Storytelling in Business Part 2: Disney Cracks the Code on Storytelling

This is the second part in my Storytelling in Business series. View the first part here. (*Reprinted from 2020 on my other website!)

Why do we always cry at Pixar movies?

Come on — that opening montage to Up? When Boo opens the door and Sully’s no longer there? Even the breezy Inside Out left us sobbing when Bing Bong jumps off the back of the wagon so Joy can escape. Don’t even get me started on mainstream Disney, like the Bambi’s mother scene or the Simba’s father scene.

I am no cryer — never have been — but when it comes to Pixar, give me a box of tissues and let me be.

But why is that? Why do we get teary at, say, the end of Titanic? Or cheer on Rocky or the Mighty Ducks? Or scream with excitement when the rest of the Avengers appear at the end of Endgame? Why do we reread our favorite novels or rewatch our favorite TV shows?

It’s because stories are inherently emotional. Stories are meant to move you, inspire you, challenge you, anger you, and make you passionate.

And they do that by drawing you into the characters’s world, so you can live out the story with them.

Flying Over London, Diving Beneath the Sea

Did you know that Disney cracked the code when it comes to storytelling?

I went to STORY a few years ago, a conference for marketers, writers, and professional creatives about the importance of story and storytelling. One of the speakers was Christopher Chapman, who was the Global Creativity and Innovation Director at Disney at the time. He taught us how Disney, and specifically Disney parks, think about storytelling. He said (and I’m going off of memory here, so no direct quotes) that the most important thing to know is that Disney doesn’t see you as the audience, Disney sees you as part of the story. When you’re on the rides, you don’t watch Captain Nemo go 20,000 leagues under the see — you are Captain Nemo. When you’re on the Peter Pan ride, you’re not watching him fly over London — you are Peter Pan flying over London. You’re not witnessing someone else live out the story — you are the protagonist of the story (and we’ll dig into this more in my blog post on business education and case studies).

He said that everything at a Disney park is engineered to keep you in the story, from elements of the story around you as you wait in line, to cast members being trained on the entire backstory of the ride and its context, to everyone always staying in character (thus the famous tunnels), even to things like trashcans and sound equipment being painted in a muted green color that your eye doesn’t pick up. It all designed to keep you in the story, so you can engage fully with your experience, and be moved to joy, fun, fear, or excitement. They talk about Disney “magic,” but it was really Walt being incredibly thoughtful about storytelling.

Better Birthday Parties

Chapman went to use an example of this kind of immersive storytelling in everyday context. He told us that if your child wants to have a Little Mermaid birthday party, don’t buy a bunch of plates that have Ariel on them, or have a bunch of balloons, streamers, and decorations with Sebastian and Flounder on them. In those cases, your child is observing the story, not in it.

Instead, have your child be Ariel, with no other representations of Ariel on decorations or cups or cake. Instead, make the decor under the sea — rocks, coral, blue and teal cups and plates, ocean decorations — and have one stuffed Sebastian and Flounder, or someone dressed up as Sebastian or Flounder. This way, your child isn’t just having a Little Mermaid party, they’re living the story.

Understanding Story as a Tool

Little Mermaid, Peter Pan, Disney trashcans — what does it matter to businesses, marketing strategy, engaging with customers, and getting them to purchase a product?

Because you don’t want your audience observing what you do, you want your audience to be a part of what you do. You want your audience to become attached to your business and find connection to it, be moved by it, or recognize themselves in the problem you’re trying to solve with your products or services. That joy, excitement, edge-of-the-seat anticipation, or passion we talked about earlier? You can’t achieve that by listing facts or product specs, but you can do it by telling stories.

Grab the Tissues

I’ll leave you with a great example of storytelling. Google created a commercial to advertise how its Google Assistant could, by voice activation, remember things for you. Instead of telling us that piece of information, or listing the Google Assistant specs, or firing off a bunch of data, they told a story.