Brands need a showrunner. Do you want to know why?

Did you know that you, as a marketer or entrepreneur, can learn how to attract and retain your audience, just by watching TV series? Let me introduce you to one of my heroes: Shonda Rhimes. She is a showrunner and a hero in many ways. For example for the fact that she created series like Grey’s Anatomy and Scandal. But even more for creating a new reality in her series Bridgerton. She added black people to the ton, Britain’s high society in the 19th century in England. And it is not even a topic. It just is. Only once, in episode four, there is a short explanation regarding the Queen being black: “The world would have looked a lot different if the King hadn’t married for love.”

That is the power of storytelling. It can create things, change things. And that is why every brand that has a story to share and wants to develop an audience for it, should find their own Shonda Rhimes. Or at least learn from her and get their own showrunner.

What does a showrunner do?

A showrunner creates the story narrative. They are also the ones who build the characters and lead a team of writers that is responsible for writing the episodes for the season. In many cases the showrunner is also the one producing the television series. That’s why I think marketers should look at themselves as the showrunner of their brand. They are responsible for that one great narrative of their brand. They don’t do that all by themselves of course. They also direct content creators to create different pieces of content, or as I like to call it, episodes. And last but not least… They have to make sure they are creating and developing an audience along the way. After all, a series without an audience won’t get another season. The same goes for brands.

Jeffrey Slater added a good example in his article on The Marketing Sage:

“What would Shonda Rhimes do?

Imagine having a showrunner for a new wine brand. The first thing the brand showrunner should do is create a story narrative. She would own the brand’s creative vision and how the story will be told to help keep an audience interested.”

“Marketers should look at themselves as the showrunner of their brand”

There is a great documentary about showrunners, a profession that is known a lot better in the US than in Europe. It is called Showrunners: The Art of Running a TV Show, by Des Doyle. I think we should get at least half the dynamics which you can see in that documentary to the marketing department of brands.

Now how can one become a brand showrunner?

Therefore we have to dive in a bit deeper. Because if you see yourself as a showrunner… you should start by writing a great TV-series. Not literally, but metaphorically speaking. Every piece of content in any form, like video, text or audio, is an episode of your series. Compare this story narrative to the summary at the back of a dvd, if you remember what that looks like, if not go to IMDB for some examples. I call it the plot summary of your brand. What is the series of your brand about?  Always very close to the purpose, positioning, or the why of your brand. But always written from the third person. That way it is an independent storyline instead of a commercial statement for your brand.

“Every expression, every piece of content in any form like video, text or audio, is an episode of your series”

So what is the story of your brand? Your plot summary? We usually try to build it with four ingredients:

  1. Who are your main characters? Don’t think in persona’s, but in a group of characters. Like: are your customers the main characters? Or maybe your employees? Of course you can also base it on fiction. But that all depends on the kind of brand you are. Besides the main characters we also describe the guest appearances, most of the time this corresponds with the ‘mentor’ in the audience journey (see Binge Marketing, The best scenario for building your brand).
  2. The other ingredient is the arena. What is the scenery of your series? Is it, quite clearly ‘in a hospital’? Or is it ‘in the system of medical health care’? You can feel the difference already. We can add even more to it: ‘in a hospital with a global pandemic going around’. You have to think about the scenery in terms of; place, time, and circumstances (PTC). This all adds up to creating a fundamental basis for your episodes.
  3. The third ingredient is: three to five big themes. What is the series about? Mostly 3 to 5 themes close to the key values of your brand and also relevant to your audience. For example: innovation in health care, the human side of health care and ethics in health care. If you are writing down more than 5 themes you are probably writing down subjects for your episodes, instead of themes for your series.
  4. The last ingredient is your genre: In what kind of style will you create your episodes? Documentary? Human interest? Humor? Science fiction? It may sound like we are only talking about video, but a genre can also be applied to your podcasts and even your articles. At this point you can just create everything you like but you need to make choices here. Every episode from now on can be checked by the plot summary… does it fit? Is this our story? Are we telling things from the right perspective? According to our brand story narrative? That is up to your showrunner.

Just one more thing: your audience probably doesn’t watch your episodes lineair. They decide what they watch, when they watch it and where watch it so don’t forget the recap at the start and create a logical route on every landing page. Last tip: use cliff hangers!

Do you want to start today? Join the online course to write down your own series or start with the pilot.