When I started going to San Diego comic con I wanted to find “work” but I also wanted to meet some of my favorite artists.
Sometimes I just wanted to geek out my inner fan-boy and sometimes I wanted a portfolio review. Pro tips are the best! One or two tips from a working artist can take months (sometimes years) off a learning curve.
One thing about comic-con used to get under my skin though…
This isn’t exactly rational but… When I looked at the lines of fans waiting to meet the creative teams, the writers usually had the longest lines.
This was, well, odd to me.
I always read comics for the art. I followed my favorite artists from project to project. I figured if I only wanted to read the stories I’d just buy regular fiction books.
Right?
Well… Come to find out, most fans approached comic book buying differently than I did. Like, almost all of them.
The art may be why I bought comics but it’s the stories that keep most fans coming back again and again.
This is true with movies too. People may have loved the movie Speed, but if the plot keeps getting dumbed-down (like, Speed 2) people stop watching.
And you get wonderful reviews like…
“They truly ruined a whole franchise in just two movies… [from Rotten Tomatoes]
On the surface it’s easy to think the movie was horrible because Keanu Reeves wasn’t in it. Which is partly true. But the real reason is because the story sucked.
This is why it is so important that you tell YOUR story in your marketing. And to get better and better at telling it.
Stanford Marketing Professor Jennifer Aaker said, ”Stories are remembered up to 22 times more than facts alone.”
People won’t always remember your USP or proprietary mechanism as much as they’ll remember you story and what inspired you to do what you do.
One book I recommend to help you do this is Storyworthy: Engage, Teach, Persuade, and Change Your Life through the Power of Storytelling by Matthew Dicks.
It’s an awesome book. Study it. Apply it.
Adam