8 Best Storytelling Techniques for Content Creators
Do you want to learn about storytelling techniques for podcasters and content creators? Then, you are in the right place. The correct storytelling techniques can increase your content engagement by several folds.
Download the first chapter of The Storytelling Series: Beginners’ Guide for Small Businesses & Content Creators by Obehi Ewanfoh.
Imagine the last time you listen to a speech or read a book and you felt truly connected as if the speaker was talking specifically to you. It’s more than likely that for a moment you didn’t realize you were reading a book or listening to a speaker. There is power there and certainly a great storytelling technique in action.
The best way to engage the audience is by telling a story in a way to reach hearts and minds.
Storytelling is an art. The best stories are the ones that have a clear plot, characters that are well developed and believable, and a great ending that leaves the audience truly satisfied.
There are many storytelling techniques that can be used to increase content engagement and these range from:
- The correct use of metaphors,
- Using suspenseful cliffhangers,
- Making use of dialogue and monologue in your writing.
With that said, let’s look into the techniques used by professionals to stand out in their storytelling.
Suspense: Developing Tension by Creating Dramatic Situations
Creating suspense in your stories is a great way to keep readers engaged and reading on. The suspenseful scenes are the most memorable, and they are what make people want to read on. There are many ways you can create suspense, but one of the easiest ways is with dramatic situations.
Suspense is a powerful emotion that people crave in their books, as it makes them feel like they are part of the story. So, note that in order to make a good story, you need to be able to create tension and suspense.
Conflict is the fuel that moves the plot forward. There are two types of conflict: external and internal conflict. External conflict happens when someone or something gets in the way of our protagonist’s goals, and internal conflict is a character’s struggle with themselves.
The most common way to create suspense is through conflict. You can see conflict as the struggle between two opposing forces and it can be physical or psychological. The more intense the conflict, the more suspenseful your story will be.
Conflict can also be created through other means such as foreshadowing and building up tension over time.
Create Dialogue-driven Stories: Pay Attention to Conversations
Dialogue-driven stories are a popular genre of fiction. They can be dramatic and generate suspense. They also allow for more character development and provide a richer experience for the reader.
The best way to make your story flow more naturally is to create dialogue-driven stories. This means that the story should be told through conversations between the characters and not just through descriptions of what they are doing.
Starting with a conversation is a great way to get the reader hooked on your story. As most readers are more interested in dialogue, it’s important to make sure that you have conversations that sound natural and meaningful.
By focusing on dialogue, the action of the story will naturally become more interesting and fun to read. It’s a much better way to create an engaging story that will keep readers engaged in your work.
Dialogue can help you establish backstory and important plot details for readers who might not know about them yet. But be careful with what info you reveal as it could leave key sparkles out of the story.
In your storytelling, create a deeper connection with your audience
Effective storytelling can be the difference between a good and a great product. It is the process of weaving together a series of events in such a way that it has an arc and meaning.
It is not just about telling stories, but also understanding how to tell them in order to get the desired result.
The best stories are those that are true, have an emotional resonance, or offer insight into something you may not have known before. Stories help people connect with each other and with your brand on a deeper level.
As a podcaster or content creator, always strive for a deeper connection with your audience. Don’t forget that storytelling is an old form of communication and can be the best way to Create a deeper connection with your audience.
Storytelling is powerful tool for communication, we humans have been passing down legends, folklore, and folktales for centuries so that people can:
- Gain understanding,
- Education,
- Entertainment
- And also warnings about life’s dangers.
Talking of deeper connections, we all want to have better relationships with our audience. It is one of the most important parts of any business. So, make sure you learn how to create a deeper connection with your audience through storytelling.
Be personal in your stories
Personal storytelling is a common technique for telling your story and it also taps into our hardwired brain processes. Storytelling allows you to integrate cognitive input and emotional input together, which takes the form of a sequence with definite beginnings, middles, and ends.
