How to tell your story better

SAN FRANCISCO — A small group of grinning children sit in a sparkling clean classroom with fresh wooden walls in the Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, as a woman writes on a board in front of them. “My biggest joy is when a child has a complete change in their life; when they are more comfortable,” teacher Sister Amira explains. This is a scene from Catholic Relief Services’ first 360 degree video, a virtual reality format that allows viewers to control their own experience as they tilt their heads or spin their chairs to see different parts of the room. When they put on a headset, they are immersed in a particular place and time. Paul Eagle, head of marketing and communications at CRS, told Devex his strategy focuses on ways to create empathy. CRS can talk to people about its education work with Syrian refugees in the Bekaa Valley, but it is hard to convey what it is like to see children feeling like children again without putting someone in the room. 360 degree video and virtual reality have emerged as powerful tools to do that. As international nongovernmental organizations navigate decisions about investing in storytelling, they often keep donors front and center in their decision-making. Eagle said the VR film led to a seven-figure donation, demonstrating how storytelling can drive fundraising. But he added that fundraising is just one goal for storytelling at CRS, with other goals including awareness raising, engagement, and action beyond financial donations. Eagle hopes to see more NGOs build out their strategies to make storytelling more effective. That includes figuring out the metrics of success, integrating strategies across channels, and becoming more flexible and nimble in their ability to tell stories. Devex spoke with a range of experts to understand how NGOs can develop more creative storytelling strategies with impact that extends beyond donations. What is my goal and who is my audience? There was a time when Resonate Workshops, a nonprofit that organizes leadership workshops for women and youth in Rwanda, was so focused on doing their work they never made time to tell their own story. That was until Ayla Schlosser, who founded the organization, realized the people they were serving would be the best possible messengers for their mission. She and her colleagues started to ask them a few questions on camera so they could explain in their own words how they benefited from the programs. Over time, storytelling has become a part of the organizational culture. Her key advice? “Highlight impact stories internally to motivate staff; use outside stories to teach lessons or serve as examples; and set aside time to reflect on your work and how it shapes the story of the organization.” By giving the people she serves a voice in these stories, it not only makes for better videos, but also gives them more agency in the changes they have made for themselves, she said. For many NGOs and social enterprises, however, partnering with professionals for their storytelling makes the most sense. At this month’s Skoll World Forum in Oxford, United Kingdom, a group of social entrepreneurs received a $1.25 million award over three years, alongside the gift of a short film that could help to drive further donations. Gabriel Diamond, a filmmaker at the Skoll Foundation, told Devex he works hard to ensure these videos do not feel overly promotional. Diamond asks awardees to explain why the problem they are solving is so challenging, and how their approach to solve it differs from past attempts. He also includes moments that convey what the work looks like on the ground — “the kind of thing you can never convey in a PowerPoint,” he said. Diamond explained that most of his filming is as a “fly on the wall,” and that he never records separate voice over, instead using remarks from interviews as narration for the film. When organizations do not tell the right stories, they miss an opportunity for investment, by spending time on topics that do not resonate, said Cathy Clark of Duke University. This week, she will kick off a three-part digital pitch workshop on the Global Innovation Exchange, beginning with how to tell “an investable story.” This technology platform, with a stated mission of accelerating innovation in developing countries, has launched a new initiative to help social entrepreneurs improve their fundraising with storytelling integrated throughout a campaign. But while fundraising may be the end result, it should never be the only goal, said Doug Scott, principal and creative director at Advocate Creative, who said donors are just one audience an organization must communicate with. He counsels his clients to consider customers and beneficiaries, partners, volunteers, and journalists. Your targeted audience determines how you should tell the story, he said, explaining that some of his clients tell the same story four or five different ways in order to connect with different audiences. He referenced videos of Pauline Wambeti, a new country director at Nuru International, told in three different ways. Stories of Change, a partnership between the Skoll Foundation and the Sundance Institute, provides grants for projects that pair expert storytellers and social entrepreneurs, resulting in films such as “Bending the Arc” about the story of Partners in Health. In a recent interview reflecting on the decade-long Stories of Change partnership, Sandy Herz, director of global partnerships at the Skoll Foundation, talked about measuring the impact of the films that resulted. “Think of a funnel with three phases: the wide end is trying to reach broad audiences — that’s all about awareness. For that, I measure the number of people reached, the quality of the story, cost per person reached with that story. But are they the right people? Is it the right story?” she said. “The middle of the funnel is more about targeted engagement. That’s where a lot of these projects sit, where they have a particular agenda, a particular audience, and specific goals. So, you look to see how those needles moved.” Impact is at the narrow end of