ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at the language of the brand story and how that language serves to build the collection of perceptions that consumers hold about brands. A brand story is the narrative that marketers and their creative partners invent and use to impart a brand's essence to consumers. The essence of a brand—and its meaning to consumers—includes, but is much more than, its features, attributes, and functional benefits. Brand storytelling can occur at two phases in a brand's development: during a research discovery process, and as part of the brand's messaging in print, on television, on radio, online, and other communications venues. Telling the brand story effectively often means developing characters—similar to those that appear in a novel, play, or movie—as well as a plot, a series of interrelated events or story line with a beginning, middle, and end. Marketing research often plays a major role in the creation of a brand story.
