuel to keep doing the work that you’re doing.
So that’s why you need to be telling stories. I dove into this topic back in my “5 Reasons You Should be Telling Stories” video, so check out that video if you want a bit more on the topic.
This leads us to our next question - where do you find stories to tell?
WHERE DO YOU FIND STORIES?
Many times when you’re doing work that’s having an impact, you’re going to hear about stories when doing your day to day business. It could be through a passing comment from someone you’ve helped, or potentially through word of mouth. These stories don’t typically come to you in a “ready to share” form, so you may need to do a bit of leg work to track down the full story. That could be anything from jumping on a phone call to ask questions to having them write out their story in an e-mail. You may not always realize that there’s a story to be told, but the more you tell stories then the easier it will become to find those stories.
But what if you’ve already shared all the readily available stories? Maybe you’ve been telling stories and you’ve already shared the best ones that you found. So how do you go about finding new stories? Theres a few places you can go to find new stories.
You can send out a note to those you’ve helped to see if there are any stories you haven’t come across. Often an organization finds that they hear more of the negative encounters than the positive ones. People are more inclined to share negative experiences with an organization. As a result, you may find that there are more stories of life change that people just didn’t think to share. You may not be flooded with responses by asking people to submit them, but there’s a good chance you’ll get a few that are worth following up.
Additionally, brainstorm other angles you may be able to take with stories. You never want to force a story to be something that it isn’t just so it can fit a mold, but I’ve found that many stories have multiple ways you could share it. Is there a different angle to a story that you haven’t shared that would help to highlight another way you’ve had an impact? Or is there a story you didn’t share in the past that could benefit from being told in a different way?
Finally, remember that not every story you share needs to be a giant story. Sometimes sharing a story to highlight a larger event can work really well. Let me give you an example. A few years ago, during Covid, I told the story of an organization that was providing food for people who were unable to work because of the pandemic and needed support. We shared a story for the sake of thanking people who had supported this outreach. To tell the story, we shared some statistics and details of how the outreach was making a difference. In the middle of the story, though, we shared how there was one lady who had shown up to get some food on her birthday. She didn’t make a big deal of it, but the organization noticed it was her birthday when they were checking her identification. To celebrate the woman, they brought out a cake and sang happy birthday for her. The lady was incredibly touched and felt the love and care that the organization was sharing. It was a simple story that didn’t need a full 2-3 minute video, but sharing it in the midst of the details of the outreach illustrated how people’s lives were being impacted. The assumption was that this was just one of many individuals who were impacted. So consider smaller stories that you can use to highlight the larger work that you’re doing.
So now that you’ve found some stories to tell, what are the elements you need to consider in telling your story?
WHAT GOES INTO A GOOD STORY?
When you’re sharing a good story, you need to make sure you’re actually telling a story. I realize that almost sounds stupid, but if you’re just sharing a bunch of facts then you’re neglecting to tell a story. You need to make sure your story has an actual flow to it, following whoever your main character is throughout their journey. Speaking of which, you need a character to follow. This doesn’t always need to be a specific individual - it could be a group of people. The key is that you need to have some type of representative, or in this case character, that you’re following through the story. Earlier I mentioned the food distribution story. In that story, the main characters were “people who were out of work and needed food” as well as the organization offering the care. The focus was on those being impacted, but we also followed the organization as they met this need. Meanwhile, the birthday lady was the main character of the mini-story. The key is that these stories followed someone who were progressing through some type of life change, even if that change was minor. It all illustrated the larger impact the organization was having.
Once you decide the story you’re telling and what character you want to follow, you need to decide the point of view. You have the option of either following the point of view of the organization, or the point of view of the person being impacted. What’s this mean? Well, if you’re telling a story of a specific individual impacted by your efforts, then you’d want to tell the story from their point of view and include them sharing the actual story. But, if your story is more focusing on the overall impact that an organization is having, then you may want to speak from the point of view of the organization and then include the other stories from that POV.
Next week we’re going to be following along with an actual case study of storytelling, so this will all make a bit more sense in the context of that video. Either way, you need to figure out your POV.
Finally, make sure you identify a conflict in the story. There are entire studies done on the different forms of conflict you can have in a story, such as man vs man, man vs, self, man vs nature, and so on. Regardless, in order to have a good story you need to have a conflict. Discussing the story I keep bringing up, the conflict focused on how the pandemic meant people were unable to work, and as a result they were falling short on food. So the conflict focused on the individuals needing food to survive. The story then told how the organization was helping people overcome this conflict by providing them with meals and supplies so that they would not go hungry.
Now that you know the elements of the story, how do you bring it all together to actually tell a worthwhile story?
HOW SHOULD YOU STRUCTURE YOUR STORIES?
There are countless ways to structure a story. If you ever watch an indie movie, they love to show the “end of the story” at the begining, and then say something like “You’re probably wondering how I got here…let me explain.” Then they flashback to the beginning of the story and proceed to tell what happened. Or if you’re Christopher Nolan, you tell everything out of order so that the viewer won’t understand the story until it’s over. More commonly though, you’ll find a chronological flow to a story. Beginning, middle, end. The hero is going about their day, until they suddenly come across a conflict that they need to overcome. Then the story follows them as they wrestle with that conflict, until hopefully overcoming it in the end.
I don’t approach every video the same, but there’s a set of questions I like to consider when I’m telling a story:
Where were you?
Where are you now?
Where are you going?
I actually created a whole video diving into these ideas which you can see here, but I’ll give a brief overview here.
First, where were you? I want to explore where the individual was before they encountered the organization that helped them. So in the instance of the story of the food outreach, I want to see where they were before the organization helped them. In this case, they were out of work and in need of food. You’re helping to set up the conflict they faced, and why they needed the help in the first place.
Next, where are you now? I like to explore the story of how they overcame this struggle. Most likely this was through whatever organization you’re telling the story on behalf, so you’re exploring how the support helped your main character to overcome. You’re telling the story of that journey, ultimately ending where they are today.
Finally, if you want to use this opportunity to vision cast for the future, you can explore Where are you going. This can be as simple as having your character the hope they have for the future, most likely illustrating the renewed hope they’ve gotten through this journey. Or, if you’re telling a story from the perspective of your organization, maybe you’re dreaming about what future expansion could mean for your impact. This is a question I don’t always include in depth, but I usually like to add a hint of it into the closing section of the story. It all depends what’s best for the goals of the story.
I realize this approach can be very formulaic, so please don’t take it as the ONLY way to tell a story. It’s simply a starting point. There are countless stories I’ve shared where I haven’t followed this at all. I ultimately want to make sure I’m being faithful to whatever story I’ve had the honor of sharing, so don’t think this is the only approach.
So that’s the basics of finding and sharing stories. Great in theory, but what’s it actually look like in practice? Good news - next week we’re going to do a case study with an organization I’ve worked with to explore how this actually plays out in the real world.
If you haven’t yet, make sure you subscribe, like the video, and answer the question in the comments! Wait, what’s the question you ask? Oh right… What are the three questions I like to ask anytime I tell a story? Answer that in the comments after you like the video and subscribe to the channel for your chance to win!
Also - check out our Facebook and Instagram links in the description to get your chance to win some sweet Smartphone Storytellers swag.
September is for Storytelling - so many ways to win! Either way, though, remember that it’s ultimately not about the gear, it’s about the story!
