Data without context doesn’t paint the full picture. Here’s how to use narratives and emotions to connect and engage your audience.

If you’re not careful, product management can get really, really boring. Slide deck after slide deck, the details start to blur together, and the audience starts to disengage.

If you’re throwing stats, facts, and bullets at your audience without constructing a narrative, your point isn’t getting across. Your audience will be quick to tune it out and, even if they do listen, they’ll struggle to turn the information into something memorable and useful.

Product storytelling is a great way to add context and excitement to any product document or presentation. By sharing our data, insights, and strategies in a story-driven way, product managers can get more done with more impactful communication.

The power of stories

Storytelling is the idea that you tell your insights narratively, in the context of what it means. For example, if you’re sharing some numbers on adoption for a new feature, you might be tempted to throw up your percentages on a slide and move on. If you want to tell a story, you’d instead frame the percentages around their relationship to the user’s journey, painting a picture of action, not a spreadsheet of information.

Storytelling like this is a fantastic way to get more people to listen. If you’re being more interesting, people will have a better reason stay tuned in (even if they didn’t mean to tune out).

It also simplifies complex data into something more relatable. User personas and user journeys are great storytelling techniques that summarize millions of data points into a single view, centered around a person and story.

Sharing data within its context can also build trust and credibility, both for yourself and for the information you’re sharing. If your audience knows the context, it will be easier for them to evaluate the credibility. Having this improve understanding of the data can improve collaboration and understanding for yourself and your teams.

For example, think about a meeting where you’re set to go over your roadmap for the upcoming quarter. Sure, you could show the roadmap, then pick it apart feature by feature. Or, what if you built a narrative that demonstrated the impact of the roadmap? Instead of starting with the full view, you can start with the pain point behind your #1 item, tell its story, then share it’s at the top of your roadmap. Then, you can work your way down, adding more narrative and revealing more of your roadmap as you go.

When to use storytelling

As you can guess, I also love to use storytelling with data. Using a story to share statistics makes it far more memorable. It also brings the insights — the important stuff — right up with the numbers. Using both of these kinds of storytelling helps to get buy-in on projects and initiatives by creating clarity on the purpose and mission of your pitch. Storytelling can also be a great way to reflect on a process, lesson, or mistake.

One of my favorite ways to use storytelling is when sharing new ideas or features. By putting my idea in context of the problem and by giving it a personality, I’m communicating the direct impact our product will have. It establishes empathy and customer-centricity from the very start.

Storytelling isn’t an all-the-time thing, though. Imagine if your sales team only shared their metrics for the month in a story! Sometimes, being punchy and to the point can do more for your narrative. Make sure you’re remembering your audience and goal when choosing storytelling over other forms of communication.

Benefits of storytelling in product management

One of my favorite ways to get stakeholders engaged is to use storytelling. Usually, those around you are also interested in creating the best outcomes for the business and the customer possible, so if you start with the story that reflects impact, you’ll find common ground and motivation early. By building this shared narrative, it’s easier to collaborate with others. You’ll be sitting in the same context as your teammates and can work in the same world.

And, by using storytelling, you’re forcing a more holistic view of the problem. You’re also forcing others to look at things from the point of view of the customer. Both of these can help reframe conversations to build more constructive outcomes.

 

How to become a better storyteller

When telling a story, make sure you know your audience. You probably don’t want to tap into deep emotions if you’re making a sixty second pitch to an investment board. You also don’t want to give a super upbeat, exciting narrative about something that might be sensitive to others. Know what kinds of stories your audience is looking for, and tailor your strategy accordingly.

Storytelling isn’t synonymous with complexity. Your stories should use the least amount of detail possible to convey the right context, emotions, and actions. Use the right information at the right time, no more, no less.

When done correctly, using emotions in your story can help to further connections with your audience. When you understand your audience’s motives, you can leverage that in your story: highlight the pain points they can relate to, that they have concern for, and that feel relevant in their world.

Storytelling doesn’t end after a presentation. When answering questions, reference your story to describe hypotheticals, impact, and outcomes. Use lots of active listening to find the purpose of the question quickly so you can relate it to your own narrative.

Storytelling is a powerful tool that, when used correctly, can create breakthroughs in communication with your team and stakeholders. I’ve seen storytelling not only improve the quality and depth of conversations, but I’ve also seen it speed up conversations. The connection and empathy a good story creates drives innovation and collaboration.

Have you ever used storytelling in product management? I’d love to hear how in the comments.