5 Innovative Storytelling Examples and 1 Valuable Tool

Online communication is proving that the Internet is the storytelling playground of the immediate future, offering us boundless new creative opportunities.

Creative teams that once produced infographics are now referred to as “visual scientists.”

This is the view shared by Garrick Schmitt writing in Ad Age on Data Visualization Is Reinventing Online Storytelling.

Creative explorations like these apply raw data and information to assemble digital infographics, using highly innovative techniques to build their new storytelling platform. As we reach consumers with more easily digestible information, data visualization techniques enable us to further enhance our story to communicate more effectively and efficiently with consumers.

The article gives five mainstream examples of this trend:

1. Publishers: The New York Times, which has always done stunning infographic work, is helping to push data visualization to a mass audience with its "Visualization Lab."

2. Advertisers: Visa, as part of its new "Go" campaign, is integrating data into its advertising. The "Go" microsite features seemingly random bits of data that the user can explore to see how Visa is "helping more people go places and do things."

3. Products: Flickr, the online photo-sharing service from Yahoo, just recently released the Flickr Clock a browser -- and very nifty advertisement, actually -- that showcases the videos that users are now able to upload to the site.

4. Agencies: Stamen Design, a small San Francisco design studio has created the SFMOMA ArtScope project which is a completely interactive and visual browsing tool that makes browsing the 3,500 objects from the museum both immersive and entertaining.

5. Artists: The rock band Radiohead is working to turn data visualization into an art form with its music video, "House of Cards."

To read the full Ad Age article: http://adage.com/digitalnext/article?article_id=135313

Schmitt’s article concludes by asking two questions:

1. What data do you have that is truly valuable?
2. How can you create a meaningful experience or narrative out of it?

This is STINSON’s answer:

STINSON’s “visual and verbal CHEMists” employ a unique storytelling tool called N-of-8® that allows our clients to tap directly into the ideal group size of 8 customers – each of whom contributes to building the story. We apply a proprietary facilitation technique to the focus group setting, enabling our groups to share their most meaningful stories and identify the data that resonates with them.

N-of-8® allows us to tailor our stories directly to the consumer – we’re using the data and information they provide. The end result for us are authentic visualizations and storytelling that have lasting impact and require less interpretation – simply for the reason that we’re connecting with customers in ways that already fit into their world.

(Thanks to Peter Erickson, one of our verbal CHEMists, for reviewing the topic and writing this blog.)

Discover more about our N-of-8 tool at http://stinsonbrandinnovation.com/our_tools_n_of_8.htm