Light-Figure Business Storytelling
Cast the audience as hero and your organisation as the useful guide
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 98%
Storr's business storytelling framework starts with the audience's emotional and tribal world rather than a list of company achievements. The audience is already the hero of its own story, pursuing goals and confronting obstacles. The organisation should therefore take the role that story analyst Christopher Booker calls a light figure: a guide that arrives to help the hero obtain what they need. The process is to understand the audience's feelings, values, heroes, villains, and affiliations; define the goal; and then demonstrate how the organisation assists without taking centre stage. Product facts can still matter, but they should support the audience's journey rather than turn the brand into the protagonist. The model also requires fit: political or moral signalling can strengthen identification, but a clumsy appeal may alienate the very people it targets.
Origin
Storr credits Christopher Booker's archetypal light figures, including the three ghosts in A Christmas Carol, and adapts the role for business storytelling.
Core principles
- 01The audience experiences itself as the hero
- 02Feelings and values shape how facts are interpreted
- 03A brand earns relevance by helping the hero pursue a goal
- 04Awards and statistics should not displace the audience's problem
- 05Tribal appeals can backfire when they attack or miscast the audience
How to run it
- 1
Map the audience's world
Research how the audience feels about itself, justice, and the world around it. Identify the groups, heroes, villains, motivations, and aversions that shape interpretation.
Pro tip Use the audience's own language rather than imposing the brand's categories.
Watch out Do not infer a single worldview from a broad demographic label.
- 2
Define the hero's goal
State what the audience is trying to achieve and what obstructs it. Make that pursuit the plot of the communication.
Pro tip Frame the goal from the audience's perspective, not as buying the product.
- 3
Take the light-figure role
Position the organisation, product, or leader as a guide that helps the audience move toward its goal. Make the help concrete enough to be credible.
Pro tip Ask what the audience can do with your help that it could not do as easily before.
Watch out Do not present the company as the conquering hero.
- 4
Build an emotional arc
Show a character encountering and overcoming an obstacle with the light figure's assistance. Let relevant evidence reinforce the story rather than replace it.
Pro tip Use a beginning, middle, and end even in short-form communication.
Watch out Emotion does not excuse deceptive or unsupported claims.
- 5
Test audience alignment
Check whether the story represents the audience respectfully and whether its values appeal is credible. Remove elements that make the brand's status the main point.
Pro tip Ask whether the target audience feels helped, attacked, or used as scenery.
Watch out A mismatched tribal appeal can provoke rejection rather than identification.
In the wild
Storr recounts an early Volkswagen advertisement in which a driver crosses a blizzard before starting his snowplough. The closing question asks how the snowplough driver reaches the snowplough. Volkswagen is not the hero; it quietly enables the worker to do the heroic job.
→ The product's value is communicated through the customer's mission rather than a specification list.
Storr presents Nike's Colin Kaepernick campaign as an example of a brand aligning itself with a goal important to part of its audience. He contrasts that fit with campaigns from Gillette and Pepsi that he and Bartlett describe as misaligned or poorly cast.
→ The comparison shows that a value-led light-figure role depends on credible audience alignment.
Common mistakes
Making the company the hero
Leading with awards, praise, and impressive statistics asks the audience to admire the seller rather than showing how the seller helps.
Starting before audience research
A persuasive arc depends on understanding the audience's feelings, identities, values, and goals.
Borrowing a cause without fit
A political or moral appeal can fail when the casting attacks, patronises, or misrepresents the target audience.
Is it for you?
Best for
Marketers, founders, and leaders shaping pitches, campaigns, newsletters, and stage presentations.
Not ideal for
Technical communication where the recipient primarily needs precise specifications, evidence, or safety information.
From the transcript
“they're the hero of their own story”
“You're the light figure. You're there to help them get what they want.”
From the episode
The More Successful You Are The Longer You’ll Live: Will Storr