The Story Trap

Stories matter. They teach us, they bring us together, they codify our values and they make us feel less alone. But, for agency and brand creatives, they can be a siren song.

A lot of creatives fancy themselves Storytellers with a capital S. This belief seems to grow as a corollary to job title. The higher the office, the more capital the S. A CCO I talked to believed that, above everything, they were a Storyteller. He hit the fabled “cool S” level of Storyteller. And it took that agency into a nosedive.

I get it. Stories are important, really important, and in bearing the flame, we may feel suffused by that importance.

But that’s not what we’re making here. And trying to be something we’re not is kneecapping the power of our creative.

In aggregate, yes, advertising tells story. Obviously there is story logic in any given piece. And, across many dozens or hundreds of touch-points, a story emerges. But it’s in aggregate. And in this model, just about anything can contribute meaning to the overall takeaway simply because it was published.

To put a little romance on it: we make constellations. We cast stars into the sky, we arrange them into discernible shapes, and permit our audiences to project meaning onto them.

That same CCO once killed an idea that was really goddamn good (it wasn’t mine) with the soft rationale of “does that add to our story?” This would’ve been a big win. It would’ve earned press. It would’ve had people talking. And it would’ve positioned the brand as relevant, fun, and on the ball. This CCO also championed ideas that did none of those things… but “they fit the story.”

So… who was the Story for?

The answer, of course, is the people in the conference room who want to feel their work reflects an enlightened mind.

But nobody in the audience cares. They want to feel something and think something for just a moment— and that feeling or thought can be placed within the Constellation as a choice the brand made, as a position they took, as an idea they had. And that’s what creates the story. Just like how we build the stories of the people in our lives— constellations of meaning, made from the stuff of stars.