From Star Wars to Indiana Jones to Harry Potter – a great story is great business. Take an average character, send him on a quest, throw trials and tribulations in his path, have him slay the dragon and marry the girl. The stuff of legends is the stuff of great marketing. It’s about knowing who you want to tell the story to and creating a hero they value.
Joseph Campbell summed it up. For those of you who dozed off in English class, the gist is this: Every hero has his journey. In its entirety, the Hero’s Journey has twelve stages. On the internet, this translates to about six.
In a nutshell, take your Average Joe. He is a basic human, warts and faults and all. Just like you and me (remember that, it comes into play). Average Joe gets a call to adventure.
He says “No thanks. I’m good; not interested”.
Something happens to make him interested. Now he’s ready to step up to the plate.
He’s scared. He knows he can’t do it by himself but somehow, he meets a mentor who gives him something he desperately needs. It could be confidence, insight or just a great big giant knife with which to slay the dragon.
He journeys from his safe, boring world and steps into one where the rules are new and the topography is uneven. He is untested and unsure.
Too quickly, he is faced with his first test. He conquers but he starts to understand. It’s just the beginning. The obstacles in his way will get bigger and uglier and harder. He meets new people along his journey and he has to figure out who can teach him something, who is his enemy and who is his friend. It’s a confusing time but as he starts to trust his instincts, he begins to flourish.
After multiple successes, Average Joe realizes that in order to triumph over the ultimate task, he must once again confront his greatest doubts and fears.
He goes through the final test, the supreme ordeal. He triumphs. He is rewarded. Everything feels great until he realizes that the dragon is in fact, not dead. He has to slay it again, not just for himself but for the benefit of all. It is only through the last act of putting the greater good above his own does he become a true Hero.
I still don’t get it! What does this have to do with me and my marketing campaign?
As a business owner, you have many approaches to selling your product. You can sell it logically by telling your customer why he should buy (TELL). You can employ visual techniques to show your customer what your product can do (SHOW). Although these methods may work, the customer does not feel an emotional attachment to your product which is why you need to create one through the Hero’s Journey.
Consider this theory in action using Microsoft Skype for Business for healthcare professionals as the product.
TELL: Microsoft Skype for Business will let your medical teams collaborate online.
SHOW: Photos or videos of medical professionals talking on a mobile device or looking at a video screen.
HERO’S JOURNEY: For newborn Piper McAlister, timing is everything. Arriving 4 weeks pre-mature, she was born with pneumothorax- a condition in which an infant’s lungs can’t expand and the baby cannot breathe.teleservices delivers healthcare In such a case, medical staff have approximately 6 minutes to intervene and stabilize. For Piper and her parents, those 6 minutes could literally have become a lifetime, but thanks to the staff at the Intermountain Healthcare Valley View Medical Center, and the remote care team located at Dixie Regional Medical Center, Piper received the expert medical attention she needed. Doctors and nurses were able to consult with specialists via a brand new Skype for Business teleservices solution that had only been installed for 3 days. Read the full story of Piper here.
The above story of Piper and her family is a real example of how the Hero’s Journey can connect the reader to you and your solution.
The Hero’s Journey works whether you are selling diet pills, investment programs or technology solutions. It is a powerful marketing concept because we connect with the Hero and we see a part of ourselves in him. If he can do it, so can we. The Hero inspires us and gives us the courage to move from complacency to action. As the Hero struggles against seemingly insurmountable odds, we find ourselves rooting for him because, in reality, we are rooting for ourselves. At the end of the journey, the Hero and his world have been changed for the better. It is this change that inspires hope.
What do your clients hope for? What do they want to change?
Answers to these questions will allow you to create a Hero and a story with lasting impact. When your customers trust your Hero, they trust your product and that emotional bond is the key to a successful marketing campaign.
If you are still doubting the power of the Hero’s Journey, just ask George Lucas and J.K. Rowling. It seems to have worked well for them.