Storyation reflects on company journey for 10th anniversary
Content creation and strategy agency Storyation is turning 10 years old.
The announcement:
Forget about black holes. For proof that time is relative, just look at Australia’s marketing industry. With an endless carousel of change and an ever-evolving climate of trends, audiences, brands and insights, one year to an outsider can seem like so much longer to those in its midst.
For Storyation to be marking a decade in this landscape is no minor feat. Its longevity confirms the strength of its offering: a validation of how agility, engagement, and strategic intent will always find customers. But it also validates a decision made ten years ago that went against the expected norms of a content agency.
Storyation may have the C-word at its heart, but general manager Andrés López-Varela says the agency is about so much more. “We’re in the audience-building business,” he says. “We create engaged audiences for brands through an end-to-end content service. This includes all types of content – digital, social, print, and other formats including, most importantly, strategy and research. Everything is anchored in the client’s editorial style and our journalistic approach.”
Back in 2013, that approach was the gap that existed in the market, and a clear point of difference from other agencies. Co-founders of Storyation, Mimi Cullen and Lauren Quaintance, saw the need for quality, story-based content with an editorial focus – premium work that would stand out from the sea of same-same content online and drive measurable results for brands.
“We’d both had senior experience in major media companies,” explains Lauren. “In 2013 the mantra was ‘brands are the new publishers’, so we (perhaps naively) thought brands might need help from people who had worked in publishing.”
“Right from the start we invested in commissioning content from only the very best journalists, producers, and content creators,” says Mimi. “Those who are specialists in their field – from cruising to property, mental health to education, parenting to technology – to deliver a better experience for audiences and drive better performance for brands.”
But while Storyation’s goals for its content were created with audiences in mind, Andrés is mindful of the reality that it also needs to be couched within a commercial mindset. “Ultimately, we’re a marketing services agency,” he says, “so we work to commercial outcomes and targets. That’s very much a part of who we are and what we do. We’re focused on building audiences, and creating content that is unapologetically not about products, but instead about people and driven by human interest-narratives.”
Storyation would ultimately capture the interest of Medium Rare Content, who acquired the business in 2019. The move allowed the former to take advantage of the resources of the latter, with the two ultimately working together while operating independently. “Medium Rare is a phenomenal business that we have a lot in common with, but ultimately it’s a very different kind of content agency than Storyation,” says Andrés. “Our identity and key to the strength of our brand is to market and leverage our specialist approach.”
Managing director of Medium Rare, Nick Smith, agrees the working relationship is “a beautiful, unique approach to the market.” Reflecting on Storyation’s strengths, he cites its leadership position since the early days and ability to reach different audiences and clients.
“They really lead the way in digital branded content from the start,” he says. “That caught the interest of progressive marketers and brands, from big businesses like telcos and tourism bodies, to B2B clients and challenger brands looking for an advantage.
“Storyation has a unique approach in the way it works with clients,” he continues. “From creating benchmarks to presenting dashboards, clients can understand where they are at in terms of audience before they work with the Storyation team to quickly move the dial, whether that’s using social media, digital SEO content, or even print content.”
Similarly, Andrés looks at the evolution of Storyation over the years – new hires, new services, new offices, but always the same logo – to observe what has remained constant at its core. “We take the journalistic editorial approach and fuse it with a strong marketing sensibility and discipline,” he says. “Our data-led approach, for strategy in particular, has meant we’ve been able to take on larger, more complex briefs over time. We’ve been able to take clients and their audiences on an evolving journey of multi-channel content programs that work for both the business and their customers.”
You don’t have to be at the end of your journey to appreciate a look back to see how far you’ve come. And the story is far from over. With Storyation’s continuing impact in the marketing agency landscape, Andrés expects the decade ahead will be vastly different to its first.
“Sure, we expect to be creating more of the same compelling work that helps build engaged and meaningful audiences for brands,” he says, “but we also expect to evolve and expand the role of content across our clients’ operations. The potential for content to improve a whole range of customer and user interactions and, indeed, the appetite from the audience for that content, means there are new channels and formats that we haven’t even thought of where content will play a leading role in the next 10 years. And our team is pumped for those opportunities.”
The sky, as they say, is the limit.
Source: Storyation
