Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

What’s the best way to get people—an audience, your staff, a teenager—to do what you want them to do? If you’re like a lot of companies, leaders, or parents, you create a set of rules and policies.

Do not give customers a free upgrade without supervisor approval. Get your reports in by the 15th of each month. Don’t stay out past midnight. But those of us who have issued sets of rules know that lack of compliance is a big problem. Many people don’t like rules, so they ignore them. They lapse back into old habits. Staff members wait until the end of the month to submit their reports. Your teenager stays out until 2 a.m. In many cases, there’s a better way to get people to do what you want them to do....

According to Howard Gardner, a professor at Harvard University, “Stories are the single most powerful weapon in a leader’s rhetorical arsenal.” Yet most people struggle to think of compelling stories that reinforce their messages.

That’s usually because they’re trying to think of a “big” story. In order to help people get unstuck, I tell them to think smaller. I encourage them to think of a single customer whose life was improved because of their product or a community that is enjoying the benefits of a new public school.

A story can be many things: your personal experience with a person, place, thing, or topic; somebody else’s experience; case studies in the news; or a historical or fictional example....