What is your Story?

1. What is your Story? When I ask people what they think their Brand Story should consist of, I get these sort of answers My history. Why I do what I do. My experience and skills. What I am doing and how I help. These are all perfectly understandable and reasonable answers, but they are not the full picture. Your Brand Story is a very important part of you and your business. Finding out who you are and putting it into a story, is a way of getting paid for being you. It will attract your clients, who are drawn to you because of who you are and what you have to offer. A brand story isn't your life history, skills and your success, in fact it's nearly the opposite. It’s the story of your failures, the uncertainty, when things went wrong, the hardest times you had and then... showing how you won through!

2. Let's look at some celebrities’ brand stories Oprah Winfrey - molested by family members as a child, pregnant at 14, gave birth to a son who died a few days later! She could have rightfully been upset and become a victim of those circumstances, but instead she used those experiences to help others to be courageous and change their mindset. Richard Branson - He was a really bad student, dyslexic and had bad grades. He used his creativity and personality to develop lots of successful businesses, often citing that his success is down to facing his fears and seeing failure as a challenge to overcome; to teach himself and others, to get up and try again. Thomas Edison failed 1000 times before he got the light bulb right! How did they and others overcome their adversity or trauma, to come out on the other side? Each of them used their perceived setbacks as a springboard to their success. All stories have a hook that we can connect to on an emotional level. Have you noticed that when you connect with a story, it's often a story of two halves? For example... Love - they will talk about the time they were heartbroken. Belonging - they will talk about the time they were excluded. Connection - they will talk about a time they felt disconnected. In other words, a time when they were vulnerable. Showing people that we have been, or are, vulnerable allows people to have a connection with us. It gives purpose, meaning and comradeship with others and as humans this is what we want and why we are here. At this time the whole world is going through a degree of uncertainty this can make us feel vulnerable, it can shine a light on feelings we would rather not have. When we are vulnerable it is because in some way we feel shame, which is when other people can see that we are not perfect and that gives rise to a fear of being disconnected. We say these things to ourselves! I am not good enough! I am not ......... enough (fill in the gap, as you see fit) I am not… (you can finish the sentence)

3. The good news is, vulnerability is often the birthplace of joy, creativity, success but how often do we try and numb it or hide it under an addiction, or by sabotaging ourselves in some way. We look for perfection. We look for certainty. We pretend. None of which are really us or our history. People connect to us through our stories, especially about our vulnerabilities, they don't have to be traumatic or as devastating as some peoples, but we all have difficult times. If we didn’t, we wouldn't have the good times and we wouldn't grow. This is what people like to hear about. So your brand story isn't about the trauma or the bad times, but how you progressed out of them and what you learnt in the process that you can pass on. Telling your brand story is about the courage to be imperfect, to show that you do not have a charmed life that has never gone wrong but that it did and you have the courage to overcome whatever obstacles came your way. Maybe then, this leads us to realize that, there is no failure, just lessons; that’s our story! There is an analogy I heard, that I love. Get in Touch Us Here:- Site - https://www.sallyinkster.com/ Mail - sally@sallyinkster.com Phone - 07734 417957