Brand Storytelling

We tell stories to educate, inspire, engage and move people to action. By sharing authentic stories about Mizzou’s faculty, staff, students and alumni, we can communicate facts and figures and build an emotional connection with our audiences. It is this emotional connection that elevates Mizzou’s brand and reputation.

The brand messaging playbooks are available to Mizzou employees to download and print. 

What makes a story memorable?

Facts alone don’t drive audiences to act. It’s our responsibility to motivate and inspire our audiences through emotive stories about real people with real interests, goals and feelings. They should be delivered through clear and consistent messaging.

To craft a memorable story, you need to have :

1. A fact (or topic) you want to communicate.
2. A value consistent with your brand personality.
3. A tone appropriate for your audience.

Once you have those three things, you can apply Mizzou’s key messaging storylines to shape the story.

Remember: each personality has a distinct storyline and dimensions that help express key values of the Mizzou brand. Review the key messaging storylines here: Narrative & Key Messaging Storylines

If you’re a visual learner, here’s a helpful formula to get you started on the right path:

[Fact/topic/differentiator] + [Value expressed in storyline] = [Emotive story]

Another way to approach this is to begin with the fact and then ask yourself, “So what? Why should my audience care? How does this fact relate to Mizzou’s larger story?”

The values expressed in Mizzou’s key messaging storylines are a great starting point to answer this question. This “so what?” factor — the value — combined with the fact, leads you to the emotive story.

Example

Fact: Mizzou is a Research 1 institution
Remember: subject matter does not equal expression. Any fact or message should be communicated through one or more of Mizzou’s key messaging storylines. It’s about creating an authentic story built on the values central to the Mizzou brand.

Brand Writing Best Practices

Jump to: Editorial Style | Headlines | Copy | Captions | Audience Examples by Channel | Revising Existing Stories | Tips for Long-Form Writing 

Editorial Style

For editorial and journalistic content, Mizzou follows the Associated Press Stylebook. MU-specific issues are covered in the MU Style Guide. If a discrepancy exists between the two styles, the MU Style Guide takes precedence.

In some fields, writers and editors might also follow discipline-specific guides, such as the MLA Style Manual. Regardless of the field, in communications produced for general audiences, the MU Style Guide and the Associated Press Stylebook take precedence over other guides.

Headlines

Keep headlines focused, yet creative.
Headlines are the best, and maybe only, opportunity to grab the reader’s attention and encourage them to keep reading. They need to be quick, clear and intriguing. Don’t try and say everything or you’ll confuse (and lose) your audience.

Copy

Before you start crafting your story, make sure you know:

• Who your audience is (review Audiences, Voice & Tone)
• What it is you want them to get out of it — what do they need to know?
• What tone will convey this information the best? Should it be curious, ambitious or maybe a bit of both?
• Gather relevant information, data, names, dates and details

After identifying these core items, review the content on Narrative & Key Messaging. This includes our narrative, personality archetypes, key messaging storylines and dimensions and can inspire the cadence of your copy. Feel free to pull from the storylines and dimensions to integrate into your copy when relevant.

Remember we’re crafting authentic stories with impact:

• Move beyond simply stating facts to connect with your audience.
  • Instead of saying: We have four degree programs …
  • Say: With four degree programs designed for the entrepreneurial spirit, we …
• Show the human element behind our success.
  • Instead of saying: Mizzou has many research opportunities …
  • Say: At Mizzou, students work with renowned researchers …
• Create a strong emotional tie with your audience.
  • Instead of saying: We make an impact.
  • Say: Our research and discoveries are positively impacting our local communities, the state of Missouri and beyond.

GUT-CHECK:

• Does the tone of what you are writing inspire the reader?
• Does it reflect one or more of Mizzou’s archetype storylines?

Use copy to influence visual choices: to influence visual choices:

• The Mizzou brand is enhanced through supporting visuals. Refer to the Visual Identity section for brand graphics, fonts and photography. Coordinate these elements to enhance your copy – your messaging should be the star.

Captions

Clear, concise captions can pull curious readers further into the page while ensuring that those merely skimming the page can garner the most important information. Guidelines on crediting photography can be found here.

How to write enticing captions:

• Generate interest and intrigue. Engage readers.
• Add details that aren’t in the accompanying story.
• Use active verbs and energetic language.
• For every photograph, provide a caption with specific information, if available. Captions accompanying generic or decorative photographs, such as pictures of campus icons, can provide background information or a bit of MU history.
• Be honest and accurate. If using an old photo, identify the date. If using a photo for illustrative rather than documentary purposes, make that clear in your caption.
• Use “from left” rather than “from left to right” when identifying multiple people or things.
• Don’t editorialize. Avoid subjective adjectives. Let your readers decide whether someone or something is beautiful, happy, troubled, etc.
• Because readers know you are referring to the photograph, omit phrases such “is shown” or “pictured above.”
• Try to use present tense, but use past tense to refer to events that preceded the taking of the photo or that are not pictured in the photo.
• Don’t point out the obvious, such as gestures or colors, except when writing alternative text to accompany photos online. Alternative text can be detected by a screen-reader and provide photo information to users who are visually impaired.
• Before publishing the photos online or in print, double-check the photos and captions for accuracy and consistency.

Revising Existing Stories and Messaging

Some stories and messaging have longevity but need to be updated to better align with the Mizzou brand. Start by reviewing Mizzou’s personality archetypes, key messaging storylines and audiences to answer the question “so what?” By answering this question, you can transform the story. Let’s look at a sample story, before and after we revise it to align with the Mizzou brand.

Tips for Writing Long-Form Copy

When writing longer stories and messaging, you shouldn’t feel tied to one personality archetype or key messaging storyline. Start by connecting the main facts, topics or themes in your story to the dimensions from different archetype storylines to tell a richer story.

Say, for example, that you’re writing a news story about a student who collaborated with
a professor to complete a research project.

• The student explains that trial and error played a major role in their process while the professor praises the student’s commitment to finding new, exciting ways to approach a problem others have largely ignored.
• You might connect the first part of this story to Mizzou’s “unflinching investigator” storyline, highlighting Mizzou’s commitment to learning through experience.
• And you might connect the second part of the story to Mizzou’s “groundbreaking innovator” storyline, emphasizing the original, innovative aspects of their research.
• Both of these expressions are authentic to the story the subjects told and authentic to Mizzou’s personality. It makes sense to combine the archetype expressions as you tell the story.