Telling your brand story is a crucial part of your Abound profile. Not only do retailers love learning about you, your brand stories are an important part of their business plan as well. Many indie retailers learn the brand story of every single product they carry, so that they can answer all of their customer’s questions, and differentiate themselves from big box stores.
Even though writing can be a slog (believe me, I know), it’s worth taking the time to make sure your brand story is well written, interesting, unique, and personal. If you’re not sure where to start or are looking for rewrite inspiration, check out these six different techniques for telling your brand story.
1) Tell A Personal Story
The epic boat explosion scenes may be what made Titanic a blockbuster, but Jack and Rose are what made it a classic. Telling your personal story is one of the best ways to tell your retailers why they should support your brand. But don’t just rattle off facts about yourself. Put yourself in the retailer’s position, they’re busy and they’re probably just glancing around. If they start to read your story you’re going to have to hook them in. Check out this example by Finger Licking Dutch Caramel Stroopwafels to see how thoughtful writing can make a personal story pop.
About Finger Licking Dutch Caramel Stroopwafels:
Our products are authentic, premium and produced in The Netherlands, to provide the real Dutch taste. Femke is from The Netherlands where stroopwafels were invented over 200 years ago. On one of their first dates, Femke gave John a cup of coffee with the famous Dutch cookie, a stroopwafel on top of the mug. John had never tasted such a delicious cookie before, and he was immediately hooked with the taste of warm caramel surrounded by two crispy wafers. The Netherlands is the motherland of stroopwafels. Stroopwafels are one of the best-selling products in the Netherlands and now Finger Licking Dutch has made them readily available in the United States of America.
2) Show Your Brand’s Style
Getting personal isn’t the only way to show retailers you have a brand worth supporting. If you have a strong brand identity, make sure you reflect that in the writing style you use for telling your brand story. If you check out SIC Cups’ lifestyle photos, you’ll see that they’ve branded themselves as a fun, outdoor adventure loving company. They’re casual, energetic, and passionate about their products. What makes their brand story so effective is that they use those same qualities in their story’s phrasing, punctuation, and attitude. Their confidence shows and it gives retailers another reason to trust them – they look like pros.
About SIC Cups:
We make the coolest drinkware on the planet! All of our products are double-wall, triple insulated and finished with the highest quality powdercoating and other designs. We stand behind our quality and are happy to back all of our products with a lifetime guarantee! Our vision of the SIC brand is much more than just a cup label, we strive to invoke a lifestyle image that takes you to your happy spot. It doesn’t matter if that spot happens to be on a boat, at a party, working the grill, on a beach, fishing in the early morning or anywhere else – our SIC cups will be just as excited as you are to be there for it! We want to be right beside you in your happy spot and with you on your next adventure…
3) Think About The Customer
Don’t feel comfortable bragging about yourself? Well, as you’re working on getting over that (because bragging about yourself is a key part of owning a brand), you can always focus on what you’re going to do for the customer. Sometimes your differentiator can be how much you care for the people your products help. Fuze Body was able to tell their brand story by doing just that. It does a great job of peppering facts about the brand and why it exists, but its primary focus is on how much better the customer’s life will be when they have their products, and it comes off as genuine.
About Fuze Body:
What does goodness mean to you? To us, it is the very core of what we strive to deliver through our products.
As the entrepreneurial parents of two beautiful little girls, we know life can be fun and messy! As you step into the unknown every morning you will inevitably navigate through different emotions. Life is full of surprises and that is the beauty of it. When you are so busy, how do you stay healthy and mindful of self-care?
With that in mind, we created a line of natural handmade products infused with therapeutic-grade essential oils – a blend of innovation and wholesome living. Our mission is to help blend goodness throughout your day no matter what life throws at you.
Do you need more energy or focus to finish that big project? Do you need to just calm your mind and have that restorative sleep after an exhausting day? Are you feeling a little under the weather? Or maybe you could use some more romance in your life…
So tell me, what are you in the mood for?
4) Argue Your Point
Did you start your company to make something better than the competitors? When retailers are shopping at Abound, they understand they’re going to pay higher prices for products that are much higher quality than their competitiors. There’s nothing wrong with explaining how bad the other products out there on the market are. This brand story by Driftless Studios doesn’t pull punches on their cheap competitors, and step-by-step they explain everything they do differently.
About Driftless Studios:
The home decor business is rife with importers and large companies using cheap materials and lazy design. At Driftless Studios we do things differently. We design everything in-house. We source quality materials, build it by hand and product test everything we sell. If our products don’t have a high sell-through rate at our mobile retail events, they never get listed on our site. Driftless Studios is family owned and operated since 2014. We are located in Westby, Wisconsin. We look forward to working with you.
5) Convince Them Of The Greater Good
Having a social good attached to your company is great for the world and for your business. If you want to elevate your brand even more, use your brand story to convince people just how important your social good cause is. Not everyone already knows the stats and figures associated with the problem you’re working to fix. Why were you drawn to this problem? What gut punched you and made you dedicate yourself to working on it? Use your brand story to argue this case as effectively as you can, just like Bhavana Bottle does with theirs.
About Bhavana Bottle:
The idea for Bhavana Bottle came to us while we were living on a small island in the Gulf of Thailand where it was clear the destruction single use plastic is having on our ocean ecosystems. One day after a storm, we were swimming in the ocean and found ourselves surrounded by a murky river of trash that was floating in from the ocean. We were extremely saddened by this experience which ignited a flame deep with us. It was time to create change… This is when the idea came. A simple and elegant bottle encased with sacred geometry and high vibration words to bring the mind back to the present and serve as sustainable and eco-friendly alternative to replace single-use plastic.
We want to inspire people to be the change they wish to see in the world one sip at a time. We donate 3% of all sales to innovative organizations working to preserve and protect our global eco-systems.
6) Show Your Skills
Sometimes your biggest differentiator is your own two hands. I knew absolutely nothing about the leather making process before I read Kiko Leather’s brand story, and they converted me in one paragraph. The authenticity shines through in this brand story and made me appreciate their beautiful products even more. There’s nothing wrong with explaining to retailers exactly why you’re an expert.
About Kiko Leather:
Founded by the Kiko brothers in 2014 straight out of Los Angeles, the Kiko Leather brand and product line is a fresh chapter of a book boasting a story of generations of leather crafters, innovators, and distributors. The Kiko brothers are no strangers to tanneries and leather production facilities with decades of experience acquiring elite industry knowledge of the best materials, methods, and resources for top-tier leather goods. In a unique blend of family trade history and modern day ambition, Kiko leather brings craftsmanship to ensure lifelong products with timeless design. Not all wallets are created the same. There are limits to what leather can do. Given the right resources, time, and skill, those limits can be mastered. Don’t let the youth of Kiko Leather fool you. Like all good things, tanning leather takes time. For Kiko Leather, the time is now.
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