Storytelling Conference 2024

09.00 Registration & coffee

09.30 Welcome from the Chair

Grant Feller, Founder, EveryRung

09.40 Panel - Change up the story: new approaches to storytelling

Join out of sector panellists as they discuss the latest trends in storytelling and innovative approaches and technologies being used beyond the insights sector. What can we learn from other storytellers to make ours more compelling?

Chair

Grant Feller, Founder, EveryRung

Panellists

Chris Hides, Managing Director, The Academy
Emma Wicks, Head of Analytics and Editorial Insight, The Telegraph
Ian Hudson, Managing Director, Bloomsbury Publishing
Sophie Meyer, Producer of Rye Lane, Dorian Gray and St Trinian’s
Alice Loxton, Influencer, presenter, documentarist

10.25 Gen(der) Z: Underwear and Inclusivity

Situating Sloggi in a Beyond Binary World – a storytelling challenge

Successfully navigating gender amidst contemporary culture requires new ways of seeing, new ways of thinking, new languages and new stories. But how do you uncover the stories that go beyond the binary, especially when that ‘beyond’ is ever evolving and how do you serve people in these evolving spaces? 

This case study will explore how Sloggi partnered with BAMM to develop an underwear range inclusive to all genders and to future-proof their brand by resonating with Gen Z in the evolving gender space. Hear how the participant-led, ethnographic approach captured beautiful, inspiring footage producing a searingly insightful encapsulation of ‘the diverse stories which make the narrative’. Discover the impact of this impactful storytelling. 

Elizabeth Jones, Associate Director, BAMM   
Eszter Szijarto, Strategic Planning & Brand Insight Manager, Triumph

10.55 From insight to action: driving beauty growth through immersion & storytelling

Discover how an immersive research program and storytelling approach led Boots to deepen it’s understanding of the UK Beauty market and develop ideas for activation. At the heart of this story is the immersion of stakeholders from start to finish, instilling a sense of partnership and empowering them to help build and tell the story. 

Examine how a series of activities alongside an interactive digital playbook enabled stakeholders to hear first-hand from different shopper groups and gain insights through immersive and multi-sensory experiences. This session will support delegates to reflect on how to effectively engage stakeholders throughout their own narrative.

Kate Skivington, Research Director, Boxclever
Sarah Taylor, Head of Beauty Insights, Boots

11.25 Morning refreshments

11.50 The Art of Storytelling

To get to under the skin of what it takes to be a brilliant storyteller, Sky’s qualitative research team interviewed 15 of Sky’s greatest exponents of the art, speaking to senior directors from Sky Creative, NOW, Sky Arts, Consumer Strategy, Public Affairs and more. 

The term storytelling brings to mind a mythical skill, possessed only by those with incredible charisma and decades of experience. The truth is everyone can be a brilliant storyteller if they know the golden rules.

In this interactive session, delegates will gain tips on how to up their storytelling game and cover everything from preparing through to presenting.

Ed Nash, Qualitative Research Lead, Sky
Kate Benson, Qualitative Research Lead, Sky

12.20 Using new tools and new ways of thinking to develop memorable segmentations

Segmentation is a methodology type that easily lends itself to storytelling but too often after a final presentation, the nuances of each segment or persona are long forgotten. However, certain image generation elements can be a great way to optimise storytelling, resonance, and memorability. Madano will share their experience of harnessing new tools, such as AI, to create rich visual archetypes and boost the impact of segmentations.

Arian Oldroyd, Creative Director, Madano
Max Taylor McEwan, Research Director, Madano

12.50 How storytelling raised the voices of marginalised migrant couriers across Just Eat Takeaway

Couriers are a vital component in Just Eat Takeaway’s (JET’s) business and migrants make up a large percentage of this group. Yet, JET failed to recognise how being a migrant had an impact on their workers’ needs and experiences. 

