Tell me a story
By Miryam Audiffred of Designing Stories a London-based studio that combines web design and proven storytelling techniques to create engaging and portable online experiences.
I am a story hunter by profession. I always look for good stories everywhere: in the newspapers, the cinema, in the library, on TV, on Internet and off course in all those endless encounters with people I get across in my life.
My story quest started long time ago. I studied journalism at university – still remember the old and heavy Remington type machine I used to learn typing. Oh! I’m not that old, but I studied in a public school in Mexico, my homeland.
After getting my degree I started to work for a major national newspaper, writing about art and cultural affairs. Almost at the same time I fell in love with radio. I still am.
I came to the UK five years ago to work as a correspondent for Latin American magazines, and living in this country I realized that it is possible to build a bridge between journalism and businesses, through storytelling.
So I started to use my journalistic skills to find the stories behind businesses and help those businesses to communicate those stories effectively on the web.
Everybody loves good stories, and every business has a unique story to tell. With that in mind, I set up this year a studio on web design and storytelling called Designing Stories.
The web designer, Sergio, is my partner and accomplice in this adventure. He shares with me the “story first” principle. Together, we have developed a new approach to web design by discovering the stories of our clients through conversations and interviews, before starting to design sketches and layouts, or producing audiovisual content.
And this is what I like more of my work: the conversations and close relationships we keep with our clients, despite having different backgrounds and interests.
There is no typical day in my working life. I don’t have a fixed schedule nor do I have to go to an office from Monday to Friday, but my day normally starts at 7:30 (must confess I need to set up three alarms to wake up). I try to go to networking events or museums at mornings and then meeting with clients. After lunch, it is time for writing, reading and preparing interviews. I still do journalism for Latin American publications and also work as a freelance translator for BBC Outlook radio program, translating from Spanish into English live interviews about “extraordinary stories from around the world”. Again, stories.
Maybe the weirdest part of my job happens when I introduce myself as a business storyteller. There’s always a “What is that?” face and I love it, because it always gives me the opportunity to tell a good story.
I truly believe that what matters more is the ability to place facts in context and to deliver them with emotional impact. Indeed: emotion sells newspapers and cinema tickets and it also can sell products and services. The underlying formula is, more often than not, effective storytelling.
