Using the “Special Sauce” of Storytelling to Build Your Brand

It’s 2003. I’m sitting in the audience of my first TED event. TED, which stands for Technology, Entertainment and Design, is a once-a-year, invite-only private event in Monterey, CA. 

As I look at the speaker list, I recognize… no one on it. Then I gaze through the descriptions of the talks scheduled--one on nanotech, another on robotics, another on anthropology…

I find myself thinking, “Is this event really for me?” 

These topics have nothing to do with my business, so I’m not sure I even belong here. 

As the speakers begin, one after another, I find myself captivated. Not just with one Talk - with all the Talks. So much so, that the TED experience changes the way I think. 

Listening to those Talks (eighteen a day for five days straight!) exposes me to a cross-pollination of ideas that not only influences how I run my software company, it cements lateral thinking, something critical in both business and storytelling.

Today, I’ve invited a special guest who uses his own special sauce of lateral thinking each day. In this episode, Mike Wald and I talk about the power of stories when it comes to making your business and brand stand out, especially in a crowded market. He provides so many wonderful tips for storytellers and business owners while answering questions like:

Where does the danger lie in researching the market for stories that’ll land with your potential audience? Where do people often have to be corrected in telling the story of their brand? What investment can you make that’ll have people loving your brand?

• How to make stories in your marketing more relatable for your audience
• How to ethically use data gathering online for storytelling and marketing purposes
• How to mitigate the risk of turning off your audience with your stories

For over 20 years, Oniracom’s Chief Marketing Officer Mike Wald has developed campaigns and launched products for a wide-breadth of verticals. He considers himself a technologist and a futurist with expertise and affection in ecological anthropology which brings a thoughtful, innovative blend of science, tech, and sociology to the company’s work. Since 2018, he has worked on over 50 projects studying hospitality mobility, gentrification patterns, sustainability goal measurement, social listening indicators, and the effect of sharing economies on urban and suburban landscapes.

International governments, mass-focused businesses, and first-mover firms enjoy effective solutions through a wide array of industries and platforms thanks to Mike’s background in driving successful conversions across mixed media. You can see his work everywhere, from Disney movie campaigns to government infrastructure dashboards in Australia.