Storytelling is still story-telling

Within the BUSINESS module of the educational program AcademIAA, Marija Stošić, Senior Creative Planner at McCann Beograd, gave a lecture titled I’ll tell you a story, with the support of a special guest, Pavle Zelić, who is popularly known as a writer, cartoonist, editor of collections and a film critic.

At the core of communication of each brand is an appropriate story, and quality storytelling is one of the key distinctions between brands on the market. Wanting to introduce young talents to the creative approach in shaping brands, Marija explains why she brought a real, live writer to a lecture about advertising:

1. Because storytelling is the art of telling stories, and who better understands storytelling than a writer.
2. Because this storytelling of ours, in the industry, is not a story about a brand, but about a person.
3. Because the person is the one who is hurt, who suffers, who rejoices, while brand solves, enlarges, participates.
4. Because the time when a brand could tell a story about itself, its price and promised quality has passed.
5. Because it’s important to understand that person, who is the protagonist, who is not(or is) a bag of bones like in the writings of Stephen King.
6. Because it’s important to understand that there HAS to be an antagonist, and that there HAS to be a conflict, a tension, in order for the story to be good.
7. Because only a writer could tell us precisely what the character arch means, so all of us became richer for the way in which we now understand the story that we tell through our work.
8. Because storytelling changes through time, from stories told besides the first fire, to today’s telling of a single story, but not the same story, across multiple channels!
9. Because technologies that have long since stopped being new offer us the opportunity to tell stories better than ever.
10. Because the monologue has become a dialogue.
11. Because Chuck Palahniuk was right when he wrote You are not your job!
12. Because we are all better in our job when we live all our lives – when we remember that the art of storytelling is in the knee bruised at a basketball match, it’s in the popcorn scattered on the cinema floor, it’s in the finals of the UEFA Champions League 2005, it’s in a novel, a collection of short stories or poetry.