How To Use The Hero’s Journey For Marketing

May 3, 2021

Superheroes and everyday heroes

Humankind has been telling stories since, well, since before writing was invented. Do you know what stories have survived the millennia? Stories that tell of what Joseph Campbell called the “Hero’s Journey.” Stories that tell of the friends and the challenges of any significant life journey a person takes. 

We still use these stories to give us language and courage for our own difficult times in life.

That’s why using the elements of the Hero’s Journey in your marketing material will get potential client’s attention. Everyone has a sense of the heroic deep inside of them. Most people are even inspired by the heroic.  

Consider Dorothy in Oz.
Luke Skywalker.
The Black Panther.
Most any main character in a Disney movie.
Potential clients seeking a guide to walk with them on their journeys.

These are all ordinary people drawn into the classic Hero’s (or Heroine’s) Journey.

Everyone has a hero in them.

Some years ago, I started teaching the Hero’s Journey to incarcerated writers at a maximum security prison in this state. I had no idea what I was getting into. It turns out, the men have been excellent teachers. 

In the first class, H. came into the room with a scowl on his face. He turned to me with his lips curled in scorn.

“What do you get out of this?” I’m guessing he hadn’t read Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends & Influence People. 

I shrugged my shoulders and, as best I can remember now, said something like “We get to explore the Hero’s Journey and do some writing.” 

He was not impressed. 

I wondered what I’d gotten myself into. 

We met once a week for 14 weeks. For the first several classes, he continued to verbally push and challenge me. But he wrote every week on a stage of the hero’s journey. As the weeks progressed, he wrote more of his personal stories. He read them to the class and they responded with their support. 

By the end of our class, H. had shared some of his deepest pain. He softened in his demeanor. Even his face relaxed. He was profusely grateful for the class and joined the same group of men for an advanced class we created for them. He had lived something of his own hero’s journey.

Living the hero’s journey

I’ve had the privilege of living the hero’s journey through some of life’s difficult times. I got to study it as a writer and teach it to incarcerated writers. In my pastoral and spiritual direction ministries, I’ve been blessed with the opportunity to walk with people on their own heroic life journeys. I’ve also learned to incorporate it into my work as a persuasive writer for marketing purposes. 

One of the biggest gifts of this story structure is that it normalizes the difficult times in people’s lives. It gives them a construct for understanding what is happening as they traverse a bumpy road. It gives them language and courage for their struggles.

Every hero’s journey has a Mentor, someone or something that is a wiser and stabilizing force for the hero. You could be that “someone.” Let your potential clients know that upfront through your first contact with them. 

Inspire people to find their inner hero

Your marketing material is often people’s first contact with your business. Use that material to acknowledge how every hero has hard times. They get confused and scared and wish things would get better. They find their way out of that stage by finding their way through it. On the back end of “through it” is a new perspective on life. New hope. New confidence. New successes.

How do you use the Hero’s Journey to inspire people to grow and to broaden your own business?

1. Familiarize yourself with the classic stages of the Hero’s Journey and the characters, the archetypes, involved in most journeys. Christopher Vogler, author of The Writer’s Journey is an authoritative voice for writing with the Hero’s Journey structure. You might want to focus on particular stages of the journey as they relate to your article theme. 
2. Use common hero stories people relate to. They might be from movies or books. They could be real-life heroes in the news. They could be from your own heroic journey or, as I did in this article, share the story of someone you know.
3. Use the language of the hero’s journey to stir your potential clients’ imagination and dreams. 

This ancient story structure has survived the millennia for a reason! There is value in using it as you reach out to prospective clients. 

Carmala Aderman writes persuasive marketing copy for professionals in the personal development and spirituality businesses. Contact her for more conversation.