If you’ve read Gone Girl or seen the movie, you know that who tells a story matters. When the narrator changes, readers uncover different motivations, blind spots, and alternative interpretations of events.
Who tells a story shapes how we interact with it.
In a previous post, I explored several elements that make stories sticky, such as using personal characters and vivid details. Today, we’re going to look at another storytelling element: who is telling the story?
It likely isn’t much of a surprise to learn that the identity of a narrator can shift how we understand a story. In 1985, psychologist Daniel G. Morrow wrote: “protagonists can have a powerful influence on readers’ beliefs…The people at the center of a narrative help shape how audiences make sense of what they’re reading.”
But what happens if the main character doesn’t change, but the person telling the story does?
Let’s explore a study from the world of science-policy communication research that I think has several intriguing lessons for science marketers looking to use storytelling in their content marketing.
Stories in Emails — Help or Hindrance?
The research comes from an unlikely place. Published in Drug and Alcohol Dependence Reports in 2024, the study examined if narrative could increase policymakers’ engagement with research about alcohol and drug use and substance abuse disorders. But they also studied a more subtle question: did it matter whether the stories were told in first person or shared through a third-person lens?
To answer these questions, the researchers turned to email. They emailed US policymakers who work on committees related to alcohol and drug abuse and their staffers. Each email included a link to a fact sheet with relevant research findings. For each email sent, the researchers measured open and click rates.
In the first trial, recipients received an email containing a personal story written by someone who had experienced substance abuse disorder. The email appeared to have been sent by the story’s author (who also co-authored the fact sheet). Recipients clicked the link to the fact sheet 137% more frequently compared to a control with no narrative (262 clicks vs. 192). Open rates were unchanged.
The researchers found a similar result when the story came from a scientist describing their motivations for studying substance use disorders: Recipients clicked the link to the fact sheet 132% more frequently compared to a control with no narrative. In both cases, adding a first-person story to the body of the email increased engagement with the linked research.
In a later trial, an author of the fact sheet sent two versions of an email. One contained a first-person narrative about substance use disorder while the other told the same story from a third-person perspective. Neither story was about nor written by the sender: they were about someone else’s experiences.
This time, including both types of stories in the emails backfired. The narrative emails were opened roughly half as often and generated only about one-fifth as many clicks as a control email that contained no story. The subject lines were the same, so the different open rates likely reflect the emails’ preview text.
In short: when the story was the sender’s own experience, policymakers were more likely to click to the fact sheet. But, when the story they received was about someone else’s experience, open rates and click rates fell.
One of the study’s authors commented in an article about the study: “This suggests that when the email sender is telling someone else’s story, it is possible that policymakers may perceive it as inauthentic, thereby decreasing their engagement.”
Takeaways for Science Marketers
While this study focuses on policy and substance abuse research, I see similarities in how science marketers use storytelling in their own work. We often use stories and personal perspectives to spark interest and funnel an audience towards more factual, product-centered, or research-focused information. I think there are two clear takeaways for science marketers in this study:
- Stories can drive higher engagement, and
- First-person stories delivered by the narrator might be more effective than ones delivered by someone else.
This study has a lesson for science marketers looking to incorporate storytelling into their content. When producing testimonials, case studies, or other forms of content, we often focus on what story to tell. This research reminds us that it’s also important to consider who is telling the story. A customer describing their own experience or a scientist explaining their own motivations can make a story feel more authentic and make audiences more likely to engage with the information that follows. For science marketers, tapping into this study might look like putting clients front and center in case study webinars, building an employee-generated content program, or supporting your organization’s thought leaders as they build their own audience.
