Storytelling

Apr 21 2025

Why the Stories Commercial Brands Tell Usually Fail — and What the Ones That Work Have in Common

By Michael Lynch Marketing Strategy & Growth, Business Strategy & Positioning, Influence & Consumer Psychology, Thought Leadership & Authority Building

Why the Stories Commercial Brands Tell Usually Fail — and What the Ones That Work Have in Common The most common mistake in commercial storytelling is telling a story about yourself. The case study that leads with the client engagement and ends with your methodology. The capability narrative that describes…

Apr 20 2025

How Inconsistent Brand Messaging Quietly Undermines Everything Else You’re Investing In

By Michael Lynch Branding & Identity, Conversion Optimization & Sales Psychology, Marketing Strategy & Growth

There's a test we run early in almost every diagnostic engagement. We ask five people inside the company — separately, without preparation — to answer a simple question: "What does this company do, and why should someone choose you over the alternatives?" The answers are rarely the same. Sometimes they're…

Apr 14 2025

How to Engineer Word-of-Mouth Marketing To Make People Talk About Your Brand

By Michael Lynch Marketing Strategy & Growth, Business Strategy & Positioning, Conversion Optimization & Sales Psychology

How to Engineer Word-of-Mouth Marketing To Make People Talk About Your Brand There is a pattern visible in the new client intake of almost every professional services firm and hospitality brand that has grown consistently and profitably over more than a decade. The majority of their best clients — the…

Mar 30 2025

Why Buyers Trust Category Leaders Before Evaluating Credentials

By Michael Lynch Branding & Identity, Business Strategy & Positioning, Marketing Strategy & Growth, Thought Leadership & Authority Building

Why Buyers Trust Category Leaders Before Evaluating Credentials HP Field Notes | Highly Persuasive Stanford Web Credibility Project research found that when evaluating unfamiliar professional service firms, 75% of decision-makers form trust judgments within 50 milliseconds of encountering brand signals, before reading capability descriptions or credentials. The evaluation happens pre-consciously…

Mar 20 2025

When Technical Superiority Fails to Create Commercial Pull

By Michael Lynch Branding & Identity, Business Strategy & Positioning

When Technical Superiority Fails to Create Commercial Pull HP Field Notes | Highly Persuasive A Singapore-based precision engineering firm lost a $4.8M aerospace contract despite demonstrating measurably tighter tolerancing capability than the winning supplier. Their CMM reports showed 40% better dimensional accuracy. Their AS9100 audit scores were higher. Their delivery…

Jan 08 2024

The Archetype Effect: How Businesses Can Use The Ancient Power of Storytelling in Modern Branding, Marketing & Advertising

The Archetype Effect: Why the Story Your Brand Tells Determines the Room You’re Invited Into

By Michael Lynch Branding & Identity, Marketing Strategy & Growth, Paid Ads & Persuasive Messaging

The Archetype Effect: Why the Story Your Brand Tells Determines the Room You're Invited Into There's a sentence that appears, in some form, in the "about" section of almost every professional services firm in the world: "We deliver expert solutions to complex challenges." Read it again. It says, in sequence,…