Who we are
Our mission is to inspire and amplify the work of R&D leaders, technologists, philanthropists, legal experts, and others who are confronting societal challenges. We understand what it takes to stand out and build meaningful connections in this time of noisy digital environments and audience distrust. Stories pave the way to a better future for our global civilization, and we feel privileged to support the impactful work of our clients.
We are based out of San Francisco and Vancouver, with a collective of talented partners dispersed around the globe. We're writers, designers, multimedia creators, marketers, communication strategists, researchers, data scientists, and AI-systems builders. We construct high-precision teams to meet the unique needs of each project.
Astoundly is part of an ecosystem of brands created by Storyhackers.
What we do
We embed within organizations and create inspiring storytelling experiences that support internal and external communications. We're guided by systems thinking and scientific rigor. This positions us to see how dots connect between workstreams, business units, and audiences. As a result, the programs and processes we build often persist for years as key growth drivers within organizations.
Voice of customer programs
We start by conducting in-depth qualitative interviews with your key customers and partners. Next, we use our proprietary conversational analysis algorithm to identify insights that are relevant to your organization. The final deliverable is typically a series of engaging articles, case studies, videos, and/or other resources that can be used publicly or internally to support a wide array of use cases.
Internal & external publications
Using best practices from traditional publishing, we help you build a strategy & operational framework that connects your organization to micro and macro-level trends. The end result is a system that clearly communicates important stories to customers, employees, investors, and/or other relevant stakeholders. This typically includes a mix of content creation, social media distribution, audience newsletters, and partner/media relations.
Strategic narrative blueprints & collateral
To ensure that your organization is communicating effectively, we start by conducting data analysis and/or qualitative research supported by our proprietary conversational analysis algorithm. These learnings help us build a modular communication system that reduces friction. We use this system to create ongoing content collateral as needed for your organization.
Educational & data reports
Learning and collaboration are the fabric of modern innovation. More than ever, there is a need for information-sharing that drives awareness, discourse, partnership, and collaboration. Following a journalistic process, we help you translate internal knowledge and data into compelling resources that advance public understanding and elevate your organization's profile.
Training curriculum
Authentic educational programs build stronger teams and happier workplaces. Supported by a curriculum library developed over the past decade, we create tailored storytelling courses and workshops. These trainings contribute to the growth of employees as individuals and the organization as a whole. Curriculum ranges from creative brainstorming approaches to ethically integrating AI into writing methods.
Our clients
We work with early-stage ventures at the cutting-edge of systems change and innovation teams at established organizations.
They are the first organization I contact for help with industry research or crafting compelling product stories, whitepapers, case studies, or long-form blog content. I rely on their keen ability to understand people and form high-level strategies.
Ben Strahan
Former Global Marketing Director, Soracom
The team's intellectual rigor and deep commitment to inspiring narratives is best-in-class. They have been invaluable to our content strategy at Dun & Bradstreet. Importantly, the work we develop together consistently performs.
Abby Lutte
Former Head of Portfolio Marketing, Dun & Bradstreet
They truly embed in our organization, so the feedback loop is easy and effective. The team dives into understanding our business, audiences, and style. On a personal level, I also just like working with good people. Life is too short to depend on jerks.
Brad Young
Former VP, Content & Business Creative, Prudential
A few of our projects
Defense sector storytelling
CarteNav
This technology provider customizes aircrafts for missions that support maritime surveillance, natural disaster relief, and public safety. They are well-known for their augmented reality mapping systems and technical interoperability. We interviewed their highly-technical product team and clients to build a series of plain language educational resources for internal use and prospective defense sector customers.
Infrastructure connectivity narratives
Soracom
Soracom is a developer-friendly connectivity solution that is easily scalable. The platform is straightforward to deploy and is known for its applications to global infrastructure. We led the development of a voice of customer library to help Soracom educate and inform its audience about its product value proposition.
Market expansion support
We supported 4 separate teams within LinkedIn, across a variety of product, marketing, and sales initiatives. We interviewed customers in tough-to-convert segments and developed materials for marketing campaigns. Deliverables included strategic frameworks, playbooks, integrated campaign copy, and product marketing resources. Our team found it particularly rewarding to support the company's expansion into the local government sector.
