Hey all,

Next Thursday sees the return of Proper Fancy with the brilliant Ian Edgar on co-host duties. Ian spent 8 years as VP of video for Condé Nast. Before that he was a DJ and video remix artist making amazing things like this. Join us at 1 pm (UK) on Thursday 28th March. For the uninitiated, Proper Fancy is a team show and tell that is open to everyone. So come hang out with us and a bunch of smart freelance creatives from around the world chatting about what’s tickled our fancy this month.

If you’re not sure why your content isn’t delivering the results you need then we have a product for you. Our Content Audit Workshop will help you analyse what content works for your audience and identify gaps and improvements. We’ll help you understand what to save, erase, or revise. If you have a little bit of budget left over that you need to spend before the end of the financial year this is a brilliant way to spend it.

Thanks for reading you lot. Enjoy the newsletter and have a fantastic weekend.

Hugh

I need a content audit

How to Write – Everything Is Interesting. Absolutely Everything (5-min read)

How Often People Listen to Podcasts (7-min read)

Social is Lost to Preachers, Drunks, and Mad Dogs. We Need Another Town Square (5-min read)

Should There Be an Oscar For Title Design? (8-min read)

"Create a Binge Bank” (2-min watch)

The Most Beautiful Shots in Cinema History: Scenes from 100+ Films (3-min watch)

WePresent: Wild Memory Radio (Interactive audio experience)

“It’s in the V&A” (5-min read)

How to Use the ‘Bucket Technique’ in Copywriting (2-min read)

The Curiosity Matrix: 9 Habits of Curious Minds (5-min read)

How we can help you

Storythings is the content marketing agency of choice for some of the world’s most forward-thinking B2B brands and organisations. Here are 2 reasons to get in touch. 

1. “I don’t know what to do” – You’ve been creating content but it’s not having the impact you need. Talk to us about our Content Audit Workshop.

2. “I need something making” – You know what you want to make but need an agency to make it. We can help make your podcast, video, publication, animation and newsletter.

We do other things too. Get in touch for a FREE 30 minute consultation. 

Free 30 minute consultation

How to Write – Everything Is Interesting. Absolutely Everything (5-min read)
We often say that starting with a new client requires learning a new language. We have to become fascinated about the industry very quickly and then talk to potential customers in a way that gets them fascinated. I love this from Ian Dunt on the role boredom plays in making us better communicators: “Boredom and frustration are not a hindrance to good writing. They are a guide. If it bored you, it will bore others. So your job is to get past the boredom, find a way of understanding the thing, and then present it in the way that would have appealed to you if you had first discovered it that way. The boredom you feel is a warning sign about what not to do when you are explaining the topic. It tells you how to write about it, which bits are hard to grasp, and the point at which all the information just becomes a bit too much. Each moment of resistance from your brain indicates where you need to clear the path for readers.”

How Often People Listen to Podcasts (7-min read)
We make a lot of podcasts for clients, so staying on top of trends and data is important. We came back from SXSW with pages of notes about audience attention around podcasts and other forms of media. Over the next 4 weeks we’re going to choose four notes on different subjects and dig a little deeper into them. The first focuses on a piece of data I heard about how frequently people are now listening to podcasts. I wanted to check how accurate the data was and hopefully provide some insight for anyone trying to make decisions about how to engage audiences.

Social is Lost to Preachers, Drunks, and Mad Dogs. We Need Another Town Square (5-min read)
A good piece from The Drum on the need for new community spaces as social becomes less hospitable and what to do if a community space isn’t right for your audience: “When it comes to cleaning detergent or cereal bars, do people really want to ‘be a member’? Maybe not, but it does now start to shift our gaze back toward owned platforms and what we can do with our first-party data. Innovative newsletter approaches, more compelling brand editorial, or making our .com more useful to our customers.”

Should There Be an Oscar For Title Design? (8-min read)
We’re big fans of Art of the Title, the online archive dedicated to film and TV title sequences. Content creators who need to capture the attention of audiences can learn a lot from the art of film title design. Movie titles can have a huge impact on how people perceive a film. It’s the job of the graphic designer to communicate what people are meant to experience. Here, Art of the Title’s Lola Landekic speaks to the graphic designers behind titles and posters for some of this year’s biggest films.

"Create a Binge Bank” (2-min watch)
You only need to watch 2 minutes of this interview to get the point we’ve been making about the importance of creating an archive. Dave Perell chats to Shaan Puri on how to master storytelling. He kicks off with a great anecdote about the value of building an archive for reputation.

The Most Beautiful Shots in Cinema History: Scenes from 100+ Films (3-min watch)
Here’s a promise. Spend three minutes with this and you will undoubtedly improve whatever it is you are working on today. Wonderful!

WePresent: Wild Memory Radio (Interactive audio experience)
This is absolutely gorgeous from WeTransfer and WePresent. It’s a kind of gallery, except rather than objects or artworks it contains memories. Each of these memories belongs to a leading creative, cultural or artistic figure, and each is about a place: a specific location that changed that person in some way, or had a lasting impact on their work. Listen to memories from Gilbert & George, Laurie Anderson, Gruff Rhys, Hans Ulrich Obrist and many more.

“It’s in the V&A” (5-min read)
I really like this campaign from the V&A that highlights the museum’s relevance to audiences in a simple but effective way. Here, the chaps at Ideas We Love take a closer look at this museum-myth-busting campaign and make a good point about ideas and longevity: “Unlike many publicly traded companies, institutions like museums and galleries are able to think long-term. In fact, they’re actively encouraged to - their job is conservation and preservation. At the heart of this campaign is a brilliant platform thought - and you could see how this idea can come back year after year.”

How to Use the ‘Bucket Technique’ in Copywriting (2-min read)
I liked this simple 3-step technique for copywriting.

The Curiosity Matrix: 9 Habits of Curious Minds (5-min read)
I value curiosity as one of the most essential traits in any creative I work with. As the first story in today’s newsletter says, everything is interesting. If you’re curious enough that is. Working on our curiosity muscles is something we should all try to do regularly. Go through the nine habits in the Curiosity Matrix and ask yourself: how habitual are these practices in my daily life? What is one habit I can start building today to nurture my curiosity?

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Thanks for reading. We’ll see you all next week.

Hugh, Matt, Anjali and the whole team at Storythings.