You’ve probably heard about the importance of storytelling in marketing.
I’ve written about it plenty of times. I’m not going to jump up and down and proclaim that storytelling is dead, but now there’s a new twist. Well, it’s more of a swipe than a twist.
Everyone’s using their thumbs to scroll quickly past your marketing messages. So it’s easy for your story to get lost if you’re not designing for that new habit.
In 2026 your marketing needs to evolve from storytelling to scrollytelling. Which means your messages need to be tighter, punchier, more creative than ever.
Most people who dive into new website projects forget that at least 75% of their website visitors will be on their phones. Scrolling rapidly and aimlessly.
And even if they’re on a laptop or a big screen desktop, they’re still scrolling like mad.
So you better say something that stops them… Something novel, unique, unexpected.
That means choosing words, sentences and short little blurbs that are not seen or heard every five minutes.
That means working harder and getting past the trite, half-baked clichés that Chat GPT is spitting out for all your competitors.
Word selection matters! One word can be the difference between a marketing home run and a dribbling bunt.
If you mix up the words just a little bit, and introduce a hint of incongruity, you can successfully stop the scrolling and capture people’s attention. (At least for a sec!)
Another way to slow the scrolling is to show an image that triggers curiosity and causes a pause.
Images can work well on their own, or they can bolster what the words are saying and increase your persuasive power exponentially.
But only if the images are highly relevant, carefully chosen, and uniquely yours.
You can’t expect to stop the scrolling with cheesy stock images or faked-up Ai stuff.
That’s why we help clients build libraries of distinctive brand assets. Both verbal and visual. We can provide a constant supply of words, headlines, graphics and images that your competitors are not using. And they cannot copy.
Wouldn’t that be better than starting from scratch every time you have to execute a new ad or social media post?
Just go back to your bank of scrollytelling brand assets.
Let’s talk about what that might look like for your company. Let’s sit down and look at everything you currently have to see if it works in this new context.
Let’s discuss your story, and find creative new ways to tell it.
Scrolling or no scrolling.
Contact me here.
