Bloodthirsty female vampire symbolizing the rise of storytelling with teeth.
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Stories with teeth. Why nice content isn’t working

ByJohanna

If your stories don’t leave a mark, your audience won’t remember they were bitten. In 2025, “relatable” content isn’t enough. The digital world is drenched in contradiction, tension, absurdity, grief, and humor. Audiences are savvy to emotional manipulation and numbed by vague vulnerability. People don’t want your pain, exactly, but they do want your pulse….

Block letters spelling out the word "failure" to feature a blog on how to recover from marketing failure with the help of narrative or storytelling.
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Fail fast, story harder. The strategy that makes failure marketable

ByJohanna

If your marketing failed, maybe it wasn’t the idea. Maybe it was the storytelling. “Fail fast” left out the best part We’ve absorbed the Silicon Valley gospel like scripture: Fail fast. Fail often. Learn and move on. The part they forgot to teach us was what to do with all that failure. So, we bury…

An image of a cybernetic eye as a metaphor for subconscious influence in modern marketing.
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Marketing is mind control, and you’re already under the spell

ByJohanna

You think you make choices. You think you pick your coffee. Your laptop. Your shoes.You think you scroll, browse, click, and buy of your own free will. You don’t. Marketing did. Not the buy now, act fast, final sale pushy kind. The real kind. The kind you don’t see coming. The kind that whispers instead…

Woman choosing to take a light path or a dark path in a forest. Concept of pivots in brand storytelling.
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From plot twist to pivot. When to change the story (and how to tell it mid-flight)

ByJohanna

You’re allowed to change the story. The question is: can your audience follow it? The myth of the masterplan Every brand loves a tidy origin story. It starts with a flash of insight. Maybe a garage or a heartbreak. Some grit, a little grace, and a perfectly timed market need. The narrative rolls out like…

An armoured Nordic woman fighter with an axe on her shoulder to represent the Heroine's Journey at and after the end.
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This isn’t “the end”. The Heroine’s Journey and post-victory arc

ByJohanna

Most brands celebrate the peak. Few ask what comes after. But real loyalty, legacy, and resonance live in the sequel. Not int he climax. In the aftermath. After the (story) arc We’re taught to love a good return. The hard-won resolution. The satisfying full circle. The mountaintop moment where the air is thin and everything…

An image of the Wizard of Oz, behind the curtain. Here it's used to represent the AI behind the content repurposing curtain.
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The AI behind the curtain. Your 2025 toolbox for story-led content repurposing

ByJohanna

AI can remix your blog, but it can’t rewrite your voice. You don’t need to become a tech whisperer. You just need to know which parts of your creativity are sacred and which ones the robots can borrow. Let’s get one thing out of the way: You are not being replaced. Not by ChatGPT. Not…

A blackboard with the word "repurpose" and a magnifying glass representing content repurposing in marketing.
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Stretch, multiply, repeat. Scaling your content without losing your voice

ByJohanna

If you only say it once, did you ever really say it loud enough? There’s something oddly appealing about the “start fresh” mindset. Like if you aren’t bleeding over your keyboard or rebuilding your strategy from scratch, you’re not a real creator. But! Originality is overrated. What matters more in 2025 and beyond is sustainability….

Content remixing metaphor shown through cheerful female musical artist DJ
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Beyond repurposing. How to remix your content like a storyteller

ByJohanna

Repetition is reputation. Remixing is reinvention. Remixing is not reposting, and it’s not recycling either. Remixing is reinterpretation. It’s storytelling through transformation. Think of it like this: A remix takes the essence of a piece, its mood, its truth, its voice, and reshapes it into something that hits differently. Same story, new spine. Musicians and…

Woman working on summer content strategy while relaxing on a hammock. Only the woman's feet are visible, and that part of the hammock.
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More mileage, less meltdown. Repurposing content in 2025

ByJohanna

You don’t need more content. You need more mileage. (Note! Practical tips to start repurposing below!) Here’s the wild thing about summer season: it’s the perfect time to make your content go further. Not louder or faster. Just further. So, before you scramble to create something new while sipping an iced latte and dodging burnout,…

A bunch of pencils with one taller than the rest.
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The literary copywriter’s toolbox. Tactics stolen from novelists, poets & playwrights

ByJohanna

If it works on the page, it works in a funnel. But if your words don’t make people feel something, your funnel is just a sequence. Here’s what marketers can learn from people who make language do unnatural, unforgettable things. Yes, we’re stealing from the greats There’s a door hidden in the side of the…