In this discussion, you’ll hear how a simple research project quickly evolved into a critical conversation about the experience of those at the front line of the business. An ethnographic approach and strong visual storytelling helped JET humanise the realities of couriers, grow understanding and empathy towards its diverse community of couriers and speak directly to couriers’ unanswered needs and struggles.

Sam Lipscomb, Partner & Head of Insight, The Mix

In conversation with

Jeremy Nye, Senior Global Insights Manager, Just Eat Takeaway

13.20 Lunch

14.20 Transforming the stories we tell: using discourse analysis to spotlight on consumer language

Magenta is championing the use of discourse analysis to support its storytelling through

spotlighting the language used by participants. This approach can be used on any kind of textual data, including interviews and focus groups and the result can transform insight led stories.

This session will offer tips, tricks and practical exercises to understand how this method can be used to transform the stories we tell. It will demonstrate the process involved in conducting this kind of analysis and how it can be used alongside other findings to develop outputs which tell the whole story.

Eve Robertson, Research Director, Magenta
Dr Joanne Meredith, Research Manager, Magenta

14.50 Beyond words: the power of metaphor

When faced with complex ideas, the human mind seeks familiarity and relatability. Metaphors serve as a powerful tool in simplifying intricate concepts. This presentation will explore how Chivas Bros. have put metaphor at the heart of how they share insight and will reference multiple examples to demonstrate how this approach has enhanced comprehension and engagement, appealing to the emotional and imaginative facets of cognition, rather than merely the rational. 

Examine how this approach has enabled Chivas Bros. insight team to challenge embedded assumptions in a natural, intuitive and non-confrontational manner and how it has also improved internal communication across audiences and boarders.

Alice Salisbury, Co-founder, Inkling CC
Harry Steer, Consumer Insights Specialist, Chivas Brothers

15.20 Making commercial estimates with incomplete data to tell a simple, compelling story

Car buying journeys have become less linear than traditional models. The Close Brothers insight team wanted to engage its Executive Committee in these new routes to market to drive strategic decision making about how to reach new customers in the future.

This session will show how the insight team weren't afraid to make estimates and assumptions when synthesising a huge number of sources - including sales data, customer research and white papers. Hear how this simple story - inspired by Brent Dyke's narrative arc - kept the executive committee engaged with the big themes and the bigger picture rather than getting bogged down in micro details.

Dan Young, Director, Shed Research Consulting
Nicola Stevens, Head of Insight - Retail, Close Brothers

15.50 Afternoon refreshments

16.10 Using neuroscience to optimise audience engagement with audio advertising

Global Radio and Walnut Unlimited wanted to build a story for audio engagement across radio advertising. Grounded in the principles of neuroscience, the study examined emotional responses, arousal, and memory to determine how both contextual radio content and the distinction between active and passive listening influenced audience attention and engagement with radio advertising. 

The study revealed the nuances of how people react to various types of content and determined the extent to which conscious attention is important in shaping preferences. Hear key findings from the project and how this work is providing message guidance for advertisers on how to select the right style of audio stories and to tell them in the right way for different contexts to maximise audience engagement.

Andy Myers, Director, Walnut Unlimited

Ailsa Mackenzie, Group Strategy Director, Global

16.40 Panel - We can't tell evidence led stories alone: why persuasive data storytelling requires a collaborative approach

Data is being democratised across business functions and consequently data storytelling is happening, with or without insight specialists. To play a key role in ensuring robust, data-driven customer insights are powering organisational decision making, insight specialists in agencies and client-side teams need to work more collaboratively with a greater range of stakeholders, from data professionals, communication specialists and subject matter experts from across the organisation. 

This panel will bring together an eclectic mix of research, data, customer and marketing experience and perspectives to share insights and examples of how collaborative data storytelling has enhanced the effectiveness of insight communication.

Chair

Caroline Florence, Founder, Insight Narrator 

Panellists

Charlotte Neal, Head of Marketing, Turning Point
Elizabeth Harris, Customer Director, B&Q
Jeremy Hollow, Founder, Listen & Learn Research

17.10 Closing comments from the Chair

17.15 End of conference