What brands can learn from sci-fi storytelling
Sci-fi starts with one small change and follows it all the way out. Calvin Ross Carl explains how brands can use the same move to rethink their world.
Summary
Calvin Ross Carl names what sci-fi does well that every brand could learn from. It starts with one simple idea: if this fact were true, or became true, what would happen? What else would become true? Calvin suggests taking that one little nugget of change and extrapolating it to infinity, then asking how it affects your brand and your world.
Highlights
- Sci-fi asks: if this were true, what else would become true?
- It starts from one small nugget of change.
- Brands can extrapolate that idea to infinity to see where it leads.
Key insights
Start with one change
A new world doesn’t need a hundred ideas. It needs one, followed honestly.
Extrapolate to the extreme
Pushing a single idea as far as it goes shows what a brand could become, and what it would change along the way.
Detailed analysis
This is the engine behind the rest of Calvin’s argument. Treat a brand’s key idea like a sci-fi premise and follow it to its inevitable end. The exercise turns a differentiator into a world, with consequences a brand can design around.
Conclusion
Take one small truth about your brand and ask what happens if it goes all the way.
What sci-fi stories do really well, that I think all brands could learn from, starts with this: if this idea is true, or if this fact becomes true, what would happen? What else would become true? It’s a really simple idea. You take this one little nugget of change or truth, whatever it is. What happens when you extrapolate it into infinity, and how does that affect your brand, your world?