Why we love a good story?

Being in advertising, one thing I keep hearing about daily is, the art of story-telling. All that we plan and do in terms of insights, culture, data analysis, personality sketch, mood boards, etc... all lead to the output of telling a good story.

But, why do people love stories? Me thinks, it is much more than effective technique of communicating the content & the context; it is a question of fulfilling what we (or at least most of us) lack.

The lives we live are mostly predictable - school till 17, then college, then higher studies, job, marriage, etc, etc.. as the days goes by, it becomes more predictable and monotonous. Thus our lives starts to become a staid repetition, consisting of same characters and same situations. Our lives are bereft of a good story.

To satisfy this inherent want or need of good stories, is when we become receptive to good stories. Most stories that are successful (in popular terms) are those that do not reflect our lives, but those which reflects our dreams (maybe that’s why we dream too) - Heroes, Superheroes, thrillers, etc all these genres thrive because they satisfy that lacking in us.

Maybe, that’s why in advertising too, there is a huge gap between the conceptual customer and the actual customer...because, the brand story told was a good story told.

Cheers!


Santosh
Image source: www.brandpoint.com

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