Marissa Sharpless, Sr. Manager, PR and Social Media at Cinnabon, joins the Social Pros Podcast to discuss the power of storytelling on social media.  Huge thanks to our amazing sponsors for helping us make this happen. Please support them; we couldn't do it without their help! This week:  Salesforce Marketing Cloud  emma   Storytelling on Social People have been telling stories since the dawn of time. A great story has the power to bring people together and foster meaningful relationships between brands and customers. But with no recipe to follow, how can you use social for storytelling? The good news is that you don’t need a massive following to start connecting with your audience via storytelling. Even if you only have a handful of followers, knowing how to tell a good story on social can make waves that resonate outside of your community. As Marissa Sharpless, Sr. Manager, PR and Social Media at Cinnabon rightly says, your storytelling ability is what will help you transform your fans into brand advocates. You don’t need to turn yourself into the next George R.R. Martin to be able to tell a story people will connect with. Your story could be something ‘small’ or as big as changing the world one Cinnabon at a time.   In This Episode:  04:23 - How Marissa went from being a reality TV star to the Sr. Manager of PR and Social Media at Cinnabon 09:39 – How Marissa’s background in broadcast journalism has helped her fuel Cinnabon’s success on social 11:00 – What it’s like working with multiple franchise owners 16:05 – How Cinnabon views paid social and use it to boost customer advocacy 19:03 – How to incorporate UGC in your brand storytelling 23:33 – How to use Twitter Chats and social listening to bond with your community 34:18 – How Cinnabon utilizes data when it comes to sales attribution   Resources Get the new State of Marketing report for free from Salesforce Find out more about the community at SocialMedia.org with a special form for Social Pros listeners Learn more about how emma can help you take your email marketing strategy to the next level Find out more about Cinnabon Bakery and their tasty treats!   Visit SocialPros.com for more insights from your favorite social media marketers.