How To Create a Powerful Brand Story: Tips to Build Connection and Impact

In this mini-episode of Not Nice, Clever, we are breaking down six essential tips for crafting a brand story that not only resonates emotionally but also leaves a lasting impression. 

In this episode you'll learn how to: 

• Define your purpose 
• Know your audience 
• Identify your core values 
• Outline your journey 
• Make it personal 
• Evoke emotion

Clever Crew, it’s time to dive deep, get real, and share the parts of your story that truly matter! Are you ready?

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• Not Nice Clever
• Candice Carcioppolo
• Kat Torre

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Chapters

• 0:53 Tip 1: Understanding Your Purpose
• 4:05 Tip 2: Knowing Your Audience
• 5:26 Tip 3: Defining Your Values
• 6:19 Tip 4: Outlining Your JourneyTip 4: Outlining Your Journey
• 8:16 Tip 5: Making It Personal
• 10:10 Tip 6: Evoking Emotion
• 10:40 Tip 7: Ending with a Vision

Transcript

(00:00.942)
Hi, I'm Kat, marketer turned brand storyteller. And I'm Candice, educator turned entrepreneur. And you're listening to Not Nice, Clever. As CEOs and leaders, it's your job to always have the answers. But sometimes you need a little help. Leverage, if you will. We get it. This is the place for you. So wherever you're listening, 530 AM Club at the gym, on your way to your next meeting or putting out today's fire, let's get into it.

In today's mini episode of Not Nice Clever, we are sharing six tips for crafting your brand story so that you can connect emotionally with your audience and really develop a memorable and impactful and profitable personal brand. diving into these six tips, where are we starting, Candace? So super important to have a brand story that you can share with your audience, a compelling story that makes someone feel like they

feel connected to you, like they want to listen to you, that they want to learn from you. And sometimes we are too close to our own story to be able to figure out what the important parts are. So these six tips are kind of those jumping off points for you to begin to craft the story. So the first one is understanding your purpose. Like why do you

And probably like as a brand, why do you exist? So think about what brought you to this place. That's super important. And when you are crafting your brand story, you want to write these things out. Or maybe if you record yourself, if you like to listen to voice memos, maybe this is a great way to get out your thoughts about your purpose, using voice memo or writing it down.

highly recommend doing either of those things. You can go back and listen to it and refine it or read it again and refine it. I know this is one of those things where people like might be rolling their eyes, but trust us guys. Like if you skip over the purpose and skip over defining and answering why you might have some like initial success in your brand, but you're not going to have lasting success. So that's why it's such a crucial element of your brand story. And when I think about my brand,

(02:15.978)
Obviously it has evolved over time, but the root of it is I'm a teacher and I love to see people's light bulb moments. Like that is my thing that gets me high. I just want that feeling over and over again. And ultimately why I do any of the things that I do is because I want people to understand that they can do whatever they want to do. That's like at the heart of it. Like that's why

I have not nice clever. That's why I own a design studio. That's why I teach people how to create content because whatever their goals and dreams are, I know they're possible. And at the root of everything I do, it's helping people to see that and achieve that. And that's kind of it. by contrast, actually not contrast, by complementary fashion, whereas Candice is an educator and loves to teach, I love being like a hype man. I love helping you.

you know, establish clarity and certainty and confidence and just being able to like step into the space and the person and the brand that you want to be. it's, they're complimentary approaches, but like, that's just truly what I love to do. you know, Candice, you being a former educator and then me being former dance team, it's like, we were already kind of doing it sort of in our past lives and now we've just evolved it. Yeah. I know I've just been able to connect the dots and sometimes it's hard to see where those dots.

connect until you do an exercise like this. Okay, but this is a mini episode, so we got to move it right along. Tip two, know your audience. Know who you're talking to. Again, this is something that we see a lot of people skip over, but knowing exactly who you're talking to makes it easy to know what to say. I think it was an example that you had shared, Candice, where if...

Dom were gonna text you or give you a phone call or Will was gonna call me like when we would pick up the phone, we would know exactly how to talk to them and what to say because we knew who we were talking to. And so I have this example that I share on stage where if someone were to call me right now and I'm talking to them on my phone, just like this, and then I were able to hand the phone to you and be like, here Kat, talk to them. You'd be like, wait, huh, what, who?

(04:34.904)
But if I'm like, this is my friend Jane and she's actually going to Japan this summer and I know that you had an amazing time, can you talk to her about your experience? You'd be like, hell yeah, let me talk to Jane. prime, let's go. Right? Because you know who you're talking to. So you know you have context and you're able to add value to that conversation and you feel confident about adding that value because you know who they are and what they want and what they're looking for. And so...

