At Oracle Modern CX 2019, SmarterCX sat down with Julian Guthrie, award-winning journalist and New York Times Bestselling Author of The Billionaire and the Mechanic, to discuss her new title, Alpha Girls, The Women Upstarts Who Took on Silicon Valley’s Male Culture and Made the Deals of a Lifetime, as well as her tips for CX professionals looking to leverage effective storytelling in their customer experiences.
Watch our interview with Julian Guthrie and view the 4 tips on storytelling for your customer we gleaned from our conversation.
Be inquisitive
According to Guthrie, “You just have to love hearing people’s stories and always be on the lookout. You have to be very inquisitive about people in general. Then you have to find the right narrative.” Guthrie, who admitted to being an “obsessed storyteller,” shares that her stories do not start with an agenda. Instead, they begin with people, their dreams and aspirations, the obstacles they face, and why their story is so important.
Focus on who your audience is
Someone told Guthrie, “You can’t uncouple your brand from your customer.” As a writer, Guthrie’s customer has always been the reader, who is different with each book. For example, with her book, Alpha Girls, Guthrie aims for an audience of “women of all ages, from teenage girls on up to centenarians. I really focus in on who’s the target demographic, who’s going to love this story. Who’s going to relate to the story. Who’s going to want to share this story. Who’s going to be inspired by this story.”
Experiment with social media
Guthrie mentions that she’s experimenting with bringing in a younger demographic with Alpha Girls by incorporating technology and social media into the experience through Instagram. She picked 12 different scenes from the book, worked with a designer and had them illustrate, making it very visual and design-driven.
Try new things
Guthrie chooses to try new things by mixing up storytelling mediums like audio books. “I love storytelling in any medium,” says Guthrie, “and now there has to be a great versatility between the mediums, because it’s also evolving so fast.”
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