We hope you are enjoying our approach to this blog. It is a place where experts from across the nation are sharing their thoughts about a common theme that relates to marketing, communications and involvement for our ever-changing world.
With the closing of April, our communications theme of the month – storytelling – is also coming to a close. In the past weeks, Collaborative Services’ blog was buoyed by wonderful guest interviewees who brought new insights into the storytelling theme. We would like to thank them all for their valuable time and effort, as well as their willingness to generously share their ideas. They are:
Rich Cherry, Executive Director of the Balboa Park Online Collaborative.
Jon Franklin, two-time Pulitzer Prize winning newspaper reporter.
Ashley Kingsley, Co-founder of Daily Deals for Moms in Denver.
Nedra Kline Weinreich, Professor of social marketing at UCLA’s School of Public Health and Founder and President of Weinreich Communications.
Kendall Haven, a Senior Research Scientist, Storyteller and Author of the book, Story Proof: The Science Behind the Startling Power of Story.
Caren S. Neile, the Founder and Director of the South Florida Storytelling Project at Florida Atlantic University.
We learned much from their thoughtful responses to our questions. We learned from a poodle how memorable a moment and a story can be. We learned how the circuitry in our brains is hard-wired to respond to stories. We learned what makes the most interesting man in the world so interesting, as well as what he has in common with miracle whip and a little boy in a Darth Vader costume. We learned not just the elements of a good story, but also how not to be cast under the spell of a story that is up to no good purpose.
In addition to our interviewees, we want to also credit the experts that we mentioned in our commentaries. These experts – Tyler Cowen, John Sadowsky, Terrence Gargiulo, Stephen Denning, Luis Masur, Jean Gianfagna, Jay Conger and Daniel Brookes – gave us additional ideas to share and carry forward in our own work.
All month, we learned that storytelling is more than a story, it’s a strategy and a powerful one at that.
Now, we unveil our theme for May and June. We’ve paired these months to highlight words and word choice. These are the building blocks of all messages. So, in May, we’ll get curious about words. We’ll try to answer questions such as where did all these words come from and why do we tend to use only a small number them? We’ll look at how you can create a new word or give new meaning to an existing one. If you’re one of the many who are hooked on Words with Friends, you might recognize yourself in commentaries later in the month about the cultural ways we are playing with words. In June, we’ll look to what words mean in some of the most rapidly evolving fields – do you know the difference between weather and climate, smart and intelligent, clean and green? June will be our month to hear from experts in the fields offering those terms and ultimately changing how we go about our lives. Hold tight because we’re featuring everything from Merriam Webster’s Dictionary to NASA. We look forward to finishing out our very own spring season and having these topics move all of us into summer.
Happy reading and let us know how we’re doing. We look forward to hearing from you –
Catherine Smith, President
Collaborative Services, Inc.
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