The story-and-lesson post
A story-and-lesson post tells a small true story and then says what you took from it. The story can be tiny. A customer who came back after a year is enough. So is the morning the coffee machine broke an hour before a catering order.
People will read a story for longer than they'll read advice. A lesson also lands better when the reader has watched you learn it.
Last Tuesday a woman brought in a dress she bought from us in 2019. The zipper had gone. She wasn't asking for a refund. She only wanted to know if we could fix it. We did it in about ten minutes and didn't charge her. She came back Friday with her daughter and they bought two things. I keep relearning that the small favors matter more than the ads.
Making it yours
Start in the middle of the moment, with a time or a place. Don't open with "I want to share something."
Keep the story to a few short paragraphs and give the lesson a line or two at the end. If the lesson takes longer to explain than the story took to tell, you probably have two posts.
Where it goes wrong
Invented stories tend to get found out, and they aren't worth the risk to your name. Leave out anything that identifies a client unless they've said yes.
Not every moment needs a moral. Sometimes the story is just funny, so post it as a funny story.
Did this shape work for your page?
Type in the numbers from a few of your posts and see which ones beat your usual.
Open the outlier checkerStop typing the numbers in
The SwipeKeeper Chrome extension adds a Keep button to Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn posts you're looking at. Click it and the post lands on your desk with its visible counts, scored the same way as here. The free Field plan holds 25 posts.
Desk is $19 a month or $190 a year. Atelier is $149 once. Pricing