The process of telling your story starts with a clear image of yourself in your mind and includes physical sensations such as touching or smelling something.
A common misconception about personal storytelling in business is that it involves sharing intimate and vulnerable experiences. This isn’t true.
The point is that there has to be a strategic function and you need to answer the question that your audience is asking but do this through your personal storytelling.
“Everyone has a story to share”, you would have already heard of that slogan on our podcast (Obehi Podcast). Be original and authentic by sharing a bit of your personal experience which will help you to better connect with your audience.
I don’t need to remind you that connecting with your target audience is one of the most important parts of every business.
Having more knowledge of your customers will help you to understand their needs, wants, and interests so you can eventually fulfill them better.
With the high amount of competition in today’s businesses, it’s important that you stand out from those around you. And developing a good storytelling strategy and technique will help you there.
Another important storytelling technique you need to learn is giving life to your characters. Let’s find out more about that.
Give life to your characters in your storytelling
A key step to successful storytelling is developing your characters. For example, if you are writing a story about a person who is preparing for their wedding, you need to give life to that person by describing the thoughts, feelings, and emotions they are experiencing.
When reading a story, readers may not always remember specific details about our protagonists and antagonists. However, subtle clues can make them come to life.
Audiences really appreciate when stories have the power to pull you in and make you forget about everything else. The best kind of storytelling requires a lot of skill, attention, and hard work. So, be prepared to learn more so you can tell your stories like a pro.
Show, Don’t tell.
To be a better storyteller, you need to Show. Don’t tell. Showing is a powerful way to connect with the reader. Telling the audience how something felt or how they should feel without showing their reaction can be lackluster, and oftentimes, it’s boring. Showing in storytelling is a way to break this pattern, and keep your readers engaged.
What does show, don’t tell mean?
It’s a storytelling technique that allows the reader to experience descriptive details of the story through actions, sensory details, words, or the expression of characters’ emotions.
Telling what someone’s thinking runs the risk of having it feel repetitive. Showing how they are feeling is more effective. For example:
- Mary is tired (Telling) vs Mary yawned (Showing).
- Mark is hungry (Telling) vs Mark’s stomach rumbles (Showing).
The concept is often attributed to the Russian playwright, Anton Chekhov, who reputedly said “Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.”
The Show, Don’t Tell writing technique is often used in creative writing. It allows readers to experience the story and characters through how they act, think, react to certain situations, and anything that matters.
This can also be done with sensory details like sight, and sound or by describing people’s feelings or thoughts.
Connect with your audience through Converging ideas
There are a lot of techniques that can be used to make your content more engaging and relevant to your audience. One of the most popular techniques is Converging ideas.
Convergent ideas are important because they allow us to generate creative solutions that we may not have thought of on our own. They can also help us see the world from different perspectives, which can lead to more informed decisions about our lives and our world.
What is a convergent idea?
A convergent idea is when two or more unrelated thoughts come together to form a new concept. This can be as simple as putting together two unrelated words, or as complex as combining multiple concepts into a whole new idea.
Converging ideas is a speech structure that shows the audience how different strands of thinking came together to form one product or idea.
When a single idea comes into the world, it is usually on the back of other minds that have been grinding towards generating this creative breakthrough for a little bit.
Converging ideas is like a nested loop, but rather than one story being framed with complementary stories, each equally important story comes to a single strong conclusion.
Leave your audience with a memorable Conclusion
A conclusion is the final part of a written piece that wraps up the main points and leaves the reader feeling satisfied. It provides a sense of closure for the piece, whether it is a short story, novel, or even just an article.
A conclusion should be written in such a way that it ties up any loose ends from earlier in the piece and leaves the reader with something to take away from reading your work.
A good conclusion should also leave some room for interpretation so that readers can think about your work and make their own conclusions about what you have said.
Download the first chapter of The Storytelling Series: Beginners’ Guide for Small Businesses & Content Creators by Obehi Ewanfoh.
