STORYTEL: Innovative use of data

Storytel has become the first in the world to provide users with streaming audiobooks on phones and tablets. The platform operates on a subscription basis. It has been present in Poland since 2016. Since then, it has been growing rapidly, expanding its user base and business.

In 2021. Storytel became a sponsor of the Innovation competition organised by the Association of Advertising Agencies. In doing so, the brand wanted to reinforce its image as an innovator. In order to impress the extremely demanding group of advertising agency employees and marketers from the largest companies in Poland involved in the competition, it had to approach sponsorship in an unconventional way. To surprise, to intrigue, to engage.

The list of nominees this time... was not a list! Instead, we built an interactive website. It was guided by a voiceover that, in a low, deep voice, the way novels are read on Storytel, welcomed arriving users and encouraged them: "Get ready for what awaits you at the Innovation Gala. Look into the cards and see what your future holds." After typing in the name of the advertising agency, virtual cards similar to those used by tarot tellers animated on the screen. Each corresponded to a nomination. The reader uncovered one by one and analysed them like a seasoned narrator of a novel. 

"Let me listen to the pleasant hum that accompanies exploring space-time. The cards allowed me a simultaneous insight into the past and the future. I saw clearly there that your participation is more fortuitous than last year. I can also see that the jurors were not unduly annoying. Many of your achievements have awed their stony faces. There is victory on the horizon," he read. 

This is just one of dozens of statements recorded for the campaign. Indeed, the dialogues were individualised, written separately for each of the nominees. It was a creative play on words, but also on different voiceover styles. It was therefore a direct reference to the wealth of audio content collected on the Storytel platform. 

The challenge was to synchronise the database created from the submissions and results of the deliberations with dozens of voiceover recordings. We developed a special algorithm that built a personalised message in real time, based on four variables:

• the name of the advertising agency,
• a comparison of the number of submissions in 2021 and the previous year, 
• a comparison of the number of nominations to the number of submissions,
• a comparison of the number of awards to the number of nominations. 

The last ratio determined the voiceover styling - here we had a choice of one of five entries from the Storytel Originals series. For example, if the agency did not win an award despite the nominations, the reader used the styling from the novel Random by Natasha Przymierz, while if all of them turned into statuettes - we reached for the styling known from the radio play Robin Hood and the Emerald King by Jakub Ćwiek. There were also messages alluding to "Peasants 2050" by Cezary Zbierzkowski, "The Raven" by Aleksandra Zielińska and Jakub Korolczuk or "Between the Letters" by Magdalena Witkiewicz. We show how our algorithm worked in practice in the attached video

AWARD

• Innovation 2022 in the category Media Innovation – Touchpoint

NOMINATIONS

• Innovation 2022 in the category Innovation in communication – Content&Entertainment
• KTR 2022 in the category Use of Data