Why Theater Kids Make Great Marketers
How grown-up theater kids use storytelling and performing skills to build a career in marketing
Note: This article was orginally posted in Better Marketing June 9, 2021
When I was a child, I dreamed of a career on Broadway. I practically lived at the dance studio during the week. Weekends with friends were spent gathered around a piano, singing show tunes. I filled my summers with community theater, memorizing lines, and practicing choreography. I got headshots taken, auditioned for shows, and ran my monologues.
Then I grew up, and I became a marketer instead.
While I haven’t given up yet on my Broadway dreams, my youth as a theater kid prepared me well for a marketing career. Whether you’re a current or former theater kid trying to identify your transferable skills, or you’re a hiring manager trying to find the right person for a marketing job, here’s why theater kids make great marketers.
“Who tells your story?” — Hamilton
What makes for great theater? A compelling story. It has a heroine we identify with, no matter how different they are from ourselves. It has a villain, whether tangible or intangible, that our heroine must battle or overcome. And, of course, it has a clear beginning, middle, and end.
Theater kids know it’s these central elements that make a show resonate with the audience. The structure of a great show or a great song is repeatable yet dynamic, making each story feel new and exciting. Whether “RENT”, “Hamilton”, or “Pippin” (yes, I’m not just a theater kid, I’m a musical theater kid), the characters, plots, and structure of a show help create a deep emotional connection to the audience and leave a lasting impact.
Storytelling is also the heartbeat of marketing. Whether it’s a Google ad that tugs at your heartstrings in 30 seconds, a print campaign like “Got Milk?” that highlights the relatability of your favorite 90’s figure skater, or a keynote address at a tech conference like Dreamforce, marketers are storytellers too.
We use the same story components seen in a theater to connect their products to their target audience. Emotionally resonant marketing that focuses on storytelling leaves a deeper impact on customers than marketing that focuses on surface details like product features. And, stories are a powerful framework for delivering a message in a concise and timely manner.
“How I know you, yes I know you” — AIDA
Besides being expert storytellers, marketers are also armchair psychologists. We get inside the minds of our customers in an attempt to understand what they need and what’s missing from their experiences. We seek to understand why our products or services help fill those needs, wants, and desires. We study their communication so we can “speak the language of the customer,” and spend time researching personas to get a complete picture of who our buyers are.
A great marketer doesn’t need to be their target audience to understand them. Instead, we need to know where our customers spend time and how to get inside their heads to find out what truly matters to them.
Do you know who else gets inside the mind of someone completely different from themselves? Actors! Performers don’t pick roles based on similarity to themselves. We find ways to get inside the mind of complex characters with completely different experiences from our own. We create backstories, motivations, mood boards, and personalities. People who don’t like musicals often don’t understand why a character can just “break into song” in the middle of a conversation. But people who love musicals (hi!) know that for some people, the only way to convey a feeling or emotion is to sing it or dance it — the feelings are bigger than what the spoken word can articulate. Hire a theater kid to be a marketer, and they’ll already know how to find your buyer’s motivation and learn what matters to them.
“We’ve got parts to perform, hearts to warm” — Pippin
Early in my career, my manager scheduled a practice session before a presentation. I wrote my talk track out, studied my transitions, and identified where to add vocal emphasis or a personal anecdote. I prepared for this presentation no differently than I had prepared for the role of Ermengarde in a high school production of “Hello, Dolly!” I often find creating the presentation to be harder and sometimes less enjoyable than actually giving the presentation.
Theater kids know how to perform, whether it’s presenting a slide deck or dancing in a chorus line. We can wow a crowd no matter the size or subject matter. We’re no strangers to memorizing lines, projecting our voices, and making eye contact with the audience to draw them in. Hire a theater kid as a marketer, and you’ve got someone who was born ready to stand up in front of customers and give a pitch — or a kickline. You might get both at once.
Were you a theater-kid-turned-marketer? What connection have you found between your performing days and your current role? Or, are there other childhood activities that you feel uniquely prepared you for a career in marketing? Share in the comments below or reach out to me, I’d love to hear!