the funnel, she said, explaining that the question is whether something materially changed. Capture the heart At a workshop last week at YouTube's headquarters in San Bruno, California, nonprofits learned about how to improve their impact storytelling (the YouTube Creator Academy also offers lessons online). Participants developed action plans to build out their YouTube channels, including trailers as well as searchable videos, core videos, and “tentpole” videos, which require greater investment and are built around inspiring and exciting stories. They were encouraged to think about how the fundamentals of creative strategy apply to their mission — for example, what makes the organization stand out; what kind of triggers in the content would make it shareable; and what will it inspire people to do. “In the impact space, we have the best stories, but we tell them in the worst ways,” said Jason Lee, founder of Jubilee Media. He asked the audience to consider three key lessons: Capture the heart, tell an authentic story, and make an invitation. “Most people say, what about the impact and numbers?” he said. “That will come, but once you capture the heart, the brain will follow.” For example, tell your story through people rather than numbers, he said. A storyboard artist from Pixar shared 22 rules of storytelling on Twitter, and many of them translate well to NGO storytelling, Lee suggested. He narrowed in on number five: “Simplify. Focus. Combine characters. Hop over detours. You’ll feel like you’re losing valuable stuff but it sets you free.” Often, when making an invitation, organizations ask for too many things, Lee said. Every story should make a single invitation for that target audience. “Once we start to leverage [our stories] in the right way — in a way that we’re capturing the heart, telling an authentic story, and making an invitation — we can change the world,” he said. Rigor and nuance However, focus shouldn’t mean compromising on rigor and nuance, some experts said. Improve International, an organization focused on water and sanitation in developing countries, created a tongue-in-cheek video called Chicken Diapers, poking fun at so-called silver bullets in the social sector. Susan Davis, executive director of the organization, told Devex it all began with a friend telling her about a study on how many children put chicken poop in their mouths. The video presents chicken diapers as a sanitation solution worth squawking about, with diapers made locally by fairtrade artisans, that also improve reforestation and food security, and can be delivered by drones. As ridiculous as the video seems, Improve International was trying to drive home the point that both innovation and storytelling in the development sector need to be evidence-based. Every year, the Boehm Media Fellowship brings storytellers and journalists to an annual conference in Mexico called Opportunity Collaboration, where they share their expertise with professionals working in social impact and poverty alleviation. "I thought we were there to help delegates tell their stories better,” said Daniela Kon, the executive director of the Social Impact Media Awards who was a Boehm Media Fellow last year. “But after I arrived, I began to understand that we had to help them find their story in the first place.” Often, these workshops focus on ways to tell a good story while also bringing more rigor to the storytelling process, particularly given far too many examples where solutions are presented as silver bullets, and never live up to that promise. For example, a workshop Devex led together with Ellen Wilson of Burness, a communications firm with clients in the international development sector, emphasized how organizations can distinguish themselves by the insights that can be gained from their approach. Boehm Media Fellows also recommend resources for further learning, which last year included tips on improving elevator pitches, investing in visual storytelling, and optimizing social media posting. Kon offered up a piece describing what she calls the “unbearable lightness of nonprofit propaganda,” explaining why the Social Impact Media Awards recognize how organizations do their work, rather than only what they do and why. Sometimes, in order to make stories more powerful, storytellers leave out important aspects of reality that do not fit the narrative, including data points, moments of failure, or the complexities of systems. All too often, nonprofit storytelling fits a stereotype — a child in need and a plea to support them. While one of the main goals of storytelling is to raise funds, there is also a need to build awareness of why these issues matter, how they are being addressed, and which efforts do and do not work. Charlie Bresler, the volunteer executive director of the nonprofit The Life You Can Save, brings a commercial perspective to social sector storytelling from his time as president of the Men’s Wearhouse. “Unlike retailers and manufacturers that use advertising to build their brands and generate sales, the nonprofit and social business sectors are curiously allergic to spending money on advertising — and, more specifically, to saying, ‘We are better than our competitors, and this is why!’” he wrote in a recent blog post. He talks about a hypothetical scenario of two ponds in the wilderness, one with one child drowning and the other with five children drowning, and said that with limited time, the obvious choice would be to dive into the pond with more children drowning. “Each time donors or investors decide where to direct their funds, they are, in essence, making a choice between ponds. Shouldn’t that choice be an informed one?” While there may be particular reasons why NGOs do not take a comparative advertising approach, it is important for organizations to use storytelling to distinguish themselves, Bresler argued. For more on storytelling, check out Devex’s new blog series On Message, and join our Devex World track, “From Storytelling to Movement Building.” Update, April 25: This story was updated to clarify the name of an organization and the blog post on comparative advertising.