Through the ages, technology and media, whether stone or the sound of our voice or pixels on a screen, has dramatically influenced the way we communicate and tell stories.

This was one of the main points on “the art of storytelling” presented by Julie Roehm, Chief Storyteller at SAP at the Inbound Marketing Summit on April 3, 2013.

Julie showed many visual and multimedia examples of how storytelling has been around for as long as humans have walked the earth.

The first TV ad was run by Bulova in 1941. The first political TV spot was run by Lyndon Johnson in 1964. Apple’s “1984” helped propel Superbowl advertising to the heights we see today. And Yahoo started the shift to online media when it ran the first banner ad in 1994.

Across the ages, brands have been using the art of storytelling to reach their audience. According to Julie, “Today with digital media and emerging technologies, the challenges, and the opportunities are boundless.”

But, she continued “to break through the clutter, meaningful, one to one conversations with our customer is now more important than ever.”

Bottom line: we need to tell more human stories. We need to touch our audience in a personal way. And we need to tell stories that people want to hear.

One great example Julie showed included one of my favorite commercials for Google Chrome.

She then showed one example of how SAP is telling more human stories through the voice of our customers – showing how we help our customers to help their customers and improve lives.

To read more about Julie’s presentation, check out this summary and enjoy the full presentation below.