There’s always an array of tabloid magazines at the checkout lines in grocery stores.
 
Even amid the print media downturn, those magazines seem to thrive. The reason for their success? They talk about people.
 
Sure, most of the stories are sensational and many would argue, untrue. But tabloids do something to keep us engaged. They appeal to human emotions by talking about people.
 
There’s a simple lesson here for those who want to create engaging content in the B2B space. And no, it doesn’t entail using gutter tactics to engage your audience.
 
Instead, the lesson is to focus on humans. And less on your products or services.
 
You can, of course, talk about your products or services—just centre it around people. How did your product or service serve people? How did it help them grow? Save money? Succeed? Make their lives easier?
 
No matter what industry you’re in, there’s one subject that intrigues everyone: people. Talking about people leads to more powerful storytelling, and as this Harvard Business article notes, storytelling is an effective way of helping your audience learn new things.
 
Good storytelling, especially stories that involve people, sticks in the minds of your audience. Good storytelling is often remembered longer than stats or facts about your product or service.

Consider this point when you’re crafting that new product or service case study or writing that blog post on the latest update to a product your company sells.
 
And the next time you’re in a supermarket glancing at those tabloids, think about how you would tell your company’s story if it was on the front page of one of those magazines.

Humans are wired for stories.
 
“You’re never going to kill storytelling, because it’s built in the human plan. We come with it,” says author Margaret Atwood.
 
Atwood’s right.
 
Storytelling is what kept the spirits of our primitive ancestors going when they would sit by a roaring fire after a long day of hunting thousands of years ago.
 
Today, storytelling keeps us feeling connected in our remote, pandemic-weary world. It brings out our emotions at a time when disassociation from reality is often our only means of pushing through the current circumstances.

It’s no surprise that the business world has taken on storytelling, often through content marketing, with the aim to gather larger audiences.
 
Businesses that use storytelling are tapping into the depths of the human psyche to connect people to their brand, products, and services.
 
But what are some reasons why businesses should use storytelling?

• It humanizes your brand and that means more people relate to your business
• Storytelling allow you to build a strong connection with audiences
• When you talk about your business through riveting narratives in the B2B space, it gives you an advantage over competition that isn’t using stories to create inbound leads

 
And it pays.
 
In the B2B SaaS space, for example, businesses using content—storytelling through mediums like blog, podcast, and video, saw 30% higher growth and a 10% higher retention rate than SaaS businesses with no content marketing, according to Inc42.
 
Still not sold on the power of storytelling?

The B2B space is predicated on statistics, logic, facts and technical acumen, and you’ll see that spill out on company blogs.

Some B2B companies are beginning to see the value of going beyond that into the emotional realm to connect with people.

And it’s working. A study conducted by Google, Motista, and CEB saw that 50% of B2B customers are more likely to buy a product or service if they relate to the brand on an emotional level.

It makes sense.

Brands that use storytelling evoke positive emotions in potential customers, and that engenders trust.
That same study notes that 71% of B2B buyers make a purchase when they see personal value in a brand.

Storytelling is a powerful tool in personalizing brands. 

And finally, the study found 68.8% of B2B buyers would pay a higher price for a product or service if they believe in the business.

Storytelling also gives people faith in your business.

If you’re a B2B business looking to scale, consider adding storytelling to your marketing strategy.

Imagine you had two options to write a story on the dangers of winter driving.
 
You can start off by looking at the stats on the number of people killed on icy roads each winter.
 
Or you can start by looking at a father killed on his way to work after losing control of his vehicle on black ice. A father who leaves behind a daughter starting university in the fall.
 
What grabs your attention?
 
If you think the version with the father is more interesting, you’re not alone.
 
Humanizing storytelling has been around for thousands of years. We relate to the pain and joy of others. It gets us hooked. It gets us reading.
 
Today, however, we have access to ample amounts of data and numbers in the mix. And many content marketers working in the B2B space have to deal with dense, convoluted content that often goes through one ear and out the other.
 
What can content marketers do to humanize businesses through storytelling?
 

Here’s a hint: talk about people!
 
I’m sure your product or service is great and in demand if it continues to sell.
 
But how can you take your inbound marketing strategy to the next level?
 
Do what our cavemen ancestors did when they sat around fires telling each other stories: focus on the human angle.
 
How does your product or service make the lives of your customers better?
 
If you sell electrical safety equipment to electricians, for example, how has your product made your customer feel safer on the job?
 
Showcasing the success of your product by writing about how it has helped a customer is more powerful than just listing product features, which can quickly make readers zone out.

Other times we take ourselves too seriously.
 
“So often, when we get stuck just thinking about the business results, we conflate really boring, dry stuff with the stuff that’ll actually work. This white paper; it has graphs, it uses academic language, we sound super serious, it’s authoritative. No, it’s not. It’s boring. No one’s going to want to read it,” said Joe Lazauskas, co-author of The Storytelling Edge.
 
He's right.

“Stories make us remember and they make us care. The reason content marketing works isn’t artsy-fartsy. It’s because our brains are programmed for stories,” Lazauskas added.
 
Humanizing storytelling in the B2B space has a long way to go.
 
But doing so is a necessity for businesses that want to scale with content marketing.