Having understanding who you're talking to allows you to build the context that will create that bridge between you and your audience. Love it. And once you have answered why you exist, what your purpose is and who you're talking to now comes in the third tip that we want to share. And that's about defining and knowing your values. And values are really important because it's how people make decisions. It's how people know, yeah.

that brand is for me or I want that product or I want to work with that person because they stand for justice, integrity, supporting small business, creating freedom, you know, like whatever the value is, that's how people intrinsically connect. And you don't have to have like 20 of them. In fact, like when we work with clients, Candice, we say what, like three, maybe four?

Yeah, I say three to five all the time, like three to five values maximum. That's all you need to really be able to connect and then show your values through your actions. You don't need to say, value justice. You can show that you value justice through the type of content that you create. Love that. Okay, this next step is something that I even got a little tripped up on recently when I was creating a carousel for Instagram. So

Tip number four is outlining your journey. Now, like Hannah said at the beginning, developing your brand story and communicating it is a process. You're not gonna get it right on the first draft. You're also not gonna communicate your entire story in one post, so don't even try. A great example, if you wanna go over to my Instagram, at CatToriXO, and scroll down, there's a carousel where I show a tattoo that I got in 2019, and you swipe through, and it just shares

 (06:49.416)
handful of moments where the connecting theme throughout that story that I was sharing was times where I thought I could give up, but I didn't give up. And so it doesn't share every nitty gritty detail. It doesn't share every failure, every triumph or all of that. It's a handful of moments, but it's process of me outlining that facet of my journey and not the whole Russian novel length of it, which ended better than Anna Karenina. So it's good, but it's like a process, right? Candice, we don't want to like

Let perfection get in the way of this. Right. Because people think that they have to share every single detail and that's not what this is about. It's really about thinking what are the pivotal moments that will actually make my audience want to move and want to move in the direction that you would like them to move in, right? So you're of just trying to find that sweet spot of connection. So what are the things that will allow that connection to happen?

Those are the most important things that you want to share. All right. Next tip, make it personal. I know you like this one, Candice. Yeah, because it's the thing that makes someone remember you. Is that you have a personal story to tell. So I always tell people how I swiped my credit card for the last time and hired a coach because my credit card was full after that swipe.

And because I knew that I didn't want to move back in with my parents as a 33 year old adult, right, who quit my job, even though they told me not to. I was like in this desperate pickle, like, okay, I can't go back home. I don't have any money, but I know I'm supposed to be doing something different with my life. so hiring that coach like made all the difference in my career.

And I wouldn't be where I am today without that decision, even though was scary. I talk about that because I know that there's people in the audience who are in that place that I was where it's like, this is the scary point when I'm going to have to eat crow or I'm going to decide that I'm going to make something happen right now. And so it's a point of connection because maybe you're there right now or maybe you've been there before. And that

(09:12.546)
you know, even though it's a story that might be, I don't know, embarrassing or shameful for some people to admit, I think ultimately almost every human has a similar point in their life. Ryan with the yogurt story. Exactly. Me with my bell hop cart's worth of belongings. Like that's just, everybody has it. And the more personal you can make it, the more personable you will.

appear and be able to connect better with your audience. And that leads us to tip number five, evoke emotion in your story. Your brand story is not there to share the facts and the features of the benefits of what it's like to work with you. It is not. It is to evoke emotion. Do you want to make people feel like they are aspiring to rise from the ashes like a phoenix? Do you want them to feel so delusionally excited about making

in one day, what they used to make in a year, right? What's the emotion you want to evoke? And then think about moments throughout your story where you felt that too. It's so crucial because emotion gets people to take action and then action gets you results. And then the results feedback into how you're feeling. And it's just this endless biological loop. And it's super powerful to use in your brand story. Yes, absolutely. Evoque Emotion. And the last one for you today is end with a vision for the future.

So make sure that you are leaving your audience excited about what's to come and hopeful for the future and seeing possibilities because that's really going to connect them to you. Yeah. They want to know where you're going and to be able to come with you too. So as we close out this mini episode, we do have a shout out for one of our reviewers. Candice, do you want to read this one? Cause I know you know Becca.

Yes, this is from Becca. She says, if you're looking for a witty, thought -provoking and refreshingly honest podcast, look no further than not nice clever. Or as social media strategists, Kat and Candice have unique perspective on the table and cover a range of relevant and relatable topics. So she says so much more, but ultimately I'm just excited that she thinks that we're witty.

 (11:33.538)
But thank you so much, Becca, for leaving the review. And if you haven't yet left a review for Not Nice Clever, please leave a five -star review. And that really helps us with booking even more incredible guests for you. So thanks a lot.

Thanks for joining us on Not Nice, Clever. Remember to follow Not Nice, Clever wherever you listen to audio. And if you haven't already, drop that five star review. Share your takeaways. Tell us your story. We love to hear it. Signing off, you're not so nice, but so clever besties that mean business. See you soon.