The 7 basic plots

Throughout our lives we hear thousands of stories - this is why our brain needs to store them efficiently, using templates. In this way only protagonists and details need to be remembered individually, while the general plot is already clear to our brain.

Journalist Christopher Booker came up with the idea of 7 basic plots which all our stories follow - these provide a great starting point to be intentionally replicated in order to craft your next story.

The 3 universal structures

Often we tend to reinvent the wheel. This is especially true for presentations where we start from scratch instead of using proven templates.

The good news: there is no need to remember lots of structures for any remotely possible use case. Instead there are 3 structures that will work for most presentations.

Customer Journeys

Instead of showing a spec-sheet of your new product, consider illustrating how your target customer might use it. Start by describing his pain with the current alternatives before introducing your new solution.

Afterwards you can go through the functions and features of your new product and describe how your target customer will benefit from each of these and which emotions he might feel.

Consider creating a Customer Journey Map in advance to get ideas for your story flowing.

Metaphors

Our brain loves simplification. Therefore try to use this method whenever possible. There are several motives that work well and can turn complex projects into simple ideas.

Consider using one of these motives: building a house, going on a trip, climbing a mountain, building a rocket, cooking a new recipe, dating potential partners or taking a flight.

You can get wildly creative on all of these motives or introduce own metaphors close to your current project or industry.

Images

Similar to metaphors, images help our brain to simplify complex topics. In addition, images can be processed faster by our brain than text (Picture-Superiority-Effect) and have the power to evoke emotions, which is way harder through text.

Therefore try using images whenever possible to help your audience in briefly processing the information you're trying to convey.

Own Experiences

The best stories we can possibly tell are always those that we have experienced ourselves. There is a different level of authenticity to it, when we can describe all the details, surroundings and emotions of a particular situation.

Whenever possible and related to your presentation topic try integrating personal stories. Be careful though when you invent stories not to flag them as your own experiences. While an audience will also enjoy an invented story more than a flatlined business presentation, people notice pretty fast if your own experience is not true.

Good vs. Bad

This century old motive has been used over and over in literature as well as in movies and has enabled entire companies to build their success upon (think about Disney for example). Therefore this is a very good motive to use in your presentations as a lot of tension can be created by describing the opposites.

If the motive of Good vs. Bad doesn't work directly, you can slightly alter it to Old vs. New to create similar amounts of tension without being as judging as if you paint the picture of an evil villain.

Your audience as the hero

Whenever using stories in presentations make sure it is all about your audience and not about you. We tend to tell stories that are relevant to us but might not be interesting for our audience. 

Therefore make sure it's them who experiences the story and goes on an adventure. Your own role should always be the one of a supporter or consultant but not the one of the hero. So consider yourself rather to be Yoda than Luke Skywalker.

Imprint -  Privacy Policy